je comprendo don’t ne I understand pas no comprends

Music-critico-racial-pyschoanalytic-politco-philosophical theories are topics humanities students, which by students I mean me, thrive in. We like things that most people hate: why you sexually love your mother, how a triad is a trinity and how everything relates to Christ, how the systems we live in oppress people openly but no one seems to care, and if that tree really makes a sound in the woods . . . all alone . . . just like you and I: alone.

I’m the annoying student in the back that heckles when people mispronounce Foucault’s name (foo-cal-t). I’m the arrogant student that says “ontology” all too often. I’m the ass that raises my hand after every gendered comment. And yes, I hate marriage.

So every so often (all too often) I go to a lecture or talk and stare like a fresh baby looking at the world in a dazed and confused way. I hold my chin like my head might fall off, stare to the nearest wall, breath deeply, and think of absolutely nothing. It’s like trying to breath in a cement block.

“I don’t understand.”

I’ve been to two talks, in particular, that have flown so far above my head they are like the sun–definitely there in the sky but like the sun. Far away. Though I recognize it’s a sun and can describe the sun, talk about it “intelligibly,” and get warm from it.

Once I realize this is a sign from the universe that I need to get off my high horse and realize that I’m not always awesome I get to start new activities. This is the art of not understanding.

I look around the audience. Humanities students and professors are some of the best looking people IN THE ENTIRE WORLD.

I go into broken model pose. Sometimes I need as much practice as I can get and pretty much everyone at humanities talks are contorted into weird positions all while crossing their legs.

I think about my “thesis.” I do this often and I think that the osmosis theory of learning might kick in . . . finally.

I think to myself in french or spanish or I imagine what other language might sound in my head. I mean I have been stuck with English and my voice for 20 years, it’s time for a mental change.

I breakdown about how terrible the world is. People fight and protest for those that are temporarily abled-bodied, white, cis-gendered, and upper-middle class. All while people are being killed in the street, fired from their job, homeless, and all while I type this on my laptop.

I ponder about my white privilege, my male privilege, my cisgender privilege, my ability status privilege, my citizenship status privilege, my socio-economic status privilege, my educational privilege, and all my other privileges.

And then the lecturer says the world “antagonism” and I’m back!

Not understanding things that happen around me allow me to either A) think harder, B) focus on issues in my life that I don’t “have the time for” and gives me a rather quiet space to do so, or C) do this dance: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8UyWmcCQYk

Sometimes you just gotta dance. And I do understand that.