Undivided Attention- Taylor Mali

A grand piano wrapped in quilted pads by movers,
tied up with canvas straps—like classical music’s
birthday gift to the criminally insane—
is gently nudged without its legs
out an eighth‐floor window on 62nd street.

It dangles in April air from the neck of the movers’ crane,
Chopin-­‐shiny black lacquer squares
and dirty white crisscross patterns hanging like the second‐to­‐last
note of a concerto played on the edge of the seat,
the edge of tears, the edge of eight stories up going over—
it’s a piano being pushed out of a window
and lowered down onto a flatbed truck!—and
I’m trying to teach math in the building across the street.

Who can teach when there are such lessons to be learned?
All the greatest common factors are delivered by
long‐necked cranes and flatbed trucks
or come through everything, even air.
Like snow.

See, snow falls for the first time every year, and every year
my students rush to the window
as if snow were more interesting than math,
which, of course, it is.

So please.

Let me teach like a Steinway,
spinning slowly in April air,
so almost-­‐falling, so hinderingly
dangling from the neck of the movers’ crane.
So on the edge of losing everything.

Let me teach like the first snow, falling

My own shame

This week I read a few articles, saw a few memes, and have just been generally thinking about fat shaming lately. I have to admit, I rarely think too much about the general popular culture movements in fatness. I am too close to it, and have to deal with it on a daily basis, so I tend not to think too much about how it is portrayed in the world at large. I went through a phase when it consumed me pretty regularly. I had a tough time watching Friends' episodes where Courtney Cox donned a fat suit for an endless stream of fat jokes, and I could not even deal with Shallow Hal when it came out. This does not even go into Mike Myers Fat Bastard get-up, Ryan Reynolds in a fat suit for that Just Friends movie, or any other thing where "normal" sized people put on a fat suit to make fun of fat people. I have moved on from that sort of anger at the world. The Rock is going to be a in fat suit for bits and pieces of his big summer blockbuster this year, and it does not bother me, or at the very least, I realize getting angry about it does no one any good. Instead I focus on what I can do in my own creations to make fat people not the butt of the jokes, to portray them as complex beings with feelings. That is the best I can do.

But the fact remains, I struggle with the fat acceptance movement, and I almost never think about why. It feels anti-progressive to struggle to accept this movement, and the reality is, I do accept it, just not for myself. I have been battling with this for a few years, and I have maybe documented it slightly in this blog over the last few years, but never fully. I think it would be great if we got to a place where people who were fat were not made fun of for being fat. I think it is awesome that people out there are owning their bodies no matter the shape or size. It is probably super empowering. I just do not feel it. I do not accept my own fatness, because to accept it would be to accept how horribly unhealthy I have been for a majority of my life. It would be to accept the debilitating joint pain and back pain as a result of that fatness. It would be to accept the fact that climbing two flights of stairs leaves me gasping for air. I just cannot accept it. I cannot look at myself as I am now and say, "This is okay."

I understand my real issue is with my health, not my size, but my size has caused my health. The immense pressure I have put on my knees, my ankles, my feet from the sheer weight of my body, is why I have joint pain. When I lose weight, that joint pain is less agonizing. It is simple math, and while I have a strong distaste for math, it is impossible to ignore. How can I accept this? How can I be okay knowing that? Every day I have general panic that my future kids will end up like me, and that terrifies me. There is a part of me that is glad I have not accepted my body. I do not want to feel like it is okay. I want to change. I have been slowly changing for four years, too slowly, but slowly.

2016 has been a significant year for many reasons, but one of them was the dedication to living healthier, and in terms of food, I am probably doing the best job of my life. I am counting calories, eating much healthier, even when not at home, opting for salads at Sac State instead of Panda Express or Togo's. I have cut way back on sweets, cut back on the sweetener in my iced tea, and outside of a rough march, cut way back on alcohol. I should be losing more weight than I am. I should feel better than I do. The problem is, I sacrificed working out for a grad school program. Managing my life has gotten tricky. I am busier than I have ever been in my entire life. I thought teaching 2 classes, putting together PACT and performing in Titanic five years ago was the busiest I could possibly be, but I was wrong. I have placed a value on strengthening my mind, and strengthening my job prospects, over strengthening my body. I was great at it in January, and early February, but abandoned it.

I hate my body. Hate hate hate. Then I hate myself for hating it. I hate feeling uncomfortable in my own skin. I hate that I am always conscious of my arms showing my stretch marks. I hate worrying that any part of my belly flab might become visible while stretching, especially in a classroom of 30 teenagers. At the moment I hate the throbbing pain in my left knee that has been persistently present for six days now, but I never feel like I can talk about it because it my own fat fault that it hurts. There is no reason to see a doctor, because as my last two doctors told me, all of my issues likely stem from my obesity. No shit, homie.

This is how I feel for myself, by the way, not for anyone else. I do not want anyone to get the impression this is what I think anytime I see a fat person, because it is not. I am thrilled to see fat stories existing in the world today. I am excited that there are fat blogs, and fat fashion, and I am hopeful one day, we will see more fat stories in popular culture where being fat is not a punchline. At the same time, I do not ever want to get to a place where I feel too comfortable in my own fat experience, because it has made me horribly unhealthy, and I want that to change that, not accept it.

I also wish other people's empowerment empowered me. I follow sassy fat people on social media who are clearly comfortable in their own skin, and I always hope it will rub off on me, but every time I think, "it's my body, I should be happy with it" my next immediate thought is "but you ruined the one body you get."

Do not misunderstand me, Fat Shaming is disgusting and unhelpful, and of course, anyone doing the fat shaming is not trying to help any way. They can frame that shit however they want, but they are not trying to help, they are trying, and often times succeeding, at being assholes. No one should feel that they can comment on anyone's body just because. There is not a single fat person in the world who does not know they are fat, trust me.

I usually try to come to some resolution on these blogs, but I got nothing today, sorry.

"If you don't like that...you don't like KINGS basketball"

The current Arco Arena (I know, Sleeptrain, but it will always be Arco to me) opened in time for the 1988-1989 basketball season. The Kings, who had moved from Kansas City in 1985, opened the arena, which was the cheapest NBA building. My family moved to the Sacramento area in December of 1988. I do not know a Sacramento area world without the Sacramento Kings playing in Arco. It was not to long after we got settled that my dad took me to see Rodney McCray, Kenny Smith, Wayman Tisdale, and the others for my first time. It was the birth of mt first and only Love/Hate relationship. Being a Kings fan in the late 80s, early 90s, mid 90s, late 2000s and early and mid 2010s has brought more tears than laughter, but it is our plight to bare.

For years we had a routine, my dad and I, and occasionally a sibling or two. For a long time the Kings offered game plans, where you could pick from a few different packages of anywhere from 7-15 games to get tickets to. My dad would buy the family 2 seats for one of the those packages and he would switch off who he would take. I have no idea if the routine was the same with the rest of the siblings, but for my dad and I, we would first stop at Long John Silver's for dinner because my mom hated the smell of fish and we never got it at home. After dinner, we drove to Arco, climbed the steep steps and took our seats at the top row, or next to last row, and because my dad had work early, with about five minutes left in the game, we would leave our seats and catch the rest of the game on the move. We tried to time it so we were exiting the arena as soon as the game ended and we could beat everyone out of the parking lot. We were never concerned with the freeway because we were going the opposite way of everyone else.

Much like The San Francisco Giants, the Sacramento Kings hold so many wonderful memories of my family, of my friends, and it all stems from Arco Arena. I can remember driving to Arco back when the area was a vast expanse of nothingness with an arena in the middle of it. I remember dreaming of playing on that court when my dad set up our basketball hoop at our house. All I wanted in the world from 1990-1995 was to be Lionel "L Train" Simmons but with Mitch Richmond's jump shot. I must have practiced my Richmond jump shot hundreds of times a day.

I remember when Billy Owens refused to come to Sacramento and somehow the Warriors were willing to part with one third of Run-TMC and brought The Kings its biggest star in that era. I remember when the KIngs used to host a draft viewing experience in Arco, and my dad and I would go every year to watch the draft live at the arena. The arena booed like crazy when they drafted Peja Stojakovic because his European contract was not up yet, and we had to wait two years to see him in the Kings uniform. It turned out to be worth the wait!

I have lived through eternal heartbreak as a fan of this team, and its dumpy arena personifies that. It, like the Kings, can be tough to love most of the time, but when you really think about the memories, you cannot help but love it. Nothing in this world has ever made me feel pride in the city where I was raised like Arco Arena during the 1998-2005 seasons. I had never experienced that much energy, emotion, love, and joy. Those Chris Webber led Kings teams were a wonder to behold. Webber, Divac, Peja, Bibby, J-Will, Bobby Jackson, Scott Pollard, Hedo, etc had us cheering for every single second of every single game. The height, of course, was the 2001-2002 season when the Kings had the best record in the Western Conference! For those of us who had been sitting in the top two rows cheering our hearts out when the Kings were routinely finishing with 25-35 wins, and were the laughing stock of the NBA, it was more than just a basketball team, it was like members of our family finally succeeding. 

The last six years have been rough, but the city of Sacramento rallied and proved to the the nation why Larry Bird called the Kings fans the best fans in the game way back in 1986. We are the best fans in the game. We support a team that routinely breaks our heart because they represent a city always fighting for respect. Through all of the years, Arco has persevered. An entire city went up around it. No longer is it alone. No longer do people wonder what that random building in the middle of nowhere is when they fly into Sacramento. It has been a landmark, an ugly landmark, but a landmark of our city, and while I am excited to see the full unveiling of the Golden 1 Center, I am going to miss going to Arco to see the Purple and Black, or the Powder Blue and red, or whatever iteration comes next. 

I have too many wonderful memories of Arco to even spill out into this blog, but I do want to highlight one. In the 2000-2001 season my good friend David got two tickets and asked me to go with him. It was early January in 2001. The Phoenix Suns were in town, the Kings, Lakers and Suns were battling it out for supremacy in the Western Division. It was a HUGE game, and four minutes in Chris Webber got himself ejected. I was sure that was it. I did not think Vlade could handle all the middle with all of of Jason Kidd's ability to break Jason Williams down. I made a comment early in the game about not believing in Vlade and the two dudes behind us heard it and for the rest of the game, every time Vlade did anything good, they gave me a hard time about it. As the game went on and those two guys got increasingly more drunk, the comments got more obnoxious until one of them dumped beer all over my hat. I was seconds away from probably getting into a fight when I turned to David who was just laughing about the whole thing. When I asked him why he was laughing he commented on the absurdity of us arguing over Vlade keeping the team in the game. We were all on the same side. It diffused the situation and allowed me to sit and enjoy the rest of the game, which went into overtime and saw the Kings pull out the victory, mostly due to Vlade's free throw shooting. Even though Tony Delk went for over 50 points, somehow, the magical Kings pulled it out.

Thank you Arco Arena for over 25 years of memories, I will cherish them, even the heartbreaking ones. Thank you for giving me a place to watch world class athletes doing world class things.  

A jumble of thoughts

Clearly, I have not been able to keep up with the schedule I had hoped to, so I am going to have to lose the 2 times a week posting. My new goal is to post every Sunday. Setting an actual schedule is incredibly helpful, and since I have to update my grad school Teaching College Composition blog every weekend, it is a good time for me to update this blog as well.

As it turns out, being a full time teacher and a full time grad student is insane. The work load is more than I would recommend to anyone, and it has definitely taken its toll on me in recent weeks. If I survive April and May, it will be a miracle, seriously. Between writing two fourteen-page papers, four shorter essays, a lit review, two annotated bibliographies, reading three more novels, preparing students for the AP Lit exam, teaching four junior English classes, planning next year's yearbook, and writing, and submitting paperwork to the UC system to get yearbook as an A-G credit, I may just die.

That being said, being a grad student has actually helped me find the energy to teach every day. It has reminded me of how important learning is. I actually think I have been a better teacher the last two months because of the time at grad school. Plus, one of my courses has opened my eyes to being a better teacher of writing, which is the area in which I am weakest. Next year I am going to be a whole new teacher, and I am totally stoked. But I have to get through the next eight weeks first.

This week, which was supposed to be awesome because it was spring break from teaching, took a pretty nasty turn Thursday night. My wife had my car in Oakland, and someone smashed the window and stole my wife's laptop and a duffle bag full of clothes and makeup. It turns out our deductible on our insurance is so high that we are pretty much paying out of pocket to fix the window and if we want to replace the lost items. The last few months we were starting to climb out of the financial hole we have been in for what feels like forever, and this is definitely an unexpected hit. But, I know we will survive it. We have survived worse together. And it turned out that, for me, this was not even the kicker.

Friday afternoon I ventured out to Arden Fair Mall to get a receipt on the Macbook Air that was stolen, and as I was walking around the mall, I heard some whispers from behind me. I heard two voices cracking jokes about my obesity. It appeared that these people were actually following me just cracking jokes. I have written at length about my experiences with people making fun of me for being fat, and I am not super eager to rehash that conversation, but it is hard to not write about it when it is something I continue to deal with multiple times a month. Yes, multiple times a month I hear people in the world making comments about how fat I am, as if I am oblivious to the fact that I am an obese person. I have been obese since I was probably fourteen years old, this is not a surprise to me. What is surprising is that the things my fourteen year old peers taunted me with in middle school and high school, are still happening. Those people who caused me to miss half of the school year in seventh and eighth grade because I could not possibly face them, grew into adults who do the same thing.

After listening to these two people for longer than I should have, I finally snapped. I wish I hadn't. I wish I had not given them the satisfaction of knowing they got to me. On a regular day I probably could have let it roll off of me. I have become pretty damn good at ignoring such things. Friday though, man they managed to find the exact way to make their words stick. I have said this before, but if you take pictures of people to mock them online, or if you mock people openly in public, you are an asshole and I have no time for you in my life. Please delete me from any social media if you think that is funny. You can go on and on about politically correctness being bad, but if your aim is to hurt people, you are not some defender of Freedom of Speech, you are just a fraction of a human being, and have no concept of decency.

If I could go back to any moment in my life, I would go to my twelve year old self and implore myself to not get obese. It is a seriously awful thing to be fat and try to occupy space in public. Almost always, that obesity was caused by bad decisions so people think it is fair game for mockery. This entire weekend I have been replaying all the worst things I have heard or had done to me because of my obesity. It is an awful space to be occupying, but I have not been able to shake it at all. It is Sunday and I am still stewing in how awful it feels.

I am a productive member of society. I think I have an honorable profession. I am working hard to better my mind, and my station in life. I like to think I treat people fairly and fight for people who are struggling to fight for themselves. I think most people who know me would say that I am kind and sincere, so why should it matter to me what two people who have never met me before think? Why does it hurt? I wish I had answers, I really do. This is not the kind of thing I can seem to intellectualize. It boggles my mind that there are people out there who feel the need to be so mean. And I know that it is a reflection of them and not of me, but that does not help.

My hope is that now that I have written it out, I can let it go. I do not need to hold on to the anger, the sadness, the hopelessness I have been feeling for three days. Last night I had a great work out. I am a dedicated teacher and student. I am a dedicated friend and husband who has people who love me. It is time to focus on those things. It is time to remind myself that I am not my obesity. We are not the things the world makes fun of us for. We are stronger than that. I am stronger than that.