Last weekend. A seven foot tall plant. (Thanks to one Pat and one Ezra for helping me get it up to my apartment in the Slowest Elevator In The West End.) I don't exactly know what kind of plant it is. All I know is that it's basically just one really long thick cactus-like trunk covered with thorns and adorned at the top with a few dozen small and yet substantial and yet kind of floppy leaves that hang a little like dreadlocks. Any ideas out there as to what kind of plant it might be? That's right - I'm addressing my audience. Look, I know for a fact at least a few of my friends check out this blog occasionally. I also know for a fact that at least one person I don't even really know checks out this blog occasionally (that would be my friend Liz's friend, to whom Liz introduced me as "the guy with the grey box blog" (I'm paraphrasing), which friend said he checked out my blog occasionally, which made him the first person I've met who's read my blog before actually meeting me, which I'm not sure what I think about this, can you tell I've been reading DFW lately). There's also Darren, who'll be happy to know that, if none of you can tell me what kind of plant I know own, I may actually post a photo on my blog for the first time (the photo of the grey box on the masthead notwithstanding - yes, that is an actual photo of *the* grey box).
The point is, there was a point in addressing you, my audience, aside from my deadly earnest entreaty for your help in identifying the species of the seven foot tall plant I know own, and that's to clarify something about the grey box. A few of you have asked how, for example, a two drawer legal filing cabinet or a coffee table could be left *in* a grey box. The fact is that the grey box isn't that big. I doubt if it's two feet by one foot by one foot. So, full disclosure: a lot of the things I take "From The Grey Box", I'm actually taking from the carpet laid out "Beside The Grey Box". To further complicate matters, my landlord has posted a sign in the basement asking tenants, when they clean out their storage lockers when they move, to leave anything that they don't want "In The Grey Area", by which she obviously means "In The Grey Box", or "Beside The Grey Box", which is not as (unintentionally) funny as "In The Grey Area". (To her credit, the area around the grey box actually is grey, although I think they grey box makes it seem much greyer than it actually is.)
So the real point is that "From The Grey Box" is just an expression. Moreover, it's too late to change the name of this blog to "Beside The Grey Box" or "In The Grey Area" (although the latter would be a good title for a blog about more than a few friend/lover distinctions from my 20s).
Actually, the real real point is that I love my new seven foot tall plant. It's got personality, the way it's posing there beside my bookshelf, looking out for itself, interested and yet indifferent. It's like having a pet, or a roommate, except it doesn't shed, like pets I've lived with, or kick me out of my own apartment so it can have sex its significant other, like roommates I've lived with. It gives me space. And I like my space.
Oh, shit. What am I doing? I don't have time to blog. I'm in pre-production!
Thanks, grey box.
* OK, OK, OK - due to popular demand, here are three pictures of the plant - the first three pictures I've ever posted on this blog - which I have to admit have given "From The Grey Box" some serious production value.
10 comments:
As a, er, student of all this blogging stuff, I've observed a recurring theme: there comes a time in every blogger's life when they recognize, for the first time, that strangers read their blog.
The response, especially among personal diarists, is often to immediately shut down their blog and start again, anonymously.
It's like being on stage, and looking out into the audience expecting only to see friends and family. All of a sudden, there's a bunch of strangers looking back at you.
The rambling sentence full of "which" clauses: very DFW, JB. Less convinced about the final clause of the sentence, though. That's just a comma splice. I'm pretty sure DFW's creative grammar doesn't go so far as to condone comma splices. (I could be wrong about this, but I've no way of checking. All my books are still in storage.)
Hi-It's EShaw. I think you must have a yuka tree. Sounds about right and then can get big!
I think you should post a photo of the tree, so we can confirm the species. =P
Also, I expect you'll find a nice alarm clock in the grey box any day now. Because I just bought one (as my old roommate finall took hers and I needed something to ensure I wake up for work in the mornings).
>> It’s like being on stage, and looking out into the audience expecting only to see friends and family. All of a sudden, there’s a bunch of strangers looking back at you.
Actually, in my case, it was like being on stage, and looking out into the audience expecting to see no one, and all of sudden, my friends and family - and a stranger or two - were looking back at me ...
Carol - note that the comma splice separated the DFW stylings from the comment on the DFW stylings. I'm sure the man himself would sign off on that.
That is one freaky looking plant!
Nope. Shoulda been a semicolon, JB. I'm standing firm on this one.
Aha. A semicolon in lieu of another which, instead of a comma. Ya, OK, that would have been better.
As the former roommate of yours that most people probably think of when you say "a former roommate of mine", I want to clear my name. I never once kicked you out of our apartment to have sex with a significant other. (That said, there were a couple occasions where I wish you had kicked me out...)
Also I'm fairly sure the plant is
from Brazil. I'm gonna get Melina to ID it. It's mighty similar to a kind we saw in Sao Paulo that she became obsessed with finding out what it was. It too had a spiky trunk and rubbery leaves. She now has one in a pot on her porch. I'll let you know what she says.
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