Sunday, December 21, 2008

make it good

I really do amaze myself sometimes. How is it I can be so pragmatic and unemotional about certain things, but then completely lose my mind when it comes to a few select others? I guess "lose my mind" is the wrong expression. I don't think crazy thoughts about these delicate issues, but I seem to constantly be feeling strong feelings that manifest themselves in uncomfortable physical conditions, like a constantly tightened diaphragm, shortness of breath, stress stored in painful lumps at the base of the neck. My rational mind knows what is happening, knows it is powerless to control the situation in any way, but my cardiovascular system and adrenal glands don't see it that way. My body sees this thing as a constant threat to its wellbeing, perhaps its very existence. So how do I eliminate from the body the thing that has permanently altered the mind, like a rare hallucinogen? The cerebral effects are somewhat pleasing even when they are unwelcome and unexpected, but the physical overstimulation is more than I can stand. I ache all over.

I'm not really scared, either. It is merely uncomfortable.

This all could just as easily be the fresh array of symptoms from some degenerative disease that has been dormant until now.

Strange, though, how it coincides with this utterly absurd time in my life. I wonder how this absurd time will measure against all the others I've already lived through. Does this take the cake? Mmm, cake. I had a chocolate muffin from Robeks today.

I feel like I need a full body cast just not to melt into a puddle of human fragility. I need something solid to contain my strange ethereal essence. Feeling connected to everything all at once, even on a purely philosophical level, is exhausting... As is pining away for something you can probably never have.

Also I am newly addicted to Nat Shermans.

Merry holidays!

2 comments:

tortoise said...

Hey Mariya,

I just heard you on the Junkies "best of" that was broadcast over the holidays. I have to say I disagree with your estimation of the junkies, especially vis-a-vis howard stern. The post in your blog seemed to say that the Junkies don't see anything beyond asking you questions about your sex life, hotness, etc. But if you thought about it, you'd realize the experience on the Stern show is the same. Do you really think Stern asks his employees more real questions than the Junkies asked you? He does the exact same stuff! As for your critique that the junkies talk too much about sex, Stern does that all the time! He built his reputation interviewing pornstars and asking them to show him their private parts.

How is that so much better than the Junkies? You said to the junkies on-air that you wanted more show content to be about the staff. They regularly have Bret and CK, not to mention Bob Gu and Matt Valdez, chime in. As for your suggestion that they have BDK on more, have you listened to the segments with BDK? IMO, they are the worst Junkies segments, not funny, just EB and BDK trading insults and trying to sabotage each other.

I read the comments from your post in March. People attacked you for criticizing the Junkies and it seems like you felt that was unfair. But your posting vacillated between being angry with the junkies for seeing you as a girl, happiness with the internship, and thinking you are so much better than the junkies. It is natural to think you are condescending and arrogant because your writing bears that out: "They can't even fathom that I may know more than them about the world at large, or that my IQ is most likely higher than their IQs averaged... maybe even put together.. haha. " That doesn't sound like someone joking. Talking down about the Junkies on Stern's wrap-up show AND then acting like it wasn't a big deal and making excuses for yourself when the Junkies confronted you about it is unfair, not to mention duplicitous. I lost some respect for you because you weren't being honest or open as a staff member, which was the very thing you said the Junkies lacked - genuine interaction.

If you want to be better understood, you ought to make an effort to communicate better. Entertainment is hard business and it's ambitious of you to pursue a career in it. But I would suggest that until you have demonstrated that talent, you may benefit by listening more (the junkies are my favorite radio show, and I used to listen to Stern) and talking less.

MariyaWrites said...

Your respect doesn't mean anything to me, as I don't know anything about you.

But just for the sake of humoring yet another misguided attack on my character, let me try to address some of your concerns.

You have every right to disagree with me about Howard Stern being different from the Junkies, because it's just that, an opinion. The fact that you don't see the stark difference does tell me, however, that you understand very little about how Howard's mind works and what he actually finds funny, and how he is able to connect with people as well as he does. The Junkies all possess a great degree of talent, to be sure, but their basic perspectives on life tend to contradict many of my own, so I simply don't relate to them. (I find the most common ground with JP) You can say that on the surface all radio shows are the same - the sex talk, the strippers, porn stars, etc. Surely you must realize that none of that offends me, as I willingly participated in all discussions pertaining to such topics. My issue was with how my internship was handled from the beginning. I saw male interns with less training and qualifications than me get preferential treatment, my attempts to engage creatively with the show's production were ignored out of sheer laziness, or worse yet, out of disdain for me as a woman. You didn't experience what I experienced there, so you really have no basis for forming your opinion other than what you heard on the air and reading my extremely sarcastic, purposely ironic blog. Even the quote you chose to highlight in your comment is very telling of your inherent insecurities as a man threatened by a woman stepping out of her place. What I was lamenting in that blog entry was not that I am in fact smarter than anyone, but the fact that my intelligence or lack thereof seemed completely irrelevant to the people with whom I was making honest efforts to engage.

You can interpret my writing any way you please, but again I can assure you it is intended to be post-modernistic and absurd, fueled largely by self-loathing on my part. I certainly don't think any of what I did warranted the kind of hateful vitriol I was bombarded with. If you think I deserve to be called demeaning names associated mainly with my gender - because let's face it, if I were a guy saying the same stuff, it would be a different ball game - then you and I also have fundamentally opposing views of the world and I can't possibly hope to convince you of anything. Nor should I want to.