Analytic Note #1

Jess sent me her list.  Lucky  means such different things to different people.  Must remember to be explicit about not defining it for future folks.

a definition of anger

: the experience of separating or moving away from a loss that one has decided will not go away

(I didn't write that; I'm just thinking about it.)

my lucky list

When I talked to Suzanne about her lucky list, she prompted me to parse out the differences between lucky and grateful and privilege and blessed and straight-up intuition.

So I used those as categories when I wrote my list.  Here it is:

LUCKY

Nobody made deliberately choices or put in purposeful effort to make these things work out the way they did.  They just did.  Coincidences that are awesome.

• Meeting Amanda through some listserv that Rebecca was on.
• Finding Joaquín on Craigslist.
• Rachel interviewing at UHS.
• Jessica and I going to IHOP that one time when we realized we were both staying in C-U after graduation.
• Nora finding my application in the SFUSD system.
• That Andrew and Raymond were at Esquire that one time when I got stood up.
• That I said “yes,” to Pete asking me if I was interested in tutoring in local schools with VIS-A-VIS on Quad Day 2008.
• That as a student-teacher I was assigned to Mike L.
• That I responded to that poorly designed job posting for the internship in Mobile.

GRATEFUL

Things that did not have to happen but did because someone in my life made the decision or did the work to make each of them happen.

• My parents stayed together.
• Michael sent me a new phone when mine got stolen.
• Scott suggested I take classes with Dr. Dyson. 
• Dr. Willis bringing me to LRA two years ago.
• Kasey inviting me out for that night with Amy.
• That I got to have Greg J. as a mentor early in my career.
• That Angi F. and Todd T. helped me learn what was what.
• That Moe always reminds me of that one picture of Jim Morrison I taped in her locker once that said, “A friend is someone who gives you total freedom to be yourself.”  She is.
• Having had so many models of women leaders/bosses to mentor me.
• Elders.
• Spending so much time in Ireland as a kid.

PRIVILEGE

Things I have because I am White, non-disabled, straight, cisgendered, middle-class, American, Language-of-Wider-Communication-speaking, thin, young.

• That without a real job, I can manage.  That I can hang out in the lobby of the Hilton, using their free wifi and watching all the people there for conferences, and the security guards assume I belong.

BLESSED

Things that make me feel like "the world is very mysterious," like Bobbie told me.  These things freak me out and make me feel like stuff is purposeful and we are not in charge -- "more sacred, more broken, more salvageable than we know," like Ron says.

• NCF.
• My Bible Study at Glide.
• That I can write.
• That I went to India, even though it was mostly a crappier experience than I anticipated it would be.

INTUITION

Things that are because I listened to and trusted myself even though lots of times I don't.

• EJP.
• Becoming friends with the White Guy.
• Thanksgiving 2014 at Michael and Jackie’s with my family.

• Tammy booking an appointment at David’s Bridal right when I quit my job.
• Taking Dr. Mayo’s class.
• That Andrew wanted to check out churches with me.
• Hanging around Caleb long enough to get to read his book and be affirmed in my suspicious that he is so so great despite all the times I wanted to punch him when we worked together.  And just, I don't know, feeling somehow restored by that.
• That I took the job at UHS instead of moving to New Orleans.
• That on the day when J was saying he "couldn't" read Night, I said, "What's up," instead of just directing him back on task.

She was wearing bedazzled animal-print Ugg boots.

A teenager on the bus today made so many people so mad.  I watched eyes darting toward her and away, toward her and away.  The bus was crowded, and she was resting her feet on the seat next to her.  Old women sucked their teeth in her direction, and a hip looking White guy told her, "Move your feet, and let these people sit!"  She didn't, though.  And then she laughed so much, but it didn't seem like a real laugh.

Taking up space is an interesting thing, huh.

whilst sharing a joint at a Philip Glass concert

A musician friend of mine asked my boyfriend at the time, "What kinds of creative things do you do to express yourself?"

And my boyfriend at the time said, "I play golf, man."

Brought to you by first grade me.

a playlist that should be called "sickest, saddest sap in the whole wide world wallowing in self-pity"

I recently scrounged up a new charger for my old laptop.  And it's such a happy thing because now I can access all the music that's on that one.

I laughed the other day when I found my "cheer up" playlist.  I made it four or five years ago, the first time that I had a really intense depressive episode.  It was horrible.  And I listened to "cheer up" so much.  (Sorry, Jess.)  I remember Moe coming to visit and being like, "Why the hell is this called 'cheer up'"?

Whatever, I still like it.

1.  The Mermaid Parade – Phosphorescent (When he says, "Yeah I found a new friend, too, and yeah she's pretty and small, and... goddamnit Amanda, oh godaamnit..," I just feel for him.)

2.  How to Fight Loneliness – Jeff Tweedy

3.  You Are Not Alone – Mavis Staples

4.  Slip Slidin’ Away – Paul Simon ("She said a good day ain't go no rain / she says a bad day's when I lie in bed and think of things that might have been."  Crushing.)

5.  At This Point In My Life – Tracy Chapman

6.  Cocoon – Jack Johnson (You know, what?  Just lovely.)

7.  Forgive Them Father – Lauryn Hill

8.  Skinny Love – Bon Iver

9.  Power of the Gospel – Ben Harper and the Innocent Criminals (The intro times a million.)

10.  Torn - Natalie Imbruglia (Don't even care.)

11.  Night Falls On Hoboken – Yo La Tengo (I even used this one for a mini-lesson on quoting song lyrics in an essay.)

12.  I Get Along Without You Very Well – Nina Simone

13.  I’ll Fly Away – Alison Kraus and Gillian Welch

14.  I Remember You – Steve Earle and Emmy Lou Harris

15.  Either Way – Wilco
16.  Angel From Montgomery – Susan Tedechi (So good: "How the hell can a person go to work in the morning / and come home in the evening and have nothing to say?")

SF is invading my style.

sometimes, the group bursts into applause when they make the decision

All anxious, self-deprecating humor aside, I really love my part-time job at this bridal shop.

I love it because I love listening to people talk about their style and/or observing people’s style choices and wondering about how they came to them.  I could wonder about that shit all day.  (I once wrote a paper about how exactly the literature on popular culture helps to explain the visceral joy I get from reading amateur fashion blogs.  My professor told me it was “moving,” and I don’t think I’ve ever been so proud.)

I also really like weddings.  For real, I think most of the dresses we sell are heinously expensive and actually just kinda nasty, and I think that if I got a closer look at more of the wedding industry, I’d be even a little more queasy about all that.  (I tried on one of the dresses the other day, and besides the out-of-body weirdness of it, I was struck by how seriously difficult it was to walk in it.  Always with the constriction of women’s bodies…).  But weddings.  I love the idea of blurring the public and the intimate, of standing there, bolstered by the support of all of the people who have made you who you are, and saying, “Okay, let’s make your people my people.”  It’s beautiful. 

Plus, this place is all women all the time.  I love working in all-women contexts.  So much.  I really feel like there’s an unspoken solidarity all up in there.  Maybe I’m just sentimental (I am.).  Women (the other staff all call them “brides,” but that gives me the willies a little bit) come in with their mothers, their sisters, their grandmothers, their in-laws, their friends, their cousins.  It’s fascinating, and sort of an honor really, to get to stand so close to those relationships as they work through this particular style decision, laden as it is with sentiment and body image stuff and $$$ concerns.  I keep thinking that I should write about this part of the job, getting into the gorgeous little details that make up the wide range of relating that I get to see.  But I suppose it’s not very nice to write about strangers without their permission.

My biceps are sore from lifting wedding dresses.