Yes, it is finals season and i’m on lock-down, but some rituals simply cannot be broken. On 18 May 1999, i flew back from Amsterdam (with a flight full of Star Wars fans) to celebrate Jon’s birthday by watching the midnight showing of Episode I with a pile of friends in Seekonk. We had seen every re-release midnight opening night, celebrated by long goofy lines and various piercings (my piercer in Providence had a small Star Wars obsession). Jar Jar aside, we were dreadfully disappointed by Episode I. Yet, i returned for the sappy love story of Episode II, once again at midnight on opening night. Given ongoing disappointment, i had avoided even thinking about Episode III until i realized the release date. Jon and i giggled as we relived college years, celebrating his birthday by romping into the Metreon for a near midnight showing with a crowd full of light sabers and costumes, chanting and even executing “the wave” as people awaited dun-dun-de-dun…

When we walked out, we looked at each other and laughed. “At least nothing sucked” we both agreed. Light sabers galore, Episode III is nothing more than an action-packed filler piece to complete the puzzle. Little dialogue, no real passion, minimal substance. There’s something strange about seeing a movie where you know the beginning and know the end and are just waiting to see the interpolation. It’s been almost 28 years since the original one was projected – my entire life. What a funny end of an era. Of course, i don’t think that anyone at the Metreon tonite saw the original release in the theatre. We all grew up with it and somehow, needed the finale. Maybe now we’ve grown up?

When i first picked up Jocks & Burnouts, i was very reticent; the very terms in the title reflect outdatedness. But as i dove in, i realized that this was going to be a key text for my dissertation. It’s an ethnography of American high school, looking at the categories that we all had. Jocks are the folks who participated in school activities and helped maintain the school’s status quo. Burnouts are those who loathed the school’s pseudo-parenting bullshit and did everything possible to rebel.

What i found painful reading this book is that i could not resist the masochistic desire to see how i fit into the picture. Interestingly, i found that it answered a comment that has haunted me for years. In the 9th grade, the school psychologist said that i had a 10% chance of graduating. In high school, i was neither or both a jock and a burnout. It has some history…

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I’ve reviewed papers, run workshops, juried for things online but never have i found jurying to be so stimulating as my experience this week at Prix Ars Electronica. Last year, when i saw the call for submissions for the digital communities category, i was utterly frustrated. While i have not resolved all of my frustrations with the call, i have come to see the value of the Prix for what it does do; i still think that the call needs to be changed to more appropriately manage expectations and make transparent intentions and process.

I suspect that it was my vocalization of discontent last year that allowed me to participate this year. Of course, the fact that someone was listening and willing to take seriously my concerns warms my heart deeply. But what i gained from this week had little to do with simply being taken seriously in my disagreements. Here was an environment where people from around the world gathered to decide how to reward practices and projects of varying types.

In our category, we were concerned with digital communities and we struggled to discuss what it meant to be a digital community, with what should be honored and valued. Joi warned me that it would be like negotiating treaties at the UN – we all had a political interest at the core of our beliefs, a value that what made digital communities important was that they enabled freedom in its broadest sense, but we all had different perspectives on how to value or support different projects. We spent a huge part of our week discussing values and politics, trying to suss out how we could acknowledge different groups. For example, there are a million vibrant communities – how can we reward one over the other? Should it be about their vibrancy? Their goals? Instead, we decided that there needed to be something innovative about their practices, something that really altered the way one should think about communities and may even be useful for other groups to know and emulate. We discussed the pros and cons of supporting different kinds of endeavors, the potential complications that could occur. (Last year, when the Prix awarded a group in Zimbabwe, they lost all of their outside funding.)

We had a long conversation about what it means to think about two axes – the process of giving people access and the process of allowing people to make their voices heard. So much of what we considered sat in this narrative. We talked about technologies themselves vs. the communities that take the technologies to a newer, deeper level. We talked about work from around the world that fit into so many different cultural contexts with so many different languages.

Outside of the jury room, we discussed globalization and community development, the history of Silicon Valley and the culture of fear, the ways in which governments can benefit or devastate local communities. I met some amazing people that i never knew who were able to give me such different perspectives on the world.

OMG. It’s real. I’m *FINALLY* taking a proper vacation. ::bounce::

May 29 – June 20 … Thailand!
[conference in NYC]
June 27 – July 2 … Family time!

OMG. OMG. OMG.

I haven’t had a day off in months nor a vacation in years (and never more than a few days). I kept meaning to take one (and y’all have done wonders at giving me inspirational sites). But now it is real. (Translation: tickets have been purchased.)

If anyone has advice for Thailand, let me know. My intention is to have a vacation full of beach, yoga, meditation, massage, scuba diving and visiting monastaries. The goal is complete and utter relaxation which will be measured by the distance between my shoulders and my ears.

Oh… and a warning… Because the idea of coming home to 20,000 emails terrifies the living shit out of me, i’ve also decided that i’m going to bounce all emails during that period (or send them to /dev/null). I need to get the weight of email hell off of my back.

OMG. OMG. OMG. ::bounce::bounce::

Last week, i posted a link to a news article about a high school banning blogging which Cory reposted on BoingBoing. In turn, Phil Gyford critiqued BoingBoing’s journalism and Clay worried about about the way memes spread. The commentary on Gyford’s post is rich with anti-BoingBoing attitude (as well as some very interesting dialogues).

So many aspects of this collection of material bother me. Embedded in all of this is an assumption that what any of us bloggers do is journalism. I, for one, am not a journalist and have no desire to be one. In the case of the post in question, i put it up there for my own reference and because it references the ongoing paranoia that people have about kids and blogging, questions of its educational value, etc. I don’t care one ounce about the truth value of that article – i simply care about the fact that people are talking about this, journalists feel the need to report on things this way. I’m not trying to be a reporter so much as i’m trying to document things that are of interest to me.

Truth be told, i hate writing, yet i write for a living. That said, blogging is not what i consider to be my writing. My writing comes in very formal structures, goes through peer-review and takes forever to reach its intended audience. My blog is my little land of ponderings, ideas, links, rants, etc. Much of what i write there is inexact at best. But it’s my zone, my tool of procrastination and documentation. I even take Many-to-Many more seriously than my blog because at M2M, i feel like i’m producing text for an audience (and it’s why i blog there much less frequently). On my blog, i’m writing it for me and those who might get a kick out of it. I don’t want to be told that i have to live up to journalist’s rules simply because i have an audience. I’d rather the audience go away than be expected to have to do something with that blog. The blog is for me and if it became a responsibility, it would go because the last thing i need is more responsibilities. Besides, me trying to make meaning about my life is neither of journalistic or academic caliber.

This connects deeply with what i think Cory and Xeni are doing (i don’t know the other BB people as well). They are blogging the things that matter to them. “A directory of wonderful things” is not meant to be a universally agreed upon notion of wonderful. Cory and Xeni’s posts are clearly what’s most wonderful to them. Thus, it absolutely kills me to see people bitch and moan about BoingBoing, as though it’s written for them. What makes BB special is that many of the quirky things that those characters blog are also appreciated by others. But it’s not about the readers, it’s not about journalism, it’s about what matters to the writers. Y’know what – i’m not interested in everything that they have to say either. But it’s their blog and i just skim past the things that don’t matter to me. And of course they don’t have open comments – no one wants to manage self-important audiences who bitch constantly. Yuck. It’s not about not wanting criticism – goddess only knows that they get plenty of that all the time in every form imaginable. It’s about not wanting to have everything you write be attached to constant negativity intended to make you miserable.

Perhaps i’m in a funny position because i know and love Cory and Xeni. Sure, they’re quirky characters and that comes through in their blogging. And yes, they have passions that border on obsessions. Sadly, i realize that the way people are treating them looks a lot like how people treat celebrities in this culture. And, honestly, that’s pretty sick.

I guess what it comes down to is that i don’t really understand why readers of blogs expect so much from bloggers. I know that i struggle with this and i know that it makes some of my fellow bloggers utterly irate. Why do people expect blogs to be journalism? Why do readers expect bloggers to be attentive to them simply because they read? This causes me excessive amounts of guilt. I literally do not have the time in the day necessary to respond to all of my email or to talk to everyone who approaches me because of my blog. It makes me cringe to be called a bitch because i can’t do it and i get so frustrated because people expect something from me that i can’t offer. People think that having an audience of people you don’t know is a blessing, but it’s also a curse. And i don’t know how to resolve the good and the bad in an easy way. But when i see people say horrid things about Cory and Xeni, it makes me sad because i know how much that stings. What motivates people to say these things? I mean, sure, i could go meta on the psychology of humanity, but that’s not good enough. It’s the difference between knowing and _knowing_.

::sigh::

So, i’m supposed to exercise yet i’m always too exhausted to exercise (mostly cause exercising is boring). And i want to socialize but i have no time to socialize. I decided a few weeks ago to combine these two by making dancing rules. I can go dancing iff 1) i only leave the dancefloor for cigs, water, bathroom; 2) i maintain a constant sweat (which translates to staying in the psytrance room); 3) talking is done through body movement; 4) drinking is prohibited.

Last night was round 2 of this plan and it went brilliantly. I went to bed after work, woke up at midnight and went over to 1015. My *FAVORITE* DJ duo in the whole wide world was in town – Son Kite. I went straight to the front of the audience, parked myself in front of the stage and danced danced danced my ass off. Now, Son Kite is the music of my Master’s Thesis. When i was working on that darn thing, i only had one CD after having all of them stolen. So i played it on repeat for the bulk of the duration of my thesis writing. The music is brilliant – it’s what happens when you have classically trained musicians play psytrance with the goal of making genuinely beautiful sounds.

That said, the CD pales in comparison to Son Kite live. OMG. Not only did i get my dance on, but i got to find a meditative peace that i haven’t seen in a long time. I was totally on a different plane, relaxing into the beautiful sounds. The most amazing sounds come out of them when they start playing electric violin. Wow wow wow. For anyone who has any appreciation of electronic music, you must see them live if they come to town. I brought out DnB, breaks and goth kids last night and they lurved it – a rare thing.

I came home, physically exhausted and proceeded to work all day. Exercise truly is a good thing.

When i moved to San Francisco, i quickly got involved with False Profit because of friends from college. FP consists of a lot of overeducated, workaholic party kids. The community had a homebase, a warehouse at 43 Norfolk. After the death of the landlord, it was sold and the new people want to move in. Thus, we are losing our space in 2 days.

As can be expected, we threw our final party this weekend. Friends flew in from around the country. 850 people showed up before we locked the doors (probably another 300 came to try to get in but we were at capacity). It was a miracle that the cops did not shut us down – perhaps they knew it was our final party… or perhaps it was our security people. For me, the party started Friday when a bunch of us got together to prep the house and just hang out. Jeff Heer helped me put together a network exhibit using his Prefuse to visualize the Friendster-based social network of my crew and their friends. We started dancing at 10. By 8AM there were still 250 people on the dance floor. When the music ended around 11AMish, there were still 60+ people dancing their asses off. As it soaked in that it was the end of an era, we gathered in a circle… there were tears. And then there was hottubbing to ease the sore muscles.

I love that warehouse to bits and i’m really sad to see it go away. I’m still not sure what it will mean for our crew. Of course, many are splintering off to go back to school. And there is a new smaller live-only warehouse (no party space).

At least we went out with style… A full-on crazy liquidation.

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I got the phone call late afternoon yesterday and felt my heart warm. I did the practical things i promised to do in response and then sat down in my office and let the tears drip down my face – tears of relief, of joy, of love.

The worries began many months ago and Google is the perfect tool for the intermittent hypochondriac. I had been prepared for the worst but when all began to unfold, i found myself overjoyed that it had an explanation at all. As the weight of the situation began to press down, i found that i could stand firmly on my feet, balanced, grounded. There was only one caveat – i could not deal with anything minor whatsoever. Meowing cats, laundry, the smog check people, people who couldn’t understand, couldn’t know. I fell out of my usual habits, partially by necessity and with that came the loss of many connections.

I don’t know if i was ever truly afraid – i had confidence; we had confidence. And we fed off of each other. We giggled over the practicalities, brought out our inner children, joked about Smurfs and found fascination in every scientific detail. I relished those phone calls. I stopped being able to distinguish if i was performing OK or just was OK. People worried about me, bless their hearts, and i tried to assuage their concern, whether or not they believed me. I guess it doesn’t really matter – in my heart, i started believing my performance.

So when that phone call came, i got to feel the weight as it melted down my cheeks, got to see just how much i’d been carrying around. Relief is a precious feeling, a tool of joy and love. The clouds have only begun to pass – it will be many months until a clear sky is truly visible. And i don’t know if things will ever be the same. Priorities become objects for inspection, as do habits. But in the meantime, i want to keep building on our childlike play.

After a conversation yesterday, it occurred to me that the relationship i’ve had with my advisors and mentors is not necessarily typical. I’ve been thinking about how much is rooted in a disciplinary distinction and how much is rooted in me.

As an undergrad, i had the most amazing advisor. He took on a parental role almost immediately. He was there for me intellectually and in moments of crises. He was always making sure i was OK, the kinds of check-ins that are so important to an 18-year-old going through identity crisis. He taught me how to be a professor, how to be a mentor and gave me a level of expectation that i still hold today. At MIT, my advisor was not that much older than i and while she didn’t take on a motherly role, our relationship was certainly more than simply advisor/advisee.

My current relationship with my advisor is far more like my relationship with my undergrad advisor. He’s very much of a father to me and i love him dearly, both intellectually and personally. How he’s doing and where he’s at is very important to me.

Advisor as parent-figure is something that many of my friends have. One of them we jokingly call daddy (or Bosley depending on how goofy we’re being). Many of us are deeply dependent on our advisors for funding, departmental support, collaboration and sanity, especially those of us in fields that don’t have clear distinctions.

In the humanities, students publish alone while we’re so used to publishing with our advisors. Students get by via TAing while we’re connected to research grants. Advisors in other fields are off writing sole-authored books while ours are all working on publications with us.

I’ve spent the day thinking about how much my advisor means to me and i feel very fortunate to have such a relationship with him – i cannot imagine grad school any other way.

I have never been a fan of Valentine’s Day. My resentment began in middle school when i was forced to get those awful miniature cards and craft an individual one for everyone in my class. Nothing helps me detest a holiday more than forced gifting and cards are the ultimate worst. As i grew older, i started justifying my disinterest – it’s what happens when all of my unrealistic romantic dreams crash head on with my anti-corporationalism. Valentine’s Day tarnishes my foolish fantasies and i resent things that get in the way of dream states.

In 1998, i had the opportunity to shift my expectation of Valentine’s Day. For me, it became V-Day and for five years, i spent this season preparing a production of “The Vagina Monologues” in some form or another. I was able to turn the corporate V-Day on its head and use the time to really think through masculinist hegemony. I was able to work with battered women, with women who had gone under the knife, with women fighting for their freedom. I was able to work towards my dream state of a life without violence. This is the first season that i’m not attending a V-Day and it makes me truly sad. Unfortunately, my only excuse is my current state of hibernation and need to work.

This morning, i awoke to NPR as always. I should’ve known better because there’s nothing like a Valentine’s Day special to make me dive deeper under the covers. But there was something disturbing about it that me unable to turn it off. The discussants each wrote a book about a different psychological / neurological aspect of ‘love’. I love science and i love scientific analyses of emotional states, but now the attack of my dream state was coming in two directions – attack on my fantasy and attack on my sleep explicitly.

It’s funny – i definitely believe in the pursuit of knowledge and i definitely realize that much of my fantasies are complete social constructions. But i don’t want to give them up to the sterility of science even though i love science. I don’t actually want to be rational about everything – i want passion (however hormonally manifested) to drive me in at least some ways. Instead, my day began with the nice scientists telling me that falling in love is simply a rush of hormones and love is simply the state you reach when two people have managed to balance each other’s hormones in a positively cyclical fashion. I don’t want to think about the hormones – i want to feel them. So, instead, i buried deeper into the covers.