Do you love libraries?

I got myself locked out of my apartment today. No phone and no phone numbers, no keys, no coat, no nothing. So I went to the new Logan Square library, and they just happened to have a copy of the book I would have been reading if I weren't a damned monkey idiot.

Chicago schools were out today and so the kids were in full force. Homeless people and junior high students: that is a library. The new Logan Square branch looks as good as the new condos on Fullerton. The bathrooms were fantastic. Sadly, however, Logan Square will have to remain a warm place to sit with the homeless and a clean bathroom. Harold Washington is my branch.

To avoid worrying, and to avoid calculating the teeny stutter steps between being me and being hungry, mentally ill, and sleeping in the library, I decided to reminisce about the libraries I have loved. I have lived in many neighborhoods and attended many schools, and I do love to read--these things are related, but that's another blog--so I have loved many libraries, but only six really stick with me. From the top:

"The Circle Library" Heatherdowns Road, Toledo, OH:

When we first got to Toledo we spent a great deal of time at the most amazing place I had ever seen: a round library. The stacks radiated from the center. It was smoky glass and painted black metal that was always cold. I also remember solid armchairs in natural wood and brown tweed. Once as we walked in an adolescent said "Fat ass" or some such thing to my mother, and I burst into tears for the pain and the humiliation of it all. Probably the first time I felt homicidal toward anyone but my Sister. A terrible memory , but there were still books, and I was lonely. From the Toledo Public Library website: "The original Heatherdowns Branch was built in 1968 and was unique because of its round shape. In 1991, a parallelogram-shaped addition was added and it became the largest branch in square footage—21,125 sq. ft." The picture online doesn't look round at all! "Parallelogram"? Bullshit.

Sanger Branch, Central Avenue, Toledo, OH:

The Sanger Branch was in a crap strip mall next to the Food Town. They knew me there. I can still see the low beige wall of Sweet Dreams teen romances and the Lois Duncan novels that got me obsessed with ESP. I actually ran away to this library once: I was going to read all day, bath in the University of Toledo fountain, and then sleep in the parking garage. My mom arrived with the cops and yanked me out of there; she was livid. A couple of years ago she told me that she had stood in the entrance for five minutes nearly sobbing with laughter because, holy shit, her daughter ran away to the library. This branch is also gone, and check out this exuberant blurb from the website of the new "Sanger" branch: "Sanger Branch was established in a storefront in the Colony in 1953. It moved to another location in the Kenwood Shopping Center in 1959. Over the next 40 years, the branch was enlarged twice, and finally, thanks to the generosity of Lucas County voters who supported a capital improvements levy, a new facility was built. That was opened in March 2000." It's not even in a shopping center. How are children supposed to learn?

Ohio State University Library, Columbus, OH:

Eleven stories, people, and a library to rival Alexandria. Sexy co-eds enjoyed the 7th floor stacks and our gay classmates made dates on the 5th floor bathroom walls. I was usually on the 11th floor, where the Aramaic parchments were shelved. Occastionally I would engage in tense, nerdy banter with the Heavy Metal Librarian, and then spend the walk home wondering about our future life together, and could I get him to cut his hair? Although I skipped graduation, my mom made me wear my cap and gown, and the only pictures I took were in front of the library.

Columbus Metropolitan Library, Columbus, OH

The Columbus Public Library had the most amazing CD collection, and for one year the library was my landlord. I lived in a studio apartment right to the left of this picture. I had constant access to the topiary garden and to all the Alan Lomax recordings, early calypso, primitive hip-hop, and folk music that the library had to offer. There is also a really great sculpture in the lobby, and I would show it off to guests like it was mine, because no more than one adult could fit in my apartment at a time.

Harold Washington Library, Chicago, IL

This building is a monstrosity. There are enormous gargoyles on at the corners and it is dripping with gothic charm in modern materials, like the ever present green glass. The doors are prohibitively heavy. There are no stairs, only escalators. I love this library because they have books in Armenian and the homeless dudes are suprisingly considerate; one stopped printing his 600-page Apocalyptic Forecast so that I could print a paper. The reason I had to do this at Harold Washington is because the computers at UIC were broken, which is one of the many reasons why the Daley Library did not make this list.

I should maybe do some work now, seeing as I am at work, and 'blogging' is not yet recognized as an activity that will "save the life of a child--whatever it takes" which is, I kid you not, my agency's motto.

"Beauty has been corrupted by being thought attainable at any cost, so it's not useful to me. I am interested in damage. " Laylah Ali

I just sat silently with an angry sobbing child. This was not the cathartic cry that turns the page and cleanses the soul and let's me know that I did my job. Have you seen the Princes of Tides? Not like that. No one will be whispering my name to the wind. This was the crying of a child who really actually gets how unfair and sad her life is, and feels trapped. I cried too. And sat and prayed. Watched her pull apart her nail beds. Best therapist ever!

Earlier I blessed the world with Mariah Carepy, but I am revising my therapeutic model. "What is your approach?" they ask. "I practice mistake-based therapy," I answer. I mess up and then I think about it, and I try not to keep messing up. Right now I am thinking about the Sermon on the Mount and the weak become the strong and the first will be last. Let's say that damaged people will become the most beautiful. I myself am literally spiraled in scars, so that makes me--Heidi Klum?

She is just precious. And did you read about how she made pregnancy hip again? Expect a major reversal in the developed world's birthrate.

Today I also hung out with a cool kid who had just finished three years of therapy with, like, the world's nicest guy; I was a bit of a disappointment. He talked with such pride about how he changed in therapy and what he had learned. How when he started he wouldn't even look at the guy because he thought he might cry. He recalled all the good times and the compliments paid by this man, and it wasn't hard to get through the fog of my jealousy and insecurity to see the possibilities that exist when I have one of these kids in my office. Oh yeah, that's right: I have my own office. And my own card. It reads:

St. Renegade

Mistake-Based Therapist

And

Kick Ass Social Worker

"I am interested in your damage."

There are many things I could have done to honor MLK Jr. today. I thought of attending church, as he was, first and foremost, a man of God; I also considered going to the DuSable Museum with the foster families and checking out what Afrocentric and Civil Righteous things they were doing today. In the end, I did none of these things. 1) I wore a fancy outfit. 2) I started some racial shit at work.

I got up on a soapbox and gave my little speech about Chicago and the great opportunity we, as social workers in this segregated city, have to address racism and ourselves and our professional and personal development. I have brought this up at three meetings in the last two weeks and was rewarded by being grudgingly invited to join the Diversity Panel. And you know that when a panel gets to meeting, things are gonna change!

Nothing will change. What I have done is burned my social capital, which is what I do. I'm all fun and reserved for the first couple of months, then bam--it turns out that I am a pain in the ass, that I say things that aren't funny at all, that are actually sort of earnest and grating. This will be my institutional legacy, as the honorable Dr. Brian Ragsdale says. They will remember that thick and sassy white lady who was always trying to talk about racism, and they will say "What happened to that thick and sassy lady?" and the answer will be "She married a Yezidi shepherd and went to live in the mountains of Armenia."

I was also looking for my favorite MLK Jr. quote in my journals, and fell into a journal hole. I stopped at journal #2--there is only so much about myself I can learn in a day. I did note that many of the things I had planned to do, had drawn and cooked up or planned to read, I did actually accomplish, although up to 10 years later. As Sister Mary Carol said: "Patience is a virtue, possess it if you can, found seldom in a women, and never in a man." Despite the restrictive gendering of human attributes, that rhyme has stuck with me. This is not the case with birthdays or multiplication tables, or the beautiful quote Martin Luther King Jr. said about justice working towards the ends of love.

In the absence of wisdom or insight, or inspirational words from a gifted holy man, I pledge to try not to be such a jackass all the time.

"Barf means snow."

I first saw a box of Barf in Gyumri, Armenia, in 2001. It was months before I had the confidence or language skills to actually purchase a box. I gave the contents to my host sister Kristenah--get to washing, villager!--and made postcards for my cousins. A box of Barf is a wonderful thing.

It's 2006, people, and I went back to Armenia, and I'm here to tell you: things have changed. Barf is still available, and the packaging still has that exciting ka-pow of blues and oranges, but whispering under the holler of Barf! are the teeny English words "Barf means snow." That got me thinking about the Tower of Babel: how did it get back to an Iranian manufacturer that in American slang "Barf means vomit"? How did all these Armenians get cell phones? Like, everyone: not just the dudes. Old ladies pull cell phones from their outfits of aprons covered by skirts under what appear to be bath mats. Everyone is talking all the time, everywhere.

My two years in Armenia was my big adventure, the experience that pulled my taffy and helped make me the mess I am today. I had a great time being back but it felt similar to my trips back to Columbus: going home, seeing family, feeling loved and safe. I cannot look to Armenia for boundary-expanding wild adventure any longer, which may very well be the theme of 2006--Get Used to It. My current personal challenge has none of the exotic gleam of mental illness, subaculta cliques, developing nation travel, or drastic surgery: I'm just growing up, and being stable, and having to get used to it. Bor-ring. Anyway, to the pictures, to the good times in Goght:

That's Ludvig. He is enjoying some cake. Ammo made that cake, and it was real good. It was enormous and would have lasted the Misakyans clear through January had I not brought my Sister to Armenia, and had she not eaten most of that cake.

These are more little kids. I think that it is important to show off the tiny adorable children that live in Goght. Svetik was a baby when I left (as was Ludvig) and now she is old enough to kick her brother's ass when he takes away the singing iron that Santa brought her.

The children pictured here have been genetically engineered to be light-skinned and light-eyed. Their parents' marriages were facilitated by their grandparents and village elders because they would result in the continued lightening of the Armenian people, who were originally nice and light, until Persians dirtied up the blood stream. This is what they told me. Their tremendous fascination with eugenics is nauseating, and their racism is frustrating in it's blunt idiocy. On the other hand Americans are actually right in the heart of it, and the subtle poison of liberal White bullshit actually destroys people; the people of Goght will probably never meet an African, and they'd still stuff them full of cake if they did.

And now we dance! Hayk is a member of an Armenian dance troupe, and he got to go to Georgia. Ammo is also an amazing freakin' dancer. Sona and Shoushan do okay--they mostly look cute, you know?

This was the table set for New Year. Sister and I sat at this table for the next five days, eating and eating and eating. It was magnificent, and also terribly boring. Note the arrival of Pepsi products; there was even Pepsi Lite, packaged in Armenia. Now that's development.

Happy New Year 2006!

Ludvig loves to give kisses. He was using this little finger puppet thing to give my sister some sweet Armenian sugar.

Sister and Guyane and I. Note that the sassy lady on Guy's sweater is taking a picture in the picture. And also note my golden outfit, terribly tacky here at home, but all the rage in Goght.

Armine is Ludvig and Fruenzik's mother. We have had a rocky relationship, but she was really sweet this year; check out our bad girl poses.

Ludvig and his grandpa, Fruenz.

Family portrait. We took two versions: one in which they laugh "like Americans" and one in which they stand proud and somber like Soviets. Samvel had been hunting that day and with all the ammo in his belt and camoflauge, this one is a lot less intimidating. I like a big fake American smile everytime.

I ate seven pieces of turkey bacon at Thanksgiving and had a vegetarian self-identity crisis, until I saw this at the Masiv shuka.

And yet how hot is Anush's jacket on me? Is this another animal rights crisis? No, because this coat is 100% acrylic. Or puppy or something, whatever.

Geghard is a 12th century monastery. The square building is the 'new' building, from the 15th century. Behind that building are three small churches hand-carved by a man in love with God and, possibly, with a nun. It is a fantastic church and I love it strongly and deeply.




It was Christmas mass. There were women from Etchmiadzin singing hymns in crystalline voices and Armenian priests in their tremendous robes, black pointed hats, and house slippers. The patron of Geghard blessed each one of us 'Christ be with you' and it was cold and ancient. I confess to not feeling tremendously holy. There was a feeling of weight and depth. Christianity in the US can feel so new, like at this icky Home Depot church I went to for our Christmas. In Turkey we went to a church and saw the young Turkish visitors staring and giggling and I remember thinking that they were in something they thought was outdated, exotic, and maybe creepy. I like the incense and the pomp and the stamp of time and culture and what it says about human fickleness and frailty.


This is the clique. We had expected a big crowd but the road was icy and people were staying in the city. I asked Hovsep how many accidents he has been in and he claimed none. This was under the evil eye of ancient Christianity, which then made sure that our car spun off the road in Goght. I don't have a picture but it was cartoonish--when we got out of the car, which was tottering off the road, it creaked forward and almost slide down the hill. Thankfully there are 20 Armenian men standing at any given corner who were, with our help, able to pick the unharmed car up and place it back on the road.

Some dude got wasted on New Year's Eve and drove his car right through a road side hut-store on the road to Garni. There was a big steaming hole right through the place and it was all the news until patched up by a mason and the 20 Armenian men watching him.

New Year 2001 in Yerevan was marked by a scrawny tree downtown and one sad and dirty Santa. Now look at that tree! Check out that square! That clean and spry Santa came out of nowhere, jumped into our picture, and demanded 1,000 dram! That's development, people.

Check out all those people! It was very festive. And it also answered the eternal question of how Santa fits all those gifts into his sleigh. Duh--he has a shuka bag.