and then our exile

i told various beoble i would update from here.

after some complications with flights (delays, sitting on runways, rescheduling, the fact officials in the philly airport had no idea where university park is) i am transferred, sans any real border troubles, to state college, PA. t called it "hicksville" on the phone - "but wait, that might be good for you, you might feel more at home there". thick corn fields standing tall. what i most felt, though, was how hot it is - in the mid-30s, but muggy and humid.

campus is beautiful, long green lawns, huge dutch elms, brick and stone monuments (what they call "buildings") reaching to the sky. we're settled in to dorms; as the only male i have an entire wing to myself. the days have formed a pattern by now, in the morning i go running and then hurry to finish the day's readings or written response over coffee and granola. then a seminar/ discussions on the readings and issues raised; then lunch and other lectures or meetings, or, as today, nothing scheduled.

there's actually a lot of unscheduled time ("and what will you do with your freedom") - most afternoons and evenings. the dorms are only a few minutes from what they call "downtown" (the strip analogous to whyte)(as someone said today - "it is so small i feel i'm walking in a model"), which is good proximity to interesting places.

after lunch today we walked around, talking about the different places we are all from, stopping in thrift stores and guitar stores. i eventually split from the group and sat at a table in webster's (think of alhambra's books but also serving cookies and coffee), trying to write and drinking tea. then wandered around an art gallery, and sat on grass and peoplewatched.
this lifestyle is foreign to me, i am guilty that there is not more work to do. a free jazz festival starting tomorrow.

i have been pointing out american flags to whoever from the group is around. there are so many of them around, red white and blue. they don't notice them anymore, apparently they are normal. but no it is a subconscious rabid nationalism.

we were walking in to linda martin alcoff's lecture (comparative race, comparative racisms), and fox news was on the auditorium big screen. shocked - "people actually watch this?" "ha, you thought it was an urban myth?"

have been walking at night, alone under streetlamps, soft shadows.

the bus to philly on saturday, to meet t. a week left here.

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an elegy for beirut. <-- read, and pray.