Sunday, March 21, 2010

obfuscate


\AHB-fuh-skayt\

verb

1 a : darken b : to make obscure
2 : confuse
3 : to be evasive, unclear, or confusing

okay. this word traces back to the latin "fuscus" which means dark brown, hence the meaning to darken, or cloud over. a dirty window. a neglected aquarium. my judgment, on occasion.

can one OBFUSCATE the self? because i think i do this all the time. and purposefully. as though there is a little mental curtain that i pull over my eyes in order to not observe the lies that i actively tell myself. not that those lies are all bad; sometimes i lie to myself about my confidence on the days i need to be tricked into believing i have more than i do.

(the above is what was actually written on sunday, march 21. the below was written late, on a tired monday morning.)

i woke up in seattle yesterday morning and checked my email from the holiday inn. i wrote the word OBFUSCATE on my hand so i would spend the day thinking about what i was going to write. i did not think about it. i ate breakfast with my sister, we drove back to portland, i wrote two short paragraphs about the word, and then i went on a date. it is now monday morning. i am a day late in writing my blog and the word OBFUSCATE is fading from the back of my left hand.

today there are errands. i have to return the rental car in a half hour. i'm not ready. i'm only partially dressed and there's still half a cup of tea to drink. i'm all out of vanilla yogurt and the bed sheets need to make it to the washer. i try to wash the word off my hand in the shower, but i can still see it. the OBFUSCATIONS need to be OBFUSCATED, darkened, clouded, hidden, shrouded. a glove perhaps?

i go to the gas station to put $5 in the chevy cobalt so i can return it to enterprise at the appropriate 5/8 of a tank. i get out of the car to dispose of a day-old apple core and look at the sky.

it looks like it wants to be nice out, i say to the attendant. my mother says things like this about the weather, as if the weather has a conscience.

i heard 50/50 chance of rain—i hope i'm on the good side! he laughs.

i guess there's always a 50/50 chance of everything. either it happens or it doesn't. right? i say. he just smiles. i don't think he wants to get deep. it is just a gas station. i wish i didn't always try to take conversations to the next level.

i leave, wishing just a little bit that i was a gas station attendant. piano man is on the radio. i turn it up really loud and sing along, wanting it to mean something, but it doesn't. so i laugh. because i'm always trying to put it where it doesn't belong. meaning, that is. after all, there's a 50/50 chance that everything means nothing.

fortunately for us, OBFUSCATE means something. although i'm not sure i've figured out what that is yet.

1 comment:

  1. You had me laughing out loud when you said that I think that the weather has a conscience! Maybe it's true. I want to make IT feel guilty for giving CT so much rain this month.....water in the basement 3 times! Love U!

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