Some weeks I do transcription instead of attempting to write. (Transcription pays much better than attempting to write, I assure you.) This current job is a transcription of a meeting involving free trade agreements. I have some pretty strong opinions about free trade agreements, which are not the point.
What I find happens when I transcribe another person's words, verbatim, with stammers and mannerisms and all that, is that I am very sensitive to the channeling effect. I feel myself taking on their opinions -- only slightly, like they are inhabiting my fingers and eyes and ears just long enough to get their words on paper. But it is a real effect. So when I think about free trade agreements, and I do think about them frequently enough to matter, I feel like I for very brief moments can see all sides of the argument. It's kind of cool, but disturbing.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Monday, February 4, 2008
Reminding myself
Everyone is real. That's the main driving idea in my life. I know it sounds obvious and probably lame, but I think it's easily forgotten. (Or maybe it is just me who can forget it and the reason I have this main idea is to keep me from forgetting it!) The guy cutting me off in traffic, he's real; he has goals and a life. The kid in school who drops his tray in the lunchroom -- real. That embarrasses him. The laughter embarrasses him. He thinks about his clumsiness for a long time, remembers it when he leasts expects it. The losing team last night, did they sleep? Did they weep? Some of the fans did, I know.
This driving idea affects the way I parent, the way I write, the way I worry about people I have never met -- which keeps me from sleeping sometimes.
I wrote a dreadful poem in college. Really, who hasn't? The main point of this atrocious piece of work was the idea that when I ride along in the car there are people everywhere, going along, doing things, going places, and they don't even know I'm wondering about them and I wonder if they are thinking thoughts like mine. (Really atrocious, seriously bad.) But I still think those THOUGHTS when I'm driving along. I try not to think about the poem.
This driving idea affects the way I parent, the way I write, the way I worry about people I have never met -- which keeps me from sleeping sometimes.
I wrote a dreadful poem in college. Really, who hasn't? The main point of this atrocious piece of work was the idea that when I ride along in the car there are people everywhere, going along, doing things, going places, and they don't even know I'm wondering about them and I wonder if they are thinking thoughts like mine. (Really atrocious, seriously bad.) But I still think those THOUGHTS when I'm driving along. I try not to think about the poem.
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