methinks

Diffusion

Sometimes our heads fill with fumes. Maybe a doubt putters around all day, or a chore is left to idle. The perfumes of lust mingle with the formaldehydes of sloth with the volatile hydrogen of pride. Even joy makes a noble gas. And so it is that we find ourselves choking in our own toxic mire, on our own personal nerve gas.

Some of us are more gaseous than others, some more sensitive to these emotional vapors, but we all make them and must all vent. We exercise to flush them out, play music to coax them out, maybe drink to drown them out. Myself, I prefer to walk them out, to let the fumes diffuse into the fresh air.

I should rephrase that. I would like to let the fumes diffuse into the fresh air, but China is running rather low on freshness lately. There was a two week period at the very start of spring - after the coal stoves of winter had been snuffed and before the coming heat of summer beckoned forth what I like to call The Great Rot - that made me think flowered breezes were here to stay. I was wrong. What I get when I go out now, instead of simple one way diffusion, is more of an exchange program. The emotional vapors of life go out, and the pungent odors of China come in, which is actually more stabilizing than you might think. It's kind of like when Indiana Jones swaps the gold head out with that bag of sand. Wait a second…that didn't work, did it. Anyway.

There is a certain path I take along the river when I need to vent. It crosses several bridges: a stepping stone path, an access bridge in front of the spillway (certain death if one fell (I'm just teasing my family now)), a suspension bridge that leads to a river island hosting western China's largest roller rink (yes, we're very proud). The route was first charted by Alfred and me back when I was a PCV, so it not only provides an intimate look at the urban river front but is also a direct link to the "good old days."

A faithful companion in contemplation during the winter months, the summer heat has turned the river fiendishly vile. It's become a foul, pungent, putrid, barfaceous (okay, that's not a real word) fecal quagmire of trash, oil, chemicals and miscellaneous rot. At night it smells like a toilet (probably because the sewer runs under the sidewalk alongside it). During the day it smells like a toilet filled with dead fish. The oil slick is so thick that plastic cups and bags float completely above water. Luckily the river is now so murky that you can't see the bottom. The smaller tributaries of the river that run through town are shallow enough that one can see that the bottom is totally carpeted in plastic rubbish.

But it seems a warmer river has brought advantages as well. The fishermen congregate around the sewer discharge and the health conscious swim and bathe in the deeper areas. Oh, didn't you know? It's good for the health to bathe in the river. Young men strip down to their skivvies and lather up with a bottle of cheap shampoo (a few hundred more gallons and they might come out clean). Children shoot jets of water between their teeth. Every now and then the crack between their front teeth gets plugged with partially ground turd…that's so gross. To be fair, I should add that most people think the river is as toxic as I do. Seriously though, the only thing I'd call a real plus is the eerie, surreal sheen the river has on a windless night. It's like a slow wave of liquid onyx reflecting the city lights. It's magical but best viewed from a distance.

So now that my therapeutic river-walk has become a noxious sewer-run, I've had some excess pressure build up in the ol' mental tanks. I've hiked up the mountain near my house a few times, but I get so hot on the ascent that even if some gases escape, the overall mental pressure remains constant....PV = nRT, right? I guess writing all this has been my release for the day. Huff. Sigh. Exhale. Whoosh. I feel a lot better now.

Timber Framing

In the Spring of 2003 (just days after being evacuated from China), I went with my dad to a timber framing workshop in Maine, timber framing being the method of building structures with mortises, tenons and pegs (instead of nails, screws and bolts). I didn't participate much because I was already a Master Framer (well, perhaps only a Journeyman) at that point and didn't want to deprive the students of their experience. I took a few pictures instead. When I wasn't at the workshop I was hiking in the White Mountains of New Hampshire (that's next to Maine); you can see some photos from my journeys there at the end of this album.

Click here to see the pictures.

My Street

Job Fair

With graduation just around the corner, the (less prepared) seniors try to sell their skills at the college job fair.

Click here to see the pictures.