Feb 13 2013
3 Comments
Literature, Writing

The Advice of Mr. Electrico: Live Forever

Mr. ElectricoLast week I read most of an interview with Ray Bradbury in The Paris Review. In it, he describes the altogether unbelievable but hopefully real friendship he had with Mr. Electrico, who might be familiar to you from either the novel or the movie Something Wicked This Way Comes.

According to his story, on the way back from the funeral of one of his favorite uncles, little Ray tells his dad to stop the car. When his dad complies with this ridiculous request (which my own father would have merely laughed at), Ray runs away to the carnival, where he suddenly finds himself face-to-face with Mr. Electrico.

Slightly intimidated, to break the ice, Ray gets a magic trick out of his pocket and asks Mr. Electrico for some expert advice. Seeing from Ray’s pocket inventory that they are of the same fold, Mr. Electrico takes kindly to the boy and shows him around the carnival. As the story gets even more surreal, Ray and Mr. Electrico wind up walking along the shore of Lake Michigan when this conversation happens:

Mr. Electrico says, ” I’m glad you’re back in my life. [Ray says], What do you mean? I don’t know you. [Mr. Electrico] said, You were my best friend outside of Paris in 1918. You were wounded in the Ardennes and you died in my arms there. I’m glad you’re back in the world. You have a different face, a different name, but the soul shining out of your face is the same as my friend. Welcome back.”

One on level, I’m incredibly touched by the sentiment of these statements, of how old friends can be channeled through new faces or even animals (I swear one time the spirit of a good friend communicated with me through an Italian golden retriever), and how there can be familiarity even among strangers. On another, slightly more objective level, this relationship is bizarre. Then again, what should you expect from these two.

That night, Ray goes back to see his new friend at the performance. He recalls the experience,”

Seventy-seven years ago, and I’ve remembered it perfectly […] He sat in the chair with his sword, they pulled the switch, and his hair stood up. He reached out with his sword and touched everyone in the front row, boys and girls, men and women, with the electricity that sizzled from the sword. When he came to me, he touched me on the brow, and on the nose, and on the chin, and he said to me, in a whisper, “Live forever.” And I decided to.

It’s impossible to know whether or not this relationship happened exactly how it’s been portrayed, or if Ray was merely spinning memories every which way out of his geriatric mind, but it doesn’t really matter. I was struck and am still struck by that last statement, “live forever.”

This is how I interpret it: living forever is a choice. It means knowing that the actions of your life can have repercussions far outside of your own existence, and that those repercussions can last longer than you imagine. It means that conventional wisdom is often just that: conventional, and that “You can’t live forever” is not a viable argument, but a blind negation of notion that can be scary. With those words, Mr. Electrico pushed the boundaries of the possible and revealed a bird’s eye view of what life could be.

Life is much more interesting than we make it out to be sometimes. Maybe I should go find my Mr. Electrico and get some weird advice that the Paris Review will want to hear.

What do you think of Mr. Electrico’s statement? Is he just a strange man with some wacky words, or is there something more? 

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Feb 11 2013
5 Comments
Humorous, San Francisco

What I’ve learned from speed-walking to work in San Francisco

Speed walkingSome people drive to work. Others bike or hop on the train, bus, light-rail, or ferry. Still others run, walk, scoot, or rollerblade. There are, perhaps, a few that cartwheel, skip, grapevine, ride a hovercraft, tesselate, or apparate.

But it is a small minority indeed that speed-walks to work. In fact, from what I can see, I’m the only SWLKR, making me the Bay Area’s foremost speed-walking commuter.

Speed-walking is like walking, except faster and dorkier. I like to keep my arms up and moving at a brisk pace to avoid finger swell, one of the foremost dangers of long periods of speed-walking.

As the Bay Area’s expert SWLKR, you probably have a lot of questions for me, and these I am happy to answer if you leave them in the comments below.

For now, I give you 10 tidbits, just a sample of the mind-juice I’ve squeezed from my walking grapes.

1. No one else speed-walks to work.

2. Speed-walking past someone is, by far, the most awkward way to pass someone. Especially if there’s a stoplight coming up. And they’re your co-worker. And you stand behind them because you don’t want them to see you in your tennies and backsweat. And then you walk at a normal pace so you don’t have to talk to them, but end up taking the elevator with them anyways.

3. Speed-walking up a hill makes one look just as foolish and out of shape as running on a flat stretch of land.

4. Speed-walkers get more love from the general public than other kinds of commuters. To date, I’ve gotten two thumbs up, countless smiles, and one (friendly) comment.

5. If you’re speed-walking, it’s a shorter step to running across the street to avoid waiting for a red light than if you’re just walking.

6. Wearing tennies, athletic capri pants, and a backpack in downtown San Francisco at 7:45 am in the morning is a great way to avoid fitting in with the corporate culture or getting respect from people who dole it out based on appearance.

7. Sweat still happens, but like most liquids, it dries.

8. People are often frightened by speed-walkers, the bizarre combination of quick but not-too quick movement that makes them think someone’s trying to sneak up on them but no it’s just me, your friendly office employee heading downtown to do some thought work.

9. There are three major hills I have to overcome as I head into town from the Richmond, but they don’t always pay off in beautiful views. Rather, the views come when you least expect them, like when I saw the Golden Gate bridge randomly yesterday and a rainbow today.

10. Beauty is everywhere. I saw a bird fly from a blossoming tree branch as two flowers fell to the ground and thought it was incredible. Then I realized what a romantic sap I was and that I probably shouldn’t share that moment with anyone.

11. If you keep your eyes open, you’ll see something new everyday. And I think that’s the most important lesson of all.

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Feb 08 2013
7 Comments
How to do what you love, Writing

Stop everything and think about this

cool picture(Skip to the quote if you’re short on time)

So I’ve been using the thinking part of my brain and the talking part of my mouth recently, having those kinds of conversations with older people that make me wonder why I ever thought I knew anything in the first place.

One of those was with my former professor, who I now call by her first name and that’s a little weird. I don’t remember the exact words of the conversation, but I remember coming away from it, shocked to learn that there are many stages in life, and the fact that she is a professor right now doesn’t mean she will always be a professor and in fact she hadn’t even imagined she would ever become a professor.

To me, this was mind-blowing. For some reason, probably because I’m too intelligent, I imagined popping out of college and entering “career” or “dream job,” neither of which turned out to be true, and in fact I don’t even know what my dream job looks like. Understanding this stage in my life as part of something greater is extremely relieving, because that means I still have the chance to revive 30 Rock and write for it in 10-15 years.

On the note of life stages and the illusion of permanence, I read an incredible quote today, courtesy of Literary Jukebox. The quote is from someone I’d never heard of with an equally unknown book, which gives me hope that one day my words might inspire someone even if they’ve never heard of me. Debbie Millman in Look Both Ways: Illustrated Essays on the Intersection of Life and Design writes: 

“I discovered these common, self imposed restrictions are rather insidious, though they start out simple enough. We begin by worrying we aren’t good enough, smart enough or talented enough to get what we want, then we voluntarily live in this paralyzing mental framework, rather than confront our own role in this paralysis […]

Every once in a while — often when we least expect it — we encounter someone more courageous, someone who choose to strive for that which (to us) seemed unrealistically unattainable, even elusive. And we marvel. We swoon. We gape. Often, we are in awe. I think we look at these people as lucky, when in fact, luck has nothing to do with it […]

If you imagine less, less will be what you undoubtedly deserve. Do what you love, and don’t stop until you get what you love. Work as hard as you can, imagine immensities, don’t compromise, and don’t waste time. Start now. Not 20 years from now, not two weeks from now. Now.”

When I read this, I find it extremely challenging and convicting, and it reminds me of something that Stephen Elliott of The Daily Rumpus (and other) fame said once in one of his letters.

He said that people will never be surprised at your failure if you try to do something “impossible,” like make a movie, or publish a book, or travel around the world. In fact, they expect it. They’ll say “of course you couldn’t publish your book, of course you couldn’t make your movie, of course you couldn’t change jobs” etc. etc.

But the reality is that people are doing those things every day, and the only difference between them and me is the fact they’ve been pursuing their passion with a relentless fever, making the impossible happen for themselves and not listening to the consolation of others.

What does it take to be extraordinary? I’m not completely sure, but I know that part of it is steely tenacity. Today I resolve to be more tenacious.

(By the way, if you don’t read the site Brain Pickings, you should. A side-burn of Brain Pickings is the tumblr Literary Jukebox, which is also fantastic.)

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Jan 18 2013
4 Comments
Financial District, San Francisco Fast Food, San Francisco Food, San Francisco ice cream, The Castro

The Soft-Serve Ice Cream Cone You’ll Take Home to Meet Mom

Super duper burger logoThere is a fast food joint in San Francisco. Its name is Super Duper. It has the juicy burger, it has the crispy garlic French fry, and it has the ice cream cone.

Yes, it is organic. Yes, it comes in swirly, chocolate, and vanilla, and yes it’s worth the $3.25 price tag for a child’s cone.

Oh my.

How many of you have sped-walked after a long day of work hostessing at Paragon Restaurant, hoofing it the one mile to Super Duper on Market Street before it closes at 11, propelled by the naked fear of reaching it only to find its gates closed and the wretched masses standing about gnashing their teeth?

How many of you have sacrificed taking the fastest way home for a frozen dairy treat upon a crispy wheat base? How many have dreamed of the ecstasy that would ensue upon the first lick, only increasing as the tongue grows number and happiness spreads to the extremities?

For this cone, I’ve walked many miles. For this cone, I’ve buried at least 1.5 Hamiltons. For this cone, I’ve allowed between 6 and 10 people to call my reputation into question because I compared its flavor to McDonald’s soft-serve and they did gaze upon me in disgust because it was revealed that I had indulged under the golden arch.

Do I regret it? No. Never. Not for a million years and one thousand suns and 8 terabytes of data.

And one day, when my mother does come to San Francisco, the first thing I’ll buy her is one of these swirled paradises, but only after she buys me dinner.

If you liked this post, you might also like: Purchasing and Eating a Sandwich and Open Letter to the Pile of Mush I Ate Today and The Horrifying True Story of How My Sister Ate My Fingernail. 

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Jan 17 2013
7 Comments
Guides to San Francisco, San Francisco, Travelling

The Official Snotting Black Guide to Loving San Francisco

san francisco twin peaks san francisco state university USF1. Love at first sight isn’t real. That’s true with humans, parakeets, human-parakeet relations, and cities. You think you know a city but then it starts raining and housing is hard to find and strangers talk to you while you’re in line for the bus. Give yourself space to find the reasons you love the city for yourself. Or go back home to Oklahoma.

2. The city will be just like you thought it would: hilly, tree-ridden, and expensive. Rejoice in the fact you knew what you were doing when you came here. Make sure your confidence level is as high as possible.

3. The city will be nothing like you thought it would be: you had no idea what you were getting into, people take themselves too seriously or not seriously enough, and it turns out that dreams don’t come true automatically with geographical relocation. Beginning with a surfeit of confidence, however, was the best way to beat your bird-brained assumptions out of you.

4. You can make it work. Believe this despite the fact that no one will blame you if you fail or decide to move away or change course. Maybe that’s what you should do anyways–you shouldn’t rule it out at least. It’s hard out here, but people make it work every day. You can too.

5. Attitude changes everything. Either you’re stuck in a job you don’t like or you’re getting the skills you need to move on to something better. Either you’re stuck with a cat at home or you’re learning how to love felines in order to relate to your cat-loving boyfriend. There’s always a lining to the cloud, but you choose what it’s made out of.

6. Everything your parents and your pre-calc teacher told you was right. You need skills. You need to be able to offer something valuable to someone. You need an income and somewhere to live after your friends get tired of you squatting in or around their apartments.

7. Everything your parents and your pre-calc teacher told you was wrong. I’m still trying to figure this one out, but I’m pretty sure it’s true.

8. Be prepared to talk to people either about their dogs or about food. It’s the surest way to the San Francisco resident’s heart. Be sure to call it “Frisco.” Locals love that, almost as much as they love instant coffee. (The last two sentences were jokes.)

9. Learn the secrets of the city, the way things look at night or from the tops of hills, the vistas you earn through inner thigh sweat, the places that everyone says are good but actually aren’t (I’m looking at you Bi-rite ice cream). In this way, you can make the city your own.

10. Don’t be afraid to be who you are, even if that means using a flip phone and eating McDonald’s soft serve ice cream occasionally. Singularity (both kinds) is what San Francisco’s supposed to be about, I think, so don’t go changing to try to please it.

11. Remember it’s all going to burn anyways.

What are your secrets to loving your city?

If you liked this blog post, you might also like: I’m not a local, but then again who is and Finally, a Bachelorette Party that Celebrates Pain, Confusion, and Fear and The Oatmeal that Changed My Life

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