a rhetoric of lack
my words are a little reluctant to come out these days. i can translate, with relative ease, from middle english to modern, and recite the lines better than many--according to someone important to me. and this degree of importance is part of the stumbling block--my stumbling block--where i trip on my own words and find myself at times a pot calling her kettles black. are my words as alienating as i find others' to be? am i the object of my own subject?
things have flipped, or switched; i realized it this weekend when i was deep in the geek chorus, elbow to elbow with like-minded wordsmiths, debating the ethics of comfort-zone tutoring and the much-sought proof of writing center visit. this is my new milieu; my peers and i frequent ratemyprofessor-dot-com, strategize thesis panels, fret over tests yet to be taken, belabor lengthy papers, plan conferences, and work everyday to meet our ambitions. i never thought in a million years that there'd come a day when i'd be researching application information for phd programs, hoping that my 4.0, stellar letters of recommendation, and my writing talent would help get me a degree that would allow me to teach college, and influence others as much as i have been, and am, influenced daily. not me...
...but here i am, knee-deep in philological projects, narratives, and deadlines. and here i am, over a year too early to be having separation anxiety from my school, but already feeling the pangs. and here i am, able to talk constantly to myself, whether it be out of loneliness, frustration, or in or out of some challenge, but unable to piece together why i can't find words tell some of my oldest and dearest friends how i'm feeling. and it's partly because i can't quite figure out what it is i'm feeling, only i can't cover it up anymore with ice cream or sushi or the golden girls or free shipping from amazon.com. i just know that my words of late are pointed towards tuesday night, heavy with useless anticipation about the inevitable nothingness of what lies between me and the one unknowing person i've pegged to save me. it's utterly futile. it's my constant subtext. it's what i've invented to be the solution to my own case of 'missing.' it's what some people (seem to) have that i don't. it's making me noisy with silence. and, worse, its pronounced rhetoric of lack is undermining all the great things that have become my life.
and still, like so many other things, the words refuse to come.