This entry is long and strange. There may be are a few factoring causes:
1.) Last night, I experienced art that shook me to the core.
2.) This morning, I was mortified to read an article that suggested the design festival I worked on while in Scotland has seriously jeopardized the fate of the museum that organized it.
3.) The past few weeks, there have been articles in The Chicago Reader and the New York Times about how this finiancial crisis is affecting cultural not-for-profits in the US. It is not pretty.
When I sat down to write today, I found myself writing a timeline of the last few years. I did not set out to do this; my brain just needed to and took control. What emerged from this stream of consciousness timeline surprised me. For the first time, I realized that coming of age during wartime has affected me in ways I never noticed before. I just thought I’d post it, no matter how weird and rambling it may be, in case it inspires others to think about how living in wartime affects them.
Timeline
November 4, 2000
For the first time ever, I vote.
November 5, 2000
I am outraged.
September 9 2001
Applied to transfer to NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts for Spring ’02 term.
September 11, 2001
World Trade Center Attacks. My sophomore year of college was just beginning. I was in the registrars office, trying to get the attention of the staff to help me drop a biology class. They were huddled around a radio. “Shhh,” the registrar said, “New York City’s just been bombed!”
Confused, I left the office in search of my friend Derek. I found him looking for me. We went to his apartment and turned the TV on just in time to see the second plane hit the tower. My roommate came over. We were numb. We ate Hershey bars. We wondered aloud if we should’ve saved the chocolates for the wartime to come. My roommate throw a Vogue at me, the thick spine of which cut my forehead. She said my comment was stupid and insensitive. It was. Why did I say it? I left.
I could not get a hold of my boyfriend via phone. Once I did, we fought. He was angry at the passengers for not successfully deterring the hijackers. I couldn’t believe his initial reaction to this was to blame anyone, let alone the victims. I was 19. He was 23.
That night, I dreamt that all the souls of the day’s victims were in my room, looking at me. They wanted to know where to go next but I didn’t know. The sky was quiet that night. No planes flew overhead.
October 12, 2001
Opening day of David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive. Boyfriend proposes marriage in parking garage of movie theatre. I break into a cold sweat. I agree.
November 19, 2001
NYU informs applicants that the admission process is delayed. I am too nervous to move to New York without a formal acceptance. I am impatient. I lack faith. I apply to Columbia College Chicago.
January 25, 2002
Boyfriend becomes husband. As always, I love him. But I do not get comfortable with his new title–or mine–for years.
January 26, 2002
Move to Chicago. I am a student, a wife, a barista, an intern. I struggle to make friends. I am unsure of my new life. I am adjusting. I am trying.
February, 2002
Shaun lands his first job out of college in the publications department of the Art Institute. I receive a letter of acceptance from NYU for the Fall 2003 term. I think of all the time spent on my submission portfolio. I look around at my new life. I save the letter in an old hat box. I wonder if I have any regrets.
March 2, 2002
Four days shy of my 20th birthday, a man named Tom Ridge unveils the Homeland Security Advisory System. Days are color coded according to how terrified we are supposed to be. We live on the 48th floor of a high-rise apartment tower. There is no known evacuation plan. I dream of saving my husband from a wall of fire.
March 2002-December 2002
Months march by. The government tells us to seal off our rooms with duct tape and plastic sheeting. There is a SARS outbreak. We get a pet cat.
January 2003
We move to a small apartment in Wicker Park. We are very poor and cannot afford to eat much or turn the heat up. We reuse tea bags. We play chess. We walk to gourmet grocery stores to dine on samples. We are very happy.
February 2003
Our country is on the verge of war. We get into museums free with husband’s Art Institute staff ID badge. We visit frequently. We go to the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) for the first time to see a show called War (What is it Good For?). I couldn’t stop thinking about it for days.
March 20, 2003–April 2003
Our nation declares war in Iraq. The words “Shock and Awe” physically sicken me when I hear them. I stop watching television news. I start listening to NPR religiously. I visit the MCA again. It is the one place the offers an articulate voice of descent. Contemporary artists are the only ones expressing ideas that I can identify with. I start checking out contemporary art exhibition catalogs from the library. I drop all my screenwriting classes and switch them to art classes. I change my mind and switch them all back once I realized I couldn’t afford to change majors at the end of my junior year. We were poor enough as it was.
April 2003
I land an internship at the world’s most popular daytime television show where I receive anthrax training and a box of rubber gloves to sort the fan mail. Eventhough it is too late to change majors, I decide I cannot work in media.
June 2004
I graduate college. I land my first job out of college at the MCA. I am a part-time assistant. We are still poor, but I am happy to be around art. I am stunned to find myself on staff tours with curators and artists. It makes all the other part-time jobs I have to keep worth while. I tutor English. I shoot and edit video, freelance. A video client of mine gets seriously creepy. I am stalked. I think about bird flu. We go to court with the stalker. I sell my camera to help pay court costs.
November 2004
Bush gets elected again. My mom and step-dad divorce. We decide to leave the country soon.
October 2005
Sick of our tiny gross apartment, Shaun and I move to Ravenswood, on Chicago’s north side. The apartment is bigger. In our new place, only one outcropping of asbestos is visible, only one pipe requires a drip pan beneath it.
January 2006
I am promoted at the museum to a full time position. I buy a new winter coat. For the first time in a while, I am warm. We aren’t too terribly poor anymore. I sign up for writers workshop. I start to make real friends in the city for the first time.
June 2006
Husband is accepted to the University of Glasgow’s MLit program. We are moving to Scotland!
September 2006
We move to Scotland. Husband never wants to leave. Loves his classes. Loves his writerly life. Initially, I am full of hope and joy. This soon gives way to panic. We are poor again. My face breeds a huge outcropping of painful, gory cysts. I have to interview for jobs this way.
November 2006
Despite cysts, The Lighthouse hires me to work on an inaugural, nationwide design festival. I am thrilled to have work–especially work that advances my resume–but adjusting to the cultural differences in another country’s workforce is challenging. The whole festival is challenging. My skin never fully clears.
February 2007
I am finally enjoying Scotland in earnest. I’ve made friends. I feel close and connected to my colleagues. I have a role here. I am happy. But I am wondering what comes next. Anxiety plagues me. Husband does not want to leave, ever. I am not sure if I can commit to a lifelong, ocean-wide separation from family. We fight. We make up. We enjoy the moment. We fight again.
May-June 2007
The festival is in full swing. I’m so busy it is hard to believe. I drink more than I’ve ever drunk. I’ve come to love the place and friendships are made for life. In-laws also visit and I make a horrible comment that causes mother-in-law to cry. I will never be forgiven for this and I know it while its happening.
July 2007
Festival ends. I contract shingles, brought on by stress and fatigue, and am bedridden for two weeks. I watch Planet Earth on DVD.
September 2007
Husband and I still cannot agree on what happens next. He feels at home in Scottish culture, cannot bear the politics and attitudes of Americans. But our lease has run out. We are homeless, but house-sitting for friends. My work contract is in its final weeks. He is finished with school. We buy plane tickets for Chicago but change them last minute when I am offered a pathetically low paying job in NYC. We look at this new opportunity as a compromise, as a new adventure. There is about ten minutes of thought before we flew into action. Flights are changed. Arrangements are made. Our fight draws to a close.
October 2007
Mom gets remarried. We move to NYC.
November 2007
My pathetically low paying job turns out to be a scam. We temp and look for secure employment. We own next to nothing, as we’ve just come from overseas. We live in a ghetto. We have a major roach infestation in our apartment. Mariachi music plays all night long, punctuated by bullets in the night. Rats are everywhere. This is poverty.
December 2007
We both land jobs. We are relieved but still poor. We look forward to visiting family over the holidays.
January 2008
After the holidays, I fall into a deep, horrible depression. I have trouble eating. I cry every night. I sleep a lot. I want to go back in time. I hate New York.
March 2008
I start working a second job. It is the only way I can save up enough money to leave. I am always tired. Everyday I am swimming upstream.
May 2008
I start to have a small but promising stash of escape money. I put the word out to Chicago friends that I am eager to come back home. A few days later, my old boss contacted me to let me know about a position at the MCA. A week later, I was on a flight back to Chicago. Moved in with a kind friend. Slept on her couch until I could afford a down payment on an apartment for husband and me. For the first time in a long, long while, I could breathe. It was incredible.
August 2008
Moved into new apartment in Rogers Park, on Chicago’s north side. Was joined mid-month by husband. We feel like survivors. I am happy to sleep in a bed again.
September-October 2008
Husband freelance writes and teaches at a university while he looks for a secure day job. We are still poor but the whole world is going broke, so this is nothing unique. There is a declared global financial crisis. We are happy anyway. We are sick of worrying. We are concerned without being afraid. For the first time, it occurs to us that we will soon feel ready to start a family.
October 30, 2008
I stay late at work to see Jenny Holzer’s nighttime projections on the face of the Museum of Contemporary Art. A text-based artist, Holzer created the projection using The End and the Beginning, a war poem from Polish Nobel Laureate Wislawa Szymborska. I read first few lines, “After every war/someone has to clean up. Things won’t/straighten themselves up, after all,” and thought of how I came to this point in time. I realized that coming of age against the backdrop of war has influenced my decisions, has affected me more than I thought. I was reminded of how I first came to love the MCA. I was thankful that now, days before this election, the museum is a place where I find connection once again.
