Three or four times a day, a plane will fly over the University of Puget Sound. Professors will pause mid-sentence as they teach, waiting for the noise to fade, while students walking below will take out their earphones and search the sky. Sometimes they will see the plane, low over the campus; other times the clouds will hide the jet from sight. But no matter the type of plane or the time of the day, one thing never changes\u2014the silence that follows.<\/p>\n
I leave the library, head back to my dorm. It\u2019s overcast, but the sunlight still peeks around the edges of the clouds. I think about what homework I have left to do. No, don\u2019t think of that. I think that I haven\u2019t posted on the blog in a while. Two weeks? That\u2019s a while. I think, What can I write about?<\/p>\n
Today the Finnegans Wake<\/em> reading group recommences\u2014that is, after a break for winter vacation. I remember just as I enter my dorm. It meets in ten minutes. So I say bye to my room and head back out. I\u2019m convinced that Joyce is someone I will\u00a0never understand. Reading his work is like trying to get to the center of a giant lollipop, lick by lick. And when you get there, you find a giant cricket; you prod it with your tongue to see if there\u2019s something more, and then you vomit. Or else you\u2019re just not getting it. We get through about a page each time we meet.<\/p>\n Then that\u2019s over and I think I can go back to my room. But I remember\u00a0that I have to meet with a group for a project that cannot wait, and that I\u2019m late. I sigh, or groan, or do both at once, and fast-walk to the library, because what is life if you\u2019re not tracing and retracing your steps? Out of the library, into the library. I take the steps by two and find the room they’ve set up in. I forgot my laptop.<\/p>\n But this isn\u2019t a record of a twenty-year-old\u2019s angst.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n A plane crashes in Taipei.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I\u2019m outside in the drizzle, talking to a friend I haven\u2019t talked to in a while. He\u2019s telling me about the snow on the East Coast, how cold it is right now. A plane flies low overhead; I am deafened to my friend. I raise my voice to speak, but I\u2019m not getting through. I wait it out, try to walk in the opposite direction.<\/p>\n The plane passes and everything is silent. I sigh and tell him I’ll talk to him soon, I have to go now. A lamplight turns on above me. The sun sets behind a mountain; it has just risen in Taipei.<\/p>\n Back at my dorm, a suitemate of mine is eating a lollipop. He sucks it for a while, then bites, cracking it in two. He throws the stem in the garbage can. Want to go to the library tonight? he asks.<\/p>\n Maybe I\u2019m just not getting it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Three or four times a day, a plane will fly over the University of Puget Sound. Professors will pause mid-sentence as they teach, waiting for the noise to fade, while students walking below will take out their earphones and search … Continue reading