out of focus, out of mind

I'm starting to lose my shit. I've known for weeks that I'm leaving for school this summer and ever since I haven't been able to focus on anything. Today during the staff meeting when everyone was scheduling their summer leave I cracked and told them I'm leaving--but that's still five weeks away. I don't know if I can make it. I wake up at night thinking about the depths of our junk closet and which books we should take with us and which should weather the next few years in my mom's garage.

My lack of focus has taken strange forms. I've made plans to build elaborate bookshelves using colored plastic cups. I've read two books in as many days. One doesn't really count--I re-read The Turn of the Screw and it's only a novella. I won't count the other one either--it was pure shit. I'm reading The Joy Luck Club right now. I don't know how I got through life this far without reading it. In the acknowledgments Amy Tan thanks her agent, Sandra Dijkstra, for "saving [her] life". While we were in San Diego looking for new jobs, I applied to be Dijkstra's assistant. I was one day too late to get an interview, but they said they'd keep my resume on file. At the time, I was sick over the lost opportunity. That was back when I thought I might work in publishing--when I thought I might be able to write something decently not-awful. Then I came to my senses and went to work for the government. Though now, reading that crappy piece of crappity crap book, I'm starting to convince myself that I could be the next JK Rowling. If I ever write that billion-dollar-industry series, I'm totally writing in a part perfectly tailored for Hugh Jackman. Thus my power of Planning will finally come to some good.

Joy Luck has failed to hold my attention, and now I've been sucked into watching crappity crap TV all night. There's a new show on TLC hosted by Clinton from What Not to Wear about teaching complete slobs manners. They have them housed in an manor of some sort, where they force them to walk around with teacups balanced on their heads and use salad forks. One of the victims, a self-professed feminist, objects at every turn--questioning the etiquette based on her sex. Some woman in a tweed suit fails to convince her that embracing gender roles
will make her a better person, a better woman. Then she cries because her boyfriend is caught on tape comparing her to a dude. Then they put her in a wrap dress with snazzy pumps. Oh, now she's sold on the whole idea--she understands what it is to be 'a lady'. She feels what it is to be a woman now, what it is to be herself. Funny, I feel most like myself in a pair of trousers. And a blazer. In a dress or skirt I always feel like a gorilla who's somehow managed to sneak into an english garden party to eat all of the little sandwiches. Wow. Maybe that's who I really am.

I sure know what I'm not--Chinese, that's what. These bitches are crazy.