attendants

it strikes me that few workers are described as attendants. flight attendant, bathroom attendant - are there any more? are there any kinds of workers who aren’t attendants? shop attendant, sanitation attendant, cattle attendant, spreadsheet attendant.

when i was young i got into the habit of compulsively listening to the radio, then podcasts downloaded to an old ipod. If you attend closely enough to a radio story you can supplant your inner monologue. at the next level of attention you become unable to hear noise from the next room, even if the noise is loud or scary. after you learn to do this you can tune out airplane engines, etc, no noise canceling needed.

7/3/26 - 7/22/26: 60.3 hours of podcasts. [ city ] history, xi jinping, america, americanness, history of fireworks, liza minnelli, menopause, ai, grocery prices, the odyssey, durkheim. a woman with a slow voice hypnotically reading a tale of two cities.

i’d somehow ended up in the school psychologist’s office.

“what time of day do you feel worst?”

“in the morning.”

“and how do you start your day?”

“i have a hard time getting out of bed, so i put on the radio to distract myself. i listen to npr.”

“and do you think listening to the news could be causing your anxiety?”

i gather myself to stop by thinking: the world needs your attention. your life needs your attention. when i take my headphones off, there are pink spots on the cartilage ridgetops. i notice that they hurt.

the yellowed plants in my brother’s empty apartment need my attention. my friends need my attention. i’m not sure that the streets of this remote city need my attention, but it’s worth offering.

no longer thinking about liza minnelli, i can respond to texts without making typos, clean the stove, pick up the tissue that’s been living on the floor for a few days. i can go outside. i can feel a dull physical ache that runs from my toes and fingertips to my chest. i understand now that when i said i was heartbroken in the past, i really meant that i was guilty or disappointed.

at the height of my attention to my heartbreak i perceive a vein of sadness that encompasses my body and extends into the world, fanning out into distant tributaries. i cry like a kid with a beesting. the vein of sadness sways slightly. it shines.

later, i imagine this sensation corresponds to something real in my brain. interrupted patterns, signals sent out with no response. disordered ripples of electricity in water. i am a mind full of habits that no longer function. my model of the world is wrong. how to eat, sleep, arrange my days - how to imagine the future - who to tell when i hit my head, when that podcast makes me laugh, when i’m hungry - who to tell anything, or whether to tell anyone at all. how to make coffee. how to understand the last half-decade of my life. what to call myself. everything is slashed up and needs to be refigured.

why a vein, then? why not a rift?

but i would never use that word to describe this feeling. I know something has already filled in the empty spaces. it feels warm and silvery. i think it might be attention.