t h e b e e b o x

The Nameless

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Even as I am spun around in the vortex of work, my mind wanders off at the oddest of moments. As I walk across the street to a waiting taxi, I think woefully about how lately, things, instead of taking on clarity or a more defined quality as I grow older, seem to be shedding identity, becoming unfamiliar, becoming less and less describable.

I’m beginning to lose definitions for things.

What do you call, for example, the awful waking up in the middle of the night, throat dry, eyes unfocused, the mind unaware but frightened? What is the name for that moment when you say “yes” when you actually mean “hell no fucking way, no?” What do you call the twist to the ankle that tumbles you out into the street, the momentary look you catch in a stranger’s gaze before he turns away? What is the name for that little hollow at your back where your child’s head always seems to find itself, even deep in sleep? What do you call that little strip of lit up flesh on your finger where a ring used to be? What do you call the blank pages at the end of books? What do you call the soft fuzz that covers the back of a boy’s neck? What is that emotion that comes after anger but before defeat? What do you call the act of forgetting to do something on purpose? What is the specific name for that stirring in the gut that impels you to flee, to race inside and shut all doors hurriedly even when you know there is no one out there?

What is it, what?      

So, Am I?

For today’s first order of business, I have been asked this:

“Are you there? Like there, there.
As in a non-Nietzsche kind of way?”

To be asked this on a Monday, of all days, is particularly thought-provoking.

Living In Dangerous Times

A desk is a dangerous place from which to watch the world.

- John le Carre

I suspect that I am suffering from diminishing lucidity. It’s a condition that causes one to lose clarity of thinking, an affliction that reduces all mind processes to mud. I am a proxy server that refuses connections, I am error 404, I am a fatal head slump on the leather desk blotter.

I think I just need to go home.

Bite That Apple

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I haven’t really felt the need to justify my love for Macs—yes, those gorgeous wonders of technology that just keep getting better and better with each new product. I just love ‘em, and I don’t pay much attention to those who attempt to argue the merits of one over the other.

I don’t bite, even when PC users heckle me about buying technology that seems to them, “way too fancy.”  I just smile while they agonize over crappy file structure, virus infections, and system crashes. I know how it is, I use PCs in the office because I have no choice. And then I go home to my Mac.

Now, the Apple guys have unleashed a whole new ad campaign that places Macs alongside PCs. It encapsulates all the things I’ve long been wanting to say to PC users, especially those who jostle my elbow as they sneak a look at the screen of my little ibook. The six commercials unfurl a blow-by-blow comparison that just leaves the competition, well, wanting.

Wanting a Mac, I bet.

Book Me

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He left the book on the topmost row of the shelf where I keep the television. It is a new book, one he knows I haven’t read yet. I do not like how he continues to keep knowledge of things that pertain to me. More to the point, I do not like him presuming that all the things he used to know about me still hold true.

In return, without my consent, he took two of my books. To read, he says, in the meantime. In the meantime of what, I wonder. While I take time to finish the new book? Until such time that he can bring me another one?

I do not like this ransoming of books. I do not like the underhanded attempt at bribery. Insidious. But what harm can possibly come to me in a book? Too many to contemplate, I think. Still, I slowly crack open the spine and fall in.

Soon enough, just as he probably intended, I am completely lost.

Them Bones

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I look at that little calendar on the right column and I see that I’ve been remiss in my posts. Much as I try, I just can’t snatch the time to get my thoughts down into the blog. I am constantly sidetracked. Yes, work gets in the way. Yes, real life intrudes.

Work and life are at a clash lately. And when I say life, I of course mean the life that is outside of work, who I am outside of the job that boxes me in just so. I’d like to be always careful in what I post here, since I realize that I could be held responsible (so adult!) for work related blogging. Sigh.

Lately though, I can feel the demands of this job choking the life out of me. And it’s not even the actual tasks or the extent of the responsibility, I’d like to believe I have a firm enough handle on all that. It’s the little itty-bitty things that do me in: the demented politics, the subtle whoring, the boxing in, the subtext that is there for me read. Apparently, to me those things are not of little consequence after all.

It’s debilitating—when you understand how these things must work, when you know that what’s being done is not just, is not right—when it goes against your gut and yet you are expected to play along. This kind of play tires me, it eats me up, it becomes a malaise that goes straight to my bones. Them bones, they complain to me, they are tired of being bogged down with such nonsense.

Gawd, the things you have to put up with to make a living around here.

Brokeback Melons

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Even in the streets of Cebu, it seems as though the much-examined Ang Lee film, Brokeback Mountain has a few runaway parodies.

While stewing in the hot confines of a taxi under suspect air-conditioning, I was jolted out of my misery by a sharp tap on the window. It was one of those enterprising ladies who hawk their wares in the streets, mid-traffic. She had on a black cowboy hat. No, make that eight black cowboy hats, piled neatly one on top of the other. She made it apparent, by way of smiles, pointing gestures, and manic eyebrow movements, that she wanted me to buy a cowboy hat. The hat looked to be of thin material and the brim was a bit narrow, but it had shades of Brokeback, alright. I’m not very surprised. Cebu is known for such timely rip-offs. Hey the newer the trend, the more likely one can get a quick buck off it.

When I shook my head and mouthed “No,” the lady just grinned and immediately switched tactics. With a flourish, she brandished before me a couple of plump melons, snuggled moistly in a plastic bag. Brokeback Mountain and melons. That’s a strangely erotic twist, I thought, and this time, I couldn’t help but let out a laugh.

To her credit, the hats-and-melons lady—although she did not make a sale nor guess my thoughts on the amusing combination of her wares—she did the same thing.

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As can be expected, the web is awash with Brokeback parodies. Here’s one for (by) Mac geeks.

Jim? Your Name Is Jim?

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There is an oxymoron for the condition I have observed in my sweaty neighbors at this workout place I go to—it’s gym giddiness. Maybe it’s the rush of adrenalin, or the inadvertent release of pheromones in the air, or maybe just a pronounced sadomasochistic streak, but people actually seem to be happy to spend time at the gym. I’ve never seen so many smiling, grunting, sweaty people in my life.

Sure, I am sold on the total fitness philosophy, the healthy lifestyle, the habit of torture, er… tenacity that would merit a slim physique. But mainly, the gym for me is a place where I release the tension and the blind fury that will otherwise manifest in a conference room brawl at work, with me going for the jugular vein, life draining out on the Pledged-wood surface. A safe stress outlet and a shapely butt, those are the things I want out of gym.

For some folks apparently, gym giddiness is linked directly, inexorably, to positive self-perception. Self-affirmation. Self-love. By that I mean intense, serious, narcissistic affairs.

There’s the guy with the awesome upper body mass but with the stick-thin legs, pumping away 25 pounds to firm up already bulging biceps. There’s the endless wall of mirrors, all the better to reflect the adoring expression on his face as he gazes at his image. A few 15-set repeats, and then it’s switch to the next bicep, different side, same adoration. I almost expect him to kiss his reflection in the mirror. And if he did, I wouldn’t be surprised.

Pi In Your Face

 

Today is pi (pie?) day. Get it? March 14 = 3.14 = Pi.  I remember my struggles with pi, the bane of the equation-challenged.  This pi in the face is a throwback to my student days, oh so long ago. As a concept, I struggled with it, I didn’t find it easy as pi(e). Heh. Pi, which is the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter, is a never-ending number, so the math folks say. Some people even find joy in it, the perverts.

Well okay, so it’s all geeky-cheeky humor. Whatever, today it just made me chuckle. Tee-hee.

My Word!

¹wan·ton
Pronunciation: 'won-t^&n, 'wän-
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English, from wan- deficient, wrong, mis- (from Old English, from wan deficient) + towen, past participle of teen to draw, train, discipline, from Old English tEon. 

1 a archaic : hard to control : UNDISCIPLINED, UNRULY b : playfully mean or cruel : MISCHIEVOUS
2 a : LEWD, BAWDY b : causing sexual excitement : LUSTFUL, SENSUAL
3 a : MERCILESS, INHUMANE  <wanton cruelty> b : having no just foundation or provocation : MALICIOUS  <a wanton attack>
4 : being without check or limitation: as a : luxuriantly rank  <wanton vegetation> b : unduly lavish : EXTRAVAGANT
- wan·ton·ly adverb

That is my word for the day today, courtesy of those online dictionaries that throw a random word at you each day, for free. I get a lot of new words this way. I munch on them like one would on crackers.

Wanton. Even the very sound of it seems faintly indecent, don't you think? How's this for alternate meanings: wanton = slutty dimsum. Haha! It's very apt, all four meanings of it detailed above. It sums up my day perfectly.
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