107: These Are Your Endless Nights

There's a light at the top of my basement stairs. We've never replaced it in all the time we've lived here. It's hardly ever on, but it went out the other day. I wonder if we'll leave it, or reach all the way up (high ceiling over the landing) and change it.

It was one of those real down days. Not a lot to think about, but a lot of thinking anyhow. Following some advice I got from Ryan L. weeks ago, I went down to the far end of the platform to board the 9:45 Eastbound express. I still didn't get a seat, but it wasn't very crowded either. So I sat on the stair and contemplated. Not a lot to think about, but a lot of thinking anyhow. I repeat myself for poetic effect.

My philosophy TA was sick today so we actually had face time with the Prof. It was largely a pep talk for the upcoming exam. We went over a feud principals we weren't all clear on, including Reductio ad Absurdum, which is deceptively easy despite the appearance of being difficult. Let me conjure up an example with some lewd visuals..

1) If Rob has a penis, then Rob is a boy. ("If p, then q.")
2) Therefore, either Rob is a boy or Rob has no penis. ("either q or not-p.")
3) Take the contradictory: Not "Rob is a boy or Rob has no penis." ("Not [q or not-p.]") We know this makes no sense, but we prove it by following through...
4) Here's where it looks like math, expanding out the brackets. Rob is not a boy and Rob does not have no penis. ("Not-q and not-not-p.")
5) Rob has a penis. ("Not-not-p.")
6) Rob's a guy. ("q.")

Or something. Yeah, I'm sure I'll do fine. A lot of this logic stuff has its roots in the same "if p then q, all A's are B's" exercises I did way back in Grade 5, Mr. Witzel's peer group. I still find it baffling to believe that Matty Oh and I were the ones who went there when our grade included Rohan, Farah, Amer and Raj, along with maybe several others. People who were much more conventionally smart than I was; people who can probably grasp Reductio ad Absurdum without invoking human body genitalia.

From there, well actually an hour after, it was the Narrative tutorial. We talked about the Frederick Douglass book, which I've not yet really gotten into (the preface.) I know a couple of the people in that class by now; both of them are in my Cinema Studies class, although only one is in my tutorial for it, and the other I've never seen there (and only once or twice in the Narrative lecture anyhow.) The former is a dude I make smalltalk with occasionally, the latter I spoke to at length once and have not had too much contact with since, mostly just to and from class. "Maybe I'll see you Monday," she says as we walk the same direction, me to Bloor, her to the subway. "I'll find you." Well, I kinda like the sound of that, but you know me. I'm very excitable. Every now and again I revert to myself at 15 and am just glad that someone, a female no less, is paying attention to me. Then I remember that I'm actually 20 now, and that I've changed and can get back into character.

I'm not saying anything, but it was a weird and nice thing to hear.

I made a somewhat selfish promise to myself at the dawn of this University career. No new platonic female friends. I love the ones I have, trust me, you've all been very good to me; but I think that my ever-expanding collection of non-touching lady-friends has been counterproductive as far as getting some. Admittedly, it's hard enough meeting and staying in contact with anybody in my position. I only get continuity on Wednesdays in Poetry and on Fridays in Tutorials. The rest of the time I'm left to float in the sea of anonymity surrounded by familiar-but-not-known faces. But these connections are being made at a generally acceptable rate. God knows it was months before I made any real friends at Sheridan and I was there a lot more with the same people. This is a weird paragraph. I should delete it, but I won't because I'll keep going back to it and going "Oh God that's embarrassing, but that's so completely me. Bang-on. Can't believe I wrote that; so true."

So this girl, I know her a bit, sure, but I don't really know her story. She could be engaged or something for all I know, although to my knowledge they don't typically get rings on fingers at 18. Until I know her better, I'm better off not knowing.

Ladies, how long would you converse with a guy you've just met before mentioning you're in a relationship? Let's face facts; if two members of the opposite sex meet and spend any length of time talking, a few things can be assumed.
1) The other person is single.
2) The other person is straight.
3) One of you is into the other, at least for now.

It can be embarrassing when the opposite turns out to be true in any case, but you can't assume the opposites until stated or otherwise indicated. I have this running joke in my head where I'm chatting up some girl and I ask her about her boyfriend. She asks how I knew she had a boyfriend, and I say, "Because all the girls I ever meet have boyfriends." And for a while, between 2005 and recent days, that's really proven to be the case, but I've never gone in assuming such. I'm not such a defeatist.

Back to my initial point. I'm reminded of a time, a while back but not too long, when I spent about the length of a subway ride (that is, 15, 20 minutes or so) talking and getting on with a girl. We joked around, I made her laugh. I won't mention what we joked about. For karma's sake, she might be reading and take offense that I'm writing about her. (Then again, it shouldn't surprise her that this was my line of thought: see #3 in my list of valid assumptions.) Suffice it to say, it was a good conversation and it never once came up whether she was attached, even when I asked what she was up to that weekend. I later got strong indication from a third party source that she was likely attached. We still haven't spoken about it, even tohugh we've seen each other at least once since (without really talking.) Again, this is a different girl from the one in Narrative, and I've got to be thankful that at least I've got this to be lamenting. Attached or not, not long ago my romantic interests were limited to whatever was on TV that day. Some days it's a relief to just be given a chance to fail.

I mean, I know, it's private business. Nobody is expected to turn to the person next to them and say, "My boyfriend is a 6'2 football player" unprompted. But if you talk to someone long enough, if you don't put these details out there, people will suspect you're deliberately hiding them. And if that's the case, well... I've known that girl, and I'm pretty sure she felt bad for it. Or hell, maybe not, she sure did seem to be enjoying herself at the time.

Ahem. Off track. This is me: the romantic.

Big concluding point in this sermon. Sometime after walking away from school today, I came to a realization or at least a very clever but misguided soundbite. I've spent so much of my life trying to understand girls, but it's only recently occurred to me that they might also be trying to understand me.

It's often we don't realize that we don't appear to others as we are in our heads.

Class was uneventful, without even a fun pointless debate between some dude and the TA. We did a little quiz. There was some confusion as to the meaning of "Crane" and "Boom" as far as camera movement. It's not hard to grasp, yet to express it, seems to really confuse the issue.

I got a Mr. Sub at Union, not really being able to put off eating any later that day. I meant to buy some lunch stuff this week at grocery shopping but gee whiz it slipped my mind. There's a microwave at the Innis Cafe, too, if I wanted to return to my warm Corned Beef sandwiches. That's a fine slice of meat right there. It got me through many a story meeting in PJour Year 2. I miss those days.

Mostly zoned out on the way home, except there were some kids in nearby seats utterly fascinated by the train. I don't blame 'em. My first ride, I was 18 years old. If I'd been 12, I'd be bouncing off the walls.

I got back to Oakville just in time to see the buses pulling out. I briefly rushed toward 'em but suddenly was aware that I didn't have the correct change. Go fig. Couldn't muster up 2 quarters. I considered getting coffee to make change and waiting, but thought better and walked home in the cool fall air. OH, and I also did get coffee. Once upon a time I considered using University as an opportunity to quit the habit, but that's foolhardy. I composed a poem early this moment in consideration for my next entry due Wednesday.

"I never used to see
What mom and dad saw in coffee;
But now it's all that's keeping me
In touch with my sanity."

Uh yeah. Keep trying.

My best leads right now are a sound poem ("This light glints in my eyes, hits irises, strikes; blinds. It shines high in the sky..." and it goes on like that) and a poem in the rhyme and meter of Coloridge's Xanadu/Kubla Khan/Vision in a Dream about my daily commute. I like his work. I'm trying to reconcile my desire to be both Coloridge and Kerouac. It's not easy. I should probably just be me. If that's possible.

You know, I knew that I'd start writing more per entry once fall rolled around. It's no coincidence. My brain has really kicked back into overdrive, not surprisingly.

I do find it surprising, however, and somewhat unnerving, that we're starting to get readers from all over the world again. Got our first hits from Italy and South aFrica ever recently. It's nice to see, but I still find it odd. I wonder what they're reading, what they've come for, and how they got here. I wonder if they'll stay, or decide (like I did long ago,) that this kid ain't got much worthwhile to say. But hey, if I didn't want people reading, I guess I'd take it off the net. And if people didn't want to read, they wouldn't.

So keep on rockin' for tonight. I've earned this weekend
-Scotto