How to Cheer Up a Nerd

Most of this week was severely terrible. Despite the best efforts of my dear allies, many things conspired to put me in a pretty evil mood. I hate feeling evil, and then I get mad that I feel evil, and that makes me more evil. So sorry to everyone I groused at.

When I sulked into the Last Word (my favorite West Philly bookstore) the nice owner whipped out A Hero of Our Time-- and not just any version, the NABOKOV TRANSLATION. I unsulked immediately-- I NEEDED that book.

AND the Edward Gorey cover...

I don't think I can underestimate how much effect that book had on me as a teenager. It opens with a poem, whose narrator lies in the Caucasus dying from an unexplained bullet wound. He's dreaming of his lady friend, who is dreaming of him, and then he croaks. At fifteen that was the most romantic thing in the entire world. The book itself is about a thoroughly disillusioned, bored, brave depressed young man named Pechorin who has adventures and feels jaded. I had no higher aspiration at fifteen than to be Pechorin. Upon reading it again, I realize I glossed over all the sections about mountain scenery and early 19th Century travel, of which there are pages and pages. I also missed out on Pechorin being kind of a jerk-- but a romantic jerk, but a jerk nontheless. The climax of the book is when he shoots an acquaintance off a cliff. 

Why did I think that was so awesome? Also Pechorin has blond hair and a black mustache. Is that even a thing? Regardless, I stayed up way too late reading and feeling young and dreamed that my bed was surrounded by exotic weaponry, which was cool. 

Then today I was riding home, singing 'Janie Jones' to myself as one does. That song, too, is pretty important to me-- or rather, the Clash on Broadway boxed set, of which it is the first track. I remember the first time my father played it for me, I thought WOW. And I still think that. Anyway, I was hollering out the part that goes,

'This time he's gonna really tell the boss
'He'll really tell the boss
'Exactly what he FE-EALS!'

And right on cue, a guy on a fixie a few yards behind me shouts,

'IT'S PRETTY BAD!'

So I rode the rest of the way grinning.

SO DREAMY

And then I found an acceptance letter in my mailbox from one of the grad schools I applied to. Which inspires all kinds of mixed emotions, because until today my plans to make a huge change in my life were abstract and now they are concrete.

I haven't figured out these emotions yet. Next week had better be calm!

--Isis