Happy Fun Cog

The world today is built on tasks and ideas that cannot be captured or solved by individual pieces of software. Or if it can be captured/solved, people still have to accept that the software also does a thousand other things they don't understand or like. It's all a big goddamn mess and I feel like I'm nothing more than a janitor who pushes pieces of garbage around so that people will see a clean space amongst all the trash and think that something is fixed. But nothing is ever "fixed." Nothing is ever clean. There will always be problem and we, people in IT as well as people at the software companies, we just move the problems around so the customers can get this one thing at this one time. Everything else is pretty much up for grabs. The idea of spending the rest of my life doing this or something like this is revolting in a very deep and powerful way.

I realize that another thing that I don't like about my job is how, because my job involves collaboration and because I drive a lot of troubleshooting work, I'm always having to a) ask people for their help and b) be told what to do by other people and c) have to serve as the contact point for customers and therefore bear the brunt of their irritation. But it's b) that really bothers me; any time there's a collaborative effort going on, it seems like I'm the one who has to run around trying to do everything that people suggest. I feel intense resentment on a regular basis because I'm supposed to be an expert (my position is literally "Subject Matter Expert") but I'm not. I rely on the developers, both in-house and at the software companies, as well as our in-house server people or Blackberry people or whatever to actually know what's going on and how to fix it. The majority of problems that I "fix" are actually fixed by other people; I just coordinate it.

I feel like I'm trafficking in my own sense of helplessness by having to constantly rely on other people. And if those people are busy or not replying to me because the leave work early for the day or just suck at their job, I'm the one who has to hold their feet to the fire to get things done and I fucking hate doing that. I'm an introvert, yet somehow I ended up in a job where I'm the main point of contact for customers and the person who has to deal with their anxiety and frustration and need, need, need. And I'm also trying to coax answers out of people and act as a translator between the business and the REAL subject matter experts, people who often don't speak the same language. I feel like my brain is being torn into small chunks every day because I get pulled into so many different directions. And I feel like people are always grabbing at me and hassling me because I'm at a central junction of a lot of different threads that connect the people who have the answers with the people with the questions, and it makes me angry and resentful almost every day.

Bill,

I made her cry.

***********

Leo,

It happens.

Bill,

Have you ever read "The Delta of Venus?" It's a book of erotica written in the early 20th century by Anais Nin, a muse/lover of Henry Miller and an author in her own right. I want to say that you have read it because my roommate in my first semester of college had a copy and we may have discussed it at the time because I was so enthralled with it as it was the first 'real' erotica I'd read, everything up to that being something on the level of Penthouse letters. I bought a copy at some point last year, though it has sat mostly unread in the bookshelf near my bed.

I picked it up again last week and started reading. I was struck by one story in particular, a tale of a man who adopts a boy and a girl from an orphanage. I say 'a man' because the man's wife, a sickly woman, doesn't really figure into the story as she spends most of her time being sick in bed. Ah, the setup of old-school erotica. The sickly wife, not interested in sex, closed up in her room all day. These days, we'd look at the scenario and right about the healthcare problem in America. Fah, I say!*

As the boy and the girl in the story (they are not brother and sister) grow older, the girl falls in love with the boy but he is not interested in her. As they go through adolescence, he becomes cold and distant from her, thinking her a silly, sensual animal as he focuses on his studies and makes himself rigid (above the waist) with the self-righteous discipline of one who is gravely certain of the importance of his tasks. The girl ends up in the arms of her adoptive father and they become very familiar with each others' pubic regions. The boy finds out about all of this and as such comes (as it were) to realize his own conflicted feelings for the girl

This boy has a moment of self-realization, of understanding of the schism between his two halves - the scholarly, purposeful, self-righteous, and ultimately naive versus the sensual, emotional, and ultimately loving half. It's not a transcendent bit of writing per se, but it is genuine. More importantly, it resonates with me. I feel like there is a powerful split in me between such similar halves, and it's a problem that I feel is reflected in my current relationship. I think it's because I feel so frustrated with certain elements of my life right now (my job, the place where I live, etc.) that I subconsciously try to keep my emotional self at an arm's length. My instinctive fear, I think, is that if I bring the emotional into conjunction with the real, I will be overwhelmed by the frustration and the sadness of the things that are not going right in my life.

But I'm also frustrated with my relationship with my girlfriend. I find myself seesawing back and forth between whether or not I want to continue with the relationship or break up. I feel tripped up in my emotions in that I feel myself leaning towards breaking up, yet I am also aware of being mostly ignorant about my feelings for this woman (the schism described above). The longer the relationship lasts, the more it will hurt both of us to end it. I had a long talk with her yesterday, one that stretched on for several hours and many tears on her part. I veered between cool detachment and utter panic, with little time spent between those two poles. I don't want to describe the problems too much because I don't think it's appropriate for correspondence, but these issues aren't based on dramatic situations. It's more about a growing sense of our emotional incompatibility. I think that I will have to break off the relationship, but I just don't know if that's the right thing to do. And my girlfriend is no help - she has a long history of not acknowledging or dealing with the things in her life that are making her unhappy, and she reacted to my statements yesterday by just hugging me harder and harder. It was heartbreaking.

Lionel

* Any time a politician on TV starts talk about reproductive rights, they should have to intercut the speech with porn clips. Or if they're going to talk about the aging population and the impact of that on the economy, they should have to show geriatric sex. I mean, it happens. Let's not deny it as a society.


*************************

Leo,

As hard as it is to do when you're caught up in such a way, just try to take a step back and see what you're experiencing through the lens of the larger human experience, namely that this is the kind of thing that lots of people go through. I know that you don't want to make a mistake, and I know that you don't want to cause anyone emotional pain, but you have to accept that there is a very real chance that both things could happen regardless of what you do, or even whether or not you choose to do anything at all. What you are talking about is a relationship, a romantic relationship that is expected to end either in a breakup/dissolution, or marriage and/or children. This is one of the few genuinely black and white situations that you'll find in the day-to-day world of the adult. Anything you do or don't do is going to dictate the future of your relationship with this person. You can't avoid it. You can't get someone else to make the decision for you. You can delay, but as you know, that will only make it more painful for both of you.

You are, I think, addicted to the idea of having other people tell you what to do or feel. It's a bit of odd desire for an authoritarian relationship from a scruffy little liberal like you. The sooner you let go of your dependence on other people, or even your desire for their opinion, the better. Of course, you may also just not know what to do. If that's the case, just focus on it. Every time you're with the girl, don't just roll with it day by day - really think about whether or not you love her and whether or not you think a relationship with her is the best thing for you. And it's all about you, really. You have to do what's right for you. As much as I dislike the navel-gazing and selfishness that I think is inherent in the long-term psychotherapy that you've undergone, I think it is an appropriate way to approach this situation, if only because you'll make her miserable if you're miserable.

Plus, in the end, it's not a life or death decision. You're not in the military, issuing order that could potentially send men to their death. You're a yuppie with girlfriend problems. Embrace it.

Bill

Bill,

I am glad that my letters find you in good spirits and that you do not find the back-and-forth off-putting. Writing is a funny thing. You can never anticipate the impact on the reader or the writer. For my own self, I find it both liberating and embarrassing*. I think I've found that one of the primary reasons behind my constant writer's block is that I'm too afraid to embarrass myself, either in the view of myself or in the view of others. I suppose that, at it's root, this problem has a positive side in that it shows me that I've always considered writing to be an act of honesty. Indeed, when I've been unable to be honest with myself and others is when I've struggled the most. Of course, it's not purely by foolishness that I unlearned honesty; after all, it would be poor form (I'm assuming) if I were to answer most of the technical questions put to me during the course of the workday with "I don't give a shit."

In fact, and I apologize for the digression, it seems to me that there are many areas on life in which we are discouraged from being honest. In school, up through AP courses in high school, we are expected to keep our answers in line with what we have been taught is the teachers' and schools' expectations. In courting and relationships, in both high school and through adult life, success is often marked by how well one is able to blend fiction and non-fiction, all in the name of shaping one's conversation in a way that does not accidentally or deliberately cause pain to the woman you love (this is especially true if you are only trying to love in a physical way).

To return to the flow of the previous paragraph - perhaps it is because of the fact that I've not been honest with myself or others for a long time about what I want in my career... no, that's window dressing, or perhaps salad dressing. It really goes back to my family, I think, in that the members of my family are rarely open with each other, at least as far as the big, heavy matters that pass between us over the long course of mind, calling into mind cargo ships that pass heavy freight between them as they sail around the world, following the sun, until one by one they sail into the horizon, ultimately alone but hopefully remembered and integrated into the spirits of the others.

In any case, while a lark, these letters are freighted with the need for honesty. Oh, damn, I'm doing it again. Emotions! Oh dear, dear, dear.

I'm nearing the end of the Faulkner biography, by the way. It's truly been a fantastic learning and reading experience. I highly recommend that you read it - I remember you often mentioning your love of Faulkner. Something which, now that I think about it, I can see in the memories I have of your creative writing going back through college. In that context, I think you'd enjoy the book even more than I. I'm rather sad to report that Faulkner's death wasn't very spectacular. Given his prodigious appetites for whiskey and young women, I'd rather hoped that he would die from a fall from a horse upon which Faulkner was committing carnal acts upon a young student from the University of Virginia. But, alas, he died in a hospital bed after a sickness, the effect of alcohol more like a creek (or a roaring river, in Faulkner's case) wearing down a rock rather than something more explosive like Dylan Thomas' death.

All the best,
Lionel

* Though not as embarrassing as how many spelling mistakes I make and that this blogging software catches; I spelled "writer" as "rider," for God's sake! I should be drawn and quartered by tractors in the fields of Vermont.

**********

Leo,

As far as the poor spelling goes, perhaps you are a victim of the auto-correct in the blog's software, wherein a slight misspelling is recast into a horrid misspelling because the software decides it is closer to one word rather than another. It's not as apocalyptic as most horrors visited upon humanity by technology, but neither one of us is living a particularly apocalyptic or vivid life.

For example, my big goal over the past weekend was figuring out how to remove rather embedded poop stains in my son's jeans. It was my own fault - he shat himself a number of times several weeks ago and each time I put the jeans in the wash pile so that they could be properly cleaned. However, for reasons I still can't fathom, I was putting them in the wrong place. I don't know why. My wife and I have a single place in the house where we put things that need to be washed - oftentimes there's a hamper to hold the clothes, but sometimes if a load of laundry is already being run,the hamper won't be there. So it didn't occur to me that there was a problem when, over the course of the week, these shitty clothes were piling up and there was no hamper anywhere. Finally, notified by the stench of unwashed poop, Mary (heatedly, to the point where I still feel a slow burn) pointed out to me that I'd been putting the shitted jeans in a completely random place, far away from the usual place. I still don't know why or how I made such a mistake. I was putting the jeans in not only the wrong corner of the room, but also the wrong room. And now I've been spending my time doing online research about how to get these shit stains out without bleaching. The worst thing about it, now that the stench has been washed away (I ran the clothes through the machines once which got rid of the smell, but not the stains), is that these are new jeans. Childrens' clothes are incredibly expensive. It is the downfall of Western civilization, I swear to you. Either you spend all your discretionary income on clothes your child will grow out of in two or three months, or all the parents at the daycare center look at you like you're an abuser because your child is wearing cheap and/or secondhand clothes. It's horrid. Never have children. Run away, run far away. Join a monastery. Specifically, a monastery where they allow internet porn. I mean, the bastards are having a horrible time recruiting - they must be lowering their standards.

Have you ever considered when you might want to settle down and have children? I know you're rather averse to the concept. And the experience isn't great for everyone. I've been very lucky. But I really think that it would be good for you, especially given that you perceive many of your problems as stemming from your family, specifically how your family makes you feel about yourself. So why not start up a new family? That's simplified, but it's true as well. You can redefine yourself this way, you really can. Words can't describe how different it is. It's like waking up one day and realizing that the sun (pun intended) is a living, breathing entity. It's still the same sun that you've always known, but there's a whole new dimension that you've never seen before and now the world as you know it is completely redefined. You don't truly understand the power of life and family until you have children. Or maybe I'm proselytizing. I am happy, very happy, with my own situation, and I think that children would make you happy as well, but I realize that you're probably feeling enough pressure as is, being a bachelor at the age of 35. I can't decide if you're impervious to societal pressure or if you're highly sensitive but also highly contrary and stubborn. Probably the latter.

As far as writing goes, yes, having children (or even just one child) makes it much, much harder to dedicate any real time to writing, and I know how important writing is to you. And in that context, your growth as a writer will slow. But in the context of becoming more honest, and growing as a writer in that manner, I think that starting a family would be a welcome new stage in your life.

In regards to your implied-but-not-articulated concerns about being too open and honest in these letters, don't worry about it. I may not always like it but, ultimately, it's up to you. You obviously have a sense for how I feel about these things so I trust you to not go too far. And ultimately, you are going to have to be more open if you want to grow as a writer. Don't be afraid to face up to it.

Yours in a most Victorian way,
Bill