A Picture Shows A Thousand Words; Maps Are Even Better

I like maps. I like maps for a lot of reasons – they have a bad habit of revealing more about their makers than their subjects, for one – but among the simplest is this: maps show distance and to me, the would-be traveler, distance is the same as progress. Take the map below: it shows you, in a way, how I just progressed.



From my parent's house in Florida to my new one in Pennsylvania (with numerous Virginia social visits in between), this map covers a lot of distance and maybe, just maybe, a little progress. Having officially competed school – the ceremony (which I did not attend) took place just before Christmas and my degree is supposedly in the mail – this map shows my next milestone: my first job. What it does not show is that, in addition to being absurdly cold in this frozen tundra, from here on out I am also employed as the Managing Director of a start-up creative arts nonprofit in Allentown, PA.

This is all equal parts terrifying and exhilarating; wish me luck!

New Kicks on Kerry and Indecision '08

How strange it is to be looking at all of this from the outside in. Here I am in Mexico - in the ITESM library preparing some group work on Brazilian imports to be exact - but Le Tigre's "New Kicks" just came on my playlist and instantly I was transported back. Not just to the United States but also to 2004, to the Bush-Kerry debacle and the feeling is indescribable. As you can hear, the song is not exactly a slice of Americana* and I wouldn't necessarily call this nostalgia - I may miss the States but I certainly don't miss the year - but the feeling I got was unshakable. Its sad and strange mix of hope and despair because today, for the first time in weeks, I feel that American politics are more than just an abstraction. Did you know that the rest of the world - my Latin American colleagues and the European ones alike - are just as eagerly waiting for a resolution not just to the Presidential Election in general but even the Democratic Primaries as I am? Perhaps more so. I was walking with a French extranjero friend of mine the other day near Cerro de la Silla and discovered he knew more about the current state of the race than I did. The reason is clear: I'm burnt out. "New Kicks" really got my pulse going, though, and I think now I know why: I was excited about the prospect of change. After this interminable race for the nomination I'm more overwhelmed than optimistic and no speech on either side can change that. Say what you want about Kerry, but at least with a tidy nomination it was possible to get excited about him (even if he couldn't). Maybe, from the outside looking in, I can re-sensitize, re-energize myself. At any rate I hope so, because if I can't there are plenty of people at EGADE willing to do it for me.

* I have Tennessee Ernie Ford's "Sixteen Tons" for that.