Adventures With Furniture

Heart-Stopping Moment of the Week, ladies and gentlemen: on Saturday, I push my trolley mere inches away from the checkout line at IKEA, only to see all my boxes fall to the floor in an unhappy heap. And the young girl scanning my purchases, who has just been apologizing non-stop for taking so long at it...really doesn't do anything.

But that's part of the magic of IKEA. Everything is so tightly packed up that apart from a few tiny holes in the cardboard boxes, there's no signs of damage whatsoever! (And if something is wrong, they have a heck of a good return policy.)

The fact that I was able to get to IKEA in the first place is due to that great blessing of this year, my friendship with the Earth Mother and the GameMaster. They love IKEA, and they love taking people to IKEA in their very nice car, and browisng at IKEA and finding things to gather for their own new home and lunching on Swedish goodness (I had an open-faced shrimp sandwich, by the way).

My goal was to acquire furniture sufficient to last me several years, and in this, I believe I succeeded. Two tables, two lamps, two chairs (office and easy), a 5x5 bookshelf set, a television stand/coffee table hybrid, a shelving unit, and a very good large writing desk, plus assorted odds and ends...the latter included a very colorful housewarming gift for the Wolverine and the Russian Warrior Princess.

Unfortunately, the Earth Mother and the GameMaster also took a spill, and they were not as lucky as I appeared to be. They bought a lovely TV stand/cabinet set of their own from the as-is department. In moving it, after the Earth Mother took out the glass shelves, I suggested we remove the drawers as well, but the GameMaster said that was not necessary. Of course, guess what fell out and got dented? (I take a chunk of the blame since I was helping to carry it.)

My entire Swedish haul, including delivery, lunch, and the always delightful dollar ice cream, came to under $700. Buying a bed in Hyde Park is a different proposition. It turns out that one store on 53rd Street which shall remain nameless misquotes their box spring prices, charges for frames, and has a $55 delivery fee even when you live just four blocks away! Then the manager looked really, really serious, we're talking Blaxploitation-detective serious, when I decided I did not want to buy a mattress today. Now on the other hand, there's ANOTHER mattress store on 53rd Street where the mattress and springs come together for the same price as a mattress alone at the other store! And frames are sturdy and cheap! And the manager also could not give me free delivery, but now I only have to pay twenty bucks! Needless to say, after testing a comfy Serta (which I flopped right down on to his approval), I was sold.

Furniture is nice. Mine may not have the history yet (the S.O.'s rug has been in the family ever since her parents got together) or the otherworldly aura (Superman and the Hardest Working Girl in Hollywood own the comfiest couch ever), but it will get there.

Siddhartha (1922) by Herman Hesse

I am writing this in some haste because I do not want to let the thoughts and emotions in my mind leave me.

Today at church I was very distracted with care and worry, much more than usual. An encounter with a friend on the walk to church today left me realizing how I have committed myself to a path which it will be hard to move back from…to stay in Chicago with no job and no idea what is to come next, to commit my remaining money and energy to this time. I am ashamed to say that though the teachings today were good and the hymns moving to the soul, I did not put the concentration into them which I should have.

Feeling spiritually neglectful and somewhat lonely, I decided to spend some time in meditation. I put a Miles Davis record on the stereo and began reading a book I once purchased for a dollar at the Melrose Avenue Sunday swap meet at Adam Strauss’s recommendation: Herman Hesse’s Siddhartha.

By the time I reached the final chapter, I had turned off the music, forgotten about the clothes in the laundry, and was reading in nervous, excited concentration.

What I found warmed my heart.

For those of you who have not read it, Siddhartha is not about the Buddha but another man named Siddhartha, who desires to find the true Self, and after an encounter with the Buddha (called Gotoma), he begins a journey in which he exchanges his spiritual life for the purely secular life, then casts that off to learn from a good ferryman named Vasudeva…and in old age, he makes an extraordinary discovery.

Hesse is a great writer, and in his structure he perfectly mirrors Siddhartha’s quest. Everything Siddhartha learns at the time is presented as a great truth, but as the story continues each truth is either proven to be the basis for another truth or is flatly contradicted. The culmination of these truths is in the final chapter, when Siddhartha is reunited with his oldest and dearest friend, Govinda, in the days of the Buddha’s passing.

“”The potential Buddha always exists in the sinner; his future already there. The potential hidden Buddha must be recognized in him, in you, in everybody. The world is not imperfect or slowly evolving along a long path to perfection. No, it is perfect at every moment; every sin already carries grace within it, all small children are potential old men, all sucklings have death within them, all dying people–eternal life.

During deep meditation it is possible to dispel time, to see simultaneously all the past, present, and future, and then everything is good, everything is present, everything is Brahman. Therefore, it seems to me that everything that exists is good–death as well as life, sin as well as holiness, wisdom as well as folly. Everything is necessary, everything needs only my agreement, my assent, my loving understanding; then all is well with me and nothing can harm me. I learned through my body and soul that it was necessary for me to sin, that I needed lust, that I had to strive for property and experience nausea and the depths of the stair in order to learn not to resist them, in order to learn to love the world, and no longer compare it with some kind of desired imaginary world, some imaginary vision of perfection, but to leave it as it is, to love it and be glad to belong to it.

Love is the most important thing in the world. It may be important to great thinkers to examine the world, to explain and despise it. But I think it is only important to love the world, not to despise it, not for us to hate each other, but to be able to regard the world and ourselves and all beings with love, admiration, and respect.”

My parents, my mentors, my friends, have all told me time and time again that God puts nothing in our way which we can’t handle, that everything happens for a reason, that there is such a thing as karma. And though I have tried to believe it, I have especially as of late, with age and responsibility settling in on me, looked back and felt nervous about my choices, felt wrong, felt that my past has been marked by foolishness and consumption and squandering. And I think of myself so often as a sinner who does not use the gifts God gave him, who falls over and over again into the same dark corners, who is not good enough, who does not try at time to be good enough and who feels when he tries that it is futile. Why did I study the Humanities, I ask myself, instead of that which could prepare me for a career in the modern economy? Why was I not more careful with the money I won? Why do I enjoy good food, good wine, books, etc. as I do when I should be thankful to have a roof, clothes, and simple food, when there are so many with less in the world? This question always makes me afraid that someday I shall have nothing and no one and be a desolated, ignored man…and writing this I feel so ashamed, ashamed that I shall break my parents’ hearts that I have not listened and that I feel wrong by the goodness they have showered on me, that I further wrong the Lord by not trusting in Him, that I pain my friends and my girlfriend by saying that I regret the decisions I made which enabled them to come into my life. Knowing all this, I have long persisted in such a manner of thinking, wanting to reject my past, feeling lesser than everyone else, that my choices and attitudes will shatter me.

But in reading and absorbing Siddhartha, I begin to recognize the error of this way of thinknig, an error which no one ever quite put into words I could understand as Hesse does. Like Siddhartha, I compared myself and set myself up against an imaginary world, an ideal to live up to where there are certain choices which bring you peace and prosperity both worldly and spiritual.

I begin to see there is no such world, that in the multitude of humankind, people I pray for every night when I ask God to bestow justice on sinners and comfort those who are hurt by sin and who repent, there are so many paths to follow, and I have long believed that the way to faith is to follow your own path.

Now I see the next step: the way to the best life is to follow your own path. But NOT a self-centered path. Following your own path means that to do what you know is right, you must absorb all that is happening around you, make your choice, and make both your actions and those of others fit in with what you value and what you believe.

Then…in studying the Humanities, I have learned how to see with clear, true eyes the world I live in, to find pattern and meaning in the most unlikely places, and now to embark on a mission to share those meanings with others.

And at the same time, because I live in the secular world, my careers must be ones in which I subordinate myself to the needs of others, to work hard for other ends which will feed my own end.

If I have learned to appreciate the good life, it has also helped me appreciate the simple life. And if all is the same, then I know in times of strict, lean living as I shall be embarking on now, there will be moments to come of richness and joy, that the simple pleasures of a glass of cold water and a good book and a little electricity give me as much contentment as a great meal.

If I have moved too much and spent money on social occasions, the places where I have been always lead me to people I have met who are now true, caring friends who listen and help and share and with whom I listen, help, and share. This is a treasure beyond the worldly which I know will sustain me if an hour of need ever truly arises.

And if I cannot approach the ideal I set myself before my bountiful God and my loving parents, God above all, they are aware that every misstep is actually a step on the path to wisdom, where I must learn in my own way what all humans must learn, and to use that knowledge not in the way of regret but in the way of change. I have told my parents these words before, but I never understood their full meaning. I thought the change had to come to approach the ideal. The change only has to come to give me what I need to satsify myself in the context of the world that I live in, to bring me into unity with my surroundings.

There I will experience peace. There I will find hope and love. There I will be home.

I must not scorn what I did before, for all of it was the loved, the valuable, the holy, and from it I shall find the lovelier, the thoughts and deeds of greater value, and the true holiness of being at one with the great plan of life. Of being at one with my past, present, and future, of all leading into each other and all flowing to the spirit.

A Memory of Two Nights

This morning at 2:00, the Tall Guy, the Legal Girl, and I were on the Red Line train pulling out of Addison. We had just watched, in the company of the Wolverine, the season premiere of Jersey Shore and The Room, so our views of human nature were already at a low ebb. The train was empty when we embarked, but one stop later, a crowd of loud young men with a case of Heineken Light got on the train accompanied by two drunken middle-aged black men in Cubs paraphernalia. The young men, all white, when not encouraging their newfound friends to drink more and sit on various laps, were laughing at one of the party who was getting married on the 14^th, declaring this was the last week he would ever be alive. I felt sorry for his fiancée.

Believe it or not, the night was not yet over…at 2:45 we managed to catch the No. 4 bus back to Hyde Park. All very tired, we could only watch in horror as a 65 year-old woman began arguing with the bus driver when a pass she had was not accepted. Refusing to get off the bus, she alternately declared that she had been interacting with this particular driver either forever or only just in the last two weeks and that she would not be thrown off the bus. She begged us for a dollar, all the while declaring that she had seen this driver be disrespectful to an equally elderly man and was not going to let her get away with it again. At this point, I broke Marc's cardinal rule and gave her a dollar because I just wanted to go home and sleep. For the rest of her trip, the woman, when not telling me that God would bless me, moaned continually about her treatment, and a smart-looking man sitting next to us offered to help her write a formal complaint.

Sometimes I think my life is miserable. I have a series of great responsibilities to live up to and no job as yet to help me fulfill them. It is easier than I would like to admit for me to feel terribly down and believe that the Lord's grace and my self-confidence, self-esteem, and perseverance will not be sufficient to secure me work.

Then I think of nights like Thursday, when went over to the Earth Mother and the Gamemaster's apartment for Game Night, and a crowd of eleven crammed in. This included the S.O., whom I had just watched bake a triple-chocolate pecan pie from scratch, the Connoisseur, who has just returned from Germany (he brought chocolate, had some fun stories, and in one hilarious moment I observed, poked his finger at the Princess's backside and made her already wide eyes go wider) and the Dancer, accompanied by her delightful new roommates and friends from her ballroom activities. We played Interview, Celebrities, Telephone Oracle, and Improv Freeze Tag, I got slightly tipsy, and all of us had a wonderful time, the S.O. more than most as she happily told me later…though the joy on the Earth Mother's face at seeing her friends in one room was a sight to behold.

And I think about Thursday night and the people I saw on Saturday night and know that my life is not miserable, that there are so many people whom I care about and who care about me, that there is so much positive energy and grace surrounding me, that I am definitely going to succeed at some point soon.

Developed Thoughts on Proposition 8

I don't think anything has made my entire circle of friends automatically post on Facebook as much as Judge Vaughan Walker's ruling that Prop 8 was unconstitutional. In my own happiness over the decision, I made a comment which I think was misunderstood by some people and which I wished to elaborate on.

As someone who was living in Los Angeles in November 2008 and who knew so many people actively campaigning against the measure, I can honestly say that the euphoria surrounding Obama's election was heavily tempered by Prop 8. A few years before I wouldn't have cared, but knowing and befriending so many members of the LGBT community through Emerson, the film industry, and St. James in the City made me share in the outrage...particularly when, writing a short essay as a contribution to a pro-gay marriage website, I discovered 1,138 legal rights which are denied to gay couples because they are not married. There's a reason I am happy today to call myself a regular contributor to the Human Rights Campaign.

However, my attitude towards gay MARRIAGE has undergone an evolution. The spark came from the Wise Old Man, my great octogenarian friend and dining and drinking campaign from L.A., who told me he didn't vote against Prop 8 because he asked all of his homosexual acquaintances what marriage would change for them and nobody could give him a good answer. I remembered that a few weeks ago on the day of the Chicago PRIDE parade, when one of the ministers at St. Paul the Redeemer in Hyde Park gave an inspiring sermon. An openly gay man, he preached with emotion and resonance on why it is our Christian duty to fight for equal rights for gays and lesbians, but he was very reluctant about fighting for gay marriage. The trouble, he said, is that same-sex couples are trying to assimilate to a straight norm. Why not, he asked, embrace what makes them unique and come up with a procedure of commitment which isn't called marriage? The great advantage is that by celebrating and emphasizing their differences, they make straight people look harder at their own differences, their own separateness...and hopefully what values they bring to the changing institution of matrimony and how they can better commit to them.

Hearing a clearly outspoken member of the gay community speak like this was enough to make me think. As a committed Christian who believes in Christ's decree that we love one another, I myself rejoice in the diversity, dignity, and individuality of my fellow human beings, and I wonder if there should be something a little different, some new procedure, new ceremony, new guidelines, so that same-sex couples and heterosexual couples don't have it exactly the same way, that their unique places in the world can stay unique. Don't call it marriage. I don't know what you'd call it...as long as, in accordance with the Walker verdict, those 1,138 rights can apply to them.

Because in the end, a word and a process are not as important as a sentiment. As being able to love and commit to and work at a relationship with your partner without ANYONE contradicting you, without ANYTHING you should be sharing denied to you. That, and not the semantics of marriage, is why I celebrate the blow against Prop 8 and human inequality.

(And by the way, as the New York Times pointed out, the brilliance of the opinion is that it is rooted in quantifiable fact as much as law, which will make it a bit harder to argue against. Well done!)

Couples

I know a lot of couples...and now I'm part of a couple, which is something in itself. Lately, as anyone following this blog knows, I've been going to one wedding after another, so newlyweds are sticking out in my mind above all. But there are plenty of other couples in this world.

For instance, the couple-who-have-been-together-longer-than-the-S.O.-and-me-but-aren't-quite-ready-for-marriage-yet. Yesterday, I saw the Nice Guy for the first time since Campus Days, accompanied by his own young lady, La Chinoise. They got a firsthand look at the apartment, which he loved and more importantly she liked, and then I took them downtown for what was ultimately a riotous, delicious Tapas dinner with the S.O. It was nothing but enjoyable to see them bounce ideas off each other, casually slip body parts around each other, obviously know each other well enough to keep a superb conversational rhythm going between themselves and with us...and it's obvious they factor each other into their decisions. They're natural.

Then there's anniversary couples. The Earth Mother and the GameMaster celebrated their first last week, and in her words, "I can't believe it's been a whole year. Also, life is awesome." I know the marriage statistics these days, but I'd wager all my money they'll make it to the end. Having known them for ten of the twelve months of their married life, I have never seen them even slightly annoyed with each other, and I know that the honeymoon period is gone...they're two people my age with financial worries and new jobs and a small apartment. But again...they don't care. They love it and they love each other and we all can see it. They're going to make it.

Like Mommy and Daddy. Today is their...wait for it...31st. 31st. They are my great livign example of how couplehood is half affection and half work. Probably more than half-work. Over the years I have discovered what opposites they are in so many ways, but through difficulties and less-than-happy moments, they have stayed together. Through driving each other crazy, they stay together, and both of them have told me there's no one else they'd rather be with. When I see him holding her at the end of a long day when dinner's on the stove, or her giving an exasperated sigh when he cracks a joke, or them dancing together at a Rostan party, I can only wish that someday I'll be in those shoes.

And then there's all the couples who are celebrating today as, after two years, somebody in power finally figured out that Prop 8 was unconstitutional. I'm still not sure how I feel about gay marriage, having heard convincing arguments against it from gay clergy whom I deeply respect, but what I love about this decision is that it makes so many people happy who have made Mommy and Daddy's decision, made the Earth Mother and the GameMaster's decision, not to marry but to commit and work and love, to put someone else first and acknowledge that such a place will be first now and forever.

I take my couplehood one step at a time...Mommy and Daddy still leave me in awe...but it's great to take those steps with the S.O. Even if she did propose a new nickname for me last night which is too damned similar to that of a certain 1960s supermodel.

The Dancer Moves Out

Today I spent ninety minutes of activity, sweat, and a lingering bittersweet air helping the Dancer move her furniture out of her apartment. This was the home of the first potluck in September on the same day as the Hyde Park Jazz Festival, when we played Celebrities for the first time and thus kick-started an entire year of amazing guesswork and motion...culminating in the Corset Party, where the Wolverine and I failed to interpret the Princess's impersonation of Curious George, which she will rightly never let us live down. And we had game nights there, and I made mead there, and I shared a great New Year's Eve dinner with the Dancer, her mother, the Connoisseur, and his friend there...of course, I'm leaving my apartment too with its many memories, but I knew from the start it was only temporary. Her place felt like a home. Which makes me think her new place will be equally homey.

One Last Thing...for Michael and Kate and Eric and Sarah (and what the hell, Chelsea and Mark could use it, too.)

The exhortation from the wedding reception:

As you take each other for richer or pooer, in sickness and in health, for better or worse...

May all your ups and downs be in bed.