Channeling the third eye

At times it feels like my life is relegated to a narrow moving walkway, the likes of which you find in airports and subways around the world. “Foreigners, please stand on the right hand side and hold onto the guardrail for safety. All others are free to pass on the left.” Technically I am living in Istanbul, working in Istanbul, and moving through the space that is Istanbul, but when I get too close to that ephemeral “it” I bump into the clear protective glass that buffers me from the rest of the world. There is an imperceptible limit to my interaction and integration.

I hate this. I don’t like feeling as though I live life on the silent side of a soundproof wall. My gut instinct is to change it; my mind knows not where to begin. I could frequent more authentic places, find a Turkish boyfriend, learn more of the language and more about the culture. To an extent, I have done all of the above. In and of themselves, these things do not make an “authentic” experience. Its about the organic process of immersion, not checking off a Turkish to-do list. For me, this process is lacking the human interaction aspect. While I wish I had the balls (and the language skills) to approach people Jay Leno Jaywalking style (and perhaps my own camera crew and late night television show to boot), I generally am stricken with shyness and fear. I am left to my own devices to intuit other ways of finding stuff out. The following posts are the result of what happens when I put my devices to goo use.

Here we go again...

I'll be honest with you. I was afraid to even broach the subject. Something as ethereal and delicate as love can't be tethered down with a few blunt words. So my idea was that if I cast a wide net, I'd somehow be able to capture everything in the vicinity of love. Maybe amidst the kelp and minnows of confusion and he said she said I'd be able to snag something I can serve up for dinner. Or put above my mantel as a testament to all my hard work and say, "See, this is what love looks like. A big smelly fish." I don't really know how to go about it, but I do know I can't hit it straight on. Its kind of like trying to swat a fly. You have to creep up slowly, then pause when you are thisclose, and only when you know you've got it in the bag can you swoop in for the kill.

But I digress. For whatever reason, I have a pressing need to consider matters of the hear these days. I can’t pin it on any one thing, and I suppose it boils down to a number of factors: my own love lost (or, as I prefer to think of it, displaced for the time being), friends in perpetual relationship crisis mode, the feeling that I am getting up there (read: when are you going to get married and have babies?) as I teeter uneasily on the cusp of 27, I’m presently reading Eat, Pray, Love , Cirque du Soleil has that Beatles Love show playing, more than half of my friends, family, and celebrities on my radar have gotten married and/or engaged in the last year (even Ashlee Simpson, for gosh sakes), and gay marriage finally became legal in the state of California (yeah!). It seems like love and marriage are everywhere, and its about time someone other than Oprah, Dr. Phil, the dude who wrote Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus, Carrie Bradshaw and the Sex and the City cast, and my mother addressed this question. So, I just figured that person should be me. I’m not going to feign humility and ask, “What would little naive me have to say about something as profound as love?” I’m not claiming to know the answers, but I’ve got something to say about it alright, therefore you should listen. (I think I already mentioned I’m out of stock in the logic department).

So yeah, how can I say this delicately? I don’t really care what anyone else has to say on the subject right now. Oh, except all those couples at the beginning of When Harry Met Sally. They can stay. I like them.

Love and Other Indoor Sports

Based on my last blog, you might be wondering: is she just a teensy bit bitter or something?

Um, I’ll get back to you on that. But first, let me flip a u-turn and show you what lies on the other side of cynicism.

Sometimes I think we are in the Golden Age of love. We’ve had a handful of social revolutions, and now slowly but surely we’re moving past the notion that there are those whom we are not allowed to love – whether this distinction be based on race, religion, gender, or any other dividing line. Not that love hasn’t always crossed boundaries (and broken them down) .

Believe you me, I love Love. I identify with Love. I’m almost certain Love and I have the same birthday, or at least Love must a Gemini too. If I had to be any emotion, I’d like to be an inexplicable force that makes no logical sense but opens people up and changes their lives. Love. What else could seem sweet and flirty one minute, callous and fickle the next?

At this point I must note a distinction: while I find the bullshit that seems to come part and parcel with relationships utterly repugnant (and no, I am not advocating free love, bootie calls, friends with benefits, polygamy, or celibacy) love is, without a doubt, the most incredible thing there is.

“But, oracle of love, doesn’t love make us want to be relationships? How can we be willing to die for someone and not want to be committed to them and have their babies?”

Um, I’ll get back to you on that one too.

I say this because I believe that no matter how heartbroken, how devastated, how certain you are that you will never ever ever love again, you have to have faith that you can and you will, even when you don’t.

I say this because that which has the power to eviscerate you even through your invisible chakras and slice you wide upon must, in some upside down cake kinda way, be a damn good thing.

I say this because while the gurus and psychologist are trying to work out some formula for what makes love work (common values + commitment + togetherness=lifelong love?) we all know its best to just listen to your heart.

I say this because that seems to be so utterly, painfully, catastrophically difficult, and I’d like to figure out why.

So dear friends, lovers, and weird strangers skulking around the blogosphere in search of intriguing new online buddies, this brings me in roundabout way to the conclusion, or rather, the beginning, that I’ve been trying to reach for the past two blogs now: How does love work?

It's not you, it's ME.

“Love lifts us up where we belong, love is a many splendid thing, love is all you need.”

Discuss.

I attempted to start a cryptic new blog under the pseudonym of Eros, Aphrodite, Agape, or something equally cliche. Just call me Dr. Drew and dial up my love line. Lonely hearts, broken hearts, wild hearts, even cold, sterile, impotent hearts are welcome to punch in my digits for a dose of amor.

There’s a slight glitch. Every time I contemplate some original love thought, Ewan McGregor prancing around in Moulin Rouge pops into my head. ...five, six, seven, eight...jazz hands! Crescendo! Hold that pose...hold it...now sing: “Never knew love could feel like this....” Suddenly I can only think of voule vou couce and other overplayed top forty songs.

So I’ll just cut to the chase. What I really want to say to all of you out there who are dealing with matters of the heart is something much more sentimental and well thought out: Get over it. Love is sooo passe. Self-actualization is the new partnership. Hole yourself up in an ashram, read some Sartre, set up a tent in Wyoming, find a mantra, and if all that sounds a bit extreme, just make yourself some green tea and read a little O Magazine. If you still really feel the urge to find someone, why fall in love the old fashioned way when eharmony.com has practically got it down to a science?

If you still don’t believe me, just consider your options. Even if you do find love, you will inevitably use one of the following ideological pillars to support your wimpy union.
First, there are those who proscribe to the opposites attract school of thought. These people generally tend to fall on either end of the behavioral spectrum and love to stew in their stale personal issues and fermenting neuroses. (Nothing like a cocktail of insecurity and inferiority with arrogance and narcissism to jumpstart a relationship)

Case in point: the introvert and the extrovert. This brand of relationship allows those who love the limelight a justification for their obsequious, attention seeking ways. Those who scoff at small talk can sit back and sip their beer, cosmo, pelligrino or whatever while their other half does the talking. They never gave a shit about the cyst you had removed from your armpit, and now they don’t have to pretend to care. This category also includes the people who want to date someone from the other side of the tracks, the globe, or the dermatological skin scale (from 1 for pasty albinos to 6 for the melatonin rich ebony skinned) merely because they love the idea of something different (fyi I am a 2-3 for olive with a yellow underdone). Yeah, using someone to make a statement or rebel against your upbringing is really healthy.

Then there are the peas in the pod – the people who complete each others sentences and probably have a dog they dress in sweaters during the winder and wear the same outfits from the Gap and have bizarre pet names like my honey bunny wonny zunny! My cinnamon toast crunch! My organic soft noodle! They always seem to have some inside joke that you are left to wonder about, therefore reinforcing their air of exclusivity and thus reinforcing the foundation of their relationship: “Yes, we do inhabit our own world and don’t you wish you could be on it? We have to keep telling ourselves we like each other, or else we’d realize we’re just in love with ourselves. ”

So while all this lovey dovey stuff sounds thrilling, I’d rather you gag me with a spoon first.

Men are from Turkey, Women are from Abroad

Here's one thing I really don't understand. Call me culturally insensitive, but Turkish men have a severe staring problem. I bear witness to this problem in a plethora of situations from swanky restaurants to seedy street corners. Although I would like to attribute it to my smashing good looks and supermodel body(clarification: sardonic humor, not narcissism) I am quite certain my physical appearance plays only a small part in the national pandemic I've coined staringitis.

This country is full of men. Sometimes it seems there are men and primarily only men - riding on the metro, loitering in the parks, working at the bakkals, walking down the street, scooting around on motorbikes. Yet for the hordes of men out there, there seems to be a massive divide. They are totally inaccessible and unapproachable, and often this gap is bridged by the palpable stare.

Although the stare is sometimes completely unsolicited, it generally starts if I inadvertently catch a man's eye. Sure, a misplaced glance could easily be misinterpreted as a come on in the proper context, say, a bar or a brothel. But when walking down a quiet street on a weekday afternoon? When glancing down the metro platform to see if the train is coming? On a crowded bus? Must my eyes have no resting place besides the searing gaze of a stranger?

Then, they stare. Not just a quick up-down-up-look away 'I'm checking you out glance,'but a full-on stare. No, not just a stare. A Prodigal Stare. Excessive. Visually indulgent. Prolonged. Persistent. Without blinking.

Then we play this silly game: I glanced at you accidentally or because I felt you staring at me, but because I caught your eye now you think I'm staring at you. Now you think I want you. Now you are staring more intensely. Now I look at you again to see if you are still staring. Surprise, surprise, you still are. Now its confirmed. I must be staring at you. The vicious cycle continues.

(begin internal monologue)
WHAT? Do I have a bugger hanging from my nose? Am I wearing a scarlet A or something? Okay I may be a little cute but come on. What is the purpose of such prolonged visual violation? I mean, really. What do these men think they are going to achieve with a passive stare? I'll approach them and say, "hey, I noticed you boring holes into my chest with your eyes. Wanna grab a kebab and make out"? Or am I expected to take a more subtle approach? Write my number on a cloth napkin and pass it along from table to table Junior High style?

Perhaps we Americans divert our eyes because we find such interactions too revealing, to real, too human. Perhaps deep down we are starers too and our true curiosity and shameless voyeurism is submerged under a false sense of sophistication and nonchalance. Is it more annoying to deal with the guy who tries to mask his desire to stare with furtive glances from behind a newspaper, or the one who makes no attempt (nor sees any reason to) hide his actions? Does it do any harm besides making me uncomfortable and excessively self-conscious?

Here's the thing. I like to survey my environment. I hate feeling that I have to keep my eyes glued to the floor just so I can avoid a potentially awkward interaction. I just don't get it, but maybe there is nothing to get at all. Maybe its just because they can.

Misanthropic Musings

In fourth grade each member of my class had a hermit crab. Mine and only mine managed to climb to the top of the Popsicle stick that had my name on it. Still in its shell, it traveled as far as it could possibly go. Is this an allegorical reference? Perhaps.

I gotta tell ya. This (the way I function day in and day out in everyday life) is not my normal modus operandus. Deep down I am still the same girl afraid to ask for permission to use the bathroom. Still, I am determined. To do what, I’m not quite sure. This weekend, I scoured Craigslist for something. Anything. I found a language exchange group, and decided to hit it up.

Let me reiterate: not my typical M.O. I am generally hesitant to meet people off the Internet. I mean, really. Its not that I think a freak awaits me at the other end of my wireless connection, but rather the awkwardness inherent in meeting people without context (besides a website). The Internet is a massive chasm that sucks individuality into its deepest crevices and reshapes it – via youtube, facebook, and my personal favorite, the white-out commentary on PerezHilton. Personalities are shed like dead skin, and with the freedom to put our thoughts out into the ether, there is no need to cower under the protective shield our “character.” The Internet has totally lost it edge. Its no longer seedy or desperate to meet people this way, especially for a wholesome intercambio/tandem/language exchange.

Not to say I am not cynical. What is a “casual conversation exchange in a relaxed atmosphere” could be a ploy for picking up naive foreign chicks. Or a scam to join a sales pyramid or something of that nature. Or, even if the other internet rovers are on the bright side of sanity, there are the just plan annoying individuals I’d rather not get to know: The socially inept. The emotionally vapid. The self-absorbed chatterboxes. Can’t forget those with intense body odor. To be stuck for two hours making small talk in a foreign language could be a wonderful learning opportunity.Or downright painful. Strangers are potential landmines. Don’t you wish you could dig a hole and crawl right in?

But...it was fine. Really. It took awhile to get a rapor going. To develop that witty banter. To know which jokes will hit home and which will hang in the air.

My anxiety and neuroses was the most interesting part of this story.

Title Untitled

I’m not quite sure what to make of any of it anymore.

Hillary and Obama’s faces are morphed on the cover of Time, a la Michael Jackson’s Black or White music video. Caitlin visited me and nearly got tear gassed on May Day. The day invokes fists in the air and si se puede and MELT (Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky – but I can’t take credit for the sassy acronym) and something profound about our right to a living wage, but since 30-odd people were killed in a demonstration in Taksim Square in the 70s, it has become the day when droves of protestors sporting pride and anger are met by droves of police sporting plastic shields and night sticks. And, apparently, tear gas. I am twenty pages into a novel, and I think I will always be twenty pages into a novel. Caitlin and I spent two days in Antalya on the Med coast, and now I’m not sure if I am a budget hotel sans hot water and a swampy green swimming pool growing pond scum girl or a five star resort with a private beach and choloates on the pillow lady. Suprise, suprise its the latter. My apartment is being fumagated for cockroaches. I am contemplating getting a motor scooter, specifically in hot pink or lipstick red. With taxes and parking I could take a taxi wherever I please for the same price, so the image of me speeding down the coast road with hair blowing in the wind will only be visible in the back of my mind. I’d probably end up in traction anyway. I can’t seem to find a decent kuafor (Turkish phonetic spelling) who I’d trust could conjure up a dramatic new look. Its confirmed – I can’t find a decent loaf of bread either. This week I’m cutting out sugar and alcohol. I’m still not sure where I misplaced Heart of Darkness, and for some reason I need it because I am surrounded by broken hearts.

A friend said something like this: the past gets closer the further away it gets. I don’t know why this is. Perhaps it has something to do with the buffer of experience that allows one thing (moment, event, person, image) to develop the magical nimbus of perspective. Perhaps only after the dust of a lifetime (and already there have been many) settles and he/she/it is still standing, we can fully acknolwedge the significance. Time is the proof that yes, it was important, and no, it will not fade. Its newly discoverd permanency extracts it from the past and plops in back in the present.
That’s why I hate to apply sweeping statments and grandiose conclusions to the stories of our lives. For example:
Question: How was it?
Answers: “A transformative experiece.” “An amazing adventure.” “The time of my life.”
Verdict: Wrong, incorrect, and wrong again.

We are all experts at applying headlines to the stories of our lives. That way, we can glance at the table of contents in another person’s eyes and go right to the part that interests us. I’m not even required to teach about subtext. No one bothers to read between the lines anymore. Nobody even bothers to read to the end, much less put the conclusion at the end. No wonder I am in a perpetual state of moral vertigo.

I know. Such summations, be it “it was great” or “it sucked” are necessary for the sake of conversation. Not every response can be a blog entry. But I worry. That if we unlearn how to respond, we unlearn how to empathize, we learn to no longer care, and we end up surrounded by our own broken heart.