People, it was cold today, particularly during the part of the day when I was walking to my car, and thereafter. Cold, as in "cold." But it was all good, because after an extremely warm greeting from both Bruiser and the historian when I got home, the mail came, and there was a Sundance catalog. Good for browsing, good for venal envy, good for a good time before tossing it into the recycling bin.
Near the end of the catalog was an item: Paradox Pants. How, you may ask yourself, can mere trousers be paradoxical? Simple: they are "soft yet strong, fashionable yet functional."
Trendy yet timeless? Cute yet insufferable? Smart yet stupid? Maybe, cropped yet full-length? Come on, play along: ------- yet ---------. Dingy yet distinguished. Dorky yet delectable. Dopey yet Sleepy. Clearly my great powers of language manipulation are misplaced, misspent, misapplied, misused. Also: undercompensated. Undercompensated yet unappreciated. Wait, that's not a paradox.
Beautiful yet ugly? Expensive yet cheap? Luxurious yet stingy? Concrete yet abstract? Here yet there.
ReplyDeleteI want me some of them abstract pants. Please.
1) Loved yet hated.
ReplyDelete2) Salty yet sweet.
3) Drunk yet sober.
4) Fancy yet plain.
I could probably go on, but I give myself a headache, yet wouldn't it be a good headache?
Oy.
And what's up. You never SigNo anymore. Have you lost my address? I think you have. Remove the old reference to the Comcast site and just go to http://www.signifyingnothing.com
Okay. I was thinking about better jobs than mine today. I was watching Dillan (retarded, charming guy, 15-year veteran at the company, who delivers the mail). I was wondering whether I wouldn't enjoy swapping jobs with Dillan.
ReplyDeleteI have no paradoxes to share but like Susan I've had moments of wondering what if.
ReplyDeleteOnce when I came into start my day as an alternative high school teacher, I saw the custodian, Allen, outside mowing the lawn. It was a brisk sunny morning yet he had a short sleeve shirt on. He looked like he was enjoying himself; in fact, in my seven years there I never saw him get angry or upset. I knew he would still be mowing away 30 minutes later while I would have to face grouchy teenagers and lazy colleagues.
During the day I would make dozens of decisions about how to teach something or another, how to engage students, how to perfect team teaching, and how to deal with a young girl in my class who was addicted to heroin. In the afternoon I had yet another meeting where we would argue about the effectiveness of service learning; by the afternoon Allen would be cleaning up the commons, now emptied of students.
And for a brief, amazingly brief given the contrast, moment I thought, what if....
(Sorry I think this is a post rather than a comment)