March 30, 2005
New RoommateWell, today's the day I move to the new room. I'd been anticipating this day for a while, but since the day kept getting pushed back it was a convienent thing to provide me hope, all while allowing me to remain in a comfortable statis.
And then yesterday I got the email. I was going to be living four floors up from my current room. My new roommate's name was Joe. I got the stuff from Housing and returned, rather bemused to G3, my home for atleast another day. Tom and Adam, two guys on my floor were hanging out in their respective rooms - doors open to serve as a sort of Greek chorus for our floor. Adam looked the guy up on facebook, to reveal a kid with a gun in a dark dorm room. He had four facebook friends and belonged to several cannibus related listings. Needless to say I was freaked.
After several minutes of pacing and dwelling, I realized there was no turning back now and so after a final moment of pause took the elevator up and knocked on the door. My findings were both good and bad. The good was that he didn't come across as an obvious pothead, and the blinds were open. He also claimed to go to bed rarely past midnight. This I can work with. The bad is that since it's at the end of the hall, it's the smallest room on the floor. Damn near a double in a single. Also, since we were on the end the sun was facing, it looks like it might stream right into the room, which may wake me up even with the sleep mask on. And as always, little personality quirks are bound to pop up. But for six weeks, it will hopefully do better than the alternative.
posted by Adam at 14:42 |
March 27, 2005
Happy EasterMy Easter this year started with a beer in my hand at a Jewish frat party. I'm not sure how, but that has to be some sort of blasphemous. The night started out with an invite from Mike that read something to the tune of "Want to get wasted at U of R?" Figuring that Jon would be up until ungodly hours of the night yet again, and never one to turn up the opporunity to get off campus, I of course agreed.
We found our way to U of R, and got lost on campus. We eventually tried to drive over a pedestrian bridge, but there was a beam in the way. So after a series of three pointer turns (right in front of the frat house we were trying to gain entry to, as it turns out) we found a suitably distant parking space and walked up.
Someone from the balcony yelled down that we should just hammer on the door; someone would come down. We hammered, but no one came down. Out of sheer coincidence, however, a group of three other kids from RIT (who through Hillel got the same invite that Mike did) came up. We bullshitted for a while, particularly about the difference between a dry campus (RIT) and a non-dry campus (U of R), noting the empty beer boxes lying right next to the steps. Eventually someone from the balcony threw down their wallet and keys. We used the card from their wallet to get into the building and then after trying each door found a door the was wedged open with what I recall was a flattened beer can. The party was dull at first; despite being over a half-hour late, it still hadn't fired up yet. It was around this time that I discovered Sigma Ph Epsilon was a Jewish fraternity, owing to the giant spotlighted Israeli flag on the wall. This frat party was apparently a continuation of the Purim festivities that had begun around Thursday. I was still pretty uptight at this point, not being my scene, and the cultural divide being what it was. The RIT students, myself included, stayed together in an awkward little circle at the beginning.
Gradually, the population grew. The guy to girl ratio also improved significantly. I realized that the party had heated up though, I think, when a girl walked by me with an "I ♥ INTERCOURSE" hat on. Over the course of the night I probably only had what amounted to one beer, but it was enough to loosen me up a bit. By the time the police came, it was pretty densely packed. By the time the police kicked everyone out, it was finally a comfortable level. The bathroom was filled wall to wall with nudie shots. The vulgar forthrightness with with sex was just straight out unemotional fucking was present to a degree I'd never before experienced outside of the movies. And the night ended on a perfect note: With the police busting the party and kicking everyone out. As we hunted for a bathroom for Mike, a girl came up to us and introduced herself. We did the same, and got invited to a follow-up party now that the main one got busted. That NEVER happens at RIT. Likewise, on the way back to Mike's car, two random strangers (probably intoxicated to some level) talked to us non-mockingly out of the blue with random small talk about Canada. That also never happens here. How great it must be to exist on a non-dry campus.
posted by Adam at 02:56 |
March 26, 2005
A promising dayThere's something about starting a day with a shower that makes the whole day seem more promising. Showering in the dorm shower stalls is best compared to showers at a campground: they're many multiples worse than home showers, but after a few days of grubbing it up in the wilderness, they'll still fantastically excellent in comparison. So I got out got dressed and ventured outside without a jacket for the first time this year - and for the first time this year I didn't actually need it. Soooo nice outside, blue skies with puffy white clouds. I've got to finish up a Computer Science lab and the initial submission for my project today so that I can go home next weekend. Tomorrow Mike said he'd go to church with me for Easter if I could find one. We'll see how that turns out. It's just nice to wake up optimistically for once, and I wanted to get it down somewhere in case the feeling passes.
posted by Adam at 15:23 |
Pushing back against the madnessWhat a strange place to be in. Here I am, sitting in the darked lounge of the third floor in Gleason. Cat Stevens dances across my head phones. In the background, the first act of tonight's "Battlestar Galactica" encodes. After a week that has included insomnia, insanity, self-doubt, and self-affirmation, I find at last a moment of inner peace from which I can regroup, regather, and recollect.
It has been a while since my last entry. This is not because I have had nothing to report - indeed I have had all too much to report - rather, it is because I had no perspective from which to place the events of my life in context. The more time I spend in desperate loneliness, the more I begin to question my own sanity. I wonder if the increasingly numerous nueroses will someday cease fading away when I return to better places and better people. I wonder if the world is rendering me into an incarnation that is composed of such damaged goods that I might never again salvage something worthwhile. I wonder at times what the point in continuing is, even as I see the destination closer than ever to being within my grasp.
Currently, I wait to hear news on whether I'm going to switch roommates. It is perhaps the nervousness that accompanied contemplating making such a drastic jump that forced my hand. Last Sunday and Monday, my roommate was up until well past four in the morning. Perhaps this is normal; previously the combination of ear plugs and a sleep mask had ensured that I got to sleep in spite of it. It was not to be.
My life keeps coming back to a quote I read from Tom Robbins, one that I have doubtless quoted here previously in some fashion:"You risked your life, but what else have you ever risked? Have you ever risked disapproval? Have you ever risked economic security? Have you ever risked a belief? I see nothing particularly courageous in risking one's life. So you lose it, you go to your hero's heaven and everything is milk and honey 'til the end of time. Right? You get your reward and suffer no earthly consequences. That's not courage. Real courage is risking something you have to keep on living with, real courage is risking something that might force you to rethink your thoughts and suffer change and stretch consciousness. Real courage is risking one's cliches." It is to this ideal that I have always aspired yet never attempted to achieve. In throwing my name in the hat for a new room, I have in my own small way finally captured that. If this new roommate is terrible, I will have condemned myself to 7+ weeks of perhaps total and complete misery. And yet, if my new roommate is an improvement, I will have made the conclusion of my R.I.T. experience a little more worthwhile. Either way, I'll have finally risked something that actually matters to me. In my own small way I will have taken hold the reigns of my life and changed the direction slightly. Another author, Matthew Stover, noted that pain and suffering or the threat of them control our destiny. Freedom is liberation from running from fear, but it is scary because when you are free to choose any direction failure is constantly at your door step. This quote sums it up well:When you always know what is right, where is freedom? No one chooses the wrong ... Uncertainty sets you free." At this very moment, I don't know whether or not my roommate is awake right now. I don't know if I've squandered an hour I could have spent sleeping. I don't know whether my current actions will drive me to insanity. But for the moment at least, I have managed to transcend worrying about it. I choose and act. I will face the consequences as they come.
posted by Adam at 03:59 |
March 13, 2005
Talk About A Depressing WeekendI just got off the phone from a 52 minute and change phone call with my parents, and mostly with my mom. I'd missed calling them last night because I went out to catch a movie at the cheap theater - "Hide & Seek" (I wouldn't recommend it.)
Since last night, I've been managing a low scale depression that was spurred by my roommate Jon starting to set his alarm on the weekend to squeeze in a few more hours of computer games and culminated in the lonely experience of going to the mall, not finding what I was looking for, then going to the movies, having an OK time, but then having to wait for the bus.
Spending forty-five minutes in the lobby of a movie theater waiting for a bus is perhaps one of the loneliest experiences on God's green earth. Surrounded by relationships - friends, families, and couples - while so utterly solitary is a truly awful experience when living a relatively solitary existence as it is.
Then when the alarm went off again this morning, I realized that the loss of my weekend catch-up sleep might in fact persist through the remainder of the quarter. This fact made me downright anxious. The sum of all of these experiences coupled with the fact that I finally stood up for myself only to have my reasonable request utterly shot down culminated in a low-scale approximation of how I felt the first half of the year. This is equally built upon by the fact that my hearing has apparently adapted to the ear plugs such that the early morning typing now re-enters my head unfettered.
If there is a bright side, it is looking towards the coming week. This is when half the mornings he is gone before I get up, I have two hours for a very leisurely breakfast while reading the paper, and three two hour blocks over the course of the week when I am relatively guaranteed to have the room to myself. I try to only write these journal entries when I can approach my experiences from a worthwhile or atleast optimistic point of view. I have no such view point tonight, but to not report back would be to spend my days with this poison eating away from the inside. The only optimism I have is that tomorrow brings with it a fresh new week full of opportunity.
posted by Adam at 22:22 |
March 12, 2005
A Night in the RoomTonight should have been far more miserable than it was. "Joan" was preempted for NCIS, Mike blew me off on the hot tub, and I didn't get to go to the mall.But it wasn't. Up until now atleast, it's been on of the best nights I've had in this wretched room. I got to watch "Battlestar Galactica" in the lounge, had a couple conversations with people I'd grown distant with, and had one of the best AIM chats of my life with Darren. Got a lot down for our screenplay, and made considerable progress just thinking about life. I managed to seep away into my own little plane of existence. It was one of those rare times where I've really felt like I closed that digital gap and really communicated. On a whim, I also wrote a poem: Close your eyes, go to sleep,
Into quiet darkness seep. Peace at last for weary head,
Climbing softly into bed. From bitter world to peaceful dreams,
Where love is real and magic teems. And freedom flows through lucent streams.
posted by Adam at 02:42 |
March 08, 2005
Sounds of SilenceYou know, it's funny. When I first came here, I hated being alone. Now it's some of the time that I enjoy the very most. A little after nine, I left my dorm room and embarked through the frigid cold Rochester night to the library to get a photo I've long sought after. That done, I ended up staying and reading through the latest issue of "Variety". When I was done, I looked around and realized how utterly quiet it was. It's a sensation I've long sought and fell short of here. In my dorm room, with my roommate, there is always noise. It was nice to spend sometime with a clear head and the lack of necessity to blast music to keep the outside world out.
My first two days of the new classes have reminded me once again how long an RIT day feels; going straight through from nine in the morning until two hours into the following day feels like a far more complete and far reaching acheivement than my two in the afternoon to four the next morning marches I rode through at home. If I have any worries right now, it is that Calculus and Philosophy are real dragger-type classes. It's going to make Tuesdays and Thursdays a struggle.
But in good news, the class schedules of Jon and I are a good deal more varied this quarter. He has class from four to six on Tuesdays, in particular, which is nice in that it gives me a garenteed two hours a week of alone time. I'm hoping the same is true of Thursdays, as well. Wednesdays look like they should be pretty much struggle-free; I have Computer Science at eleven am and Film Arts at four in the afternoon; only two classes and a sizable break in between.
Speaking of starting at eleven in the morning, it is a revelation. Finally, some measure of my peaceful mornings of senior year at home is restored. My alarm goes off at 9:00 am, same as last quarter, but this time there isn't the imminent rush. I usually make it to Gracie's by ten, which gives me a much more leisurely breakfast then the ten-minute, three-bowl cramfest of last quarter. I read the paper and still set off at twenty minutes prior to class; no more rushing, save for this morning - which wouldn't have even been a problem had it not been for me losing my class schedule printout Monday. This quarter is looking to be very long; but at the same time, there are a few small pleasures I didn't have before.
posted by Adam at 23:49 |
March 07, 2005
First Night BackFirst Night Back.
Changes and Reparations.
New Struggles. Old Struggles. Quiet Victories.
Irritating voices from beyond.
Pool closes early.
Garden State is innocent.
My class schedule is like a sunflower.
Ten weeks and change.
posted by Adam at 02:18 |
March 06, 2005
Last day of breakTonight was a wonderful end to my March break. After a day of catching up with my friend Maia, I was faced with the three phone calls. I'd already promised to hang out with Ryan, but I hadn't seen Ben in forever. And Alex wanted to see me one last time, so it was difficult. I called up Ryan and made plans with him, since I'd already promised. He ended up getting stalked by an old man in a Chevy Deville though, so we didn't do anything. My car broke down for the third time, but one new fuse later and I was back on the road. I ended up picking up Ben and going to Alex's house. Ben, Alex, Dave (a kid from Alex's neighborhood) and I watched "Eurotrip". It was a fun, easy-going, laid-back time. Just the kind of experience I wanted to close out my break. I forgot how fun nights like these are. Tomorrow I return to R.I.T. But I'm two-thirds of the way there now. It feels doable.
posted by Adam at 02:44 |
March 03, 2005
Rensselaerville, Amsterdam, and Clifton Park... Oh My!Tonight took a very interesting turn. I've logged a crapload of miles on my car, drove through the country all the way out to Rennselearville, came back through Albany and then took the Thruway to Amsterdam. That not being enough, we took backroads all of the way to Schenectedy, got confused, and ended up back at Clifton Park. Crazy, crazy night. And just for everyone's information, the Pattersonville Thruway rest stop doesn't have a Mickey D's. Very disappointing. The Roy Rogers, however, is open exceptionally late..Song of the Moment: The Beatles - In My Life
posted by Adam at 01:13 |
March 02, 2005
"I said, 'Hey. What's goin' on?'"My friend Darren's future plans just sort of went down the toilet. I look at the struggle he's having dealing with it, and I remember going through the same struggle myself. In doing so, I realize just how much I've grown and evolved since coming to RIT. It's evolved me more into an island, which is disappointing and disheartening. But at the same time, I realize now that it is perhaps necessary. I just wish I'd experienced a little more before I'd learned to close myself off like that. Had my heart broken, stuff like that. It feels like some essential part of the human experience is missing. I've come to peace with so many things that I never even realized how many things I've yet to grapple with.
Song of the Moment: Bob Dylan - Idiot Wind AIM Snippet of the Day: legames (12:07:49 AM): God, Massivepeniscus is a dark, scary place
DackAttac (12:08:07 AM): Yeah.
legames (12:08:09 AM): still better than contemporary America, though:-P
DackAttac (12:08:14 AM): Let's leave it and start our own country!
legames (12:08:28 AM): Extramediumpeniscus
DackAttac (12:08:35 AM): XD!
legames (12:09:18 AM): well, that's my AIM snippet of the day
DackAttac (12:09:28 AM): Yep.
posted by Adam at 00:34 |
March 01, 2005
Echoes in the DarknessOkay, so today I got to watch my heart beat on a monitor and it was really, really cool. They rubbed this jelly on my chest that's translucent for a little ways in then turns opaque blue. Then the woman at Capital Cardiology probed me with this stick thingy which brought my heart up on the screen. They can even colorize the different flows of blood. I thought heart valves opened either like a hinge or like a flower bud, but it's more like when a Rockette kicks her leg up in a dance line. . First the valve or flap or whatever I was looking at is like an upside down "V" and then extends all the way out. I got to see all four chambers of my heart.
I'd known about having to get an echo cardiogram as early as winter break, when I went in for a routine check-up or whatever and she heard a "click". The jury's still out on whether it's a murmor or not. But until I find out whether the situation is dire or not, I can treasure watching my own heart, MUCH cooler than anything on the Discovery Channel (back when that was like, the channel for educational programming.
I also got a new book, Star Wars: Labyrith of Evil, which leads directly into Revenge of the Sith. Finally, a lot of cool tidbits that came occasionally as pretty shocking stuff. Easier read than most of Luceno's stuff, too.Song of the Moment: Alexi Murdoch - Blue Mind
posted by Adam at 01:11 |
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