Crazy in the City: The world is your urinal

My home office looks out onto the street. It’s not the prettiest view in the world, but there is some foliage and traffic to keep me entertained in  moments of procrastination and daydreaming.

I live in a decent neighborhood with it’s eclectic mix of whack jobs and professionals. Yet, it does not seem to matter what walk of life a man comes from, they all seem to view the great outdoors as their personal toilet. I cannot recount the amount of times I have been innocently looking out my window only to see a man walk towards the parking lot across the street while skittishly looking all around – heading either behind the green recycling bin (to the left in the picture) or behind the chain link fence (to the right in the picture) and quickly unzip their pants and let loose. I have seen men in business suits do this – I have seen punk rock kids do this.

Yesterday, I saw a nice car pull over – it looked new – and the guy who got out was well dressed. Assuming he was off to visit someone or go somewhere, I was shocked to watch him scurry behind the recycling bin and unzip – not even having the courtesy to turn around as he felt pissing on the building was an appropriate urinal. As soon as I realized this, I turned my attention to my computer screen, hoping to change the mental image in my head.

And this happens all the time. About a week ago, early evening, my partner was working in the basement with the door open. He was on the phone when he heard some rustling in our backyard. He ran outside to catch a (very) disheveled man urinating on the wall next to the open door! Confrontation ensued, and the men eventually left – but not soon enough as to leave stains on our new foundation. To be fair, I kind of expect this kind of behavior from someone in the state of inebriation that this man was – but this is not behavior reserved for such men. It seems no matter how well to-do, it seems when a man’s gotta go, he’s incapable of going to a gas station or waiting until he arrives at his destination….

Online Sociability: Yahoo! Chat to Facebook

Sitting in my living room last night with the television off (a rare occurrence for me, who usually needs background noise..) and I started thinking about my time online over the years. While I was a stay at home mom, I started chatting in 1994 in the Yahoo chat rooms. Sorted by topic, the rooms were filled with regular users and sporadic new ‘faces’ who would lurk until they felt comfortable enough to jump into the conversation – of course, this goes on much the same way these days, except at the time, there were less online spaces where one could go and just hang out with a group of friends. I spent a lot of time in those rooms, and over the course of a few years, made a pretty solid group of friends around a few topics, and even met a few people face to face. I remember feeling sad when I went back to work and didn’t have as much time as I used to to chat. I remember logging in and entering one of my old favorite rooms only to realize that I don’t recognize anyone and they didn’t recognize me.  Over time, I stopped logging in completely, forgetting about most of the users I used to consider close confidants (of course, to this day, there are a few names that stick out in my memory). Leaving the Yahoo! Groups was hard, perhaps more sad, but what made it easier was that there was no traces left behind to go back to and reminisce over. Of course, there are still chat rooms all over the internet that I could join, meet new people, and perhaps recapture this feeling, but somehow it just doesn’t feel the same.

What I like about Facebook is the way that it archives all those interactions. Yet at the same time, it makes me a bit uneasy too. I like being able to go back further and further and reading what people were on about on any particular day, yet the memories are weaker. The archives are not of interactions between myself and my ‘friends’, but of individual actions collected through the guise of  ‘friends’. Instead of logging in and running into a random group of friends for a limited amount of time, it is always the same people in the same place at different times – whenever I want, I can log in and read about my friends. I miss the synchronicity of chat rooms, but I like the ability to ‘check up’ on friends even when I don’t feel sociable. It’s a weird feeling really. To think that my online time has shifted over the years from a very interactive form of social interaction to a more singular sense of sociability – where I can be among friends without having to interact (directly) with them. Of course, this is not the only means of online interaction, but it is what my use has become. Instead of logging in every morning to a list of different rooms, catching up with people and talking about our day, I log in every morning and read my friends’ blogs, check their Facebook pages and poke in on twitter to see who is saying what – all the while, being removed from anyone knowing I was there. While I am keeping ‘in touch’ with more people, my online interaction has seen a dramatic shift from incredibly social to incredibly solitary.

This got me thinking (again) about the archiving of online interactions. Of course my old chat days were logged, I think one of the things that made it easier to walk away from was that the community was always changing. That the people never stayed the same, and over time, the chat rooms morphed into a new group of people with new stories. With Facebook, it is different in that it is always the same people on my friends list. While some may be more active than others (and FB sorts my friends’ activities in ways that make me think that only 20 of the 300+ friends actually update their statuses & pages). But since the activity is archived, I can dig back and back and feel like I am not alone even when no one is “online”.

Of course, I am rambling – but it seems that the more “social” outlets I have, the less social I feel.

 

Working Through Ideas and Reality

I have been working on what is essentially the same research question since 2004 – working towards understanding the player/avatar relationship and identity – not in it’s classic sense as that which belongs (and identifies) an individual or entity (avatar), but rather how identity is morphed and redefined through digitally mediated interactions into something new. I am sure I can come back to this statement in two hours and re-articulate it again and again – get lost in it and come back again, but in the end, when I am talking about “hybrid-identity” (as I have yet to find – or invent – that perfect word for what it is I am talking about), that is basically what I am talking about.

My MA work pointed to a very specific, contextualized form of ‘hybrid-identity’ – an identity which emerges from the long term interactions between the player and the avatar and the game world over time and (social) interaction. This identity does not belong to either the player or the avatar, although both player choices and avatar design play a part in it (along with other contributing elements). I developed a framework of interconnected gameplay elements that contribute to the emergence of this type of identity in mmorpg’s. (note: this research stemmed from Everquest, Dark Age of Camelot, Lineage II and early WoW [pre-Burning Crusade] – since then, there have been significant changes to the genre that may alter the original framework. I will address this in my dissertation if all goes well =)).

The (long term) goal of the framework is to be able to apply it to a range of games (and contexts) and determine whether or not the conditions exist for ‘hybrid-identity’ to (potentially) emerge. My PhD work is testing the framework that I developed in my MA (specific to mmorpg’s) against different genres of games (through close readings of gameplay) to see where the framework breaks down, what restructuring is required  for it to be a useful analytic tool, and essentially, to test whether or not ‘hybrid-identity’ even has the potential to emerge in single-player games. Of course, the most grandiose  goal of my research is to re-articulate the nuances of identity in digitally mediated game play (and not just the player’s or the avatar’s).  These are my ideas.

The reality that I have been struggling with while writing is seeing my ideas materialize into clear, defendable arguments. The challenge of making proof plagues my sociological brain. It all makes perfect sense to me. I see it with my eyes; feel it with my heart, but when I try to explain what I mean, I sometimes lose control of my argument and find myself caving into the exist definitions of identity. The concept of identity is so concretely grounded in the human (or at least as a human construct), that trying to pry it loose seems to be a very messy (and sometimes controversial) project. I am passionate about my ideas, it is the reality of articulation (and proof!) that keeps jamming a stick into my spokes.

And with all of that – it is time to get back to work. I am close… so very very close to getting this dissertation out the door … perhaps when it is enveloped in its intro and conclusion, the reality will mirror my ideas and I can breathe easy again.

Another Semester

I cannot believe that the last time I posted was in July. It has been a busy summer filled with mostly personal challenges. My oldest daughter went away to university in Halifax, N.S. – a good 13 hour drive from home… We dropped her off last Saturday. As we helped her settle into her dorm room, met her roommate, and meandered around the quaint University of King’s College campus, I was reminded how much enthusiasm and energy can come from being on campus with a new group of eager undergraduates. Just being on campus reminded my how much I love what I do. It really reminded me that I am privileged to get to do what I love, no matter how much of a toil it may seem.

With that rejuvenated purpose, I am happy to be working again as a research assistant for the next few months, as I finish my dissertation (crossing fingers for a December deadline), and applying for post-doc funding, it looks like it is going to be a very busy semester. And quite honestly, there is no better way for me!

Crazy Shouldn’t Drive

I meant to post this a little while back when it happened, but life and procrastination got in the way.

In keeping with my crazy in the city sub-theme, the other day, the older woman who I may have mentioned spent some time gardening in her skivvies (bottoms only) late at night, wanted to go somewhere. They have three cars parked in her yard/driveway – 2 side by side, and one across them. She lives with her son, and so, she asked him to move his car so that she could get her car out. So they both get into their cars, and before her son can even start the engine (her car was closer to the door, so she was in hers first), she started her car and backed out. … before he started his engine… sitting on my balcony stunned – I could not believe that she just got in her car and backed right into her sons car, taking out his side mirror… let’s just say the scene that followed was horrific – a son should never yell at his mother the way this man did – but maybe … just maybe, he should be the responsible one and not let crazy drive…

Finding My Voice

I have been plugging away on writing my dissertation now for the better part of too long, and I keep hitting the same walls over and over again. Today I am struggling with finding my voice. As someone who loves social theory (and theory in general) but have always done some sort of ethnography, alternating between first and third person has been a staple in tying together my experience or field research with a more generalized analysis within the same portion of text. Recently, it has come to my attention that this may be jarring for some readers, and it has been suggested that I separate them into two distinct sections. At first, I thought this was a great solution to the problem I was having trying to find my voice – or rather – the voice / tone of my dissertation. But as I try to untangle experience from idea, each one seems to get lost being on their own. The examples don’t make any sense without being contextualized within the broader frame of existing literature through the use of references and at the same time moving past the existing lit and assigning the example specific meaning within my research and then extrapolating that meaning into a general context beyond my specific experience.

So while the first bit of advice I have been given (to be fair, by several people – no sociologists though heh) is to “pick one” – it is either “I” or “the player” but the more I write, the more I realize that I need both. Each one fulfills a certain purpose, and I cannot seem to find a way to take one or the other out without completely changing the meaning of the text I am writing.  And so, the struggle continues as I keep on writing. Hopefully I can reconcile this problem by being a better writer, making the voices distinct through clear, purposeful writing within the text.

The Wonders of Technology Mixed With a bit of Introspection

I know I promised to blog the CGSA conference, but, as always, I got wrapped up in attending and socializing that I did not get a chance to actually write the posts. I have a lot of notes and anecdotes that I will put together tomorrow (and with the wonders of technology – back date them so they fit chronologically). But – that is not the wonders of technology that I am talking about.

I am on the last leg of a 13 hour bus ride from the conference. If I were able to have convinced my guy to drive, it would have been an 8 hour drive – but I would not have wireless in a moving vehicle, let alone plugs to charge all my technological devices as I am in transit.

It’s funny, because while at UNB earlier this week, I was telling a story about when I lived there (1994-1995) and somehow it got on the subject of long distance plans – well – rather the fact that there wasn’t much in the way of plans back then – and I was stuck with a very (very add infinitum) high phone bill… If I remember correctly, the conversation was something like “oh, and back then, there were no unlimited long distance plans”…. thank you technology (and those who work hard to bring it to us).

I also fell into the story-telling of yore mode as I walked along the same streets I did so many years ago. Reminiscing and telling my (mostly younger) colleagues what it was like when I lived there… like “when I lived here, a cab was flat rate $2.50 anywhere in Fredericton (except the North shore). Or – when I lived here, if you were female, you could drink for free many nights of the week (ooo the ladies night of yore heh)… after a while, a good friend of mine interrupted me and said – with a bit of a chuckle and maybe a hint of …. je ne sais quoi…. “it sounds like you’re talking about the golden era…”. And as I have had the last 11 hours (2 more to go!) to sit in a dark bus and think (since my headphones hurt, and the power outlet on the last bus was out of order at my seat), I realize that in a lot of ways – it was my golden era. We all have one – the days we look back on the moments of our lives that helped shape who we are.

For me, my time in Fredericton was just that. A transitional time in my life between where I had come from and where I was going. It was me and my daughter against the world. I learned how hard it was to be in university as a single mother and learned even more about the power of community, and how strangers become friends. Cheesy, I know – but walking those streets, being so close to my old apartment, taking the same walk to the same campus really made me realize how far I have come. And it made me realize what I have to do to get to where I was going.

Canadian Game Studies Association @ Congress 2011

After a grueling 11 hour bus ride (apologies to my Facebook / Twitter friends for my off the rail rants!), I arrived in Fredericton, my old undergraduate stomping grounds. Was stunned to realize that it has been 17 years since I lived here, yet, little has changed besides the location of the bus station (which, btw is interestingly no longer in the downtown area – strange if you think of the history of bus stations in urban centers….). Anyways, walking down Waterlow Row along the riverfront was like being transported in time – funny how geography (and smell…) can bring back such vivid, almost physical memories.

 As I approached the walking bridge underpass (at least  that’s what I think it is …), the city of Fredericton had  groomed the slope to welcome Congress.

This morning marks day one of the annual  meeting/conference of the Canadian Game Studies  Association. I present today at 1pm – still not ready – but  realize that I don’t think I ever really am anyways – so I decided to not stress too much and just try to be as prepared as I can be. I am nervous since I am presenting the core ideas from my dissertation (that I had hoped to be finished by now!). I am probably even more stressed about the question period, since I am not sure how to address certain issues that I know will be brought up. I guess that’s the point – learning how to address the hard bits effectively (and convincingly…).

I will do my best to blog about the sessions – will probably only be after my 1pm presentation – on that note, I should get dressed and pack up – breakfast in 15!

Crazy in the City

Earlier this year (during the winter months), I blogged about the crazy bunch of art students who took nude pictures lying in garbage in my alley way early in the morning. Sadly, they weren’t the brightest bunch, and left all the garbage they had dragged in from the street in the middle of the alley. It seems they had no problem leaving their mess behind for others to clean up.

The saddest part of this story was not the students’ attempt at photographic irony, or the fact that they had little to no regard for other people’s living space, no – it was the fact that everyone who drove down the alleyway felt that it was better to simply run over the four full large black garbage bags… not one driver had the wits about them (or civic concern) to actually get out of their car and move the garbage aside. Sadly, when my husband came home from work, he stopped the car before pulling into our driveway (the mayhem occurred just next to our place) and cleaned up the mess of broken glass and garbage (I helped him clean it). Needless to say, he was not a happy man. For myself, all I could think of is how crazy people can be. Crazy to strip down to your skivvies for a school art project; crazy to simply drive over garbage instead of picking it up.

After that story, I thought about starting a blog about the crazy shit that I see living in the city. I live just east of downtown, and just west of one of the many areas where gentrification has not tightened it’s grips in yet. Sometimes I just want to shake my head and cry, other times I am tempted to hire a hitman (that is a joke – in case anything bad ever happens….).

I have tons of stories – every day there is someone who thinks a neighbor’s fence is a public urinal, or someone who feels the need to rant and rave at me for “owning” my apartment when they can’t even afford to rent one (this came after he tried to rummage through the garbages and recycling on my balcony while I was sitting there – but without uttering a word to me….). My crazy neighbor lady who has no qualms, at 65+, to come outside in the middle of the summer – in the middle of the night to do some gardening while having a late night cigarette… not the end of the world, except she was only wearing her underwear …. traumatic scene for anyone I tell you.

Or yesterday, this lady – looked to be somewhere in her mid-twenties – who drove a full half a kilometer with her handbrake on going at least 40km an hour – it took her quite some time to realize that the thick blue smoke and harsh squealing noise was coming from HER car! Then with a great big loud CLUNK, the squealing stopped, and I imagine, she realized her handbrake was on and simply took it off (with nary a drop in her speedometer…).

Or today – another creepy neighbor guy who knocked at my back door asking me if my husband was home. When I told him no, that he was at work, he continued to tell me why he needed my husband at the very minute – and could I get him… (seems a neighbor’s car was having some trouble in the alleyway and needed to be jacked). When I told him there was nothing I could do, and that my husband worked until 1am this morning, he asked for my address (wtf!?).

And so, I’ve decided to start a new tag for my blog called crazy in the city – so I can share the insanity with anyone who cares to read. Perhaps, after a while, I won’t feel quite as crazy as I thought I was!