Snobbin: Beautiful Trash in the Pop Culture Gutter

Give me life or something less explicit, as the receipt of my boring considerations April 26 is a day of little relevance, posting idly on the internet and floating between transit or transom, trying to maintain a fresh status in the queue of  extemporaneous age (what does that even mean?)  Pop psychology! (The pain) Illiterate (transposed) on a bed of dying critics (capitalism's nightmare  is just an invitation to create garbage (creating a world of carbon copies) What would Baudelaire or Baudrillard think? Build a decadent Disneyland  for your fucked up imaginings.  Rhizomes from another mother, as Deleuze and Guattari found out soon enough (These roots go deep, back to radical and conventional thinking) Buried in the soil mossing yet another stone that refuses to gather momentum. Yet it remains the same. The damn song remains the same. Take that Zeppelin.  Take that Postmodernism. (Are you a capitalized thought?) (Are you a capsized thought?) Take that F...

I keep working on so many writing projects that mostly will never see fruition, spreading myself so thin in order to avoid imposter syndrome and the inevitable focus on what I see as failures. My whole life has been one long struggle to communicate coupled with an obsessive need to document my struggle through different writing forms and ideas. Lately, I have been contemplating the book while finishing up a few articles.  I am writing this post to keep myself honest and focused. My ultimate goal is to put together the proposal and the introduction before the end of summer. I want to conclude the two projects I am working on, but I have to wait for the inevitable comments. I published one book chapter this year, but another was canceled. I am waiting for additional feedback on two journal articles. I was hoping I could meet my other writing goals by summer, so I can focus most of my time on researching the book and beginning to finally draft it.  Today I am dealing with carpal ...

I'm hoping to start writing regularly again, particularly beginning work on my first nonfiction book. It's been a long time coming. I've written numerous chapters/articles, blog posts, poems, a few failed book proposals, and other miscellanea but have never finished a longer work, unless you count the dissertation. Of course, numerous health challenges in the last few years have dampened this dream. My hands feel better after using wrist braces for my carpal tunnel, but I cannot type like I once did. They still hurt and are shaky. I've been having brain fog and a stuffy headache from the forest fire smoke. I feel like I'm moving in slow motion. I'm posting this for support and motivation to get back to it. I want to find the strength and energy to keep going. I miss writing the way I used to since it has been part of me for as long as I can remember. However, I made it into work for so long that I'm trying to find the fun again, along with the ability to phy...

I've really dropped off the map with this blog in recent years due to a few major life circumstances, including miscarriages and job loss. I figure I will record my journey in a series of blog posts, poems, and short essays as I attempt to navigate my issues and write more for the blog. I have been continually working on academic articles and chapters along with editing fiction and hopefully working on my own book proposals for an edited collection and for a possible music/film book. I always have so many ideas, but my follow-through has been lacking.  Here are my proposals and goals for 2024: 1. Rework my Green Day 33 1/3 proposal in hopes of publishing some of it. Perhaps, I might put it on the the blog like I did with my Drive-By-Truckers Southern Rock Opera attempt a few years ago. 2. Write and publish a CFP on my favorite television show of the past few years for a possible edited collection. 3. Finish the two chapters for edited collections that I am currently working on. 4....

I never live up to what I expect from myself. I have Imposter Syndrome and Generalized Anxiety. I achieve most of my goals, but I am still unhappy since I do not know when to quit.   I cannot stop comparing myself to others despite different career paths.  I compete with myself as much as others.  I have been teaching five courses per semester at the highest level for years. I have a vigorous publishing schedule that often gets in the way of my personal goals.  I enjoy writing most of the time.  I'm not getting any younger, so I think I might just have to give up. I should settle for what comes and finally write that book.  I will remain tired.   I am angry most of the time. 

Since I moved to Arkansas a few years ago, I have realized how much the pollen affects me and how ubiquitous it can be. I have always gotten sick every year when the trees start blooming, but in Arkansas, it is so much worse. The pine trees and many other plants start blooming, and I find myself a sick mess. My ears are plugged, my head is stuffy, and my body aches. When I first encountered these symptoms a couple of years ago, I thought I had the flu, but friends informed me that it was just the pollen. The trees are beautiful, with their needles appearing ever greener through the haze, but yellow pollen covers the roads, vehicles, and pretty much anywhere else it can land. A blanket of yellow clogs the air, and it is even visible in the water that pools in drains and puddles along the muddy ground. When I return to Wisconsin, other blooming polliniferous plants will hit me again, so my head will remain a mess.  Of course, this haze cuts down my productivity, and I struggle to cat...

Sometimes I wonder why I write since I seem to be running into more roadblocks these days. I put many hours into a project even though it might never reach fruition due to someone else's disinterest or rejection. Worse yet, I might never finish the project because I am tired or do not know how to complete it. The obstacles keep mounting whether they are external, such as committee meetings or more papers to grade, or internal, especially self-doubt and inability to commit to ideas. I seldom have writer's block, but I often lack the commitment to do the hard work of editing or revising.  Writing is a commitment that sometimes feels too much like a compulsion because I often find myself writing when I should be relaxing. I want to write in my free time, but I also want to sleep, watch television, or listen to music. Instead, I try to push through, but my job and other commitments have made it increasingly hard to do so. There are only so many hours in a day is a truism that does ...

writing poetry is fun when you have free time; however, you might not take it seriously when  you have bills piling up in the corner, when  you have a pile of stacked midterms, when you have an article due with the editor breathing down your neck, when the editors are not responding to the lengthy e-mails you send them, or when you find that editors and readers want  a different style than you are selling, and students want a different grading system; you cannot pay the bills without the CVV number, the QR code, or  whatever that thing is; you cannot pay the bills without an exorbitant convience fee that ain't so convenient; editors don't care and students don't care that you have bills due, and creditors don't care that you are done  with their codes and numbers just like you are done  with the numbers on the midterms, or the unreturned phone calls to political campaigns; it is October  in an election year; however, you should take that seriously. wri...

Sometimes when you work too much, you achieve a level of clarity that allows you to step back and take stock of your life and the choices you have made. Other times you just feel exhausted and want to take naps and sleep in every day. Of course, you force yourself to get out of bed and go to work because that is the adult thing to do and you have responsibilities. If you are anything like me, your sense of self-worth that is intricately connected to conscientiousness bordering on insanity. Your Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) leads to the strangest behaviors like getting to work early and taking on extra work to maintain a sensible sense of identity.  During these odd days of COVID, I find myself doing less work than usual or struggling to maintain my usual level of obsessive-compulsive writing and grading. I have new habits of grading a few papers a day instead of my standard marathon sessions; however, if I do decide to embark on a marathon grading regimen, I have graded for ...

I missed working at the library for the last several years, so I plan on working here more this semester. I am still waiting to get my office on campus, so I am sequestered in the library, importing my classes into Canvas and revising my syllabi. Hopefully, I will be doing most of this in my office in the future because I am excited about doing research at the library again. The library is always quiet, and I love hunkering down between books, and working. The musty smell of the books, old wooden tables, brick walls, are like home to me. I have been working in school libraries for years, and I never get sick of it. However, sometimes I get too comfortable and dose off between the stacks.

My memories of the first place I lived are fuzzy. I remember orange carpeting and brown walls in the trailer my parents rented the first three years of my life before we moved into the house on 6th Avenue that they still live in thirty years later. I remember a car my mom drove a few years later when she first got her license a little better. It was a tan sedan, a nondescript Ford or Mercury model with leather seats that smelled vaguely of cigarette smoke and oil, making my young mind think of the piles of dog poop soured by age that sat in the back yard of my parent's home until we got around to cleaning them up. I cannot remember if most of these experiences were truly real. I know that car was because I was around seven years old when my mother finally learned to drive. She had a series of cars that came from my grandfather's Ford dealership. Later she got her own, but my grandpa drove cars from his garage my entire life; they too smelled of cigarette smoke and old oil. ...

The snow is piling up outside even though it is April, and I am sitting in my office procrastinating. I think of winters past, that time of year when it gets so very dark out and the creepy, childhood monsters seem to be waiting at your door. I would get off the school bus and run through the short space between the street and my house like I was afraid. The lights were bright in the house and there was spaghetti on the stove. The family would sit down to eat and discuss the events of the day. I played batman video games and listened to oldies radio. Perhaps, I drank some hot chocolate. Now I work and think about that hot chocolate. Tonight when I go home, I hope it won't seem that dark, but I bet the hot chocolate will be just as good.

Over the past few years, I feel like I have begun to slowly unravel. I feel like I lost part of myself that I might not be able to reclaim. I am far more tired than I feel I have the right to be. But I also have never learned how not to be hard on myself. A colleague told me recently that "you are always so hard on yourself. You have to learn your self worth." Nothing could be truer, but it is hard to rediscover my value because of my own negative thoughts and self-deprecation. All the stress from my PhD studies is finally catching up with me. When I was working on my dissertation, I never had that much time to worry because I was so busy trying to get it done. Now I feel even busier. I teach five classes and have five tutoring sessions on top of it. I am working on an article that does not seem to be gelling quite like I want it to, and I hope that I can eventually catch up on sleep. My stress management seems to be failing me. I get home after a busy day at work and pre...

I often feel the pull of the written word, encouraging me to read and write fiction far more than I have time for. Yet I have so many stressors in my life, pulling me in all directions, halting my efforts and sapping my strength. It is all I can do to put a few words down on paper for a book chapter I am working on or scribble a few notes for my movie list. I write this from the standpoint of finishing my doctoral dissertation in the spring, teaching the equivalent of six courses, and trying my best to seek tenure. During these rough spells, I have been trying to read fiction and slowly writing a little. Someday I hope to get back to my manuscript and at least finish one novel or a few short stories or pull a few more of my grey hairs out. I take comfort in the fact that many are late bloomers to this fiction game. However, I have been writing fiction for more than two decades and have never taken it all that seriously. It is a given, but there is something to be said for sitting dow...

" One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise. This philosophy fitted on to my early adult life, when I saw the improbable, the implausible, often the  'impossible,' come true.”  -F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Crack-Up , 1945 I should be working on many different things, including applications, revisions, and grading student papers. Yet I find myself at a cross roads, torn between doing the things I love and trying to keep food on the table. I struggle at being an academic, a teacher, a citizen of this mess of a country, while working sixteen hour days. I feel disappointed and broken if I take time to watch a movie or listen to a record. The mounting stress and anxiety bleeds into my work, etching my writing and my scholarship indelibly until the two become inseparable, a misshapen hulk of a thing, trending between monster, art, and commerce. I know that this will someday end at the inquisition or the tenur...

These days are increasingly fueled by an antiseptic need for withdrawal -- a calm pause before the perpetual storm. The work mounts, and I disappear into intoxication and minimal self-effacement, transferring my energy to fiction instead of mounting abstracts and applications. I write prose poetry about my lack of ambition, while i thumb through interminable drafts of student papers, failed fiction, and the occasional listicle written on tattered notebook pages.  I write lists like a man possessed, usually finishing the easy items or transferring them to another list, asking for nothing less than being done eternally. Yet my manic energies and anxieties compound such lists. I sit entranced at the computer screen, looking at another file, attempting madly to use all the ink in my listing pen.  Did an emo song or an old, lovelorn rock 'n' roll song start this way? A person at the end of their energies, writing about someone or something that done 'em wrong keeps on kee...

Where do the years, weeks, and days go? I imagine they are stored in underground caverns loaded with greying filing cabinets. Or are they, like my writing, forgotten in folders and files. I often think of the nonfiction essays, the short stories, the uncracked and lonely novels I have started. Is it 1996? Is it 2004? The drafts remain unfinished. I put them off for work at the restaurant. I put them off for graduate school, theses, and dissertations. I put them off to teach course after course, telling myself that I will finish this year. I know it won't happen until I'm old and grey. Will it happen before I'm buried under an oak tree, green grass spreading over my unharried corpse.

Each summer I rack up an amazing list of wasted opportunities, unproductive mishmashes of scattered writing, files full of mindless ramblings all in search of effectual copy. I write a lot and read even more in order to continually perfect my game, but fall under the weight of the work, ineffectually stumbling back months later and wondering where to begin. As writers many of us fall into this pattern, putting work down never to return to it or never able to quite pick up where we left off. Summer is the time for me to supposedly catch up, but life always gets in the way. Even my blog posts trickle recently as dissertation chapters take all of my time. Fiction and essay writing are relegated to brief meanderings as I focus all of my attention on one never-ending project. While I just finished my dissertation introduction, so now I plan on writing more, updating old posts and returning to music, film, comics, and the essayistic scene of the crime instead of dropping in every once in...

Haunted thoughts of rusty pens sheathed, That you should be mad in the darkness drifting, That the world is nothing if not yours bequeathed. Though the doldrums that kept me wreathed In scholastic cages monthly shifting, Haunted thoughts of rusty pens sheathed. I never got to write, but static noise leaked, From my pen like a random shifting , That the world is nothing if not yours bequeathed. I slowly forgot your name, barely breathed. My glamorous past kept me listing, Haunted thoughts of rusty pens sheathed. The dogs in the cages seethed, Their barks vulgar and resisting, That the world is nothing if not yours bequeathed. Oh my lover and my cheap pen creased, A tragic benediction of misused time twisting, Haunted thoughts of rusty pens sheathed, That the world is nothing if not yours bequeathed.

One good thing about reading for exams is that what I read will always be with me. I'm a strong proponent of the idea that what has been read can't be unread and what you have written can't be unwritten. While the details might get hazy - plot, themes, characters, etc. - the very act of reading a book adds to your mental catalog of literature, helping you to better understand, if not create, your own essays and writing. Each book read shapes your mental corpus and allows you to draw on the experiences of other writers. Each essay written focuses your abilities. So the more reading and writing you do, the better you will get at both and the better you will be able to analyze and comprehend what others have written and what you need to know to keep writing. This all might be a tad elementary, but a continued sharpened knowledge base coupled with life experience can go along way to keeping you in the game.