First, I want to thank all of you who have been following this blog, and my little journey in Boston, MA.  It’s been an interesting one.  Thank you for your insights, your comments, and for just dropping in to see what I’ve been up to.  It’s been really great sharing this experience with you.

Second, I will be starting fresh as of tomorrow.  This site will remain up for a while, but in time, I will probably take it down, and file it away.  It’s a new start, and a new way forward.  Note, I will still be out there, tweeting and facebooking (is that even a verb?), and staying generally connected.  There will be a new site, a new look, and perhaps a new focus for why I write on the internet.  Maybe why I write at all.  The possibilities are amazing me!

With that, I will end here, and bid you all adieu.  Take care, be well, and look out for my next adventure!

Love,

Thom

Portland Head Light

So, there won’t be another podcast from here. I leave Boston at the end of the week. There may be a post or two between now and then, but pretty much, I’m done here.

Things to do this week:
1. finalize the packing – get my clothes all put in one spot, preferably washed/dried, and ready to go.
2. disassemble the futon.
3. keep my cool and be very, very clear about the process of removing myself from Boston. Even when it’s next to impossible.
4. say goodbye to dear friends. as many as possible. and give a forwarding address.
5. remember to breathe, eat, and sleep.

So, after a wander around the city late last night, I returned to the apartment to find my first packet of writing has been returned to me from my advisor. Like a child on his birthday, I tore into the envelope, and immediately began to take in the comments and thoughts of my advisor. All at 1:00 am.

I read through everything, and from what I gathered last night, an upon re-reading it all this morning, these are my thoughts:

1. My writing needs to grow up. No longer do I have the space in my life for immature writing. I need to say what I mean to say, and stop circling. Get to the point, and follow it wherever it takes me. Like an adult. Like an educated, capable adult.

2. This whole experience depends on my full engagement. I can come up with a laundry-list of excuses for poor writing, but they are meaningless. This is my LIFE I’m writing for. Not for anything less.

3. I am capable. If I wasn’t, there wouldn’t be a place for me in the program I’m in. I need to take my abilities seriously, and treat it as such. I need to believe in myself. This has never been easy, and perhaps it’s the greatest struggle I’m facing now – more than the move, the break-up with Nate, or any of the other things spinning in my life.

4. I need to find and respect the voice inside me. I’ve gone on and on and on about doing it, and now, NOW is the time to put down the tracks that will be my literary path. I have a point of view, a point of observation, that matters. Even if it’s only for me. It’s ME. I need to find and respect ME.

To say I’m frustrated with the results of my first packet would be missing the point. I am and I’m not. I’m better than what I produced in thus first foray into my graduate work, and I think my advisor recognizes this in me. I just need to now demonstrate a progression, a movement forward. I can and will do that in my next packet, due in two weeks.

I have more reading and annotating to do, and I’m revising a piece I submitted. I’m also going to try writing a story about something my advisor suggested – driving. Or, at least, movement. Traveling. Something along those lines.

The growing up starts now.

On today’s Boston.com website, there is an article about the Beloit College Mindset List.  Never heard of it? Neither had I, until just recently.

Apparently, this is a list, according to AP reporter Dinesh Ramde, that helps teachers and professors avoid making cultural references in class that their students wouldn’t understand. Things like, say, Peewee Herman, or A-Team, or perhaps that silly Tootsie Roll Owl “How Many Licks” commercial.  The fact is, the kids entering college today do not have the cultural reference for that.

The article is here: Wear Wristwatch? Use e-mail? Not for Class of ’14

For me, though, there is a point where a student, regardless of age, should get the cultural references being made in a classroom.  This is what being educated is all about.  It’s about stringing together what you know and coming up with a better, deeper understanding of the world you live in.  Part of that world is culture, and history, and how the two interact with each other.

A better student, in my opinion, has gone further, has asked questions, and does not need his or her teacher or professor to avoid certain references so as to ease their way into the classroom.  In my day, if you didn’t get it, you looked it up, or you asked questions after class.  In today’s world, you could do that on your laptop or mobile phone in a few seconds.  There’s no reason for sloppiness or that awkward feeling of not getting the joke.  Just look it up!

And, if you’re curious about this list of things to avoid, check here: Beloit College Mindset List

Must Cross Bridges

Since Sunday, I can feel a difference.  What I mean by that is that as I approach the day of moving away, I can feel my body resisting it.  It’s as if this Great Amount of Inertia has settled in my bones, and doesn’t want to move forward.  Ambition, such as it is, is lacking, and I can’t seem to focus on any one thing for any length of time. This is my usual response to change, and it’s so damn weird.

Seriously, I need to buck up and just face the damn music.  I need to start planning, packing, sorting, chucking out what I don’t need/want/can’t move.  I need to get a grip, get a hold of myself, and just do it.  I’ve got a lot to accomplish in TEN DAYS.  Yikes…just saying that make it seem a little shorter in time than I thought.  Anyway, yes, ten whole days to get my shit together.  And stay on top of my schoolwork.  And remain calm.

I can do this – it’s just a matter of perspective.

-Thom

Less than two weeks.  Less than half a month.  Less time, less space for maneuvering. Less patience, less planning, less time to wonder.  It’s all coming to a head, and to and end.

Last night, I found myself in bed by 8:30pm.  I don’t remember the last time I did that when I wasn’t ill.  Honestly, I was just tired.  Of course, this means I was up at five a.m., which isn’t really a bad time to be awake, really.  For me, there’s a lot of clarity at dawn.  It’s when my creative juices begin to flow strongest.  It’s also when coffee, for what it’s worth, tastes its finest.  So, I poured myself a cup, and sat down at the laptop with no particular goal in mind.

What I ended up doing was applying for another job in Portland.  Something I could totally do, something that pays rather decently for Portland ($12-14/hr), and something that seemed stable and non-life-consuming.

We shall see if I qualify.  I will be following up with this by Thursday.

Anyway, so, it was an exhausting weekend, but I’m glad to have had it.  I spent a lovely day with a friend on Saturday.  He took me to Salem, MA, where we explored both the town and the Peabody Essex Museum, both places I’d really never seen before.  The sun was amazing, the conversation was engaging, and to be honest, I learned there’s more to Salem than a few dead witches.

That day in the fresh air and sun, coupled with yesterday’s run and an afternoon in the fresh air and sun made for a tired man last night. I’m glad I didn’t fight the desire to sleep.  I’m feeling much, much better this morning.

Here’s to the start of another week.  Let’s hope it’s a good one for everyone.

I’m also thinking of putting together a new summer/running music podcast mixtape thingy to share with you all.  Some of you hate my music, and that’s fine, but I do think some of it is pretty good, especially if you’re going to be exercising and trying to tune out the blatherings of the world around you.  Food for thought for later tonight, maybe.

Anyway, here’s the loop:

Anyway, a new look with an old favorite.

This Week’s Music:

• Midnight Sun by ATB
• Alone Tonight by Above & Beyond
• Venice Beach by Daniel Kandi
• Tonight (Above & Beyond Remix) by Dirty Vegas

Yeah, so it’s been a bit since I’ve last posted here. Life has certainly taken a turn for the busy, and all of the sudden (it seems), time has become a precious, irreplaceable commodity in my life. I think this has something to do with the fact that my life is now on a deadline basis. End date for work, end date for my life here in Boston, due dates for school, etc. What this does is not only organize me into a nicely regimented little schedule, but it also takes a series of days and breaks them down into smaller, faster pieces. In a way, it’s making time seem faster than it really is.

I wanted to let you know that, after I’ve submitted them for school, I intend on writing a little bit more about the books that I’ve read for this first packet of the semester for school. I’ve had a LOT of interest in my reaction to these books from various people both on and off line, and so I thought this would be a good forum to share my thoughts about them with you all. More on that later.

I’m currently getting through a critical paper (one of two short papers I’ll be writing this semester), and perhaps that’s where I wanted to reach out to you all. See, it’s been my experience, as a reader of gay fiction and gay-themed stories, that most of them (not all) seem to be circling around the same few ideas. This is a sense of loss – in whatever shape or form that may occur – and a sense of isolation, both physical and/or emotional. This is the most common theme/effect/feeling/what-have-you in the gay writing I’ve come across.

I get why it’s there. I understand that this is the reality for FAR TOO MANY gay men out there. And this is where I get really ticked off. Maybe it’s from my place here in Massachusetts, or even here in America, where I can become enraged about the state of gay/straight relations in this country. Maybe it’s just my own personal feelings about hating to hide who and what I am. What bothers me is how much the literature of the last twenty or thirty years still rings true to the reality that is life for the gay man in twenty-first century, western-cultured America. How is this still possible? How is it we can be an advanced society, and still treat a portion of our population as outcasts, as not human?

This is the focus of my critical paper. It’s my reaction to the books I’ve read, and my commentary on the state of affairs in the gay community today (at least a little bit – the paper is only supposed to be 5-7 pages). I’m wondering, though, if any of you have a reaction to any of this? Do you read gay writing? Do you get the same sense of loss and isolation from each piece, in some small way? Do you connect with it? Do you disassociate from the characters who are on the outskirts? What is your reaction?

I’d love to know.