Letters To You

Dear Everyone,

Torn-open burn blisters are disgusting. I'm sorry I'm disgusting.

Yours In Stinging, Alcohol-, Peroxide-, and Neosporin-Filled Pain,

Damien

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Dear Place or Thing Which Shall Remain Nameless,

I gave you over fifty thousand dollars, and EIGHT YEARS of my life. I recruited for you. I went to your fucking faculty/student functions. I have been to the houses of your members. The least you could do is give me the courtesy of a written 'No,' in response to my application for employment.

Yours In Unsurprised Disappointment and Disdain,

Damien

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Dear New Girl At Emory Who Comes into My Coffeeshop,

I think you're cool and all, but I really don't want to have to have the awkward conversation with you where I unsubtly drop in the phrase "...And My Girlfriend..." So...

I have a girlfriend.

Hope We Can Still Be Friends,

Damien

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Dear People Of The World,

For a very long time now, we have been playing an elaborate variant on the game of Let's Pretend, and this variant is called "Credit." In this game, we have all agreed that scraps of paper and complex equations with no actual thing to back them up actually "mean" something, and that that "something" actually determines how we function, as a planetarily interconnected society.

Funny thing? As we've been playing this game, we have simultaneously told ourselves that A) this game is deadly serious and B) this game is completely dependent on how we feel, think about, and react to what happens in the game. When we freak out about the first part, we have effectively stuck our fingers in our ears while going "la la la I can't hear you," to the second. But, if we all decide to to change how we approach this idiotic enterprise, then guess what? The Fucking Thing Changes! It's a gods-damned miracle! It's Fucking Magical!

Jesus Shitting Christs.

Love,

Damien

Self-Image.

I'm in a weird state. This is my CV. In the past few months and years, I have applied to several teaching and academic positions, and have received none of them. Since completing my graduate program, I have only added to my field of experience, and yet... nothing. So.

If you were hiring for academic positions, is there anything, here, which would immediately turn you off? Elucidate, here.

I have a body image issue. My abdominal muscles are asymmetrical, as a result of stance, hip cast, and something strange about the composition of my ribs (right side of my ribs is more pronounced than the left, creating a weird space for the attendant musculature). This has become more and more apparent to me, in the past several months. It bothers the living fuck out of me, and I am very self-conscious about it.

Those of you with chiropractic or gait-based experience, what can I do to adjust my stance, hip cast, etc, to correct this?

Borders Trip, today. I very much feel my Raven, when I go to closing stores to raid their closeout sales.

On a happier note, pages 141 through 154 of Truman Capote's Other Voices, Other Rooms comprise some of the most brilliant prose i have ever read. I mean that. Read this book.

Okay, ta.