wilco. now.

This was the best live show so far of my life.
If you ever have the chance to see them live,
do your homework;
listen to the music (I'm pretty sure you'll like it).
Then, GO.
You will not regret it.

is this it

This evening, a huge question has been making itself at home in the forefront of my mind. Why do we all try as hard as we possibly can to lose ourselves?

Most of what this question has to do with involves the popular concept of "losing yourself" in something. We humans can perform this disappearing act using just about anything as a medium; drinking, doing drugs, playing or listening to music, eating, watching TV, playing a sport, dancing all by yourself. As you can see, some of these are much more positive (and much less stupid) outlets than the others. So how we manage to lose ourselves in things that have absolutely nothing to do with ourselves doesn't bug me; it's the fact that we want to. It's our main goal, and it appears repeatedly during day-to-day life. I just read an Avon advertisement for a perfume that invited me to "lose myself in an exotic scent". You hear people say things like, "I just want to forget about everything for a while." More importantly, you see people immerse themselves in these "losing" activities without even realizing it.

My personal way of losing myself (I don't like the whole losing thing, but I'm certainly not any less guilty of it) is running. In cross-country, or track, or on the side my road, or even just on one of those sweet Elliptical machines, I completely forget myself. My mind goes white. I think of absolutely nothing, and it's the most peaceful and happy part of my day. Granted, this isn't exactly destructive behavior, but bottom line, I'm still trying to get away from myself for a few hours, and I'm not sure why I want that so desperately.

So why do people want to lose themselves so badly? What makes us feel so overwhelmed with the mere fact of ourselves that we need to get away from it? As humans, just one species on this planet, with no concrete plans, no reliable maps, and a ton of problems that we bring upon ourselves, I'd say it's safe to bet that we are already pretty damn lost. There's really no need to try any harder to escape ourselves when we had no clue where we were in the first place, is there?

Here's the nub and grit of all this. I think we should start trying to find ourselves in the things we normally do to lose ourselves. So, next time I go for a run, I'm going to resist that lovely temptation to sink into oblivion. I'm going to think about something, about why I acted the way I did on the way home from practice, or about why that test upset me so much. When you listen to your favorite band and start to drift, try it. Try to think about how you relate to that music, what it really means to you besides escape. Even if all that results is you learning why it lets you escape, that's more than enough.

Please don't get me wrong; I am well aware of the benefits of "forgetting the world" for awhile. It definitely can be healthy - in moderate doses. But it bothers me immensely to see some people, people who are exhausted, stressed, and worried, engaging in dangerous ways of losing themselves even further.


"If you realize what the real problem is - losing yourself - you realize that this itself is the ultimate trial."

-Joseph Campbell

rudolph the red-nosed reindeer...and racism

I happened to put off doing my calculus homework long enough last night to catch most of the classic Christmastime TV movie: Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. In my mind, I remembered the story to be somewhat sappy, insubstantial, but inexplicably happy (like any other classic holiday movie...really, if you think about it, they all share these lovely characteristics, which I think are supposed to inspire Christmas-like, warm emotions). But I was in for a huge surprise.

Right at the beginning of the movie, when baby buck Rudolph is still lying with his mother in their modest cave abode, his father freaks out about his nose. I mean, this newborn Rudolph has already said somewhere around five coherent words mere seconds after his birth, and all his dad can say is "That nose!!" It doesn't matter that Rudy is smart (a super baby-genius, you might even say, if you're in AP English); all that is important is the fact that he doesn't fit in physically. To make matters worse for poor Rudolph, Santa comes blustering in, blathering about how he could never hope to make the sleigh team with that nose.

I'll admit, at first I thought I had just watched one too many deep movies in AP with Mr. Crowe; I decided to keep watching the childish movie I knew Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer really was, beyond my crazy first assumptions...right?

Dead, dead wrong. Rudolph continued to be ostracized by his peers, his elders (including the Coach of the flying team, who provided the young reindeer with this helpful suggestion: "And we're not going to let Rudolph play in any reindeer games, right??"), even his own father. Santa told his father that "he should be ashamed" for creating such a misfit son. No consideration was given to the plain fact that Rudy was pretty much the best flier ever, or that he was really smart, or that the only thing that was supposedly "wrong" with him was his funky nose. To make the hidden meanings in this children's movie even more jaw-droppingly obvious, Rudolph's merits were only taken into consideration on that fateful foggy night; Santa and everyone else immediately accepted and liked him...as soon as he became valuable to them.

Then there's Hermey, the outcast of Santa's elves that doesn't want to settle for a dead-end job making toys like everyone else; his ambition is to be a dentist. Here, the Crabs-In-a-Bucket Syndrome is striking (in any small community of people, when one tries to "escape" or move on, the rest hold on for dear life and try their best to drag them back in). Hermey's boss chastises him for holding onto such fanciful dreams, claiming that all the other elves like their jobs, and he should too. It's obvious that Hermey is a radical of sorts, trying to escape the cloying conformity of the "bucket" to basically do whatever he wants instead.

I won't even go into the misunderstood Bumble (that huge yeti-thing) and the dreary Island of Misfit Toys.

There was such an undercurrent of racism, sexism, bigotry, and all the other senseless views along these lines in Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer that it left me astounded that I hadn't noticed it until now. I have to think I'm not the only one who's interpreted the story like that, but adults never clue you in.

I guess it would be a bit tricky to explain to your preschooler why Rudolph isn't really going to go down in history after all.

shippin up to new york city

That time of year has come when the Oatka Running Club embarks on their annual journey to the depths of New York State. In other words, a bunch of runner kids pile into vans and go run around NYC for three days.

This year it'll be a lot different, which I'm pretty disappointed about, but I can't really complain; I have the chance to visit a beautiful city during a beautiful season with a bunch of my best friends. So, I'm choosing to try to see the good in this year being so different, and I hope I'll succeed.

I'm not sure if I could live in a city. While it's kind of nice to get lost in the whole anonymity of being one of a million in this little hub of activity, it's also kind of scary. You feel very much on your own, and I don't know if I like that. I'm not too good at being alone yet.

Some might argue that the same is true of living in the country, if you're talking about the true country; the my-nearest-neighbor-is-two-miles-thataway kind of country. It sounds paradoxical, but for me, being immersed in thousands of people who care nothing for you, know nothing about you, and frankly don't want to, the sense of isolation is much greater than simply really being by yourself.

I guess it's all about perception, and I guess I should start packing now.

Here's to a great weekend in NYC, spent alone, surrounded by tons of people; it'll be a good opportunity to have company and do a little introspective thinking.

yet another essay to be written

I'm in the process of writing my personal essay for my application to Colgate University, and right now the going is anything but easy.

The prompt has to do with the best piece of advice I've ever been given, and how I've employed said advice in my life. At first glance, this seemed exceedingly easy; deceivingly so, as I now realize. The short answer to this question is simple enough, and came to me as soon as I read the application. I knew I would write about what Coach says to his runners before every meet - "Take care of the little things ahead of time, and the big things will take care of themselves." But when I sat down and actually started to write, I found this statement to be a little closer to my heart than I expected. It's become something of a second nature to me, constantly at the forefront of my mind during everything from day-to-day life to important events. How do you write about something like that?

I tried to start with my interpretation of the advice, but that led to a cringe-worthy near-replica of a tenth-grade English class critical lens paper. I tried to begin with a dramatic story about an exam and a cross country race to detail an example of how I used the advice, but I imagined an admissions staff member staring at the somewhat cheesy anecdote wide-eyed in horror that this person bothered to apply to their university at all, and that idea was promptly discarded. So now I'm stuck.

Maybe what I'm afraid of is being completely honest in this essay. I'm a little wary of writing something for entry to a prestigious college that will basically impart to the reader that this advice facilitates and justifies my OCD to a most satisfying degree, or that I use it so often that I really can't think of a prime example of when I used it, or that it's easy to follow simply because, well, it's common sense.

I know this entry was a bit of a pointless rambler, and I'm sorry for making you all suffer through this for my personal cause of sparking my own thought process. But thank you for reading it anyhow, and please let me know if you have any ideas for me. The next one won't be like this. Promise.

Change We Can Believe In

What I am:
Breathing a huge sigh of relief. Excited that such an intelligent man is going to lead our nation. Truly hopeful for America's future for the first time in a long time. Thankful for voters' good decisions. Glad that a Democrat will be in office this time. Still hearing the poll results coming in, and still getting as excited every time Obama takes yet another state. Impatient for the next four years to begin. Committed to actually following politics this time around, because I actually care now. Able to let go of the terrifying prospect that Sarah Palin could be our President at some point during the next four to eight years.

So, so proud to be an Obama supporter.

one by one all day

Lately, I've been feeling like there is way too much on my plate. I'm sure you know the feeling; that hopeless, underwater daze of perpetual frustration, anxiety, and tension. If you don't, you must've never gone to high school. I'm not saying high school is the most difficult thing you'll ever encounter in your life, because it's not. What I am saying is that when the lesser issues encompassed in the experience that is high school are combined with all of the other things going on in life, everything becomes pretty overwhelming.

Just when I felt like I was going to break under the seemingly-endless amounts of pressures and anxieties that were being heaped on, I suddenly gave myself some slack. I'm not sure how. It certainly wasn't intended on my part to find that I really could live with that irritatingly bad AP Calculus grade, or that stupid, stupid mistake I made on the AP Bio quiz. I was fully intending to beat the proverbial horse to death. I was prepared to brood over my shortcomings for the weekend, going back to school on Monday with strengthened resolve and a massive headache, simply because that's what I do. So sue me.

But, I surprised myself. Sometime in between running in full Amy Winehouse makeup during practice (believe me, the hair and eyeliner is not easily reversed) and driving over to Molly's for the last spaghetti dinner of the cross country season, I gave up on it. I flat out forgave myself my dumb mistakes. When I absentmindedly groped for that oh, no feeling that commonly resides in the pit of my stomach after such an episode, it simply wasn't there.

What's more, this trend continued. I really was and am pleased with my last-ever high school cross country race at sectionals. And on the long bus ride home, looking around at my very best friends and thinking about the race, I felt my other worries loosen their grip, even if only for a few minutes. It was the happiest I've felt in a very, very long time.

It didn't last, of course; life continues, new worries emerge, and there's always something to think over. Cross country, the best sport ever invented, is over, yes. A few other great things in my life are over, too; it's true. But there's a trip to New York City coming up fast, a chance to spend three days with some of the people I love most. There's a chance to spend more time on that frustrating Calc. Above all, there's the new knowledge that I really can get over that trivial little stuff I encounter in my academic life. That's pretty priceless.