I was sitting on my bed last night trying to decide what to write about today. My week is a lot of miscellaneous stuff. Yesterday, I taught a class that I usually teach once a year and then had a meeting to discuss the applicants for the job opening we have at the museum. Today, I really only have one thing: a doctor’s appointment. I think I am having an adverse reaction to one of my headache medicines, and I need to talk to my doctor to see if he thinks it is the medicine causing the problem or something else. It’s a sensitive and embarrassing issue, so it won’t be easy to discuss, but thankfully, I do feel comfortable enough with my doctor that I can discuss anything with him. But boy do I dread this conversation because it is going to be embarrassing. Then tomorrow, I have an appointment at the sleep clinic about my CPAP machine. Luckily, I don’t seem to have any appointments either away from work or at work. It should be an easy day (knock on wood).
Next week is going to be the really crazy week. Monday, I have a class that I’ve never taught before coming to the museum. I’m really not sure how that’s going to go, but I think there is a good possibility that it will go well. Tuesday, I have two medical appointments. One here in town for blood work, and one down at Dartmouth with the Headache Clinic. Wednesday, I am moderating a panel discussion, and you can never really know how those are going to go. In my experience, they never go quite like I hope they will. They have a life of their own. Then, Wednesday and Thursday afternoons and Friday we will be conducting the virtual job interviews for the applicants we chose trying to narrow down five candidates to two or three to bring to campus.
Hopefully, all will go smoothly, and no major problems or issues will arise.
I thought by now my reverence would have waned,
matured to the tempered silence of the bookish or revealed
how blasé I’ve grown with age, but the unrestrained
joy I feel when a black skein of geese voyages like a dropped
string from God, slowly shifting and soaring, when the decayed
apples of an orchard amass beneath its trees like Eve’s
first party, when driving and the road Vanna-Whites its crops
of corn whose stalks will soon give way to a harvester’s blade
and turn the land to a man’s unruly face, makes me believe
I will never soothe the pagan in me, nor exhibit the propriety
of the polite. After a few moons, I’m loud this time of year,
unseemly as a chevron of honking. I’m fire in the leaves,
obstreperous as a New England farmer. I see fear
in the eyes of his children. They walk home from school,
as evening falls like an advancing trickle of bats, the sky
pungent as bounty in chimney smoke. I read the scowl
below the smiles of parents at my son’s soccer game, their agitation,
the figure of wind yellow leaves make of quaking aspens.
About This Poem
“Of late, I’ve been actively recording my responses to the seasons. Fall is particularly spectacular in northern New England; the countryside of Vermont hits my bones like warm bands of neon; there’s that palpable change in the air, electric and mysterious. However, in late autumn, one senses the impending, long wintry gloom overtake all reason. At some point, I began to understand Robert Frost and what critics such as Lionel Trilling and Joseph Brodsky argued, which is the darkness that hits the spirit. I think the poem is also an attempt to get out from underneath the shadow of the poet who looms in New England and to trouble the iconicity of the ‘quaintness’ of Vermont.”—Major Jackson
About This Poet
Major Jackson is the author of five books of poetry, including The Absurd Man (2020), Roll Deep (2015), Holding Company (2010), Hoops (2006) and Leaving Saturn (2002), which won the Cave Canem Poetry Prize for a first book of poems. His edited volumes include: Best American Poetry 2019, Renga for Obama, and Library of America’s Countee Cullen: Collected Poems. A recipient of fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Guggenheim Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, Major Jackson has been awarded a Pushcart Prize, a Whiting Writers’ Award, and has been honored by the Pew Fellowship in the Arts and the Witter Bynner Foundation in conjunction with the Library of Congress. He has published poems and essays in American Poetry Review, The New Yorker, Orion Magazine, Paris Review, Ploughshares, Poetry, Poetry London, and Zyzzva. Major Jackson lives in Nashville, Tennessee where he is the Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Chair in the Humanities at Vanderbilt University. He serves as the Poetry Editor of The Harvard Review.
This weekend has been both interesting and frustrating. Saturday, was just frustrating. I drove down to Middlebury, Vermont, because I wanted to take a drive and had the time to do so. I also wanted to check out a store that’s down there, and I’d found a restaurant while looking online that I wanted to try. First of all, Middlebury is not an easy place to get to from where I live. I won’t bore you with the details about the routes to get there. I took the safer and longer way to get there, and it was not an unpleasant drive, even though it was a dreary weekend. When I got to the store, it was nothing like I’d expected, and it was a bit disappointing, but I thought I’d be able to salvage the day by having a good lunch. I got to the restaurant only to find a note on the door saying they were closed that day due to a positive COVID case. My other lunch options were limited because in Middlebury most places don’t open for lunch on Saturday. The few places I did find had very long waits for a table. Finally, I gave up and headed back home thinking I’d find a place on the way back. No such luck. I was halfway home when I finally found a place, and by then, I was very hungry. At least that meal was very good. I got home and watched football for the rest of the day. One loss, two wins. Not too bad.
Yesterday, I was chatting with a guy on Grindr, and it turns out that he’s a fellow southerner. It was a chilly and dreary day, so we decided to get together and just cuddle. Of course, it tuned into more than just cuddling, and I did something I’d never done before. I’ll be honest, there isn’t much I haven’t tried before. I’m not going to go into detail because it’s personal, but I will say this, it was surprisingly enjoyable. He seemed to find it very enjoyable too, though it was something he’d done before, I just hadn’t. Anyway, let’s just say, it was very interesting and something I’d definitely do again. I also very much enjoyed the cuddling and holding him in my arms. Sadly, he couldn’t stay too long, but he stayed a good little while. Here’s the frustrating thing: he has a partner and is in an open relationship. Apparently, they are ok with each other hooking up with other people, but they don’t seem to see a person more than once, at least that was the impression I got. It’s frustrating because we seemed to connect and have a great time, and I’d have loved to just have him as a friend, but I guess that’s not how these things go.
Grindr can be a very frustrating thing. You meet people and have a great time chatting with them, and then nothing ever materializes. The guys on there seem to fall into a few categories, at least in my opinion. One, they are closeted and they can discuss their fantasies, but when it comes to meeting up, they just don’t have the courage to do so. Two, they are married and want to cheat on their spouse, whether they are married to a man or a woman, it doesn’t matter, I am not going to fool around with a married man behind his spouse’s back. Three, they are in an open relationship, and they aren’t looking to establish any other type of relationship. Four, they are one of the catfishes (usually African or Eastern European), and they are the worst of the lot. It seems impossible to find a single, unattached guy who wants to see how things go. They exist because I’m one of them, and I can’t be the only unicorn* in the bunch. I don’t mind hookups, in fact, more often than not, I find them quite enjoyable, but I am receptive to something more if it comes along.
Just to make clear, I am fully aware that Grindr and all of the other “dating” apps are really just hookup apps. I know when I log on that mostly it’s just guys who want to get their rocks off and move on to the next guy. I told one guy the other day when he asked me, “Have alot of luck with this app?” and I said, “Mostly flakes to be honest. Guys beg to get together and when we set something up, then they all of a sudden can’t get together.” Honestly, it’s amazing how often that happens. He also asked the inevitable question, “What are you looking for?” I replied, “I would really like to just find a friend who I can fuck around with….I wouldn’t mind something more than a fuck buddy, but I’m being realistic. That’s so hard to find.” It really s hard to find. I am a shy person so it’s hard to meet someone outside of one of the apps, but sometimes it does feel like I’m the only single gay guy around.
*Urban Dictionary defines a unicorn as being “the rare creature who is able to give you the thing you always wanted but thought you could never have.”
But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows.
—Luke 12:7
The picture the Bible paints for us is one that lets us know without a shadow of a doubt that we are known by God. He made us with a plan and a purpose in mind. Life has its ups and downs. Sometimes those high points are really high, and sometimes those low points are really low. It’s in those lowest points that we may think that God doesn’t know us or that He is not there for us. Yet, if we rely on God’s love for us, He will protect us and bring us through our darkest days.
Maybe you’ve had something devastating happen in your life, or you may experience depression that you think you can never climb out of the depth of your minds. Proverbs 29:25 says, “The fear of man brings a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord shall be safe.” Sometimes, a life tragedy and depression are one and the same, a cause and effect. We wonder if God is listening to us. Is He going to help us? He most certainly will, if you allow Him to do so. Psalm 46:1-3, 7 tells us, “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, even though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; though its waters roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with its swelling…The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge.”
God knows us best and loves us with fierce and powerful love. We may feel lost at times and without a purpose, but God has a plan for us, which is why He will get us through the toughest of times in our life. Jeremiah 29:11 says, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.” We may not ever understand the full extent of God’s plan for us, but if we are receptive to putting our lives in God’s hands, then He will guide us through His plan for us. Proverbs 3:5-6 clearly states this, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.”
I have been watching the science fiction series Babylon 5 for a talk I will be giving. I watched it back when it was on from 1993-1997. The first four seasons were pretty good, the last season was a different story, although there were some good parts. In the penultimate episode, a character records a message for his unborn son to be heard on his twenty-first birthday, which I think is very relevant to today’s post, and I hope you will think so too.
“As you continue on your path, you will lose some friends and gain some new ones. The process is painful, but often necessary. They will change and you will change, because life is change. From time to time, they must find their own way and that way may not be yours. Enjoy them for what they are and remember them for what they were… I really do believe that sooner or later, no matter what happened, things do work out. We have hard times. We suffer. We lose loved ones. The road is never easy. It was never meant to be easy, but in the long run, if you stay true to what you believe, things do work out. Always be willing to fight for what you believe in. It doesn’t matter if thousand people agree with you or one person agrees with you. It doesn’t matter if you stand completely alone. Fight for what you believe.”
—John Sheridan (Bruce Boxleitner) in episode “Objects at Rest” from Season 5 of Babylon 5 written by J. Michael Straczynski
Say hey, good lookin’, what you got cookin’?How’s about cookin’ somethin’ up with me?Hey, sweet baby, don’t you think maybeWe could find us a brand new recipe?
Joe
The Closet Professor 