Matching Tracksuits

Month: October 2000

Changes at Work

Thursday 26 October 2000

A new temp — Scott — began working for us Monday as a temporary editor to help out with the plagiarism re-write project. Yesterday Kali moved him off that project and essentially gave him to Stephen for the Shakespeare textbook. The reason was simply that Kali wasn’t satisfied with Scott’s work. And for good reason — the poor guy has never even copyedited! Kali asked for someone with editing experience (I overheard her phone conversation — as did a lot of other people I would imagine, especially Matt, sitting right across from her) and they sent someone without even any copyediting experience. That put everyone in an awkward situation, and I felt most sorry for Scott. I’d feel like such a boob if something like that happened to me. Being a temp is demeaning enough — having something like that happen to you must be horrid. Of course Kali tried to explain that it’s simply that he doesn’t have the skills we need, but I’m sure it’s difficult not to take that as an indictment of one’s general skill level.

I looked at some of his work, though — and it was, quite honestly, awful. I think he might have been more than a little nervous being given a job doing something he’d never done before, and he might have thought that just changing some words around might do the trick. It seems to make sense. The bad thing is, they were worse after he was done with them. It made me realize how much my editing skills have improved since I began working there. At least that’s one way of looking at it. Another way is to say that my ability to conform to Kali’s editorial preferences, which, no matter what she says, are somewhat subjective.

All this makes me wonder about temp agencies. Some of them claim to specialize in “technical” placement, or in this kind or that kind of placement, but I wonder how many of them really do. Certainly someone who places computer programmers (as if there are any of those who are out of work and have to scrounge around for work through a temp agency) or nurses doesn’t just send anyone to any assignment, but others — Professional Staffing Group, for example. I don’t know. I would say there is a lot of pressure inside those places to get new accounts and to send people to those jobs. And as such, I would imagine that a lot of unqualified people get sent to various places. Yet most of the time an intelligent person can probably bluff her way through a lack of particular experience. I, for example, had never worked reception, but I managed. On the other hand, there’s a world of difference between reception and editing, and I guess most of the placements for temps are lower-level things like that.

Another interesting office development — Kali called me on getting Luis to help out with my personal computer. She said it was inappropriate, but didn’t give me too much flack about it. I defended myself as best I could, but I forgot one minor thing — something I realized only last night. I never asked him to help me. I simply described to him my problem at home and asked if he had any ideas as to what happened. He’s the one who offered to look at it; he’s the one who suggested I bring it in. So it’s not like I said, “Hey, I’m having problems with my computer. I’ll bring it in tomorrow and I’d like you to look at it.” I would never do something like that. Anyway, I was left wondering what exactly I’d done wrong. Was it that I brought it to the office? Or was it that he did anything at all for me? Am I supposed to separate completely my personal and professional lives? DLI employees socialize in a non-work setting; why can’t we ask for each other’s help in a non-work setting? Or rather, offer to help each other? I’m a little confused about that. Was it wrong of me to ask Marlon to help me move? Certainly they wouldn’t say that. So what’s the difference between Marlon helping me and Luis helping? There are two that I can see. First, Luis used his professional knowledge to help with a personal problem, and that was certainly not the case with Marlon, who applied brute strength and patience alone. Second, the physical location of the assistance was the office. Given those to differences, the only one that could have been meaningful was the non-personal location. Hence if he’d come to my house and looked at the computer then they would have no room to talk. So I guess I learned something new about office politics/protocol. (Mary asked him to look at her laptop as well — I wonder if she got a bullocking. I would ask her about it, but it might lead to more trouble — after all, if you can get fired for asking fellow employees about their salary you could certainly at least get talked to for asking whether they got in trouble with a supervisor . . . and I’m only being half jocular here.)

Today my parents arrive. They’re only staying through Monday, though — four days, essentially. I thought they’d be staying longer, but I guess not. They were only going to stay through Sunday! Over twenty-eight hours of driving for three days! That’s twenty-eight hours of driving for seventy-two hours of time her, with at least twenty-four of it being spent sleeping! Chhavi called them back and talked them into staying one more day. I tried, but I couldn’t. I didn’t really try too hard, though. Why? I just felt a little awkward pushing for something that might cause them a bit of discomfort because of the cats — they’re reluctant to ask anyone to come over and feed them. Anyway, Chhav got an extra day out of them, so they’ll have a little more time here. Now the question is, what do we do?

Parents’ Visit

Tuesday 24 October 2000

In a couple of days my parents arrive. I haven’t seen them since last Christmas. It doesn’t seem like it’s been that long, in reality. By the time they get here it will have been ten months, but it feels only like half that. I guess despite the horror of it, this last year has gone by fairly quickly.

In the middle of my parents’ arrival Thursday and the last time I saw them lies my trip to Lipnica. Five months ago. It doesn’t see that long, either. I guess that’s what happens when you spend every day obsessing over something. I have to admit, though, it’s gotten a whole lot better. In fact, when I think of going back to Lipnica, I’m not filled with this sickening surity that I must go back or I’ll go insane. I guess saying it’s getting “better” is a relative thing because there’s still a large part of me that wants to go back, and another portion of me — God, how many parts have I divided myself into? — wants to cling desparately to that bit of desire to return, to encourage it to grow somehow.

Truth is, I’m not that terribly unhappy at work. The job is, indeed, somewhat boring when I’m stuck doing editing, but I’m doing that less and less these days. And working with people I like is a vast improvement over my job in Lipnica where I could barely stand the sight of the other teachers. And yet at the weekends, it hits me — I’m terribly lonely and I feel awfully empty when I don’t have anything to do. I guess the trick is keeping my mind busy.

Anyway, my parents are coming, but they’re not bringing the cats. I feel awful about that, but I don’t really know what we’re doing next year and I think it will be better if we just find the Puck and Lily a new home. The trouble, though, is that it is not I who will be doing it, but my parents. I feel like I’ve asked so much of them regarding those two. I guess it really is unfair to them in a lot of ways, but what can I do?

When they get here, hopefully we’ll have a chance to have dinner together just the three of us. Well, I guess we’ll be spending a lot of time together in the afternoons without Chhavi so that won’t be necessary. At any rate, I guess what I meant was that I’d like to have the chance to talk to them alone. I’d like to see what they think about all this returning-to-Poland/not-having-kids/lack-of-fulfillment/lack-of-happiness situation.

Religion Thoughts

Monday 23 October 2000

I never quite got around to writing anything in here yesterday. I was more interested in reading, I guess. Saturday afternoon we went to the Malden public library’s book sale and got a few things — about 15 books for something like 8 dollars. Not a bad deal, I guess. One of the books I got was by Martin Marty entitled, The Glory and the Power and it’s about fundamentalism in the world, specifically in the three monotheistic religions. I’ve finished the sections on Christian fundamentalism and on Jewish fundamentalism, and now I’m reading about Islamic fundamentalism, which I find to be a little slower going and less interesting simply because I know less about Islam that I do about Christianity and Judaism.

One interesting thing I found was the distinction between traditionalism/orthodoxy and fundamentalism. While the two might share a similar, conservative theology, the fundamentalists differ because they fight back. They see modernity encroaching on their world and taking away some aspect of it, and they fight back.

This brings up another interesting point: fundamentalism, while it stresses certain “fundamentals” and traditions, is a strictly modern phenomenon. Granted, they feel that they’re returning to a pre-modern, pure theology, but modernity is the stimulant that gets it all going. Without modernity we can have no fundamentalism.

Reading about Christian fundamentalism, though, I found some striking parallels with the theology of the Armstrongian Worldwide Church of God. To begin with, fundamentalists tend to be premillenial dispensationalists, and although for a while I really got tired of Dad throwing that word around, “dispensationalism” is the perfect description of Armstrongian theology. It is nothing but — it is, in many ways, at the very core of his worldview.

Another similarity is in the “chosenness” of fundamentalists:

It only takes a little imagination to see how powerful premillenial ideas were and can be in fundamentalism. Do you seek a distinctive idenity? Here is a teaching that separates you from other Christians, Protestants, and even evangelical conseratives. Do you need the feeling of being inside? With dispensationalism, you can read the newspapers with a knowledge and perception denied other believers who have no guide to apparently plotless or contradictory events. . . .1

That seems the perfect description of the WCG of old — and the current PCG, GCG, CGI, LCG, etc.

And it also explains why Armstrong was so afraid of people reading material he hadn’t written, or at least approved. The “weak-minded” WCG member might read this and think, “Hum, here’s someone saying the exact same thing as Mr. Armstrong. Here’s someone claiming exclusive knowledge and [more frightening for the believer], here’s someone explaining this whole process. And if this explanation can be made of fundamentalists, then what happens if this Martin Marty turns his keen eye toward the WCG?” Of course I did point out and want to stress that only the “weak-minded” WCGer would think this. Someone thorougly “converted” (or indoctrinated, or socialized) will simply put this off as another satanic deception.

1 Martin Marty. The Glory and the Power: The Fundamentalist Challenge to the Modern World. 51, 52.

Still Considering

Saturday 21 October 2000

Despite my claim at the top of this document, I have not written every day for at least twenty minutes. I suppose I had something I could have written about yesterday, but I simply didn’t feel like it. And that’s not quite the point, anyway. I don’t want to write in here only when I have “something to write about” but I want to force myself to write in here daily. That’s the only way I’ll ever get back to the journal-keeper that I once was — and I think I was a much healthier person when I was keeping my journal more regularly.

I had a thought yesterday about Lipnica and going back. I realized that what I’m more scared of is going back for a year and realizing there’s nothing there for me at all. I think that’s what Chhavi thinks will happen. And that is certainly the last thing I want, for if I go back and discover that what I’m looking for is not there, then I’ll be worse than “back to square one.” I think part of my frustration yesterday had to do with the fact that part of my life has recently splintered into millions of pieces and I’ve lost some things and it will take some time to pull everything back together — I’m speaking of my computer, of course, and its recent Windows 2000-induced nose-dive. That’s a relatively minor thing, and it’s simply an irritation that must be overcome. Yet last night I remember thinking, “I could work on some VB stuff, but I have to re-load Visual Studio, and I’ve lost all that source code I downloaded, and all my programs are now history.” So it’s not that I was thrown into some kind of depression over this — I was simply annoyed. Anyway, I imagine such a scenario multiplied many times in intensity and importance and I can only shudder as I imagine how difficult that would be to deal with: realizing that Lipnica has nothing for me; realizing that Chhavi might be back in India by that time; realizing that I threw away a seemingly “sure thing” for something that just didn’t work out.

Yet I did consciously use the word “seemingly” because of all these thoughts roaring through my head about having children. I’ll return to that later.

One thing I wanted to elaborate on from the previous paragraph is this: if I go back and discover that what I’m looking for is not there, then I’ll be worse than “back to square one.” I’m not even quite sure what it is I’m looking for. And that makes me somewhat hesitant to go back if I don’t know exactly what it is I’m seeking — there or anywhere for that matter. I just know that I’m not terribly happy here. And yet I think, “That’s exactly how you felt when you left Lipnica. That’s why you left Lipnica — you thought you’d find what you were looking for in the philosophy of religion program at BU. And that certainly didn’t happen.” This whole notion of being happy where you are and being content with what you have keeps haunting me. That is most definitely not what I’m doing now, though in the back of my head I have these stupid thoughts: “Once I get to Lipnica, then I’ll start living that way.” What a stupid thing to think —living an oxymoron.

So back to this “seemingly.” I’ve come to realize that I’ve have certain unconscious expectations about my life that have definite implications for what happens with Chhavi and me. I’m almost twenty-eight years old — and I thought that by now, certainly, I’d be married, and that within a year or so would be having at least one child. In other words, I thought that before I reached thirty I’d have a family. Well that’s certainly not going to be the case no matter what I do — and to be honest, I’m not ready for a family now. Not until I figure out what I want to do with my life. But Chhavi’s lack of interest in ever having kids, it doesn’t look like that’ll ever come to fruition. And so while a relatively minor assumption is being challenged at the moment (i.e., that I’d have a family before age thirty) is eclipsed by a larger, more significant one (i.e., that I’d have a family, period). So what I’ve got to do is decide whether I really want to have a child or not, and whether or not I’m willing to give that up in order to stay with Chhav. What are my alternatives? Break up and go out on the prowl again, so to speak. That’s not something I really want to do, to be honest — either break up or be out “looking” again. (I wasn’t “looking” when I found Chhav, and that’s why I found her, in part — so I’ve always told myself.) And once “freed” from monogamy, I’d want to explore that freedom a little. Sleep around a bit, in other words. It’s something I’ve always kind of wanted to do but never did — and then I’d have my chance. So I’d sleep around, maybe have a couple of years of fun. Then what?

One more thing I was thinking about yesterday, then I’ll stop. If I were to go back to Lipnica, it would certainly be nice to be able to have a place of my own (three possibilities occur to me: the old apartment, above Magda’s shop, and above the pharmacy, if they’ve built the house they’d mentioned they wanted to build), but in a way it might be better if I stayed with the Mastelas. The problem is money — I would want to pay them for room and board, but I’ve a feeling Mamo would not want me to. Perhaps I could make it that the school pays her directly and I could act as if I were completely ignorant. Who knows. Anyway, the reason this would be a good idea is in fact two-fold (or more). For one thing, I’d have someone to talk to and someone to help me with my Polish. Secondly, and in some ways more importantly, it would force me to focus on the work aspect of my life during the week because I couldn’t have people coming over all the time. It would be safe in another sense, too: less chance of me fucking around with someone in my own apartment. Screwing around would not be a bad thing, necessarily, but I wouldn’t want anything to happen with anyone from Lipnica unless I was sure I wanted to pursue it farther than a casual fuck.

Enough of that. I’m going to go read something now.

Declared God

Tuesday 10 October 2000

“Octavian was declared a god shortly after his death.” This is from the profile for Octavian that I just edited for the Western Civ I book. Being declared a “god” in this case seems something like beatification in the Roman church. Thinking of this, the obvious occurred to me: it’s called the Roman church because it grew out of the Roman Empire and was/is centered in Rome. Surely after Edict of Milan all notions of Roman reality didn’t get subsumed under the Christian worldview. In fact, the Christian worldview grew out of this Roman world, so it stands to reason that certain habits/notions from Roman religion persisted in Christianity. Hence it seems logical that this ritual of declaring this person or that person a god might carry over into the Roman church in the form of beatification. The differences, I’m sure, are enormous, and I’m not so naïve as to suggest that it’s a one-to-one relationship. However, the basic notion is the same.

That being said, even if it were empirical, historical fact that the idea of beatification grew out of the Roman deification of its rulers (which is, to be sure, not strictly a Roman notion and probably exists in cultures around the world — Japan and ancient Egypt come immediately to mind), that would not change Roman Catholic practice. Once it’s been so entrenched, how could anyone change it? Even if Pope John Paul II said, “Look, we’ve come to the realization that this beatification thing is nothing but a carry-over from pagan Roman religion,” no-one would buy it. They’d want to chalk it up to senility. Of course if the Pope said this as a holy pronouncement, then papal infallibility would kick in and then we’d have all kinds of cognitive dissonance.

Rules and Regs

Thursday 5 October 2000

From http://members.aol.com/cogwriter/cmc0929.htm

Guidelines for Church Dances: The Church of God teaches that dancing is an acceptable form of recreation for members and their families. The rules and traditions we have established for Living Youth Camp dances teach the way of outgoing concern and of decency. These rules and traditions are as follows:

  1. All music must be chosen carefully, with a very conservative approach, and with the approval of the Festival Coordinator or an individual he specifically assigns this task.
  2. No “free-style” dancing is permitted since this usually involves inappropriate music and brings out an attitude of abandoned inhibitions and showing off; thus focusing attention on the self rather than showing outgoing concern for others. Exceptions to this are some line and novelty dances.
  3. Fellows should politely ask a young lady or woman to dance i.e.: “May I have this next dance?” If the lady accepts, he should offer his arm to lead her out to the dance floor. When the dance is over, he should lead her back to her table or chair.
  4. Concerning teens, we do not want anyone left out. Therefore we discourage “pairing off” of teens at our church sponsored dances and encourage dancing with many partners, particularly noting who sat out the last dance. Older singles and engaged couples who are of age may be exempt from this rule.
  5. Music should not be so loud that those who prefer not to dance have a difficult time carrying on a conversation.
  6. Lighting should not be turned down so low that the average person could not read a book with ease.
  7. At any dance organized primarily for youth, all parents are welcome to visit.
  8. Appropriate dress for a Church dance in the Northern Hemisphere is slacks, coat and tie for adult and young men and modest knee length dress or long gown for adult and young women. A Church dance is not the place for a “personal statement.”

Despite the obviously abusive control illustrated in the above quote, I still find myself strangely nostalgic when I think about my time in the WCG, especially now as it’s fall and time for the Feast of Tabernacles. The wonderful excitement and anticipation of the coming week when you arrive at your accommodations — of course this depends on the fact that you’re middle-class and could afford a decent place and knew, from the beginning, that it would be a decent place. The anticipation when you walk into the auditorium for the first evening’s service and you’re scooping out the place — of course this depends on whether you’re in the “in” crowd and you can rest assured that you’ll meet someone for a “Feast fling” or at least friendship. Making plans for that first night after services, or going out to lunch between services — of course this depends on whether you have the money to afford going out to eat for every meal, like we did.

My memories of the WCG are almost all positive, I guess, because I wasn’t the victim of any abuse. I didn’t lose my job because of the stupid Sabbath regulations; no one in my family refused to take medicine and died as a result; we had fairly decent relationships with all our extra-WCG family members. In other words, I didn’t have to give up much to be in the WCG. I didn’t get to go to school dances, and I wasn’t able to swim at Saturday meets, but that’s a relatively small price to pay — more of an inconvenience than anything.