Yesterday E. took me to church at the Brooklyn Tabernacle because his parents were in town. The choir was very loud & their songs were very pretty & they had soft floral-upholstered chairs rather than pews & they never made you kneel but on the other hand it was still church & there was a lot of preaching going on & I didn't really like the Pastor's attitude & the only 2 things I ever look forward to at mass -- the three mini signs of the cross you make when you say Glory to you oh Lord & Communion, which is delicious -- were wholly absent. I mean, I know it wasn't mass because it wasn't Catholic, but still, I felt a bit cheated. E. was creeped out by the way some people muttered insanely but I wasn't really. On the other hand it did seem somehow affected to me. For the same reason I felt some people made too big a point of standing up & raising their hands to heaven with this very beatific look on their faces (I imagine it was beatific anyway, as I only saw them from behind, but really, what other expression would they have?), as if they were winning the competition of who was more filled up with the holy spirit. I didn’t feel filled up with anything really, especially since I hadn't eaten since the nite before & I was ravenous the entire time & they weren't even giving out any Eucharist, as I mentioned earlier.
So all in all I was very happy when it was over & I got to skip down to the G train alone, because E. wasn't off the hook yet. I bought a bag of pizza-flavored Combos & a New Yorker magazine. There was a marvelous little short story in it called "I Am A Novelist." It was by Ryu Murakami & it was the first short story in the New Yorker that I can remember finishing in ages. It was about a famous novelist who falls in love with a woman who is in love with a man who is impersonating the famous novelist. The woman says that it is OK to judge people by their appearances as long as you are true to yourself & refuse to be swayed by the opinions of others; that's something I've always felt but never articulated in my mind in that way. So I ate my Combos, biting the pretzels in half & sucking out the cheese, & I read the magazine & I had that after-church feeling I used to get as a kid, when you know you can go home & put on your old comfy clothes & watch television or play or have a snack or whatever you want because the rest of the day is yours again.
Today I am pretty hard at work so I should really get back to it.

posted by kat # 4:58 PM

Comments:

i read that short story the other night. i also like the picture that was with it. so sweet and lonely. it was actually the first story that after finding out that it was translated from japanese - i wished i could have read in japanese.

# posted by

Unknown : 6:41 PM

yes! the photo was gorgeous. the liquid-like hair. was it blue? i cant remember.

# posted by

kat : 8:50 AM

You know, I have to say, I feel exactly the opposite. I think it's perfectly okay to judge people by their appearance as long as you're willing to have your mind changed by their personality. In fact, not to be snarky, but I think 'staying true to yourself' is one of those those things assholes use to justify the fact that they're assholes. Sort of the well-read version of a 'no fear' bumper sticker. But then again, I could be wrong.

As a side note, reading your post too quickly, too early in the morning caused me to get some sort of vision of communion being done by offering a half a combo so the pentitent could suck the filling out. Church of Sara Lee, maybe?

# posted by

Morgan : 9:28 AM

interesting. i have to say, i didn't read it that way, but i like getting your input. what i thought it meant was not that one shouldn't be swayed by a person's personality, but that before you even get to that part, a person should go by their own definition of attractiveness, not everyone else's. because i do think there is a difference.
mmmm.... combos + communion... 2 of my favorite things!

# posted by

kat : 9:48 AM

no, see, i totally get that idea, because one time i was like "look at that guy, isn't he cute?!?!?" and my friend was all "eeew! no he's not!" and i was all, "fuck off bitch, that's my husband!"

# posted by

Shericat : 10:44 PM

Mr. Ryu has actually been a pretty hip and hapnin author in Japan for quite awhile now. His books are finally becoming pretty easy to find in the US. Check out Coin Locker Babies, Transparent Blue or 69. All good reads and all worth the time. He watches the translations pretty closely too, so they are about as good as you can get translating lyrical Japanese into English.

# posted by

Anonymous : 2:29 PM

Wow -- thank you! I really appreciate that. I definitely will.

# posted by

kat : 2:38 PM

what is the word

Monday, January 03, 2005

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