7 weeks after the interview...

"Matt: thanks for taking the time to talk with us about the Online Organizer position at Free Press. After careful review of all of the applications for our Online Organizer position we have decided to re-advertise the position. We are seeking candidates with more directly relevant online community organizing work experience and, in particular, candidates who will help diversify our staff.

We wish you the best of luck in your search..."

---
so that's that.

it's more than money could ever buy

we write new birthdays songs to sing to our friends. this is the only present there is: the present.

browsing in a bookstore i learn that all that places i end up living in are considered "latte towns." coffeeshop class struggle every fucking morning. i am not new here, take your bread and leave. my grandmother asks when i will get a job, well, one that's not in a cafe. as if this is really what i want to be doing or that i am content with the wage/rent system that prevents so many of us from doing what we love to do. as if the reason that i don't like working at a cafe is because how it defines my status and how that reflects my family.

so & so he has a job
gets up at a certain time goes to a certain place
takes a lot of pride in his work
it's not what he would choose
just does it for the money...

would if we were all truly in control of our lives? would if we stopped following orders and started following our passions? let's fire our bosses and stop being spectators.

steal a pumpkin from a pumpkin patch.
make someone a mixtape.

may all the old ways die

another month has begun and i find myself, once again, in a new apartment for the fourth time since i moved here in june. this should be more long-term though seeing that the lease runs through may and i have my own room with a door and everything!

so that's good.

a new month presents new possibilites. this is desperately important for me since things have not going so well lately. i need a spark, a new inspiration to get me going again. i just started playing music with some friends so that will be really good. it's amazing how many times music has saved my life. from mixtapes to shows it has the ability to help me transcend the bullshit of everyday life.

as i'm washing dishes at work i have a song in my head that makes me think of you...

the vulnerability of autumn

after much time and effort i finally finished my article for toward freedom about you and the antiwar movement! read it...here.

the seasons are changing and everyone is freaking out. there is a unique vulernability abound when it starts to get colder. we have to equip ourselves with new, warmer clothes that haven't been worn in months. we add extra blankets or maybe find someone to cuddle with. if you don't have a car then all sorts of new challenges arise when you want to go anywhere. this is what it's all about, these urgent moments of transition when you are more aware of your basic needs.

there's more to say but now is not the time. i hope everyone is hanging in there.

a weekend of adventure

i'm tired after an amazing four day adventure. if i had stayed here i would have endured an unremarkable weekend of working--days like any other, emptied into the dustbin of my history. instead...i went down to dc for the national antiwar march there on saturday. before that i surprised various friends in new york city and a fun time there before heading to dc. friday night ben and i took the chinatown bus to baltimore, a city that i had passed through dozens of times but had never set foot in. we stayed there with a friend of ben's that was writing an article about the protest with him for the new standard. we drove right into dc the next morning and met up with tens of thousands people from all over the country to oppose the occupation of iraq. it was pretty awesome.

i left that night with some students from bard college. we got back there around 4 am and then i took a bus back to northampton yesterday just in time to see erik petersen rock out at the flywheel. so many moments packed into one weekend. if i wasn't so tired i would go into it more now, but basically it was really amazing.

the suspension of everyday life

Dear Rebecca Solnit,

How are you? We met in Madison earlier this year before our unsucessful
attempt to meet up around the SF Anarchist Bookfair. Perhaps another time...(If you are curious about my project that I wanted to interview you for check out my weblog)

I'm writing you now to tell you how much I have enjoyed reading you're new book "A Field Guide to Getting Lost" and to ask you if you have published anything about New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina. I began reading the book a couple days before the hurricane hit. A week before there was a brief, minor power outage in downtown Northampton, MA (where I am currently living) which inspired a conversation with a friend about these moments when our daily routines are interrupted. Naturally, I brought up your talk in Madison about crises and the suspension of everyday life and how, given the opportunity, humans will cooperate and get along fine without the
imposition of authority. One inspiring example of this, among the many you cited, was the blackout a few years in New York City. My friend commented that that's what anarchy is (not the "anarchy" the New York Times employs to describe chaos of recent events).

Then the hurricane hit and, at least in the media, we saw a very different situation. But I'm sure in between the cracks, outside the radar of the media industrial complex there have been countless stories of inspiration and hope in humanity to overcome such tragedy. This catastrophe is also obviously related to "A Field Guide..." with thousands of people from the Gulf Coast being displaced.

I'm very curious to hear your reflections about these events. If you have already written something on the subject could please send me a link or attachment? Thank you!

Best,
Matt
----
im on a foreign keyboard--but look at the harper's website for my initial commentary.

thanks for writing,

r


The Uses of Disaster
Notes on bad weather and good government

Posted on Friday, September 9, 2005. This essay on the relationship between disasters, authority, and our understanding of human nature went to press as Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast. The excerpt below is followed by a postscript, available only on the Web, that specifically addresses the disaster in New Orleans. Originally from a forthcoming issue of Harper's Magazine, October 2005. By Rebecca Solnit.

posters and uncertainty

writing from the smith college campus center, i feel more conscious of my gender now that the fall semester has begun. walking around campus i wonder if some students think i may be f to m. probably not.

as i walked down the stairs to where the computers are i was bombarded with a college poster sale spectacle. this makes me think about what my life would be like if i was travelling around the us of a right now selling posters to college students as i thought about doing for a while. all expenses paid and you get to scam tips off students who think you are a starving poster-salesman.

i'm happy where i am now, despite persistent uncertainty. i know where i'm living and working for the rest of the month but then it's up in the air. i've been thinking about what it would be like to feel really committed to a community and have a really secure situation somewhere. i think that's what i want now but i'm really up for anything.

yesterday i made sandwiches for kim gordon (of sonic youth fame) and jay mascis (from dinosaur jr.). this is such a strange town.

did i mention that i have my own bed now? ah....

labor day labor

labor day. a dusty artifact of american culture. a pseudo-holiday in a society which lacks a true class consciousness and understanding of labor history. a disneyfied may day devoid of any substance or radical tradition. but despite this, american laborers do get this day off from work...unless you are a retail or food industry wage-slave.

so on this first monday of september i, like millions of other working americans, went to work. happy labor day.

a customer asked my boss if we were all getting time and a half for our labor day labor. "shhhh!" she responded revealingly. "i heard that!" i replied from behind the sandwich-making station. $7.50 per hour>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

on top of all of this i started getting sick the night before and going into work was the last thing i wanted to do in the whole world. five minutes into my shift i was wiping the tables down with windex and a paper towel. i sprayed a table next to a woman who was reading and sipping a latte that found this action unacceptable to her comfort: "i am chemically sensitive so you shouldn't do that near me." i passively nodded my head and walked outside to check on the tables there. i should've just walked home.

i talked about making a t-shirt that read "i am working on labor day" with the back reading "your leisure is a product of my labor" but that probably wouldn't make people want to buy cupcakes. i sported alf instead (the sitcom puppet not the clandestine organization).

but this could be the last labor day i work. i had a job interview with free press today for an online organizer position. a living wage, benefits, and holidays (even the most ambiguous ones) off! cross your fingers kids...

staying...for now

i'm living my life on a month-to-month basis. after passing up an opportunity to travel across the country with an extraordinary stranger, i recently decided to stay in the pioneer valley through september. today is september 1st. for the next month i will be living in an apartment in northampton that i just moved all of my belongings into, working at woodstar cafe and finishing my internship with class action. i also want to start writing/playing music with people in the area, make lots of stencils, bike everywhere, and take part in all the fun events that will be happening now that the colleges are back in action.

but october 1st is still a big question mark.

i'd like to stay in this area, and i probably will, but i really don't know what my life will look like at that point. i have an interview with free press next week about the online organizer position i applied for, so perhaps i will get that and will be able to start paying back my fucking student loans. we'll see...

for now, i'm here. staying...for now.

frameworks labeled home: part II

when you work part-time, occasionally you get 5 days off in a row. it's important to take advantage of this opportunity. so when i saw that i was not scheduled to work all week i made plans to go down to cape cod to see family and friends, relax and to put the aging summer into perspective.

when you hold on to your college id two years after graduation you can still get student discounts. a one-way bus ticket from northampton to boston is then reduced from $30 to $20. i got to hyannis by noon and met my mom and sister for lunch. then we walked down the street, through the crowded public beach and across the boundary of the so-called private beach. we were stared at by the elite privateers who have never seen a frozen cape cod in the winter months or it's desolation and peacefulness. we pretended to sleep to avoid their snooty wrath.

i had a really nice week at home. it's always good to go back there and put my whole life into perspective. seeing people and street names from my past, along with photographs and other memorablia of my personal history.

toward the end of the week i met up with corinna at nickerson state park, one mile from the house i grew up in, where she spent the week camping and taking a break from class action. on thursday we ended up at the land ho, a local watering hole that serves as a seasonal high school reunion venue for multiple generations of nauset high school graduates. i warned her that we would inevitably run into random people and as we arrived at the entrance i stopped and took a deep breath in preparation. opening the door we were greeted by two men. i recognized the one on the left as chris collins, wearing a land ho t-shirt, while the one next to him appeared to be much older. they both recognized me however and upon second inspection i realized that the older looking one was indeed mike murphy--class of 2000 and current town of chatham police officer. hadn't seen either of them since the late 90's. so weird.

we ate fried onion rings that, despite the exorbitant price had definitely not been prepared on the premises (or this hemisphere) as a mediocre bar band played loud enough to make one's throat sore from speaking over them. sarah's ex-boyfriend appeared next to us and he was utterly surprised when i tapped him on the shoulder and shook his hand. he lamented about his job moving furniture and the fact that the land ho bartender serves him up "the usual" before he can even make it to the bar. his gun-to-the-head motions made me pretty uncomfortable, but the interaction made me feel lucky that i didn't stay on the cape after high school or move back there permanently after college.

on friday night we went up to provincetown to see east coast tremors rock the squealing pig with their infectious brand of psycho surf. it was one of the rare dream-like moments in which disconnected people from my life are all in one space and i'm bouncing back and forth between them like a pinball. i left with a euphoric sensation of just being lucky to have so many great people in my life--even though i have to travel to see most of them. it was good to be home.

wake up call

after a blissful friday night i was briefly awoken this morning by the faint sound of my phone ringing. but it was waaaay too early to (physically) answer it. who the fuck is calling me anyway? back to sleep...at 9:30 am i wake up again, eyes open this time. but now i have the frightening realization that perhaps i was not scheduled to work at 3:00 pm today, but rather the opening 7:30 am shift! that's probably why my phone rang so damn early. i slowly grab my planner, open up to this week and stare at my ultimate (work-related) fear coming true: 7:30-2 in my signature hand writing.

fuck.

this is not a good way to begin a summer day. i listen to the multiple messages left by co-workers and bosses. i call the cafe to sheepishly apologize and tell them that i'm on my way. "see you soon," my boss replies. when i arrive enter through the back door. my boss requests that i speak with her outside. shit, is this really my life right now? "what happened?........"well, i let everybody screw up once." once. my expendability is layed out and reinforced in those words. i put on my apron and begin washing dishes. standing over the sink i think back to the first dishwashing job i had...10 YEARS AGO.

fuck.

i want more.

constellatory adventures

everywhere i go there is a coincidence waiting to greet me. life as constellation. everything thing revolves around the place where you began. everyone is related on some level.

in the next couple weeks i will figure out what i am doing. stay in northampton and work at the free press? go back to cape cod and figure shit out? stay here and figure shit out? go on a free cross country trip that a friend of a friend forwarded about widely? move anywhere? life as choose your own adventure book.

the thunderstorm and rain last night has changed everything. i can feel it in my bones. humid brutality has been washed away. we breathe again. tonight i will rock...

room, bike, phone

i have a room now and a bike and a phone. the luxuries of 21st century life in america. i might stay in northampton if i can get a job at free press.

the summer has just begun. there seems to be more potential now. is it just the ability to cross rivers and call friends to ask about song titles? mobility. communication.

but september is creeping up...i need to quit the cafe soon. everyday i work seems like my first fucking day on the job. "good luck with everything," she condescends as the buttons on the cash register beep uncontrollably. fuck you. this is not what i am living for right now. i'm just here for the wage, tips and the occasional free food. my life aspirations are bigger than the little world you've created for yourself in your head where your lesiure depends on my exploitation. this is not what i am living for. good luck to YOU.

i have keys to the office and the night owls in the park across the street watch me type this. it's still summer. it's still summer. go swimming. make some stencils. stay up all night. drink cold water. live...

early august medley

1.) homeless part II

walking down the street a man yelled out to me: "hey! dude with the dark sunglasses." he asked if i would be willing to donate a dollar to a charity for homeless people in the area. i hesitated, but then realized the weight of this request. i offered a dollar that i had received from tips at woodstar the night before. i told him that i didn't have a place to stay right now either and that i was sort of couchsurfing. he told me about how the church across the street has a place for folks to stay. i thanked him and told him that i have friends that will help me out and a potential home soon. "alright, i'll send a blessing up for you." i thanked him again and walked away as he discovered another guy with "dark sunglasses" who, from the hideous look on his face, did not appreciate having that pointed out to him. i walked thinking about everything, again confronted by my social privileges. most people who are truly homeless don't have the same options or resources as me. this is a situation of my own making that in actuality is just a nuisance, not an oppressive condition that i have to deal with for the rest of my life.

in fact, it will be over by the time that you even read this. i have been offered a room in a collective house in hadley and i am moving in tomorrow! the room is pink. the house is disbanding after the end of the month so it's temporary but it's cheap and amazing. so like i said before, i will be fine.

2.) no. i don't want to see you while you are in town this weekend.

i walk in defiance, trying not to make eye contact with cars as i walk around town. i look straight ahead or towards the tree tops so as not to seem defeated or as if i'm hiding from something. every fucking car that passes by is like a surviellance camera. i try to ignore it but it makes me even more of conscious of the possibility that i will be seen. this is bullshit. i slip up and look straight at the recently parked car. panic. my heart races and i begin walking faster. is my nightmare coming true? i walk around the corner without looking back...well, just once. i cross the street and i am free, for now. please leave...

3.) sleep-overs for survival.

thank you for letting me sleep in your bed. i feel like we've been friends all summer but i didn't even know your name when i got to your apartment thursday night. bodies traced on the porch with chalk like it's a crime scene as glass spins until the sun rises. this moment is rated PG-13 despite the suggestions, despite everything. i have to leave work early. a nap in the smith college campus center, newspaper at my side so it looks like i was just reading. i have keys to the office but the couches are too small. i have to wake up at 7:00 am so i return to your apartment before you leave for kareoke. thanks again for letting me sleep in your bed. you saved my life.

4.) i have a phone now.

please call me.

homeless in northampton

when you sleep
no one is homeless
when you sleep
you can't feel the hunger

-against me!

i left town monday night to escape the situation that i have created for myself. i had been planning on going to the mischief brew show in boston that night but my ride fell through. instead i found myself at my grandmother's house three towns away.

waiting for her to pick me up i decided that i would take a bus to new york city the next day. and i did. met up with jon and got to visit peter hart at fairness and accuaracy in reporting (fair) where i used to intern. i wanted to see griffin too but when i called her from the payphone at union square she answered...from albany. we missed each other by one day. after i hung the phone up the guy waiting to use it called me a "faggot." ah, new york. one day of summer filth baking in the sun was enough for me. i'm not sure if i really want to live there. of course if i found a rad job i would go for it, but we'll see...

took the fung wah bus to boston wednesday morning at 8am. arrived in boston to meet up with my mom for lunch. she's worried about me. my grandmother told her that i need new clothes. she thought i looked ill, like i lost weight in the past two weeks since she last saw me. i'm doing fine, i reassure her. met up with tyler at boston common and shot the shit amongst dogs the size of sport utilitiy vehicles. suv dogs for a supersized urban culture. boston is much cleaner than new york though and there's more trees. nick met us too and we walked and walked and walked looking for food. it was so great to hang out with those guys again.

i wish i could've stuck around longer. but of course i had to take another bus this morning back to northamtpon to work at woodstar cafe. the closing shift. so here i am, out of work. it's 80's night at diva's and i think i'm going... i'm just not sure where i'm sleeping tonight. but i'll figure out.

don't worry about me.

in the past week...

*i hung out with dave meek after his adventure in grenada.

*saw al burian and jessica hopper read at flywheel.

*realized that i sweep/mop floors left-handed.

*learned that i enjoy pulling weeds and watering plants.

*returned to the welfleet beachcomber to see east coast tremors.

*listened non-stop to old built to spill and pinhead gunpowder.

*took a 5 hour bus ride and then worked a 7 hour shift.

*was asked, "is this job working out for you?"

*danced my ass off to '90s music at the elevens.

*still haven't figured out where i'm living in the fall.

*...or next week.

show & movie

it was another day in which i woke up uncertain of what would happen--whether or not i would be able to do what i wanted to do. such is the life of a person without a phone or mode of transportation.

a monday show at flywheel that could've packed a huge hall in any large city: lightning bolt along with local legend thurston moore and his new side project the heavy creeps. a must-see show, indeed. it was scheduled for 8:00 pm and they meant it. by the time emily and i showed up it had been "sold out for a while." damn.

there were so many kids there and i realized how much i've missed all of that. everyone was all sweaty and gross because of the ridiculous humidity and heat. oh, and there's no air conditioning in the performace space. we did get to hang out in the air conditioned zine library room though while thurston's band played and everyone who got there on time suffered from the harsh conditions. i read an old copy of maximum rock n' roll from '92. the survey question of the month was: "would you fuck a punk over 30?" weird how the 17 year olds who were surveyed are the 30 year olds now. and how that will be me in 6 years. funny shit. there was also an ad for a "riot grrrl convention" in dc and i felt like i was flipping through a history book.

so...we left after all the sweat poured out of the room. instead of sticking around to partially experience lightning bolt's set we skipped out and drove to hadley to see the new charlie and the chocolate factory movie. i really enjoyed the book and original movie when i was younger so i was curious to check it out. it was fun but i did have a lot of issues with it. not just because johnny depp's willy wonka reminded us of michael jackson frollicking with the children through neverland. the whole oompa loompa subplot was pretty disturbing to me. i'm sorry but no silly song-and-dance number can make racist cultural imperialism cute. although i do appreciate the critique of greed and excess manifested in all the other spolied children.

i had a good night despite missing lightning bolt and everything.

search for meaning

it seems like it all comes down to having some sort of meaning in one's life: a direction, a sense of purpose. looking back, it's so obvious that the happiest periods in my life consisted of this urgency of meaning. from big things like protesting an ensuing war to little things like having an old friend visit for a weekend; this is what keeps me going. the challenge is to create that meaning in every word spoken, every breath inhaled.

labor puberty

i think i've figured out why i hate working so much. (besides the fundamentally warped logic of the capitalist wage economy) the underlying issue for me is manifested in the process of beginning a new job, getting trained. i feel scared, stupid, nervous and vulnerable. it brings me back to an earlier period in my life when i often felt insecure and socially inept. it's like puberty all over again.

i think a lot of people go through this when they start a new job but my problem is that sometimes that feeling doesn't ever completely go away. i continue to feel alienated from my work and these insecurities and fears linger. there's something dehumanizing about being trained in the most rote, menial tasks when i know that i could being doing something more intellectualy challenging that i would acutally enjoy.

but i get through the day knowing that this is a temporary situation. that something better awaits my near-future. as the operation ivy song continues:

...but i'll get out. i'll get out of here!

now i'm working just like everyone else

back in northampton after a wondeful vacation in maine.

started the internship at class action today.

tomorrow, i begin working at woodstar cafe.

now i just need to figure out what i'm doing this fall...