creative block

Final paper turned in, it's raining, the cats are hovering around here somewhere, I got invited to a party but being a quasi control freak means I'm not going if someone else is driving because I want to be able to go home. An introverted night of tea and slacking around and watching Massacration videos because things are more funny when you're tired.

I got a free ticket to see Boris last night and they blew me away. The Young Widows were good too, there were lots of dudes with beards around being introverted to the riffage and I'm sure some were drooling over the lovely lady guitarist. I took some good pictures but forgot to grab the usb cable when I stopped at home. Stayed for most of the set, which veered from noisetastic raveups to droney shoegaze to doomtacular heshery.

at the corner

so last night, I got a text from my pastor and facebook messages from some people who go to an awesome church on the corner of Scranton and Clark that they were going to be doing a prayer vigil thing at the corner of Scranton and Seymour, just a block or so north, so I ended up going down there to show some solidarity, to give comfort, to listen, even though the introvert in me wasn't sure if I even belonged there, because I want to respect that people are trying to live their lives and stuff and not become part of the inevitable media circus. Whether I did or not is up for others to judge if they want.

I drive over and I can already tell it's going to be crazy when I get off the exit and there's hundreds of motorcycles roaring down 25th, handmade signs thanking God for this miracle, people in the streets everywhere like it's 4th of July or something. I park in the church lot and walk over, and it's quiet over here, I see a few people I know that I haven't seen in a couple years since me and the roommate fell out and I dropped out of that social circle, but a commonality of belief and vision makes it seem like days. It is quiet over on our side, except for people praying and singing on the steps of a church at the corner.

Most of them are more charismatic than me, so I don't get too loud, it's hard enough to string coherent thoughts together with the emotions so overwhelming and I find myself grieving that this took ten years and that there's so many others who've gone missing, and that awful things happen to women in this city and around the world all the time. We pray for the girls, for the families, for the neighborhood, for the law enforcement that they would start doing their job in a way that doesn't hurt others, for the men themselves. A woman who says she's the aunt of the one of the girls asks us to pray for the Castro family because of the pain they're dealing with and the inevitable blowback to come.
 

And there were so many news cameras and vehicles everywhere and people with their cameras gawking and taking pictures of everything with their iPhones and people just kind of milling around who were hoping to get interviewed. Neighbors sitting on porches observing, people riding by on their bikes,  I've never been around that kind of thing really and to see the level of production, the incongruity of impeccable broadcasters and us regular folk. 

There are four of us left hanging out in a parking lot under the stars, trying to figure out what we could and should be doing, because these emotions subside, but we live here, this is where we need to be connected and trying to love, and trying to figure out how to do that more.
 

for ten long years

After the tempest of the local newsrag's misgendering of a murder victim, a subsequent arrest for that, I think I used to ride the same bus as that kid, and I don't know what the semantics are but no one should die like that. Not to excuse our newsrag, but given the way things are on their way out, I don't expect good journalism and find myself reading the Guardian for the local news stories these days.They've got the best coverage here.

And then this whole thing, which I saw on CNN when my Internet was acting wonky. I remember when those girls disappeared, and thought it was probably the same person. facebook wasn't even working I think there were so many Clevelandians collectively freaking out and rejoicing that these girls who've been missing and presumed dead the last ten years were found alive.

 I know that neighborhood, I live a few blocks north and slightly west of where they were found, almost two blocks north exactly of where they disappeared. My friend used to work at the auto parts store across from where the one girl got kidnapped and always worried about me being over there.  I've probably driven by that house, and that gives me chills. And of course there's the usual ignorant folk who make fun of the local color but screw them. These folks are pretty much my neighbors, the people I go to church with, the people I rub shoulders with at the grocery store. The Queen of the Bondo points out that if the guy below was walking on the same street as most of these people calling him a hero, they'd probably avoid him. That being said, mad props to him.

I can't even begin to comprehend the horror and disbelief. I just can't process the emotions of being glad they're alive, hoping that they recover from the hell of the last decade, frustration at a city's law enforcement who seems more concerned about generating city revenue than protecting vulnerable people. A couple years ago we found out 12 women were rotting in someone's house, this year it's three women being imprisoned in someone's basement for ten years. What the hell. And it seems like the neighbors did call the police but nothing was really ever done. This makes me so angry.

And then I wonder how many other situations are like this, and how many other times we've called the police and nothing's been done. I can think of at least two times when this has happened in my world, and then that other time when that girl's body was dumped on the side of the highway and the cops couldn't get bothered to look. 

We live in a city where human life is devalued, where the response time and whether or not you're taken seriously when you call for help depends on which neighborhood you're in, where new developments are built downtown while neglected neighborhoods continue to deteriorate because they're not gentrified, where police fire 137 shots at an unarmed car, where people would rather talk about condos than schools, where we close schools and build more prisons, where bike lanes are more important than safe places for kids to play, where women go missing all the time, where rape is a regular thing, where the infant mortality rates across the street from said hospital are comparable to third-world countries. I could go on here, but it makes me sick to think about.

I am happy for these girls, I am happy to see people come together to rejoice that what's lost is found, but this place, I can't even describe how I feel.

the tyranny of the bubble

I really believe in seeing outside what resides in my limited sphere, of hearing other perspectives different than my own, of avoiding the echo chamber of ideology/subculture/religion/provincialism at all costs. That's relatively easy because I don't see the world the same way most other people in my world do and I'm reasonably comfortable with that. Seeing the world through the eyes of others is fascinating anyway, which is why I enjoy blogworld and the Internet and reading books about people that aren't like me in places that I've never been to.

It's incredible to me with the vast array of perspectives and sheer quantity of fascinating stuff and information, how stupid a lot of people still are willing to be. It's not that hard to fact-check those memes that proliferate like crabgrass in my garden, or that urban legend that resurfaces every few years, or whether or not so and so is dead and whether or not that article is satire and then say it doesn't matter. I'm glad that people have pointed out when I've goofed on there, and I make the amends accordingly. 

I don't know how you could not bother to do your homework on our foreign or environmental policy, or learn something about another country, or get your news from somewhere other than a cable news outlet or Jon Stewart, or a quick perusal of AlJazeera English is sufficient enough to see it's not AlQaeda news.

I get that people are going to be mean and creepy especially when things like abortion or religion are involved. I wonder where some of these people live and who their friends are and if they live in bubbles that they never try to pop. What basement or what hipster ghetto where you don't know anyone who practices a different religion or lifestyle or whatever.

And it's fascinating to me to watch the echo chamber at work, when everyone gets all shrill and groupthinky together about OMG wingnuts/Democrats/people who drive cars/people who ride bikes/people who live in cities/people who live in suburbs/gay-straight-trans-bi/Muslims-Christians-Atheists/Dave Mustaine/Ted Nugent/Morrissey/AmandaPalmer). Assumptions are made, opinions affirmed, as if Point A is THE MOST IMPORTANT THING EVER when there's a whole lot of other things going on. Suddenly everyone's a conspiracy theorist in their own way.

Because any dissenter gets shouted down or has to qualify the argument in a way that one wouldn't do if you were all sharing beers at the local bar. It's a pathetic validation, and for all the talk of how bullying is bad (no shit), if anything, it cements my theory that this is a universal human trait when I see the bullying that goes on in comments sections on pretty much anything. It's only bullying if someone does it to you, isn't it?

Also, no one outside that website and that little bubble really gives a shit about bike lanes or food trucks or mason jars or that band putting out that record. No one else cares and they go on living their life. I have to remind myself of this.

the first week of warmth

night 1...
When you've been inside all day, and trying unsuccessfully to cut down on your caffeine intake, and it's beautiful out, you get the itch to start thinking and exist with others, and I don't know him well, there's nothing like that going on, but an exchange of ideas was needed. We changed our plans the other night and walked from my house down to the water, instead of getting coffee, which probably would have been awkward and datey. We were talking about art and God and this strange hovering between the embrace of subculture and the spiritual community that alternately nourishes and frustrates.

The sunlight was fading by the time we reached the beach, staring out over the empty sand to the lavender water and the pink sky enraptured by not the most picturesque sunset, but a peaceful understated one. There's something wonderful about the near-empty beach in the twilight.

I don't come down here much, he says.
All my greatest memories happened here, I say. There's always something to remember here.

We run into people he knows, foment plans of the creative kind that my skeptical self finds myself questioning a few days later. As we walk back, a group of kids sets off a hot air balloon lit from one of the grills, and it looks like a burning heart soaring away through the darkness. It sounds twee of me to say this but there was something very beautiful about it. We walked back and I took him past this giant thicket of bamboo by one of the mansions where all the birds live, and we listened to the rustle and the singing before walking back to my front yard and going our separate ways.

night 2...
The next night I have dinner on the porch with the usual suspects and then go out for a friend's birthday and miss dinner with them but end up at a pub I like with a group of her friends, most of whom I barely know. The can of Strongbow I'm drinking usually doesn't do much to my equilibrium but I knew I was a little more tipsy than usual and a little hazy so I don't say as much for a change. Most of the time when I have a drink either alcoholic or caffeinated I end up going on long ramblings about Balkan geopolitics or my beef with most urban planners or foreign policy or the intricacies of sundry music or religion but I'm not feeling like doing that this time. It's too loud in here, and these people are neither total strangers nor close friends.

I get introverted in gatherings like these and either become a total wallflower or Mary Contrary. I either say nothing or start talking about how awesome inner-ring suburbs are, and how Lynyrd Skynyrd is better than your favorite indie rock band, that the guy you voted for sucks, and how I love driving my car and riding bikes scares me.

But as such, people keep telling me stories that they think I'll find funny but I don't find them funny and feel bad because I'm not amused, they're not realizing that I'm really not as cool as I evidently come across to those that don't know better. I don't want to be impressed, I almost feel embarrassed for you when you try to do it. I just want you to be yourself, and not drop f-bombs because you think I'm tough, not try to impress me by pointing out the dudes at the bar who are probably into Nickelback, because who cares.

My theory is that alpha males overcompensate by talking about the geeky dweebs or extolling their physical prowess and their fast cars, beta males overcompensate by talking about how dumb alpha male bros are and try to impress you with their record collections, knowledge of local restaurants, smartphone capabilities and their swank bikes. Bros will be bros and geeks will be geeks. I'm usually not this magnanimous, and I know that high school never ends, but this is getting old and so are you. It must be the hard cider talking.

night 3... 
I end up working late and decide not to do anything social. I work in the garden until sunset, marvel at the seedlings poking up through the soil that will be spinach and chard, and walk to the corner store past kids playing in the apartment building parking lot, the EMTs in the garage relaxing on lawn chairs, and the crowds at the punk bar and the old-man-gay-bar. It's a beautiful night, and I feel safe because there's so many other people around.

One of my friends had a former roommate who needs a place to stay for a month or three, and doesn't know that many people over here or have a lot of cash, since she's from Ethiopia, working at a gas station, and going to nursing school. I have an extra room at my place for the purposes of art making and having a place where people can stay, so we talk tonight and negotiate out shares of utilities. I haven't had a roommate since the crash-and-burn of the previous domestic situation, but I know this has a limited timetable and I'm feeling ready.

But now I need to figure out how to consolidate two rooms worth of bachelorette living into one. Furniture starts getting moved and rearranged. I find some things I can throw away, or try to give away. It gets later than I thought, but the feral cats in the yard are fighting so it takes awhile to fall asleep as it is.

night 4...
I have an extra bed in the spare room that I was going to try and cram in a corner somewhere but a friend's friend just moved down the street from me and needs something to sleep on, so he comes over, decides it's perfect, and we cram the mattress into his hatchback just barely. The boxspring won't fit, however, so on our second trip we end up deciding to tie it to the roof of my car hillbilly style, with two dry-rotted bits of clothesline I find in the garage. It's a long and slow couple miles up the street with him holding onto the rope for dear life and me hoping this doesn't slide down onto my windshield. I'm sure it provides amusement for the onlookers.

His new place is full of guitars and drums and bikes and records and roommates. They play in a band or something, and they invite me to stay for dinner. I go home and bring over an attempt at sweet potato fries that doesn't work but still tastes good, and a bowl of hummus. They grill me some amazing steak and onions and we sit on a patio over a storefront that reminds me of friends' photos of rooftop Brooklyn parties, listening to My Bloody Valentine and I feel like I've known them all my life, it's that comfortable and weirdness-free. I'm amazed that we see so many stars considering that there's car dealerships on the other sides of the walls that aren't old apartment buildings.

black and white and light

I never did take a photography class in high school. I should have gotten a camera sooner than I did, and my early twenties are poorly documented, there are friends I've known for years that I have no pictures of, strange how my generation obsessively photographs everything from what they ate to important life events. The last wedding I was at was being Instagrammed in real time and being without an iPhone I know I'm still behind.

But one of my former teammates started a print room around the corner from my place of employment and had a pinhole camera workshop yesterday that I went to, where we took boxes and cans coated on the inside with black paint and festooned them with electrical tape to make makeshift shutters and to keep out the light, and it's kind of a crapshoot as to what you get, but these two came out all right, especially the top one. It's such a process, and strangely magical.

best of the blotter: creepy dudes and turkeys

SUSPICION, EDGEFIELD ROAD: A woman asked for special attention to her home April 20 after finding muddy handprints on the back door. She canceled the request after finding out the prints came from her neighbor’s 3-year-old grandson.

PETTY THEFT, BIDDULPH ROAD: A Cleveland man was charged with petty theft after he tried to steal four lobster tails at Giant Eagle April 15.
An alert clerk noticed the man leave the store. When he asked the man about the lobster tails, the man said that he put them back. Then he admitted he had them inside his jacket. Total value is $65.

Medina Police are looking for a Fugitive Turkey
An Old Farm Trail resident told Medina Police that damage had been done to his garage door by at 8:18 p.m. April 18.
Who was the vandal? Neighborhood kids? An agitated enemy? No, it was a bird. A turkey allegedly caused damage to the door, and the resident wanted to make a report.


Strongsville

Two women reported a suspicious man about noon on April 8.
A woman on Regency Drive was pulling out of her driveway when she was approached by a man in his mid-20s, who said he was fundraising.
When she rolled up her car window, he took off running.
Another woman who was jogging in the area told police the man started running with her, asking her to go on a date.
He didn't make any threats, but she was "creeped out" because he was too persistent.
She went to a relative's house and pounded on the door, a report said.
The man was spotted running on Shenandoah Ridge, where he told police he was trying to solicit money for a business he wanted to start.
He wasn't sure what type of business.
He said he then saw the woman jogging and wanted to get a date, so he began running with her.
Police advised him on soliciting laws and on how to get a date without creeping out the women.

Suspicious Man Has Car Full of Stuffed Animals

A dad was suspicious of a man who offered his son a stuffed animal April 17.
A report said the incident took place about 12:45 p.m. at the Marathon station on Royalton Road when a man in his 60s asked a man if his son wanted a stuffed animal.
The man saw that the back seat of the driver's car was filled with stuffed animals.
Officers couldn't find the man in the area, but gave a description of the car and driver to SouthPark Mall security officers.

You Don't Say
A passerby on Big Creek Parkway April 15 felt it was suspicious that two people were sitting on a bench, smoking a pipe, a report said.

What's Shaking?
A caller reported about 20 high school students in the parking lot outside SouthPark Mall just after midnight April 21, saying it looked like they were taping a Harlem Shuffle video.
A report said police checked the lot "and no one is shaking anything."

LAWN BATTLE, BRIAR BUSH LANE: An officer advised a pair of rival lawn care company employees who got into an argument at about 11:35 a.m. April 10.
One of the employees said he was just trying to kid around but that it went too far and then snowballed from there. Neither wanted to press charges in the matter.

STRANGE OCCURRENCES, WILSON MILLS ROAD: A woman told police on April 7 she hears outside her home’s window the sounds of a man whistling. The whistling, she said, takes place usually on weekends. Further, she noted, the whistler usually whistles the same song. 


Another Scam, But No Victim
A Fawn Meadow Trail woman told police she got a threatening call April 9 from someone claiming to be an agent with the Drug Enforcement Administration.
The man said he had a warrant for her arrest.
The DEA late last year warned about a scam in which people claiming to be DEA agents tell people they have illegally purchased drugs online.
They try to get the victims to pay a fine and if they don't, threaten to arrest them or search their property.

Turkey burglars
Westlake Police are looking for the thief (or thieves) who broke into a home on Hollywood Drive on Feb. 16 and stole jewelry and two frozen turkeys.
Neighbors told police that they saw an unfamiliar red Ford F-150 pickup truck in the driveway that afternoon.
Residents said the man and a woman who were in that truck went up to two homes in the neighborhood. At different times, they claimed to be looking for old Army buddies or a sister, police said.

Meat craving thieves crawled through the first floor window: On Feb. 28 at around 7:27 a.m., it was reported that a robbery had occurred at Smitty's Market, on Ira Avenue, between 4 p.m. – 9:08 a.m. They reported that this low-down scoundrel forced open a first floor window of the closed business and that he had crawled in and stole a bunch of meat, pecans and other stuff. The cops are on the lookout for this hungry rascal and if you know something say something and call Crime Stoppers to get this greedy dog off the streets.