a sense of joy and then a panic

The letter says I'm to be posted in Jakarta.  All subject to security clearance approval, of course.  It's a good thing we cleaned out at least some of those old boxes in the garage this winter: my mother has to dig through all her old address books.  She sounded strange on the phone telling me this but I think I can guess why.  I've never spent a whole summer away from her (only half of one at most); this is a country whose chapter she has personally closed on a bitter-sour note, the country where people die too often, where she buried my father.  I don't think she thinks this is really happening.  I know that she will never go back.  But I also know, and have known since Melbourne, that I will.

I'm going to start reading Kompas (floods, as always, crippling the city). 

Thinking about going back makes me all sorts of queasy and this is an embassy they have to close from time to time because of threats and forty hours a week might kill me but God, oh my God.  I am so ready for this. 

interpret what you will.  I don't feel like self-analyzing right now.  all I know is every time I hear this song I feel the need to post the lyrics, so that's what I'm doing. 

I've never met her, and I don' t mind
I've seen her face a thousand times
she hides behind her hair and I wonder if her love is like mine
face up, I'll face the day
three weeks you flewaway
I'll never blame her, I'll never let you make me hate a girl that way
touchdown, I hear the score
I watched you slide out through the backdoor
I never met her, but when I do,
I'll thank her for saving me from you
- Veruca Salt: Never Met Her

this one too.  I think this one is more about me and political science here in college.  I am very committed to political science.  It's a little scary.  Although reassuring, to know that this is my calling.  I mean, even if it's not fate, I don't care, you know, I'll do it anyway - that's how much I love it.

 
the corporation - cow rifling through burning trash

I wish I had a metal heart... I could cross the line
I wish I was half as good as you think I am
now that we know they're telling lies when they say
no one gets hurt, and therefore nobody dies
you know it's hard to believe anything that you hear
they say the world is round
I wish I was as big as you, you'd have to tell the truth
I'd be nothing you could hurt, nothing you could use
I want to be dependable, I want to be courageous and good
I want to be faithful so that I can be heroic and true
I want to be a friend you can rely on, you can lean on and trust
I want to understand so I can forgive and be willing to love
I wish I wasn't flesh and blood
I wouldn't be scared of bullets built with me in mind
for then, I could be saved
My sweet lord, take care of me for I think I'm done
Kiss my mother on her cheek and lay my burden down
- Garbage: Metal Heart


the war tapes: size does matter in iraq

penultimate.

when figures from the past stand tall, and mocking voices ring the hall
imperialistic house of prayer, conquistadores who took their share
they keep calling me
- Nine Inch Nails (Joy Division): Dead Souls


the fog of war: bombs over tokyo

ultimate.

all I am now, fall, fall for a way down
more than a handshake or a grin
more than a test for old friends
I'll wait till Monday for a step outside
you can pretend all you want to, I don't mind
one more chance to, chance to do something
- Denali: Do Something

I feel that I should post to prove that I'm still alive (I post, therefore I am). 

REALIZATIONS OF LATE:
* I do a lot of things because I feel I am obligated to do them to ensure future success in some amorphous career that does not yet have shape.  I minor in Econ.  I take Chinese.  I'm in the Journal of Politics and Society.  I take Statistics for Economics.  In other words, I resume build, and I hate it.
* On the other hand, I don't know if I'm truly cut out for a writing workshop/class either.  I don't even want to know what most people at Columbia write, fiction-wise.  Probably something along the lines of Kafka's Metamorphosis or a variant on the Amy Tan noun-infested cultural novel (The Kitchen God's Wife, The Bone Collector's Daughter).  Something serious and philosophical and/or demanding of respect for other reasons.  And me?  "Uh... I write fantasy."  "Are you serious?  Like Lord of the Rings?"  "Uh... no."  "Oh." 
* I really like arrogant guys.  I recognize this as a failing. 
* I somehow damaged my principal headphones because I tripped on their cord while they were plugged into my laptop, twice.  The second time evidently was too much.  Luckily the microphone still works, and I had a spare set.  Even more luckily, I didn't manage to actually pull my laptop off the desk... stupid motherfucker.  It's not like we can afford another one. 
* Chinese characters make my hands tingly.  I don't like to write them. 
* I think I've saddened my mother irreparably.  I told her last night that I want to work in Indonesia:

"I want to work in Indonesia, I want to live there." 
Silence cut across the phone and bounced across the small white-washed prison cell of a room, then floated out the windows into apartments across alley ways. 
"I made you sad, didn't I?"
"No..." her voice was hesitant.
"You're crying, aren't you?  I can hear you crying.  Big crystal tears rolling down your cheeks and splashing onto the floor, surrounding your feet, as you drown in your tears..."
"Oh, for heaven's sake.  I'm not crying."  She took a moment and then continued before I could tease her more, "I cried last night though."
"Why?"
"I was watching American Idol."
I started laughing.  She did too, but it sounded forced.  "And there was this one girl who had never cut her hair so it was down to her ankle, and was obviously very sweet.  And when she auditioned her mother, who also had this really long hair, was in the room with her.  I mean, they asked her to be there... the mother didn't want to be there.  So she sang, and she had a very sweet voice, but they told her no because she just stood there and sang, she wasn't American Idol material.  Of course, when she left the room she immediately burst into tears, and she went to her father, who was standing outside, who just held her stoically.  Not her mother.  She went to her father."
I bit my lip, wondering if she felt like I didn't go to her enough, if I wasn't grateful enough for what she did for me that she didn't want to do.
"And I just thought, how lucky she is that she has a father to do that for her." 
I sighed.  I didn't know what to say.  "Well... that's the way it goes," I said finally, listening carefully for any sounds that might indicate she was crying again.  "That's the way life is."  C'est la vie, as she would have said. 
And then, after another moment of silence, "I'm okay."  I laughed, considering.  "Well.  Sort of." 
But I had managed to make her laugh too, and although my thoughts briefly flickered back to weddings with no one to give me away, those thoughts were brief.