Kudos to the union of the rainbow flag and the Empire State Building!

Last night, gay marriage became legal in New York state. While it does not affect me in the immediate, it moved the needle a little more towards the "full" in my personal reservoir of hope. So many of us struggle with so much in relative silence, and knowing that an essential dignity which has been denied to a group of people for decades in my home country is now a reality makes today that much better of a day than it would have been. Gay marriage is legal all across Canada, and has been legal for almost six years now - so many things in this country are more progressive than in the States.

The Guardian story that I read was one of over twenty tabs I opened on my browser just yesterday - as always, I continue to be fascinated by countless avenues of world experience and happily have difficulty filtering out "what is most important". Better than being disengaged and discouraged, I suppose, which always seems to accompany the reading of any best-business-practices article that I feel I should bone up on to potentially reference in my studies and in the workplace. Such dull language!

The more I write, though, the more the confidence grows about being able to communicate using my own style and voice, rather than hammering myself into a format. That was just one of the reasons that I decided against pursuing a journalism career many years ago, what the with the Internet providing so much for free (for which on my limited budget I continue to be grateful) but also in which people could express themselves according to their own wishes, in which the cream has a chance to rise to the top. I'm glad that people like Bill Simmons have pursued it, though, with his new flagship for New Journalism sating not only my love of great sportswriting, but the recognition that those of us who value the underlying dynamics beneath the consumerism have other interests, with writers contributing great stories on the continued dearth of real comedic roles for women that reference other great recent stories that I missed.

I may not feel like I have an intrinsic fight in me like the supporters of gay marriage do - especially those in the community who are fighting for that right for themselves - but I have hard-won insights into conflict, communication, and maintaining the amateur's creative life, and it's these insights that I return to time and again as I continue to move forward.

Filling the holes created by the emptiness of so much modern language

I might make edits to this later, but wanted to get just one main thing down before I go and get subway tokens for the week, in advance of being in a chicken costume outdoors when it's expected to hit 27C today.

(Quick summation of the last two months: finished first year of MBA program, failed the finance class, started a year-long strategy project, had to beg relatives for money in one of the most uncomfortable and drastic situations I could imagine which I am still learning from, got kicked out of strategy project by school requirements to the disappointment of my team, searched for a paid internship with no success, came to terms with my employment for the summer, got approved for an on-campus apartment as a safety measure, sold the first bass I ever bought two days ago to a great guy named Brian for $1,000.00 which goes to the new-apartment fund.)

But none of that inspired me to write today. What did is my hatred of a now-common phrase, and how I actually thought up something to begin to counter it. The phrase? "Personal brand".

I was reading Chuck Klosterman's latest Grantland article and enjoying not only his take on an interesting subject, but also that I'm enjoying his writing again, really identifying with it, when I had written him off many years ago after reading Fargo Rock City. He brought up this phrase in describing a Hollywood producer and my hatred was rekindled, but this time with a realization: a personal brand is simply what others see based on how I choose to present myself, what parts of my history may fit onto a resume or into a social-media context (since nothing I do is the subject of any media coverage, the likes of which defines other people). And it is something that I have control over, which is heartening at a time when I feel like my choices to this point have made the "easy out" a thing of the past that may never have existed for me anyway.

It might go something like this, say, in a job interview:

Q: What is your personal brand?
A: I define myself as...

And stop right there, for now. No pretentious marketing language, no stupid B-school buzzwords or catch phrases. Simple, strong, concise language, which has always come to me more naturally in print than in speech. If there's any benefit to our now-atomized media and historical culture, it's the opportunity for each of us to define, explain, and defend ourselves in the ways which we deem most pure, most effective.

It's never too late to define yourself. Every time is the right time to start. Just don't ever fall let yourself be fooled into objectifying yourself into a brand. You're a person. No one should fall for being branded against their will.

Learning from failure

Earlier today, I wrote my managerial finance exam and in all likelihood will not pass the course. Beyond the fact of it being demoralizing and the fact that I will be re-taking the course in the fall barring an unlikely grade curve, I'm grasping at straws for a silver lining and not finding one. If anything, it's made studying for tomorrow's marketing exam that much tougher. Such is the gloom in the house today (since Jen had a rough day at work as well) that even the arrival of my off-campus work permit today - ahead of schedule, even - barely stood out. Wisely, Jen picked up a couple of bottles of beer for us, one of which I downed gradually as I felt sorry for myself.

Getting an F in something makes the good marks I've earned worth something, I suppose. And it'll give me that much more drive to improve my quantitative skills over the summer, which I'd already planned on doing. I just hate the feeling I get that other of my classmates can seemingly get something more intuitively, while my level-best effort wasn't good enough to pass.

Another expensive lesson, I guess, as I also have to borrow a significant amount of money from my parents after other best efforts didn't bear the financial fruit that I thought they would. It's like a mortgage at my old job where it fell apart despite my best efforts, and just as in this instance, it's money out of my pocket not being able to close the deal. But that doesn't mean that my next opportunity to excel (as an old high-school teacher one dubbed his tests) won't be the one that gets me over the hump. I have to maintain the mentality that I've succeeded just by getting here, and that the opportunity is mine to lose. But it's in that vein that I'm most frustrated, having done my best, but still having come up short.

This time.

Weird oldness

Today I realized that I missed seeing my friend Matt play here in Toronto with his band, Comeback Kid, for the second time since moving here, and got a little depressed at how I can't afford the time or funds to go out and see shows. This was on the heels of listening to a ton of Grieves yesterday while studying finance, happy that I'd discovered a new MC to get excited about. The absence of playing music in my life has been difficult with the stress and time demands of school, like the colors of the world have less vibrance. (That, and being in a business school environments where other students either seem to go out 'clubbing' or not at all, has been a drag.)

Then this afternoon, Jen and I were having was having a conversation with Jen about bears, natural selection, human ethics, and bus tours, and suddenly found myself excited about the future prospect of taking a bus tour out to Banff where we could see wild grizzlies and amazing vistas. Lo and behold: another cliched getting-older moment! I should be so lucky to think about that, a day after my friend Ben (in town on business from Seattle) asked if there we felt trapped in town without a car; at that point, I'd mentioned the possibility that she and I could probably take a bus or train out to Stratford-upon-Tyne this summer for their annual Shakespeare festival.

Lots to do here, even though I often feel guilty about spending the smallest amount of money at all with how broke we are tight money is (trying to stay positive!). And as if on cue, I need to get out to Canadian Tire and pick up a cheap vaccuum that's on sale so that we can finally clean up our bedroom (shh! don't tell the landlord!), even if it does take me away from my finance study.

Woe be to me the next time I have to dive into such a dry, analytical subject again. My visual-storytelling brain doesn't do well with it, has no interest, and forces me to go against my natural instincts of avoiding something that I truly don't care if I ever see again.

And thus the sun returns, beckoning me outside, to get on with it, just like everything else I have yet to do today, and for the next two weeks.

Reflection

Sounds travel up to our balcony quite readily from the street, especially at night. For some reason, it reminded me of how much older I am as compared to most other students, with several going out to the bars for St. Patrick's Day a couple of days ago. I happily spend time at home, finally finishing 200 or so flash cards for finance so that I can have some peace of mind at being more or less caught up with the material, even though I have a load of practice problems to do.

I'm putting on weight with the stress, but am staying focused and will do my best, despite feeling less than prepared for the papers I have to write yet this weekend. There's only so much that one person can do, and I've learned that if I state the obvious in my papers, I'll get points for setting up the problems effectively. Too often early on I felt that I had to start with a much higher-order idea before getting rolling, but just as life requires a foundation, so does a good case analysis.

At least I don't have to go war in Libya, right? Silly Democratic voters we were, thinking we were getting an innovative hybrid vehicle for a President, but it's clearly just the same old Chevy. I thought to myself earlier, "even if there was a fraud line I could call to report him, the automated voice would say 'please deposit $1 million to be connected to a representative'". I'll post that Who song on my other page for that... just another rich man's war, protecting those oil interests. I could go on, but will calm the nerves with some other study before bed.

Pastor Martin Niemoller, please know that many of us heed your words, and that we speak up for others. We may not run things, but dammit, we are trying.

Rant

I hate Managerial Finance.

After failing the midterm and being determined to pass the class on the force of sheer spite, I spent much of today and will spend the first part of tomorrow making flash cards that I can read on the train and the bus to and from school. The professor, while a great teacher in class, has made it clear from the midterm that you had better know everything, becuase if you don't, son, you are screwwwwwed.

I studied like a madman for my Management Accounting final a few weeks ago and knew everything that was asked on the final, going with my gut hunch and spending extra time on a couple of items that ended up being central to the exam. I stunned myself by pulling an A- in the class, leaving my school Internet account page up for half an hour, convinced for a time that I'd received someone else's grade, that they'd correct it and I'd get the B- or C+ that I had been expecting. But no, there it stayed, and there it still is.

I'd said that I wished the M.A. class lasted the whole term, but at this point I am joyously taking my A- and running. Hell, I can learn more on my own time any time I want to. But the sad truth is that yes, I am judged on the grades I get; I still have no internship for the summer and am fortunate that I have a chance at working at school full-time in an expansion of the part-time work that I've only just started. And the M.F. class is one where I truly don't give two sh*ts about the material, as though internalizing it would align me with the sh*tlickers that go on to Wall Street (and here, Bay Street) and become "financial analysts" and ten other versions of boring and pointless that I cannot imagine doing.

(Look at me being decent and censoring! Proof that all is not lost.)

In four weeks, I'll never again have to care about bond valuations, the new present value of anything, the present value of the capital cost allowance tax shield... it goes on and on. I brought the textbook with me to skim on the train while I ran errands and two separate people commented on how "interesting" the book must be. "It's my weakest subject", I responded in both cases.

Not for long, though. Not for long.

Involuntary meditation

Dinner's ready on the stove, a simple meal of alphabet pasta and inexpensive sauce. I've had to learn a lot about how to eat well on a budget, and wish I would have learned that lesson much earlier in life, but can't go back and redo that, so will keep doing my frugal best going forward. I still have an internship to apply to and a paper section to write, with the dim hope of getting to some managerial finance reading before bed.

I've been under so much stress of late that I literally cannot think at times, and my mind draws a blank when I consciously try to think of something. It's as though my mind is keeping me from freaking out about things, trying to help me keep moving with the stress of a new part-time job, the 9.5 hours-a-week that the job takes that I desperately miss already, but which is providing me with valuable Canadian work experience.

I spent four hours today trying to apply for my Off-Campus Work Permit, including the train ride to and from school in which I brought my laptop along to do readings for the paper section I'm responsible for. I'm glad I went to school, though, as wrestling with the scanner and trying to get legible passport and study-permit grayscale copies, plus the system time-outs with the CIC website, easily would have cost over $40 with all the time I spent on it. And after all that, it wouldn't accept my U.S. debit card or the one credit card that I theoretically still have space on. In short, I'll have to request a special form that CIC has to mail to me, then I bring that to my bank with the $150.00 payment. Hopefully it won't delay the processing and I'll still be on track to be able to work full-time starting mid- to late-April.

The joys of being international, one step at a time. Dinner!