The Death of Imagination

It's not often that I can say I've contributed to foiling a crime. (And by "not often", I really mean "not ever".) But I arrived at work to find an urgent message from my überboss about some titles which had shown up on the desk of a used-book dealer. The attempts to obscure our ownership stamps made him suspicious so he got in touch to see if they were missing from our shelves. I found no indication they'd been properly withdrawn, so security decided to refer the case to the police.

But it doesn't end there. I cc'ed in the head of circulation and she revealed that we'd been hit already by book thieves with a similar m.o. They obtained borrowing cards using pseudonyms, checked out their full allowance of recent textbooks with a significant resale value, and then disappeared. In fact, one of the books they made off was an earlier edition of an identical title! Replacement costs ran into the thousands at our library alone, and we weren't the only ones targeted.

I have to say, I'm anxious to hear what comes of this. The last time we lost serious money to a serial book thief, someone wrote a book about it.

I slept badly and woke up in the wee hours with a stomachache. It subsided later, but I still used it as an excuse to come in a bit later so I was able to see off Mom. It was bright and overcast at Loyola but became darker and darker the further north we traveled until it became obvious we were heading into a thunderstorm. Drops began to spatter the window as we neared my stop. I hit the ground running to the accompaniment of a tremendous KRACK-A-THOOM! and reached the shelter of the arcade just as the big drops began falling.

The rain had stopped by lunchtime. I was walking to a cafeteria on campus and the route I was taking reminded me of fall two years ago when I regularly went up with my student assistant to one of the branch libraries to work on materials being sent off-site. I hadn't heard from him in about a year and I idly wondered what had become of him. Not half an hour later I was standing at the railing tossing breadcrumbs to the sparrows when I heard someone say my name: the same student assistant, now working for a start-up while he finishes his degree.

Yesterday was the retirement party for one of my most beloved colleagues. Turnout was high, and included not just people from our workplace but members of the academic programme he worked most closely with and various professional organisations. Standing out among the button-down shirts and floor-length skirts was a guy with a Celtic moustache wearing hiking shorts and a t-shirt with a gym logo. I kind of rolled my eyes at the inappropriateness of grad students and went back to the buffet.

As the ceremony started, I was appalled to see Mr Camp Counselor sitting at the front of the room with the other speakers. He was actually the head of the programme, and his speech was as rambling and uninspired as his appearance; he sounded exactly like the Wyoming backwoodsman he was. Afterwards, I remarked to a coworker, "You're getting up to speak at a retirement party, put on some damn pants." She replied that that was just his "look" and she had respect for the way he remained "true to his persona". More eye-rolling. "Everyone has multiple personae," I said, "and part of being a grown-up is knowing which one is appropriate for a given situation."

But maybe I'm generalising too much from my own experience again? It's said that one of the reason homosexuals have been historically overrepresented in the dramatic arts is that we learn performativity from a very young age. By puberty at the latest, we know we have one self that the world will allow us to inhabit and another that we can only express in restricted situations. (The pioneers in gay lib, of course, are the ones who said, "Fuck that!" and chose to present that more fabulous self everywhere.)

More likely, though, this is just another good bourgeois virtue that I've fully internalised. Every situation in life--school, church, work, camping, etc.--has its own uniform and its own corresponding code of behaviour. Respectability is linked to learning the fine distinctions between them and ignoring them marks you as (at best) a bohemian and (more often) low-class, countrified, Other. It's made me cynical of the notion that there is a "true self" which it is a virtue to express always. If your behaviour isn't indexed to context, then it's antisocial--and we all know nothing good can ever come of that.

I think my fondest memory of yesterday evening will be the three of us--me, monshu, and Diego--slouchng in the front room trying to suppress our yawns because we were all enjoying the conversation so much that none of us wanted to be the first to admit we needed to wind it down and seek bed. It wasn't even that late, but between early rising and (in my case) late falling, we were all bleary. Plus, a hearty meal of (boughten) spätzle and (homemade) Swedish meatballs accompanied by a bottle of Naia and followed by mini Derby pies was definitely weighing on us. Besides, by then we'd accomplished what I'd hoped for: Diego (who works from home) had plans to join the Old Man for a midday concert on Monday.

It's been a somewhat stressful week, but things are looking up. I have my old reliable back in the assistant position, and he more than proved his worth today helping me out with a tattle tape test. This required that we set off the exit gates repeatedly for several minutes and I could tell he was getting more than a little embarrassed, but I coached him through it and then hustled us past the angry glare of the instructor who was attempting to conduct a class in the lobby at the time. Now I feel like the two or three other projects I've promised for delivery by the end of the week might happen as well.

And spring continues to burst out all over. Dad and I saw the first Judas tree over the weekend and now they're even coming into bloom closer to the lake. No hawthorns or dogwoods yet, but ornamental pears, plums, and more cherries. Plus azaleas everywhere, periwinkle in full bloom even on the south side of the streets, and trees leafing out right and left. They're predicting height-of-summer temperatures for tomorrow--which, if true, will make my office a swelterbox. Time to pack some shorts.

I left work in such a good mood today, at the shuttle stop, I began engaging the woman in front of me in conversation. Normally I just want to get home without anyone getting on my tits. I asked myself what was different and realised that I'd spent a far greater chunk of my day hearing the sound of my own voice than usual. It's enough to make me rethink what I should be doing for a living.

Basically the whole morning was taken up with a "train the trainers" session for small discussion group facilitators. To get a benchmark of where we were at, she asked us each to stand up and address the room for about a minute. While the others were jotting down what they might like to say, I jumped up and spoke my piece. At the break, I shrugged off compliments. This is the kind of thing that comes so naturally to me I reckon it to my "invisible competencies". Plenty of people, by contrast, would rather be punched in the gut--repeatedly--than have to get up in front of a roomful of people. So this is a talent I could be making much better use of than I am.

Certainly I've got to do something to keep the job interesting. I'm not going to be returning to the front desk any time soon--not unless there's a real shakeup of personnel. As the old adage goes, don't make someone a priority for whom you are merely an option, and that's all I was to them. Worse, I was an afterthought: It was clear I only heard from them when they were preparing something else and realised, "Oh shit, I never got back to Da." Sad to end fourteen years(!) of service on such a sour note, but it happens all the time--just ask the GWO.

He's doing magnificently, btw. New curtains arrived Wednesday and now he has a properly Wizard of Ozian nook for his cataloging work. His nasty scrape from his spill on Sunday is healed up to the point where he can be seen in public without his Carnival mask. We'll be celebrating with brunch on Sunday morning and dinner at jinju Sunday evening.

The tree is up! It's not even half decorated, but I guess there's really no rush. Tree trimming is actually kind of tedious on your own (even with appropriate musical accompaniment) so I'm just as happy to break it into quarter- or half-hour chunks over the next couple days. The prep work all went much fleeter and more smoothly than feared. In short order, monshu and I had assembled the sturdy new metal stand it took him six(!) stores to find and I'd hacked off a half dozen branches and several inches of trunk. It looks a little wonky, but its stability is unquestionable.

We went up a size this year. All the tabletop trees at Gethsemane were barely two foot and squat as shitting toads, so a helpful elf led me to the three shortest full-sizers on the lot. (Their pricing is so broken that I paid only $5 more for four times as much tree.) I grabbed the fullest of them and carried it home in my arms, then left it on the deck for two days while I summoned up the will. It's our first balsam fir and of course the smell is incredible.

This evening is our staff Holiday Party but I'm giving it a miss. One of my most treatured colleagues was vacillating about going and pointed out to me that since they're closing down the whole building this time, EVERYBODY will be arriving at once to a space which doesn't have the best flow under the most ideal conditions. I'm also feeling less than affectionate toward the institution again for a mix of reasons.

I mean, I'm thrilled for utopian_camorra for finding a job (a) in his area (b) in town; we all know how rare is these days. But it was, in the words of the aforementioned colleague, "wonderful and crushing news". Not only is he one of the most well-informed and politically-savvy people here, he's also one of the kindest and most supportive. I think back to how he intervened in my difficulties with his old department back in September. Then I ponder how none of the other principles involved has reached out to me since then (throwing considerable doubt on the sincerity of their motives in asking me to take a quarter off while they "get their shit together") and I feel very unhappy.

Yesterday another coworker called me "one of the most socially well-adjusted people in this institution". And the shame of it is I think she may be right. The context was that the bad habits of her colleagues are not making her attempts to overcome her own social dysfunctions any easier. I'm running into the same problem, getting a lot more reinforcement of my bad qualities than modelling of and encouragement to develop better ones. Why go someplace where I'll be reminded of that when I could be hitting the town with monshu, Nuphy, and Mr Cleveland instead?

Once again, events are overtaking my will to write about them. Yesterday was terrific and terrible at the same time. Due to poor scheduling, the peak came first at the middle of the day. One of my colleagues sent out a desperate last-minute call for tour guides and I obliged. I ended up taking four or five groups, including one that showed up after we thought we were done for the day. I was so elated by the experience that I just couldn't face heading back to my lonely workstation and hung out topside for a bit longer, jumping in to offer advice where it seemed appropriate.

That high lasted until my afternoon meeting. I knew to expect some dressing down, but I was unpleasantly surprised to find that, at least in one participant's mind, that was all the meeting was for. My concerns about problems with the student workers were dismissed with excuses and I left with the clear feeling that she wants me out. That seems like a serious overreach of her authority; so far my attempts to confirm this have been inconclusive, but I'm hoping that a meeting with the head of the unit will clarify matters. The whole affair affected me so badly that we ended up burning dinner and I struggled to get to sleep last night.

So now I'm feeling tired and stressed and not at all like doing the interviewing I need to do for a new student position. Last year at this time, I had something like 40 applicants for my open position; this year I don't even have ten. Of the four I've e-mailed so far, only one has gotten back to me. I'm determined not to panic, but I'm at least a week behind where I expected to be at this point. After the hire, the process becomes less stressful but even more annoying as I reprise the stale routine of training a new student assistant.

1. in Pension/Rente/Ruhestand gehen
2. met pensioen gaan
3. jubilarse
4. jubilar-se
5. se retirer, prendre sa retraite (LF)
6. ymddeol
7. dul ar scor
8. przejść na emeryturę
9. 퇴직하다 (退職하다)
10. 退休 tuìxiū
11. 退職する (たいしょくする)

Notes: 1. The three variants refer respectively to public employees, private employees, and the self-employed.

The retirement party for my big boss went well. I was a bit concerned the turnout might be small on account of the season, but it was quite respectable; former employees (some of whom I haven't seen in years) showed up to make up for the absence of some of the current crew. The food was generous, but except for the desserts it came from the local crap Cantonese place she inexplicably adores. The cake was fantastic and there were pastries from Meinl to boot. The number and length of speeches felt about right, though strangely her own boss said nothing. The only truly prepared remarks, in fact, came from the head of a completely different division where she's never worked (but whom she has done a lot of valuable work for in her time).

Ugh. Just sent a sternly-worded e-mail to one of my sweetest and most patient coworkers. I value her greatly, but I think she puts too much faith into leading by example and not enough into bringing the hammer down when necessary.

I'll admit, I was somewhat out of sorts today. Even if it's just a routine checkup, I'm always anxious about medical appointments. (When you depend on public transit to get across town, there's a lot that can go wrong.) Just to keep the stress level up, I agreed to attend a meeting right after the end of my shift with the understanding that I'd have to leave early. Plus I've slept poorly the last couple nights and yadda yadda.

So there I am, doing rounds, taking headcounts, fielding telephone calls, sending faxes, checking in audiovisual equipment, etc. Meanwhile, except for answering a couple of easy questions and chatting with one of her friends, all my partner did was mess about online. She got a technical question involving a password, completely mishandled it, and then dumped the patron on me, which resulted in my workstation and phone being tied up for twenty minutes while the poor woman consulted with a techie on a problem we should've been able to solve for her in two. (She was typing it in wrong. Happens all the time, and is easily fixed by spending a moment with them while they try it again.) Then this dear child turns to me helplessly when asked to grant a guess pass--literally one of the most basic things we do. Shortly afterwards, my sweethearted coworker arrives to relieve me and finds me still arguing with this dimwit. (I told her I didn't want to discuss the matter with her in the middle of a shift, but she wouldn't leave me alone.)

Then I get to the meeting and find that one of the participants will be late. When he arrives, he starts messing with the computer setup in the room (which he's never used before) so he can show us some file on his PC. I have to insist that he leave it so we can get to covering all the major points before I have to book it. And it's a good thing I did, because I somehow managed to get off a stop early on my way to the appointment and walk an additional mile to the doctor's office. Amazingly, he took me right at the scheduled time (well, not so amazing I guess when you consider that ten minutes later I saw him in the hallway laden with two tote bags and obviously on his way somewhere for the weekend).

*exhalation*

After that, the whole tenor of the day changed. It might still have been damp, gray, and a touch chilly, but I was on my way to meet monshu (who, caught flatfooted by the schedule shift was legging it to a cab) at Meinl for Old World comfort food. At his insistence, I had a slice of Mozartkuchen and a Mélange while I waited. I knew the restaurant wouldn't be a mob scene, but I hadn't expected it nearly empty. I unloaded my tale of woe on him when he arrived, then ordered the goulash for him and the Käsekrainer Spätzle for me (something of a misnomer, as the cheese was on the sausage rather than inside it).

Our server's high spirits complimented the mood. I asked if they could do a lemonade flavoured with elderflower syrup. "Sure," she said, "we could call it an 'elder-ade'." When I pointed out that that sounded like some sort of social welfare programme, she decided to go all Tolkien and called it, "An 'Eldar'. Like the name for the elves in the Silmarillon." (Yeah, you better believe she got a fat tip.) It had warmed up a bit, so the Old Man agreed to walk to the bus stop while I voiced my envy at the beautiful black-eyed susans in everyone's gardens. The northern horizon was an eerie orange and my work woes (and his) were far away.

I'm not sure how much of a success this year's Day of Enriching the Staff was--I guess we'll have to wait for the surveys to come in. Reports were that some of the events were sparsely attended and our centerpiece presentation had to be cancelled when the speaker got delayed due to (say it together with me) "weather in Chicago". But my day was a success as of the first presentation, an introduction to commedia dell'arte presented by a student of Second City and the Annoyance.

The format was simple: show a mask, talk about the character, give a short demo, invite everyone to learn a few gestures, and then tap a couple of participants to improvise a scene. He started with Zanni, the simplest (in more ways than one) and worked up to the Innamorati. I got tapped twice: first to take the mask of il Dottore and deliver a comic monologue on "the definition of 'library'" and then to take the part of an Innamorato in a parody of Romeo and Juliet.

My partner for the second scene was non other than my Überboss, who broke the fundamental rule of improvisation: She said 'no'. Literally. But I forgave her, because it proved a showstopper in a good as well as a bad way; I'm really not sure how we could've topped that laugh. She also gave a bravura performance as a Capitano in the previous scene. And even La Vache showed natural comic talent in the role of a buffoonish servant.

The presenter warned us it would be a workout and it was. All the gestures and movements are derived from ordinary ones, but enlarged and exaggerated until they become comic. This means big steps, holding your arms out, and lots of flailing about. The masks were beautiful, handmade in leather by a 3+ generation commediante, and we were warned not to touch them during our scenes--not, as I first thought, because of the risk of damaging them, but because the resulting sound might break the illusion.

Which is odd in a way because breaking the fourth wall is such an integral part of the performance. The first exercise he put La Vache through, in fact, was individually addressing each member of the audience to make sure she had their attention. Moreover, the only exception to the no-touching rule was that performers are allowed to lift their masks in order to address each other as actors and return to the scene.

My one disappointment was that we weren't able to do a multilingual scene. This was (and is) apparently common practice in the genre because troupes were, after all, international. Due to the lack of a common Italian vernacular, even those which never left Italy had to have members fluent in a variety of local dialects. He described a performance he gave in contemporary Italy where he spoke English while his three cohorts spoke Dutch, Italian, and Turkish, respectively. La Vache worked some French, Italian, and even some German into her bit, but I delivered mine solely in English despite being urged to mix it up more.

Who knows, though, I might get another crack. Certainly would enliven the planning retreat we have scheduled two weeks from now!