Well I can't tell if our experiment is working or not.

For the holiday break, Fan Tompkins and I are staying in my room, because my roommate left, and we have been trying our hardest not to invoke any Spirit at all. Every one of our movements is careful and considered and we are very careful not to get excited or unduly metaphysical about anything.

We get up in the morning and make tea, and some english muffins in the toaster oven and jelly. We get the cups and knives and plates out like it's a tea ceremony. And then we clean it up like it's a tea ceremony.

Then we tidy up like the whole room is some kind of zen mousetrap. We carefully read our books. Fan knits and I scroll. Going outside is ritualized and mindful.

So far we are not rousing up any Spirit. But the whole world seems taut like a balloon filled with energy and it's just about ready to burst.

I can barely hold it together. Fan is doing better than me. Maybe I should learn to knit.

I don't believe there's Spirit at all. I think people are just making it up.

If it were real, we wouldn't have to make it up. If it were real it would exist whether we believed in it or not, right?

So I'm going to make a deal. Me and Fan Tompkins are going to join the Spirit Building challenge, and we're not going to make any Spirit at all. We are going to be meticulous about not making Spirit.

If Spirit is real, then we won't be able to escape it, no matter how hard we don't make it, we will still have it. In which case we win.

And if we don't discover Spirit by not making it, then it doesn't exist. And the whole "challenge" is pointless.

Do we have a deal?

I was walking to Psych Jazz practice after school and some older kids cornered me and took most of my Spirit. Then a teacher found the last bit I had and took it and locked it in her drawer. Don't you need a little bit of "starter Spirit" to make more of it?

I've been playing nothing but Psych Blues on my clarinet ever since.

You know how on registration day when they post those lists with everyone's names on it AND your psy ranking? Don't you find that demoralizing? It's like right off the bat they introduce this hierarchy and where each and every student "fits in." Ugh.