The man in me

I look around me from time to time. I mean, I look around in the abstract sense, obviously I look around everyday, when I cross the street, etc. It has been particularly interesting to look around in these months where I have been idle and dealing with my less-than-stellar circumstances. I have felt a certain level of impotence as a result of unemployment and being cash poor. It has dented my self-confidence and made me question my ambitions. I find that, as I think about what “A Man” should look like, what he should possess, and how he should behave, I realize that I in fact have very few of the “masculine” qualities. As I think about it, that goes for traditional as well as modern.

I’m not a provider, a procreator or a fighter, I don’t have a car, a job, a house, etc. This makes me insecure, because I see many men who have these things. I had a car once, and the experience was kind of a disaster; I don’t even really care for driving. The point being, I clearly don’t fit the mould, the GQ stereotype of what a Man should be. But fine, I survive right? My masculinity is not really in question, at least not with people who count. So why do I care?

Because when-ever I do venture into abstract thought, I realize how alienated I am from the world; from the modern concept of what I am supposed to be. I’m not that competitive, relatively of course, and I prefer quiet reflection over fast development. This begs, in my mind, the question: where is the problem? Is it with me or with the definition of masculinity? Well, I’m not perfect, far from it. But I’ve also never met anyone who fits the GQ stereotype, not really. I’ve met chumps who try hard to be that way, but they are totally transparent. So is the definition of masculinity even an attainable thing? Clearly, if I’ve never met a Mr GQ, then there must be a whole host of insecure men in this world, because it means the perfect man is few and far between.

I’ve always been insecure about the car thing, particularly in my relationships with women. In America, the car is such a defining object, and traditional roles would dictate that I should be mobile, and behind the wheel, but 99% of the time, I have people drive me around. In my relationships, the women have always driven me around. The car, amongst men, represents status, and I don’t have one, so I feel, stupidly perhaps, that I am always starting with a negative, that even when a woman is attracted to me, and clearly doesn’t mind that I have no car, I still fear losing her to some dude with wheels. Madness!

Well, I digress. My argument is that the definition of masculinity is in fact the problem, and not me. In reality, insecurities aside, I do fine. I don’t fit the mould, but I still get jobs, respect, love and attention. The next question is: why is it like this? Why do men, none of us being Mr GQ, and thus perpetual failures, accept this condition? Perhaps it is the product of a competitive, marked based economy: in order to expand the market, and get people, in this case men, to invest in the product or image you are peddling, you need to offer something new on a regular basis. People need to be convinced the product is necessary for continued enjoyment of life (hence Adorno’s pleasure industry). If we don’t feel like we need it, we would not, and do not, buy the damn thing. This goes for image as much as for ideology or material. Ard also mentioned that American culture defines itself through productivity and ‘being busy’, thus idle time is problematic, anti-social and counter intuitive.

So, here I am, with my natural state of being, preferences and routines, all of which are being defined by the fact that I somehow feel inadequate. I am driven forward by this fear, by the fact that people are buying into this folly, and if I don’t do so myself, I risk being left behind. And ye gads, we cannot have that! So the unattainable image is in fact the perfect market mechanism. We men are like a bunch of starved and crazed donkeys chasing after that magically floating carrot that is just in front of us, yet always just out of reach. But because we are hungry, we must give chase.

I Shall Be Released

This morning I thanked God for tea. I meant it too, not the God part, but the bit about the tea. There are few things as comforting as tea in this world, and this morning, I needed that crutch.

I left her apartment and returned to the place I went to make a decision about K all those years ago. I went and looked out over the airport again. My heart was so heavy and my eyes damp with tears, but the music was different this time. Maybe I was different too, older, more experienced perhaps? I didn’t have a destination in mind, I just ended up there. The sun was emerging from behind the clouds for the first time in days, the air was heavy and warm, and the ground was still wet from an overnight rain shower. Like me, the place had changed in the six years that had passed since I last sat there. Six years, it seems like so much time to me now. The stairs leading down to street below the park were gone; there were lamp posts and a well paved path, winding its way down. I remained there for only a few bars of the song; not like last time I had sat there with a heavy heart. Back then, I sat for the whole album.

This time, there is no decision to make on my part. I made my mind up a while back, and I stand by it, even now. I chose to take the risk of being in love. But because these are matters of the heart, matters involving people, it just isn’t that easy. Both sides have to find consensus.

I know I cannot sit around and wait for consensus to appear, nor will I. But you could call me a lair if I told you I didn’t want to sit around and wait for her. Of course I do, but that simply would not help either of us make headway in this bitch of a life, as Guevara once called it. In the mean time, I will be there for her if she needs. I’ll be an ear to whisper into or a shoulder to rest on. She may wonder if she deserves this, and I can only say that deserves got nothing to do with it. I have everything I need, so this decision to be a friend and to give her time is based on what I want. C’est tout.

I thought about all the messed up people I know, including myself, and was shocked to conclude that almost everyone I know is in the shit at the moment. So much of the source of the misery comes from failed relationships. Is this how it goes? Is it supposed to be like this? I have Chris Martin’s voice in my head, telling me that they said it wasn’t going to be easy, but no-one said it would be this hard. Here, here.

I thought about the abusive son of a bitch who won’t leave her alone, and I wanted to blame him for everything, for destroying something that was once so beautiful it made others want what we had. I wanted to show him the damage he has caused in her, in us. Yet I could not. It was only her and me to blame, and me more than her. In that moment I didn’t know what the future would bring. I too, can not see the light at the end of tunnel. I only have experience and Plato to tell me that it is there, somewhere. I found it last time, so I know I will again. With or without you at my side.

Je t’aime avec tout mon âme. J’espère que tu serrait a ma côté pour les prochaines aventure.

            

501c What?

I'm helping start up a non-profit with the director of PUSL. My idea is to turn this non-profit into a community development organization, of which the PUSL will be a branch, as we want to do more than just sport related activities. Our guiding philosophy will be drawn from deconstructionist thinking and critical multiculturalism, so that "community development" comes to mean broader and more open minded citizens as a result of exchanged experience with the 'other'. I will need to read Augusto Boel and Paulo Firere I think, as well as refresh my memory of Peter McLaren.

In any case, how ever it ends up, I think the process of developing this structure is interesting, and not so cheap either! I am already slightly confused by the IRS requirements for submitting an application for nonprofit status; and the approach may be to bring someone on board who has started a nonprofit and who can guide us through the process.

Well, watch this space! I'm sure there will be tales of fear and loathing as we try to navigate the deep halls of American bureaucracy....!

You were supposed to dance and sing

Faith is a state of openness and trust. To have faith is to trust to the water. When you swim you don't grab hold of the water, because if you do you will sink and drown. Instead you relax, and float. And the attitude of faith is very opposite of clinging to belief, of holding on. In the other words, a person who is fanatic in matters of religion, and clings to certain ideas about the nature of God and the Universe, becomes a person who has no faith at all. Instead they are holding tight. But the attitude of faith is to let go, and become open to truth, whatever it might turn out to be. I want to know the truth! ~ Alan Watts

Portland United

Portland United Soccer League kicked off its season again yesterday. It started with a one day tournament in honor of James Oryem Angelo and Wilfred Okot Omal, which was won by the reformed North Atlantic. Angelo and Omal were members of the refugee community in Maine, and both were tragically killed in recent years.

It was great to see the teams running out again, to be down at KP and to be around all the players again. Not only does it speak to my love for soccer but also, it reminds me how much I love being in the multicultural setting. It is nice to hear all the languages around me and to see the great, and growing diversity here in Portland. I’ve spilt a lot of ink on the paradox of soccer as a force for social change, but when you witness the level of fun people were having on the field, when you see the Somalis buying food from the Latino stall, when you see old friends coming together to have a good time and tell stories, it is impossible not to be moved and feel that on some level, that this is worth investing in.

The question here is, how do we take this raw energy and get some of it dedicated to giving back to the community; how do we break down the national divisions in the team compositions?

East End (Slight Return)

Today I took a walk down to the water on the East End and looked over Mackworth and Peaks Island. The breeze was fresh, the grass was newly cut and the Atlantic so vast that it eventually swallowed even the sky; that beautiful blue and cloudless sky. I was momentarily stunned by my surroundings. I thought about all the place I have been in the world, but that this is the place am returning to for the second time. It is never for a single reason, but rather an amalgamation of memories, people and an unshakable desire to flee big crowds and oppressive sky scrapers; to trade steel, glass and concrete for trees, grass and a fresh ocean breeze.

It is a culture in-and-of-itself; maybe it is not Paris, Prague, Beijing or Milan, but it has its own beauty non-the-less. I might not stop here for more than a year, returning to the crowds and subways of New York or Washington D.C., and maybe, if I do leave again, it will be the last time. However it works out though, these moments will never be lost on me. They give me energy, creative and physical, for the rest of the day.

Response

In response to my last entry, on the inevitability of human nature, a friend sent me some lines from Chuang Tzu:

" yearn for a good without evil

    justice without injustice,

    order without disorder

    means does not understand the laws of the space,

    because it means long for heaven without land,

    yang without yin,

    positive without negative. "

 

The inevitability of Human Nature?

Wahrend die Weltzeit Uhr auf Alexanderplatz auf Mutters Gebuhrtstag zu rasste, vereinigte ein kleiner runder Ball die geseltshaftliche entwicklung die geteilte Nation und lies zusammen Wachsen was zusammen gehorte.

There are some things in life which I find deeply moving, one being images of the Berlin Wall being overcome and people flooding across the border. In general I find images of people overcoming such artificial constraints to be really beautiful. Yesterday I went to the Newseaum in DC where they have a corner dedicated to the fall of the Berlin Wall. Of course, being America, we can't help but wrap it in a thick patriotic treacle; that Kennedy and Reagan were somehow more responsible for the fall of the wall than thousands who risked lives to undermine its symbolic power, and who literally tore it down with their hands. Even so, the images of the repression followed by images of people bursting forth and celebrating the reunification are powerful.

I have a personal connection to these images, not only because I have been to Berlin and seen where it all went down, or because I did some indepth research into the democratic transition in East Germany, but mainly because I am, in a sense, German. At least part of my identity is German. For example, walking around the monuments in DC, like the Washington, Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials, has less effect on me than walking around the Reichstag or seeing the black, red, gold.

Anyway, back to my point. As I was looking at these images of people flooding across the check points in Berlin, and then later watching a film about the moments when Sport became a force for social change, I felt goosebumps. I felt like I was watching a great testimony to the Human Spirit and our ability to endure, to resist and to overcome. But, and there must be a 'but', I began to think about the paradox of these moments. They do not exist in a vacuum.

These profound moments in human history don't happen spontaneously, or 'just because'. Rather, they are a response to something terrible, like repression, war or racism. I realized the implications of one of the truths I hold to be self-evident, that all things in the world exists in a causal relationship with one-another; that the nature of ying and yang means happiness and pleasure are created from sadness and cruelty, and vice-versa. There is something inevitable about our lives in that system. It means we can only know good if we also know evil. The ying and yang on my shoulder began to burn a hole in me.

The cyclical view of human nature, supported by the highs and lows of our history, carries with it the disturbing possibility to justify an act of genocide or repression of free expression. If this is indeed human nature, if we are destined to continue moving through time in this fashion, then we must accept all parts of the human experience, including total evil. But how can we say that the actions of Hitler or Arkan are just part of life? It reduces the profound suffering these men created to just another passing moment in the march of history, from which there is ultimately nothing to learn.

I cannot accept this, yet how else can we define ourselves? To change the system, the paradigm, means what? A profound identity crisis? How does something exist without its counterpart? I scoffed at the idea that beauty can exist by itself, with out a concept of ugly. But now I understand the implications of that concept. If you believe beauty can exist in and of itself, then you are not caught in the inevitability of Human Nature; then you can be free of the confines of history and of the modern system, but how can you exist?

Experience is what defines me as a person. I know that I like blue because I don't like green (but would I like blue without some comparative reference?); that I like strawberries because they taste better fish (thus the good / bad paradigm); that I love you because I don't love others, etc... Thus, I see these profoundly beautiful moments in history as a response, a reaction, to the total evil which went before them. The evil, which paved the way for the good, is then part and parcel of the good. But that is as tragic as it is joyful. 

In chapter 48 of the Dao de Jing we find an articulation of this very same concept. The lines, which I am paraphrasing, arguing that the good has its roots in evil, and disaster is right behind good fortune. I read the Dao as a text for the individual rather than the collective, and thus I find encouragement in the knowledge that when things are aren't going well, there are better times ahead; it also forces me to be more conscious of when things are going well, because this too shall pass. The problem, and this is the raison d'etre of this text, is that we are not isolated, but rather that we live collectively and are interdependent. Thus, what applies to us as individuals, must also apply to the collective in some fashion. It is, as they say, inevitable.

The kindness of others

I think we often miss the effects we have on other people, certainly I do, and their consequences. A few years ago, in collaboration with Brian, I worked to help a friend, Kay, get a officer position within the Model UN group. It wasn't a big deal to me, he was up to the task and a good guy.

Today Kay sent me one of the nicest messages I have ever received, and he is actively trying to get me a job in Maine.

Thanks Kay.

But this speaks to a bigger point I have been considering for a few weeks now. The idea of leaving somewhere in order to truly see what it is you have. I left Maine for 9 months and didn't honestly expect that I would return. Yet, as I look around for opportunities to make forward steps with my ambitions, I find that Maine is where I can do that.

Of course, it is always nice to be the one who returns with stories of strange lands and gets all the attention. That speaks to my fantasy of being Odysseus. But more importantly, it gives you perspective on what choices there are, and in a sense, you then have the power to make them, because you are more defined as a person. Sure, it causes a bit of stress, but as I see it, in the long run, you become more centered and able to focus on what you want.

Without knowing it, I have built up a nice little network of people who are becoming significant in the evolution of the Southern Maine community. I didn't see it before I left, but now that I went away and came back, I can see it. It's a nice thing.

Love in a time of Swine Flu

I sat in the bus station, waiting. A bus was on its way to take me on yet another journey into the unknown. Away from a comfortable place that I have become intimate with; a place with long winters and even longer summer days. Its the place that was my home for seven years, but that I never recognized as home. It is far away from the fast streets of Paris and the Bavarian Alps of my childhood. It is not a European place, nor a Serbian city on the Danube. As I sat waiting for the bus I thought of Bukowski:

when you think about how often
it all goes wrong
You begin to look at the walls
And stay inside
Because the streets are the
Same old movie.

Behind me Wolf Blitzer was discussing the Swine Flu crisis. People are calling for a closing of the border with Mexico. My throat felt tight. My heart rate, slightly elevated. I must be getting sick. They tell us not to get paranoid, not to buy into the fear, that it will be ok. But the news is built on sensationalism and it needs us to be afraid or we will stop listening. I felt dirty, like my hands were caked in layers of infectious grunge. I rubbed my eyes and wondered if my eyes would also now get diseased. Bukowski made his way back into my mind:

It is no wonder that
A wise man will
Climb a 10,000 foot mountain
And sit there waiting
And living off berry bush leaves

I wanted to be in the mountains. I had seen the ocean again for the first time in almost a year and I had missed it. I had also missed her. As the bus pulled up and we all made our way into the confined space they warned us to avoid, I thought about leaving. I thought about being a European in America, an American in Europe. I thought about how much I miss Munich and Paris. But most of all, I thought about her and coming back. Ten days more and Bukowski will be right.

Mountains are hard to climb.
The walls are your friends.
Learn your walls.