Casey in Mudville

What's not to love?

2007-08-17T22:33:00.000-07:00

Corey Arnold, from Bering Sea Crabbing

My God, has it really been almost three weeks since I've written anything? Judging by the date of my last post, I have to assume Yes! Partly I've been busy. I mean like ass-glued-to-the-work-bench, sleeping-for-days-in-my-contacts, too-weary-to-even-run-for-breakfast/lunch/dinner busy. And partly, I've managed to piss off my family (again!) by writing something needlessly cavalier just for a cheap and probably unlikely laugh.

So, insert deep breath here, to my sister who came up to visit with her family–kids and all–for probably only the third or fourth time in her own life and definitely the first time in their lives, I apologize. It was a pleasure to watch my nephew, scared and excited, delicately hand over the doggie gift he'd been holding onto for over four hundred miles, it was my honor to escort the gang through our city's exemplary children's museum of science, perhaps even redefining the "human scare response" exhibit, and it was with great sadness I left them standing at a long line waiting for a ride on our city's famous public transport (editor's note: Casey has perhaps taken some poetic license here).

I totally appreciated the visit and the only excuse I have, is that sometimes I totally suck. The girl who learns not to put her foot in her mouth (or is it, pen in her eye?) is the girl I hope to one day meet.

Why Come?

2007-07-28T20:26:00.000-07:00

Adam Fuss, Untitled, image from pinhole camera

We survived the wedding. We survived the in-town guests. Hell, we even survived the 70's. But let's get down to brass tacks here: the film is done! No wait, it's not really done! I may cut it down to an hour. I may cut it down to 75 minutes. But technically it's reached the length it's supposed to be and that time is 86:40.

I still have to work with the composer, which means I have to let go of my temp track, which is a lot harder than I ever imagined. How do I let go? One song at a time I suppose. But I am sure the composer is sick of me saying, can you make it sound a little more like this? Something akin to giving line readings to an actor I imagine.

There are still a few more shots I need to, well, shoot. And then there's that spot about 50 minutes in where time seems to stand still, and that's not in a good way. Plus, there's the fact that we still don't have a title. OK! Not so done! But feeling done-ish. And ready to let the editor go.

The good news is that I am finding ways to squeeze in smaller moments that I really missed, but couldn't place anywhere. Like when one schoolgirl talking to another says: puberty, I don't know whats that anyways and later, when that same schoolgirl talks about her boyfriend, explains, almost wistfully: we give each other pencils. I have fallen in love with the action in the background, the things no one would ever catch upon first viewing, and I find myself spontaneously repeating the film's lines throughout the day: c'mon all you lazy children! polyester...100% and that is so a lie! We find ways to amuse ourselves. We find ways to let go. We find ways to ignore the following question:

How will we define ourselves when this is all done?

Away from Home

2007-07-20T13:42:00.000-07:00

Jona Frank, Siobahn, Girl Scout, CA

A packed bag! An airplane trip! A family wedding to attend with my parents! OK, scratch the exclamation point on that last one. While I am happy to get out of town for the weekend, and happier still to be typing this up at my long lost friend's house while she breast feeds the baby, I do have to admit that I am not looking forward to another family wedding. Another family wedding where the bride and groom are at least a decade younger than me, another family wedding where I have to attend stag whether it's because I'm single...or well, because in the eyes of my family not being married means technically I am still single. And another family wedding where, in lieu of attending with a date, a partner, or hell even alone, I am tagging along with my parents. On the up side, at least I know that means I will be leaving early.

In other news, I have big plans for this short weekend in the city of my birth. There are palm trees to stand beneath, traffic to sit in, and star sightings to miss–and I'm not talking about those to be found in the ursa minor. Wish me luck! I'll have my screenplay in hand and a sharpened pencil for my free personality test.

A coupla three things to say here

2007-07-10T16:39:00.001-07:00

Christine Wong, Green Present, 2007
balsa wood and paper

I haven't written anything here because I have been obsessed with finishing the film. OBSESSED. Assessing the howmuchmorevulnerablecanIfeel feedback, setting a date to ohmygawd lock picture, taking Ihatethispart publicity stills. I simply have no more room for creative thought in my brain. And obviously nothing to write about here. Yeah, I could tell you about the pain, the suffering, the long list of minutia one has to attend to, the difficulty in trying to replace the scratch music you love with the actual music made by the composer you hire. Let alone the absolute trauma that sets in when I actually have to watch my own film. It's not that I don't like it, or that I think others won't either, it's just getting to be too much to bear. Six years my friends! I am ready to move on, know what I mean?

What I do have energy for is cooking, for organizing the wee apartment we all share, and for walking the dog. There's apricot ice-cream. There's finally getting around to watching the last Soprano's episode. And there's a night of spontaneous in-town guests and accordion playing. But, I'm not getting out much these days. And that's OK. I've hardly noticed it's summer, if it weren't for all the available fruit at the grocery store.

On the horizon. Hopefully, a trip. Optimistically speaking, a job. And one day, a larger apartment to share.

Stop Freaking Out On Me

2007-06-26T16:30:00.000-07:00

Amy Stein, Halloween in Harlem

I am back, after a long, sweaty, and sticky weekend spent mostly in the car driving up and down our fair coast. Without air-conditioning. With one working window. And oh, including a 55-pound, panting dog squirming on my lap. Ah, the joys of owning a now-aging, gas-guzzling, pick-up truck. We arrived wilted and returned, if possible, even less unrefreshed.

All in all, it wasn't that bad. In fact, you might even say the trip was good. The boyfriend met the family. The family bought the dinner. The girlfriend, or, me, that is, felt comfortable enough to leave them alone together while she washed up. She returned to find both parties not only unharmed but actually engaging in conversation. To wit, she couldn't get a word in edgewise the rest of the night.

As for the rest of the weekend, it went smashingly well. And when I say smashingly, I do mean smashingly. The boyfriend broke the parent's shower, in addition to the side window on my truck. Though both events were, as far as he assured me, unrelated and accidental, I am considering a padded helmet and an insurance policy for any future southbound trips. Other highlights included: a pod of dolphins, a swarm of bees and a gaggle of siblings.

oh boy oh boy oh boy

2007-06-20T16:15:00.000-07:00

painting by Dennis McNulty

Take a deep breath. OK. OK. Did that. Now what?

Too much coffee. Too many things on my brain. Too much socializing. Too much beer. Too much homemade ice-cream (toasted coconut!) But all good for my health. The best, in fact.

The weather. Somewhat hot. The dog. Somewhat lazy. The boyfriend. Somewhat amazing. It could be worse. This order could be reversed.

¡Damas y caballeros! We could be reaching a break through here. Or maybe just a turning point. Or it could be more like the end of a really, really long journey. Like through the desert. Like being lost and then found. Like the coldest beer after the hottest car ride. Or the fizziest coca cola after unpacking all of your boxes. Do I make any sense?

I am talking about the film here. THE FILM! Other things, may be to apply as well. But THE FILM. It is nearing completion. It is nearing ohmygawd completion. Ready or not. It's done!

Shit.

SHIT!

And then what?

A vacation.

A much needed vacation.

No one cares about me more than you do

2007-06-11T14:49:00.000-07:00

Idris Khan, every...Bernd and Hilla Becher Gable sided Houses

The weekend. The weekend! Can you hear me, I said the weekend!! Can you d-i-g i-t?! (and I do not mean digit!)

In short, a barbecue. Strawberries that were planted. More blooming flowers that were bought and subsequently planted. A dog that was bad, very bad, and scared away the neighbor's puppy after whom we all had to run in a million different directions looking and whom was found, but not by me, and at a much earlier hour, much earlier than the hour I actually came back from looking for her.

To continue: a strenuous hike. With a view! A knowledgeable fellow hiker who pointed out a rattlesnake track on the dirt! A break! A much-needed break from the film I can't finish! Potato leek soup, even though it is by no means potato leek soup season!

!!!

Also, a day spent helping the fifteen year-old with her special final history video project for which she had done hardly any work at all! All semester! And for whom I could offer very little assistance, seeing as she hadn't done anything at all, and also who had very little to say about Nicaragua, the subject of her special final history video project which, in addition to, is the birthplace of her father.

One more thing. One more thing!

I saw an OK movie: Since Otar Left. A crier! But slow! I read some good stories, like those that were inside the last issue of McSweeney's. I continue to read that good book, Everything Is Illuminated.

And

Ali Farka Touré on the stereos! Mom on the telephone!

And

An argument with the boyfriend that was resolved amicably and quite possibly for the betterment of the relationship! Apologies accepted!

Plus

Successful annual gynecological exam at 9AM this morning! Even though I was reminded that I am past my prime for child birthing!

Success!

No one knows me better than you

2007-06-08T18:03:00.000-07:00

Hot Knives, Tim Barber

Coffee and donuts. No wait. More like cherries and peaches. More like, more like, chocolate. And tea. Fancy tea. The kind where the leaves unfurl like fists. Baby fists. The kind in the see-through tea pots. They kind they sell at upscale markets.

The kind I don't have.

That's what today feels like. Special and not special at the same time. But right. Just right. And me. It feels like me. Which is a good feeling. It means human. It means normal. It means I can feel excited and antsy and angry and sad and bored. And I promise I won't blame anyone else for it.

Tomorrow I hang out with the fifteen year-old. The one I made a film about.

Weird.

To quote Miranda July for no other reason than I just read her book and, whom, if you know me, know is both my hero and my nemesis:

I look forward to seeing you next week if you live in LA, SF, Portland or Seattle.
It will be terrific, I will bow when I see you, you will bow when you see me, we will bump heads and knock each other unconscious and when we come to we won’t remember anything, we will mumble pardon me and shuffle off in to brand new lives. I really can not wait.

Coming Through Slaughter

2007-06-04T09:22:00.000-07:00

Buddy Bolden and Band

This weekend was all decentish (thank you to Kurt's OPE for letting me borrow one or two of his idiosyncrasies. Although technically I didn't ask, I must also assume he stole it from some where else). Though the weather gloomy and cold–despite the fact that it is now June–we managed an outing or two. One thing is that we discovered our local library. We both got cards and have become quite compulsive in scouring their DVDs, CDs, and New Materials sections. Did you know you can check out back issues of Harper's, The New York Review of Books (which modestly claims the title: the premier literary-intellectual magazine in English language) and, well, we haven't actually located a copy of Hustler yet, but we can see no reason why it shouldn't be there, too.

It feels really good to go to the library. Like riding your bike to work. Like I am a good citizen of the world! Hooray for me! Because of all the doom and gloom we spent the rest of the day browsing through our materials. I got two cookbooks; I am finally able to read Everything Is Illuminated; and here is a tip for you: do not confuse the band Django with the legendary musician, Django Reinhardt. Not all of our CDs, it seems, can be winners.

Cookies were made. No cleaning was done. Intimacy was had. And while some were out triumphantly consuming hot dogs, we were watching movies outdoors, in the park, with cute kids, all bundled up, some of the cute kids being kids I knew pretty well. And despite an expensive and alarming trip to the Vet, the days felt leisurely and long. So leisurely, in fact, I have a hard time admitting to myself that I am now supposed to be working.

The Continuing Existence of Things I Do Not Understand

2007-05-30T20:15:00.000-07:00

All The Knives, Emily Prince

After both my mother and sister telegraphed their concern, I have decided to retract last week's blog post. I do not hate nor do I love any of you. The great influx of estrogen has finally leveled off and things are back to normal. That is, if you consider harboring fantasies of dropping everything and running to Belize normal. For whatever reason we hit a relatively rough patch and I am still hungover from all the uncontrollable sobbing.

But really, I am OK. The dog is alive and sleeping. The apartment mostly unscathed and the boyfriend still standing albeit now with a limp. The comforter is perhaps a little less downy due to all the languishing that had to happen but the pillows are finally dry. Words were said and while some of them held meaning, hindsight–and a few Motrin–now tell us that many of them, in fact, did not.

All this to say we are feeling back on trackish. There are gyms to which we must begrudgingly drag ourselves. Food stuffs to be purchased and then consumed before legal expiration dates. And a certain opus that could benefit from some attention. Namely ours.

Messages in a bottle

2007-05-27T09:59:00.001-07:00

Ann Hamilton, Reflection

You disappoint me. All of you. Each and every one.

But you,

You alone make me happy.

Cohabitation

2007-05-22T09:42:00.001-07:00

*Emily and Her Pink Things, JeongMee Yoon

The tomatoes are in the pots. The sunflower seeds in the ground. And the new boyfriend has officially moved in. I'm not sure how any of these things happened. They just did. And for the record, this time around I have decided to take a particularly lax attitude. As in, so what that we haven't gone out and actually done anything 3 weekends in a row, who cares that you eat a significant amount more of the food products than I do and that when you do the dishes you always leave all of the cutlery unwashed in the sink, and really, honey, it's endearing when the night you decide you are going to actually cook a meal, you run out and buy burritos at the last minute. At least, well, at least you're not throwing the dishes at me, eating expensive meals without me, and um, the amount of crumbs you leave behind tells me that you must really exist. Let's just say that your idea of yelling at the pundits on Fox News for hours on end or obsessively writing letters to the editor of Salon magazine, is not really my idea of having a relaxing time. No, I haven't Googled your name in the last few weeks, no, I don't feel the need to watch the O'Reilly Factor daily in order to take the pulse of middle America, and yes, my dog is now your dog, too, complete with all feedings, walkings and sheddings that may occur.

It's been awhile, folks. And we are both a little out of practice. Suffice to say we are entering that blobby, somewhat murky period often referred to by psychiatrists as transition. We know not what lies on the other side nor how long it may take to actually get the hang of it. I don't need to tell you the exact measurements of our "one-bedroom" apartment for you to understand that it will take some measure of diplomacy for the three of us to come out alive. Perhaps, like the time I sold my house because I couldn't find a roommate or the time I moved four hundred miles because I couldn't sleep at night, or when I adopted a 60 pound dog despite the fact that I had no yard, I have once-again jumped the gun. And I want you to know. Mistakes were made. But not by me.

Ethan and His Blue Things, JeongMee Yoon

*Editor's Note: Any likenesses from the above blog post to JeonMee Yoon's photographs are purely coincidental and entirely unintentional.

No Comment

2007-05-17T08:52:00.000-07:00

Closer, Tim Sullivan

Casey is taking a personal day. Even though she is not actually employed and only in theory works for herself, she is taking the day off from even that pretense. Casey prefers that she might have chosen a better day, say one in which the sun actually shown and the sky did not look quite so bleak, nonetheless, she realizes that the school-yard saying still holds true: beggars can't be choosers. Her plans for the day might include such exhilarating activities as: doing the dishes that have approached the dining room, buying more soil for the as-yet-unplanted cucumbers dying on her front porch, surfing the internet ad nauseum, and maybe, just maybe, twiddling her thumbs. We can only hope she accomplishes half of what she has set out to do today.

At first glance one might think that were Casey to take a day off from the utterly non-lucrative practice of pretending to be a filmmaker, she might want to engage in more productive activities, perhaps by: looking for a real job with real–and by real we mean not of the imaginary kind–benefits, applying for an art residency where, at the very least, she could be with her own delusional kind, or securing a proper mate who can better sustain her hobbies, i.e. one who doesn't need to be walked twice a day. But alas, Casey has decided to put her own self-indulgent needs above the more practical ones that society has to offer, namely the suggestion that it might just be time to grow up.

The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter

2007-05-10T16:13:00.000-07:00

Andrew Moore, Red Chairs

The days are getting really long. Too long? Is summer here? I can hardly tell. What I do know is that the weeks seem to be racing by. That I have been concentrating on one really important thing for far too much time and that that really important thing is actually going to end in the not too distant future.

A lot rides on that important thing. Which happens when you put your heart into something. And because a lot rides on it, I have a hard time letting go. This runs both in favor of the important thing and against it. In favor because you will not quit until your vision is met. Against because you completely loose perspective over time and can easily get stuck in the mire. Too much simply means too much.

They say, a film is never finished, but merely abandoned. They also say a film is never finished until it meets the audience. And I suppose I would add that a film is never done until the filmmaker actually agrees to stop looking at it in front of the edit bay. Until then, my friends, the important thing remains an important thing hanging over her head.

It's going to be long. And it's going to be uncomfortable.

Sweat. Blood. And tears.

Long Day's Journey

2007-05-08T08:24:00.000-07:00

photo by Johan Bjorkegren

I guess it's been too hot to write. Or maybe it's that I have been out doing too many activities. Or perhaps the lack of comments has forced me to seek attention and recognition elsewhere. Whatever the causes I have decided to come back. Not because I have anything really of import to say. But mostly, so that when I die there will be some kind of record for which I could posthumously receive acknowledgement, maybe an award or two, like for Most Improved Blog, or even just a coupla thank you's from my former employers. I don't know. I guess it's pointless. But yet. We persevere.

My dog got bit on the face not too long ago. Blood gushed from his nose as I watched helplessly while he shook a Rottweiler, firmly attached to his snout, across the gravel driveway. The neighbors looked on and while they weren't exactly cheering, nor where they offering any assistance. As I banged the Rottweiler on the head with the only instrument I had handy: a DVD of Casino Royale as rented from Blockbuster, the owner of the aforementioned assault weapon ran out and got his damn dog off of mine.

We survived having only lost a t-shirt and dishrag in the bargain. The five-hour vet trip was pretty exciting however what with all the swallowed fox-tails, violently shaking Chihuahuas and the unexpected entrance of a hit-by-car that took up all of the resources of the staff. For the remaining four hours, I sat in silence next to the perpetrator's owner with absolutely nothing to say save a brief exchange about our dog's ages. Thankfully there were no stitches involved and all damages were assumed by the guilty party.

And that's the extent of it. Allergies. Sweat. Ripe Fruit. And more strawberry rhubarb pie.

It's gonna be a long summer.

whoa

2007-04-19T17:07:00.000-07:00

MARY CONRAD, Tell Your Stories Here

This week as I left the office for a lunch break, I ran into the adult-learners' ESL class in the stairwell. Literally, ran into them. It's that time of year. The time of year when the class escalates to a frenetic climax, where exuberance is at it's apex because the adult ESL students now know enough language to be allowed to roam the halls. Yes, it's Spring and apparently that means the students can leave behind the primitive instructions of the classroom–with it's ticking clock, assigned seating and dry-erase board–for the more tangible language experience that resides in our hallways, elevators, and, yes, even the stairwell.

Stairs
and then, in unison
sta-airs!
up
up!
down
do-own!
wall
wall!
carpet
car-pet!

Can I help it if I smile at the intimate class of little–and I mean all under 5 feet–old Asian ladies and a surprisingly tall and thin white lady, as they giggle and shuffle through the building, all the while apologizing profusely in a very well enunciated English? Do you blame me for finding the whole thing cute and, well, refreshing? Am I really that racist or ageist?

It's probably even worse than that.

But the good news is:
that I still find a couple scenes from my film funny
that the bike ride home only gets better
that pork chops are not only easy, but quite tasty to make
that, despite the tireless debates–about fashion, politics and who is doing a better job of listening–the man across the kitchen table
is a man I find quite worth the meal.

Ha Ha

2007-04-09T11:08:00.000-07:00

San Francisco in Jell-O, LIz Hickok

Isn't it time to be funny? Isn't that why you come here? Isn't that the point of surfing the internet? Who wants to hear about my problems? Certainly not you. Well, not me neither. I want to laugh. Right now. Goddamnit. Someone make me laugh.
Is it too much?

Now

2007-04-08T13:09:00.000-07:00

urbanirony project , wroclaw poland 2007

Last night we watched someone hang themself on television.

Close Up someone grabs a seashell off the night table
Cut to Wide Shot a man clutching his neck, a paroxysm for air, legs kicking
Cut to The Next Scene wherein life goes on but not for our man hanging from the rafters

Fade into me on the couch with a pillow over my face. Pillow soft and smothering. Quick. Access to memory banks. Retrieve new memory to replace the one of Cayce hanging himself like the man on tv. Did his legs kick? Did he grab the prayer beads like the man on the tv grabbed the seashell? Was it just suddenly the only idea possible? The only one worth having? THE LAST IDEA?

The last idea.

Imagine that.

Or was the last idea regret? Did that one make it's way before the end of life did? Would it matter? Would it matter to me? Would it make things different somehow?

It's not unpredictable that these things happens. It's the risk of watchingtelevision, openingabook, walkingoutside. It's the risk of the living.

And I am not afraid of it.

I'm sorry.

I'msosorry.

A way to be with you. To be close.

Here.

And I mean now.

what love should mean?

2007-04-05T14:17:00.000-07:00

If I tole you that last night's dinner was baked tofu–courtesy of Trader Joe's, microwaved popcorn, and beer from the local liquor store. If I tole you three rejection letters in 1 week. If I tole you, if I tole you, if I tole you.
That.
Things aren't so bad.
The sky was pink last night for a real long time. And then a perfect water's blue. We sat on the wet beach. And sand got in my shoes, in my pockets, in my drawers.
There is a Foster's Freeze I walk by every day. At night they have an old neon sign they light up. The lights pop on and off and makes a nighttime sound as comforting as crickets.
We walked the beltway. We saw jackrabbits too fast for the dog to catch. We carried the dog across the brambles and still, afterwards, he stopped, paw in the air, waiting for someone to clean out the thorns.
Shortcake.
Strawberry.
With whipped cream except I forgot to buy the cream.

seventh grade excerpt:
what love should mean?
huh?
what love should mean?
i don't even know what the heck you are talking about.
first you don't care about anybody and then you do?
how 'bout generous? i don't know!

Very

2007-03-28T21:35:00.000-07:00

Squeeze. Erin V. Sotak is an installation and performance artist concerned with notions of absurdity, futility, consumption, labor, and aesthetics. Her work is best described as a moving tableau that is re-rendered through the photographic process. Sotak will fabricate a new space in the Sesnon gallery using a variety of materials including wood, wall coverings, raw silk, and pomegranates. The piece revisits ideas of constraint versus restraint, seen versus unseen, interior versus exterior, and the distinct blur of the separateness of experience that occurs in a singular shared moment.

Don't ask me why the TV is blaring in the background. Generally I hate TV. I mean I really hate it. It has a lot to do with having been a really bad cable television editor for two many years. It has a lot to do with having started my career as an editor for really bad cable television editor in broadcast news. It has to do with cringing every time I hear an audio-booth recorded voice over. Or see a Queer-Eye style animated show open. Or am manipulated to stay tuned for the next half hour by the much-repeated dangling carrot of a grand deus ex machina executed in a ten-second tease.

There. I just saw a commercial for Cotton. Cotton? Yea, cotton. Pussycat Dolls. Tyra Banks. It's been a while since I tuned in. Clare Danes and The Boyfriend Trouser™. Cheese-It Stix. I recognize none of the station bugs.

The mute button. The remote. My kingdom for the remote.

The week. In fragments. My week. Just like the TV. My friend who decided to don his Tibetan prayer beads, shortly before killing himself. The toxicology report. The Vicodin in his system. His wife. His wife. Who will never be the same. His kids. His precious kids. Who I love more than warm, straight-from-the-tap maple syrup on waffles. Nothing better than to hear them giggling. Nothing more reassuring. And thank god. There are still giggles. Thank god. Even when I don't believe.

And the leaves. How quickly they grow back on the trees. As if they were never gone. And we have forgotten what the bare tree is.

How quickly. We forget.

the difference between me and you

2007-03-22T20:45:00.000-07:00

Jo Hanson, Mother Courage – "from work that I call urban spirit figures, using metals that are crushed by street traffic."

It has been my goal to come here and write at least once a week. And I have to admit, that I have been having a hard time doing even this. So tonight I pour myself a small glass of my favorite whiskey–yes, the kind that's sealed with wax–put on some inspirational tunes and confess that I am just not sure what to write about. A free write? A political diatribe? A nostalgic walk down memory lane? What will it be?

I wonder. As for the music, I am listening to David Byrne's playlist. Too lazy and too–um, what is the word, non-committal? yes, we'll take that–I am allowing someone else to do the work for me. But listen to this. I always like the thoughtfulness with which he crafts his themes. Tonight it's: Pop as in popular. That's where this playlist falls apart. Not all of these songs reached or will reach a wide enough audience to be considered truly popular, but it wasn't for want of being poppy, catchy or sticking to your brain pan. David Byrne. I don't care much for his fine art. And he has this really earnest blog that's like, do I really need to know all about David Byrne's tarmac adventures in trying to get back to Newark, NJ from Austin, TX? But, you all know how I feel about My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts. And those Brazil Classic compilations he put out in the early 90's, I mean, we played the shit out of those albums! And they were, albums, that is, back then. But listen to this. Right now. How perfectly did Gnarls Barkley's Crazy ooze right into The Arcade Fire's My Body Is A Cage? The man knows his pop music. So why should I reinvent the wheel here?

Hunh. And now I s'pose I should write about something. Now would be the time, right? I mean, I have your attention and all. So. Do I write about helping my recently widowed friend sort through her husband's belongings and determine which items to save for the kids and which items get donated to Good Will? Do I write about the lengthening days and how encouraging Spring can be? How it always seems to come right when you need it most? Do I write about my nasty cough that has kept me and my neighbors up for the last week and how sore and tired I am from coughing? Do I write about the argument I got in to earlier today about whether or not one should aggressively confront another aggressive person, namely one who drives like a maniac, endangers other people's lives and then acts like it is his right as an American citizen to do so. Do I write about the woman's obituary I read that moved me so, a woman who died at 89 years old, but lived that life as an artist, an activist, who could teach us a thing or too if we bothered to listen, a woman who made her point out of trash, compiled an archive of city litter that showed us who we were and a time line of how we got here?

Where do I begin? And where should I stop? Where do I look to for guidance?

When was the last time you prayed?

2007-03-13T21:34:00.000-07:00

This morning I rode my bike to work. It took 45 minutes, and it was lovely. A lovely day. A lovely introduction to spring. A lovely feeling of accomplishment for riding my bike to work, for starting the week riding my bike to work. Course, that could all change tomorrow, but for now, things feel possible and, hell, downright rosy.

It wasn't until the ride back, though, that I really started to see. You know, the kind of seeing that only comes from practice, from a strict discipline of noticing the things around you, of seeing the new, of looking beyond the usual. I had forgotten. I had forgotten what that was like. But my field of vision opened and I was gifted the following. A brick factory boarded and empty, remnants of its industry being taken over by the earth. The sycamores that line the wide streets of this island, the tiniest green leaves shaking in the sun. A shiny black police car, reflecting the brightest, harshest light. The produce district where warehouses brimming with crates and crates are loaded, unloaded, and forklifts move in slow-motion.

Riding over the drawbridge I could see the water beneath the metal slates. There were crevices and cracks over which I rode, there were signs and lights that were disobeyed, there were helmets laid by the wayside, and there were motorists to curse. There were legs to get tired, an ass to get sore, and a face to get sun-kissed. There was grit in my teeth, there was wind between my legs and there was a certain music–traffic, down strokes, the last song in my head–I couldn't ignore.

the instances swimming around in my head are the instances in which

2007-02-27T14:38:00.000-08:00

1.

A man I once cared for far more than I knew was wise to, complained about his relationship with his ex: they were total opposites, she was a horrible communicator, he always felt like she had one foot out the door. Sick of hearing about it, I finally asked him why he even went out with her in the first place. His response was sure and quick. She's beautiful.

The ease with which he said it and the fact that he had never said as much to me, made me acutely sad. Not only for me, but for him as well.

2.

My office is next to an adult English Language Learners' class in Chinatown. Every day I hear them shouting in unison, with the enthusiasm of a grade-school calisthenics class things like
HELLO!
GOODBYE!
WHAT IS YOUR NAME!
Each phrase is shouted with the same absence of intonation that comes, well, with a group of people shouting random phrases while staring straight ahead at the dry erase board where a woman with a pointer taps each word printed on it.

As the semester progresses, so do the complexities of the phrases. And I don't know if this is the entirety of the class, or if things like conversation and comprehension are just done at a more hushed level.

But today what I heard was
WHERE ARE YOU GOING FOR DIM SUM!
and
I LOVE YOU!
and really, what more do you need to know how to say?

3.

In searching for a third instance, I must now admit to both you and myself that there is no three. At the end of the day, this is all I can really offer. But, this I know: things usually come out better in threes. So use your imagination.

Love Hard, Fight Beautifully

2007-02-16T13:10:00.000-08:00

I read that the other day in the lobby close to the elevators of the office where I work. It's part of an art exhibit–I'm not exactly sure for what–but it's a phrase to which I find myself returning daily. Like when my boyfriend and I fought all night on Valentine's Day. Or when I talk to my New York friend, who had a New York meltdown and left it all behind–the job, the apartment, the collection of short stories he couldn't get published–to move in with his relatives in sunny Los Angeles and is suddenly feeling a helluva lot better. But mostly I think of it because this last week has been hard as hell for me and for a lot of my close friends.

Cayce lost the fight last week and we miss him horrbily. He left behind a wife of some twenty years, two boys young enough that they still take baths together, and siblings as close as they make 'em.

You think you know grief. You think you know loss. And then along comes something that is as impossible to understand as Einstein's theory of relativity. And that's the thing. What one day seemed impossible to understand eventually grows to become something you just accept as true. And I guess, that's where I am with it all right now. Things are in the process of becoming true. And it's not an easy place to be.

I first met Cayce at film school many years ago. I was a graduate TA for a class that was small on a good day, and more like an intimate yet uncomfortable job interview on a bad one. I don't think I ever prepared harder for a class, and I don't think I ever ended up flailing more. Cayce was the only student who actually tried to respond to my questions. The only one who attempted to engage with the readings–even if he hadn't read them. And the student for whom I ended up teaching the entire course. Cayce encouraged me, as best as one of your students can, by, at least, acting like he was getting something out of the class. Years later, Cayce himself would become a teacher: a much more relaxed, genuine and knowledgeable one than I ever was. And from that first encounter, Cayce turned me on to more films, music and obscure Internet sites than seems possible for one person to be aware of. If you asked any of his friends, students or colleagues you'd hear the exact same thing. Anything Cayce championed was something worth investigating.

Cayce, his wife Chela and their boys, Django and Taj, made a home not far from mine. There's was a home I would visit, not just for the free meals and lively conversation but for the open door policy, the unlimited sustenance and playtime with two of the most mischievous boys I've known. I loved nothing more than to visit Cayce when his wife was out of town and watch him, overwhelmed with the boys, trying to give them a bath and put them to bed, and they, in turn, knowing just how to work the crowd to their own benefit. Trying to act the role of the father, you could see Cayce was clearly no match for them. And at the same time, you could see just how much he loved it all.

I could go on and on about Cayce. About how he was the best Sasha Baron Cohen impersonator I knew, about how when he left you a phone message it was so shit-your-pants funny you collected them all, or about how when he loved something, be it a song or a film or a new drink at McDonald's, he proselytized to such effect, you soon found yourself praising their merits as well. But it breaks my heart too much to think about. To realize the memories I have are the only ones I get.

Cayce was rock and roll. He was unbridled affection. He was for real when nothing else was.

And he was loved. And he was beautiful.

Not that the story need be long, but it will take a long time to make it short.

2007-01-30T20:58:00.000-08:00

Michelin Man, Christie Nielson

When I go for porno, it's of the vintage variety. That's not to say I don't indulge in the occasional pay-per-view when away from home, say touring a plummy Motel 6 or knocking around a Mid-Western Holiday Inn. There are some things that are simply more fun when done in the unfamiliar place. I imagine you all know what I am talking about here. Nonetheless, back at the ranch, I have my own stash of tried and true. The fewer the fake tits and the lesser the landing strips, the better off we all are, in my humble opinion. Sure we might have to put up with some blemishes, some bad–and I don't mean baaaddd–Shaft riffs. And yeah, the director might have fancied himself an auteur and thusly encumbered the porn with more plot than it could possibly accommodate. But I'll take my stray hairs and eggy breasts over any modern-day revision of My Big Fat Greek Penis.

To get to the point, when I went out of town last week to visit that film festival of note in the ski-sloped resort just south of the desert, my sort-of boyfriend opted to stay behind and vacation at my little resort on the island. The night before I left, let's just say, we indulged. Fast forward to me, bundled to the size of which would rival the Michelin Man and wattling through the snow to wait in line for the highly-acclaimed and very sold-out shows the festival of note had to offer. No doubt watching yet another independent film or queued up in front of the theatre in the six-degree weather, I missed the phone call from the sort-of boyfriend. But, oh, the message was well worth it's recording:

Hey dude, just wanted you to know, that when I returned King Kong, I had taken the first DVD out of the freakin, uh, player and it happened to be Deep Throat and that's what they saw when they opened it up to check it back. [change of voice] Excuse me sir, this isn't the DVD for King Kong....
...agh!

Apparently, he mumbled it's my girlfriend's...but we're not quite sure they heard that.

Of course, I played the message for my cohorts to hear, and, of course, we laughed until tears sprung and crystallized on our cheeks. In fact, I laughed all the way through the hour and a half line for a disappointing, soon-to-be released documentary. I laughed every time one of us said King Kong! And I laughed at the thought of this man, staying alone in my apartment for the first time, tentatively trying on the role of sweetheart, and trying to explain to a sixteen-year old, Blockbuster employee why the accidental substitution of Deep Throat in the place of King Kong was just an honest mistake.

Sugar

2007-01-21T10:40:00.000-08:00

Reynold Reynolds & Patrick Jolley with Samara Golden, still from Sugar

The OSC calls me kid even though I am technically older than him and even though we dated, what, about two decades ago. It seems like I have known The OSC for just about ever. He is the only man who has ever asked me to marry him–though he was drunk at the time and we had already long stopped dating. He is the first person to pour me a beer after heartbreak, the first shoulder I cry on when it gets hard to drag my ass out of bed, and–plug your ears, mom–the first lay when there has been a particularly long draught. Though his once lithe skate boarder's body has now grown soft, his hair has considerably thinned, and we don't even have to go into what years of smoking, dry walling and lack of health care has done to his capacity to breathe, looking at him is much akin to looking into a mirror, a painfully accurate mirror. Our dreams a bit more battered, our cross-word puzzling skills a bit improved, we look at each other and we read our own histories. I may not be balding and, at least I can climb up a set of stairs without coughing up half a lung, but he does know exactly what to say to make me feel better, precisely how to piss me off, and absolutely how to, um, push my buttons.

We moved in together to save money, not a good enough reason at any age, let alone when you are twenty-two. We lived in a one-bedroom, third floor walk-up where I was the apartment manager. Together we paid about two-hundred dollars a month in rent and sometimes we couldn't even scrap that together. For most of the time we lived together, I remained indignant. He never picked up a finger to help with the maintenance of the building, though, he benefited with the cheap rent. He wasn't particularly neat. And his idea of apartment decorating included hanging up his baseball cards willy nilly on the mantel so that they fell anytime the door slammed shut.

Still, we had fun. It was new, this living together thing, and we made the best of it. In our hearts we knew this was just a practice run for later, when we had the capacity to take these things more serious. We played house. And in the process, we learned one or two things. One Thanksgiving someone had given us a twenty pound bird, no doubt a freebie with the one they had purchased for themselves. We invited over a few friends and stuck it in the oven. Four hours later, it was no where near being cooked. It seemed our tiny oven couldn't handle a turkey of that size, and so, minus any kind of meat thermometer, we started sawing off the drumsticks hoping we could at least eat those. And we did. And lived to tell about it.

The OSC once tried on one of my dresses. It was a slinky, low-cut number and it startled us both to see how good he looked in it. He pranced about the house, dancing back to the full-length mirror to wag his ass and giggling the entire time like a schoolgirl in her first bra. I can't remember if it turned us on, or if the absurdity of his hairy chest and his high, round buttocks kept us in hysterics the rest of the night. He could make me laugh, that man, he could also make me forget, and for those alone, I will always keep his company. He might have been the boyfriend that behaved the worst–we were kids, after all, it could be argued that we hadn't known any better–but he was the one whom I have actually known long enough to completely forgive.

We've been to hell and back, both as a couple and each on our own. We've seen each other act the worst and we haven't always been there to witness the best. One marriage, one divorce and one abortion between us. We share a million stories. And one hopes there will be a million more. Lovers, jobs, apartments, they may change. But he is the well-worn map I turn to when lost. Separating at the seams, edges thinned from touching, the map may not always tell me where I am headed, but if I traces it's contours, it can begin to tell me where I've been.

morning rituals

2007-01-03T10:55:00.001-08:00

Kathryn Spence, Pigeons, 1997, street trash, wire, string, rubber bands, glue

Some people have their coffee, some their morning mass and others still wake up to the Today Show. And those of us with dogs, well, you know what we have. The morning walk. A ritual that I now look forward to more than than the smell of coffee percolating, more than the sight of espresso steaming, more than the screeching sound of milk foaming. I never thought it was possible to enjoy something more than these sacred things. But. Look at me now.

My morning walk, like all rituals, begins and ends with the same thing: the donning and the shedding of many layers, the leashing and the unleashing, the picking up and the letting go of a plastic bag. We button up, we grab our coffee and we hit the road. What is most enjoyable about this ritual is that we walk the same route every morning, we reach the same landmarks, we see many of the same people. And yet, what is most striking about traversing the exact same path day after day are all the subtle changes: the ones that weather, season and sunlight afford. It is the closest to religion I get. And I look forward to it more than anything.

The walk begins as we cut through the park. We pass the empty playground, we notice our breath in the air, and often the grass is full of dew, sometimes, even, brittle with frost. We head down the stairs, we come to the barren baseball field, we marvel at the energy of the tennis players so sprightly in the bitter cold and pale light. We come across the one or two ambitious joggers, the all-business dog walkers, and the middle-aged Asian couples comfortably bundled in sweats. We walk past the pond with its sleeping ducks, its one solemn egret and its still marsh reeds. And the moment I first lay eyes on the sea, like the exquisiteness of a first kiss, is the moment my day officially begins.

Once we are walking along side the beach, I notice everything. How calm or furious the tide is, the colors of the leaves on the ground, the wee little plovers alight on the sand. I mark the winterness of the trees, whose nests have become suddenly visible by their nakedness. I regard the cast of the sun on the water. I near the paved walkway, my second landmark, where the shifting tides swell over or under to reveal it's architecture. And like a prayer, a meditation, a really impossible yoga move, I am unabashedly thankful. On days like today, with the sea high and frothy, the moon sufficiently waxed, the air crisp and the coffee hot in my hand, I stand and ponder my good fortune. It's not a bad way to start the day.

The walk from there is brisk and to the point. We approach the school playground, the sounds of recess and PE echoing across the water, we pass, for the second time, the elderly man who carries a camera and whom I see, not once, but twice, each morning, we exchange another good day greeting, and we reach the house with the Butoh, or perhaps it's Kabuki puppets and bottle tree. This is the third and final landmark by which I measure my walk: a row of Butoh puppets mysteriously lining the entire windowed-wall of this last house on the water. Most of the puppets face inward, but a select few look down on us forlornly as we reach the sidewalk and leave the ocean's side. Depending on the light, the blue bottle trees leave either a tragic or regal impression.

By this point I am already thinking of all the things I have to do that day. I am dreading or looking forward to going into the office, I am ready for breakfast, I am making lists in my head. I stop noticing. I turn inward. I obsess, or stress, or act the way I normally act throughout the day, mostly as if my eyes were blinded and my ears plugged. I act the way we all act. The walk is officially over. The work day has officially begun. Life has officially taken over. But. For a brief moment in time, I bore witness to the morning. And I was humbled by it's wit.

enough about me

2006-12-17T21:25:00.000-08:00

OK this is a weird time of year, but also kinda fun if you're into baking and parties and what not. People do all kinds of crazy things this time of year. And I, in turn, feel some of that ambivalence, some of that excitement. Click on santa to watch the video. Aram did the music and recorded the self-motivational talking picture frame you hear in the background. Thank you Aram ep
Or try me on for size

Things We Don’t Understand and Are Definitely Not Going To Talk About

2006-12-06T15:48:00.000-08:00

Things We Don’t Understand and Are Definitely Not Going To Talk About,
Miranda July

An intern at my work copied for me a CD full of covers of Joy Division's Love Will Tear Us Apart. Now, I can't think of a thing out there that will cheer you up more than listening to that song over and over, each artist with their own unique interpretation of pain, suffering and humiliation as individually experienced. The world is never short of grief. Nor, does it seem to me today, are our lives.

James Kim was found dead. I recently watched a documentary about the incurable neurological disorder, Dystonia, where those afflicted loose control of their muscles. The sun was bright this morning, but I, trying to soak up its rays, was not. It's proving to be one of those days. You know the kind I am talking about. The emotional kind. I would like to call it pesado, because the word feels right in my mouth, but it turns out pesado really means boring...which might not, after all, be that far from the truth.

James Kim was my age. His wife and children survived only because his wife was able to breast-feed both their children and burn the car tires to keep them warm when the gas ran out. Those with Dystonia can implant a device in their brain that uses a remote control to stimulate neuro-transmitters to keep their muscles from spazzing. When the battery in their remote control dies, they go back to being hunched over or wheel-chair bound. Last night, the sun set at 4:45 and there was nothing I could do, but watch it slip away.

When I'm 64

2006-12-03T19:45:00.000-08:00

Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Untitled (Portrait of Ross)

Today I bought a package of Werther's Original at Ye Ole Bed Bath and Beyond. For reasons still inexplicable to me, I opened the package and poured it's conveniently wrapped contents into a small bowl. I then preceded to place that which you might call a candy bowl on that which I do call the coffee table. It was at that exact moment I realized that my fear of turning into my mother had instantly suddenly changed into my fear of becoming my grandmother. Mon dieu! What had I just done? What person of my age in their right mind would do such a thing? OK maybe candy in a bowl. Something neat like an obscure Japanese candy. But Werther's? That's like, so, Florida. It's the kind of candy that's so unloved, no one, not even the most sugar-starved two-year old would reach for. The kind of candy that stays in the bowl—which is precisely its purpose—well beyond the expiration date...
...of its original purchasers.

Sigh.

Sometimes I wonder. Just how dotty am I gonna be? I mean, how bad are things gonna get? I can handle cutting out newspaper articles on any possibly relevant subject and mailing them incessantly to my descendants and I could deal with becoming an old crank who cusses up a storm in line at the bank teller to anyone who is willing to listen. But what if I decide 2 dozen feral cats is an appropriate number of roommates? Or what if I start seeing the Virgin Mary in my pancakes? I mean, what if I start turning to Talk Radio for an answer?!

I already have no qualms about using expired milk for my cereal. And I do have a tendency to hoard. For chrissakes, it was only today when I caught myself gesticulating wildly while talking out loud in search of the perfect salad spinner (not found!) It can't be too much longer now!

Granted, there are things to look forward. Mostly they consist of finally not giving a shit: about what you say, the way you look, or what people think about you. So what if I wanna wear a Real People t-shirt over a hot-pink track suit with alligator cowboy boots? Who cares if I decide the local PTA meeting is an appropriate podium for my erudite theories about pasteurized cheese? And really, who would mind if I zydeco danced my way down the aisle at my only daughter's wedding?

Something for Nothing

2006-11-20T17:48:00.000-08:00

Marina Shterenberg, Improbable Architecture

My dad is of the opinion you can get something for nothing. Wait. Scratch that. My dad is of the opinion that you should get something for nothing. Or, at least, that he should. It goes something like this: the family goes out to dinner, we order our entrees and then, my father thinks all desserts should be complimentary. It's his daughter's birthday for chrissakes! There are nine of us! Do they know how long he has been dining at this establishment? Do they know who he knows? He has signed letters from two different presidents! He has photos of himself with Sting on more than one occasion! And do we need to bring up Tom Hanks?! Yes, Tom Hanks! He has his telephone number! His home number! He could call him right now if you like! Do you want him to call Tom Hanks?! Cuz he can! Right now! You could call them bosom buddies!

My father's tolerance for putting up with bullshit is low. But so is his tolerance for being treated like a regular customer. And that's just it. He doesn't want to be treated like a regular customer. He wants to be treated like a celeb. Or like a friend of the celebs. Or maybe just like a friend. If it's a ballgame, he'll waltz into the most desirable section like he's Jack Nicholson at a Lakers game. If it's airline seats, he'll demand an upgrade. If it's a hotel room, he firmly requests the suite on the corner, poolside. That's after he's already paid for the ground floor double with the view of the parking lot. And then he won't back down. Relentless is a word we might use to describe him. Pain in the ass others might say. Or still yet, you might see a manager mouthing the words do anything to get rid of him.

We are, all of us, used to it at this point. And we each take a unique approach in response to the situation. My one sister, at age thirty-six, will make sure to arrive at the movie theatre before he can buy her and her husband any 12 and under tickets. My mother will casually walk away from the man haggling with the maitre d' over the table with reserved seats. And I personally try not to encourage him to continue to use his dead mother's handicap placard.

It's a battle none of us will ever win. Nor one we can even begin to understand. I can't tell you the hand that my father's been dealt. But I sure as hell know the hand he will try and play. And I know precisely the moment everyone else will fold.

Anything you need to know about somebody you can learn about by the kind of soup they make

2006-11-12T21:52:00.000-08:00

(Gratuitous Halloween photo of cute kid making "scary" face)

And if they don't make soup, consider them not worth knowing.

The general consensus around these parts is that Sunday evening is a perfect evening for soup making. Soup you can eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner—if need be—for the rest of the week. Soup made out of whatever is found in the cupboards, fridge and garden. The kind of soup that can easily be extended and modified as the days progress. A soup that molds (uh, no pun intended there) to your liking, much like those pair of Levi's you've had since college.

As it sometimes happens, this Sunday evening I find myself still consuming last week's soup while at the same time beginning next week's. Unfortunately, last week's soup, a butternut squash puree, was less successful than usual. Puree is always hard over here, since we are lacking a food processor. For reasons I find hard to explain even to myself, I have never owned a microwave, a food processor, a garbage disposal nor a dishwasher and though some would swear by these conveniences of the twenty-first century, we over here like to do things the old-fashioned way. Or that is to say, we have been to cheap to date to make any such culinary advances. To wit, the butternut squash puree was not entirely my fault. But it did make it hard for me not to steal a bowlful of the steaming, aromatic, anything-goes udon soup.

It goes something like this: open fridge and look for ingredients that must be used immediately or rendered hazardous to one's health. The bok choy looked pretty good, the onions in perfect shape, but the mystery cabbage rescued from the bottom drawer and initially gotten by way of weekly-organic-food-box-shared-with-neighbor needed to be dealt with pronto. The ingredients, once brought out and modeled on the kitchen counter, spoke and when they did they decidedly said asian. What next, you might ask? Peruse the refidgerator again. Discover the packaged udon and packaged tofu that have been languishing in isolation unecessarily long. Realize wilted carrot that feels embaressingly familiar, shrivelled ginger and limp scallions would perk up nicely when combined with Trader Joe's Ginger and Soy Broth™. Become ebullient at thought of such resourcefulness synthesized with such gastric shrewdness. Note that dog doesn't much care for dropped block of tofu. Begin.

With some regret I remember the two mushrooms I so carelessly tossed out earlier. While small in number, it would have given me great pleasure to find a role in tonight's soup for those two homeless fellas. Once the ingredients have been chopped (somewhat) and tossed into the dutch oven, the seasoning should begin. This one is a no brainer. Look for asian-inspired condiments and begin pouring. Soy sauce: natch. Hoisin: we'll go with that. Sesame oil: a dash. Sriracha Chili Sauce: why not? Add more soy sauce. And then add some more. Realize low-sodium soy sauce is not much help when it comes to soup. Make way to spice jars. Vague recollection that star anise is key ingredient in favorite Vietnamese soup. Taste. Add more soy sauce. Vigoursly shake soy sauce into pot. Curse at now empty bottle of soy sauce and add more hot sauce to make up for it. Taste again. Congratulate self. Not too shabby! Enjoy bowl of soup and retire to living room smug, sated and full.

The Wagon Box Fight

2006-11-09T11:20:00.000-08:00

another opportunity to view

This is leftover video from my stay in Wyoming. From the Jim Gitchell Memorial Museum in Buffalo to be precise. Who can resist a diaorama? So wee, so precious, so antiquated. I especially love them when they are extra dusty and the people's limbs are missing and the animal's hair has fully disentagrated. This one was fairly intact and a pretty grim story. File under how we won The West. And then feel all crappy about it.

Election Day Coverage

2006-11-07T21:24:00.000-08:00

Hank Willis

Who doesn't love an election day?! Giving your name and address at your local polling place, last minute attempts to figure out which Board of Education Supervisors to vote for, listening to the pundits duke it out as the poll returns come in. Well, if we are to look at statistics—and I'm not saying that we are—then that'd be about half of you out there. Even if I hadn't paid that much attention to the state-wide elections and municipal measures in a non-presidential election such as this one (and again I'm not saying or not saying that is the case here) I still get caught up in the fervor once the actual voting day arrives. I'll be the first to admit

Today was the first day for me voting in my new hometown, or the island as we islanders like to refer to it. A new polling place, new mayoral canditates—none of which rang a bell—and new voting machines, ones that, ironically, seemed quaintly pastoral as if from a time gone by. My friendly poll worker told me there were no hard drives, no hanging chads, no blurry touch screens and none of those pesky Diebold Voting Machines any Rubrics Cuber could hack in about five seconds. Just pencil and ink this time around. Standing alone at my voting booth, I almost felt a pang of nostalgia for those earlier Rube Goldbergian contraptions that took up so much space. There was nothing but myself, my cheat sheet and a couple of pieces of paper on which I was supposed to fill in the arrows and mark my picks for the best candidates.

I have to admit, my new polling place did not quite stir the emotions like my last one. Maybe it was the fact it was not in the basement of an old Baptist Church. Maybe it was the fact that I used to live in a much poorer neighborhood—OK friends, between you and I, we can call it ghetto—where people seemed to remember what it was like to be disenfranchised. Or maybe it was the fact that I voted amongst gas station attendants on their way to work, security guards on their way home from work, and that the polling volunteers were all elderly black women—the chuch-going kind—who worked at a snail's pace. But today, there were none of the tears in my eyes, the swelling up of civic pride, I used to experience on voting day. At a last ditch effort, I called a friend to see if he wanted to watch the poll returns in some working class bar. But alas, all I got was the machine.

I don't care who you vote for—OK, again this may not be factually accurate—but, yes, I think you should vote. It builds character. It generally makes you feel better about yourself much like how you feel after going to the gym. It makes you feel a part of somethig bigger. Is that so bad? Besides what have you got to lose? This is one test that you will never fail.

Hank Willis Priceless

clean dry shiny

2006-11-01T15:50:00.000-08:00

It's back to posting some videos. They have been piling up and I gotta do something with them. Thank you for none of your comments. Nothing like a little encouragement!

Don't we all aim to be clean, dry and shiny? At least some of the time? OK and the rest of the time dirty, wet and dull will do. Aram composed the music to these last two videos. Huzzah!

Here too.

Fly like a butterfly, sting like a bee

2006-10-30T16:38:00.000-08:00

Please note: I will be registering for gifts shortly. Meanwhile, allow me to introduce Cecil.

Or try me.

Witch One Is Me?

2006-10-26T10:04:00.000-07:00

You know I am running out of things to say when I start blogging about my dreams. But I woke up this morning and it took me a good five minutes before it started to come to me. I dreamt it had rained. I dreamt I woke up to a leaking apartment. There were puddles on the carpet, mold coming through in large black rings on the wall, and a roof that looked as if it were about to cave in. Maybe it was the episode of Lost I watched last night or maybe it was the collection of short stories I am reading about food, or maybe it was just the momentous amount of laundry I have been washing, drying and folding.

In my dream I was distressed. My apartment had finally become my home. I enjoyed no more than to lounge in its bath, cook in its kitchen, lie down on its carpet and stare at its stucco ceiling. I had laid claim to the space: taking down the proletarian supplied Venetian blinds and putting up the three-weekends-to-complete-curtain-project sewn by none other. I had changed the direction in which the refrigerator door opened, I installed a hanging pot rack, I frosted the window panes in the front door for privacy.

A home. The hearth. My little nest. The place where I repose. Where I wake up Sunday mornings, make coffee and get back in to bed to read. Where I can pull back the curtains and sit on the couch and enjoy the light poring in, the blue sky above my head, the birds freaking out in the trees just outside. At this point I would hate to move. After all the letting go of stuff—years accumulated—so that I could finally fit into this postage-stamp space, after all the living in boxes, things spread out between two cities, after all the shuttling between places, the driving hither and forth, the nomadic it's only temporary until I find my own place existence, I have finally arrived. And I'm not about to let a little crack in the surface kick me out.

Forgive Me Father

2006-10-23T15:30:00.000-07:00

Smart Girl from To-Do List

I prolly spend more time thinking (and writing and oh, imagining) about relationship stuff than I should. I should prolly be out doing more important things like volunteering at the old folks home, reading the political articles in The New Yorker instead of skipping them, and repairing familial relationships instead of starting and stopping new ones with strangers. I should prolly quit obsessing about why the last man I dated did not fall in love with me. I should prolly quit flirting with the any and all online suitors who approach me. I should prolly I should prolly I should prolly.

This is not really a post. This is a PostSecret. Only it's more complicated than would fit on a postcard and I really should, ahem, write something even if I am dog tired, my eyeballs aflame, my knees wobbly and my face raw from razor burn.

I once dated a man. He was a man and not at all a boy and for that I was eternally grateful. It was not at all that long ago, although, its memory yellows from age each passing day. I once dated a man and not unlike me, he was a man who kept lists. He had a little notebook or two or three and in no particular order wrote lists both banal and weighty.

And ladies and gentleman, I liked to look through these notebooks.

They were everyday lists and I wanted to know the everyday man. At least, that's what I told myself. Groceries to buy, bills to pay, measurements, addresses, shorthanded ideas that yet remain locked in his mind. And they were scattered about, on the kitchen table, impromptu lists scratched onto receipts, scraps of paper that fluttered to the floor when I picked up my bags or brought in the groceries.

They charmed me. All of them. I tried to ascertain which were written before me and which after me. There were lists of books and movies many of which I had recommended. If they were written into the notebooks, they never made any kind of chronological sense. As a book, from beginning to end, they read like a puzzle.

And then I stumbled upon a list. It was a list about me. Sort of a pro and con list if you will. It was, like most of his lists, a short list. A mere five or six items. I never understood its formula. There was a check next to makes me feel wanted and I can't quite remember the other something like fun! There was no check next to communication or creativity. There was an awkward phrase about the ability (mine or his?) to evolve sexually for which I received no check as well. I couldn't tell if he had written the list the day before or months prior. I didn't know if the checks were like extra bonus points or if he really thought I was completely devoid of creativity. Whatever it meant, it was painfully clear to me I had not passed this particular test. I had only gotten two out of six check marks. And in the dozen or so little words written in blue ink onto the lined notebook paper, this archipelago of words scattered across the blank page, I read the story of our relationship in its entirety. And this story did not, as it turns out, have a happy ending.

The Date to End All Dates

2006-10-13T21:03:00.000-07:00

Desiree Holman, Breath Holes

My date arrived at my door early Saturday morning. He arrived dripping wet, having just swam across the Pacific to reach my door. I handed him a towel, and he, in return, handed me an orchid. No ordinary orchid, this orchid flowered only once, took twenty years to mature, and bloomed for exactly twenty seconds. Let's just say, his timing was impeccable!

We watched as the precious flower bloomed and then withered and then produced an intolerable smell. Without batting an eye, or in this case, his long lustrous lashes which, he assures me, he has never tinted nor curled, he tossed the once-precious orchid over his shoulder. Toweling himself off, he waltzed through my doors, and caught me unawares as he grabbed me by the waist to a 4/4 polka. I nearly slammed the door in the face of the German polka band that trooped in behind him. Stepping on his toes—and those of all seven members of the band—he gratiously allowed me to sit out on the 5th polka. But, oh, they were a lively bunch! And dancing together in my small New York-style studio, they sure lifted my spirits—even as they knocked over my dead grandmother's Hummel figurines bequeathed to me on her deathbed.

The polka band took a rest on my fold-out sofa bed—politely taking their shoes off as per my request—and my date preceeded to the kitchen where he had plans to wow me with the culinary secrets of his Armenian-Mexican ancestors. Again his elaborate preparations, the three crates of cooking utensils, and the bags and bags of groceries—along with the sudden appearance of his ninety-year old Armenian grandmother—impressed me greatly. After an hour or so, he took time out from the rolling of the grape leaves and the crushing pomegranategranite seeds, to court me in the bathroom—now the only room in my apartment in which there was enough room for us to sit. Delicately taking my foot into his hands—and dextorously maneovering around the toilet bowl—he gave me the most exuisite foot massage of my life! Too bad when the accordian player swung open the door to use the bathroom, he gave my date a concussion which forced him to lay low for a bit.

While the rest of us ate and his grandmother told the most entertaining dirty limericks—albeit in another language—my date reposed in the bath tub. By midnight, we thought we ought to check in on him...

dreams deferred

2006-10-10T10:04:00.000-07:00

Show me the child at 7 and I will show you the man.

I've been watching the 7-Up series (that BBC documentary series that followed a variety of wee Brits from differing social classes every seven years) in preparation for the latest release, 49-Up. Who was I at seven? I don't remember much. It wasn't one of those break out years. I was in second grade. I had had the same teacher Mrs. Chase, for first and second. Second grade felt safe. Felt like I was getting into the swing of things. It was in second grade that I realized I would be in school for a long, long time. Six more years here and then four years after that. It felt unfathomable. It was the same time I began to grapple with the concept of forever. It would keep me up at night. At night, I always slept with the my door cracked open, the light from the hallway shining in. I lulled myself to sleep with the sounds of late-night television. It was comforting: a muffled laugh track, Johnny Carson fading into the distance. Just as I was about to drift away the thought would come to me: what happens when you die? The answers the nuns gave never satisfied. Heaven seemed nice enough. But nice enough for an eternity seemed like hell. Time would just go on and on. There was nothing before it and nothing behind it. I would hold out for as long as I could and then I would hear myself screaming, MOOOOOOMMMM!

It was our ritual.
What happens after you die?
You go to heaven.
And then what happens?
You are with your loved ones: your father, your grandmother, me.
And then what?
And then you are happy. You do what you want. You don't think about time. You look down at earth.
And then what?
That's it. You're in heaven forever.
What happens after forever?
Forever never ends. It just keeps going on.

I tried to imagine it. I tried to imagine being seven forever. Or doing something I really liked like swimming forever. I tried to imagine the longest amount of time I could and then doubling that and then doubling that. It made me uncomfortable. Like practicing my scales. It made me feel scared and nauseous at the same time. Whether it was heaven or a cold plot of dirt made no difference in my mind.

When I was seven I received my first communion. I remember wearing a frill-less eyelet dress when all the other girls got petticoats and frills. I remember taking it very seriously. I remember rehearsing how to walk down the aisle. I remember holding my hands together very carefully. I remember learning how to do the rosary. I remember my Miniature Stories of the Saints. I still have it.

When I was seven my grandmother got sick. My mother was her only daughter and it meant I never saw my mom anymore. She lived at the hospital and I lived at the babysitters. When I did go to the hospital I did not recognize my grandmother. When she came out she had to wear a wig and she still did not look like my grandmother. I overheard conversations about wounds and infections and surgeries. I remember my mother on the phone a lot. Frustrated, exhausted and, above all, sad.

At seven I was quiet. I lived inside my head. I did not need a lot of attention. I was not used to big families. I was not used to being around other kids. I wanted to be a martyr. I loved to read about the saints. I wanted God to accept me. I wanted to make my mother happy. I wanted to please my teachers. I wanted to be good.

I am not sure how different I am. I no longer want to be a saint. And I no longer believe in heaven. But the thought of eternity still humbles me. And sometimes, I am still afraid of the dark.

Getting to Know You

2006-10-06T15:28:00.000-07:00

Val Britton, Ways to navigate through what we've built and what we've destroyed

How do you put together all those disparate pieces to make a whole? We talk on the phone and I try to imagine what he looks like listening to me: is he sitting down at the kitchen table or lying down on the couch? Does he doodle abesentmindedly? Do his fingers drum in front of him? From what he shares, I try to make sense of it all: a father who has died, a brother who is six years older, college in Boston, time spent in Santa Cruz. I fit together a timeline in my head and then realize it's all wrong: it was two years ago he left Boston, the pet dog is actually a labroador. I wonder if he does the same. I picture a man explaining himself over the phone, over the miles of distance between us and the image I have is soft, shifting and elusive.

A woman once wrote that there is a difference between being honest and telling. Where honesty is pure, telling expects results. It's true. There is an agreement between the teller and the tellee. There is a bond. Listen to me and your rewards will be bountiful! The gift of friendship, the promise of concern, the hope of caring. They are, at worst, Hallmark sentiments. But at best, they are all we really need.

My National Lampoon Style Family Camping Trip

2006-10-02T19:52:00.000-07:00

a covey of quail
a cast of hawks
a gang of turkey
a murder of crows

These my friends, were only a few of the cast of characters from last weekend's camping trip. We might add to that list: Swedish Death Metal couple, Frisbee golf throwing enthusiasts, poker-playing-while-Classic-Rock-listening-and-Jack-Daniels-drinking neighbors, angry fisherpeoples without any fish and exactly one meandering tarantula.

This was a camping trip 35 years in the making for never had the entire family camped together. I arrived two hours after my dad who was in the process of thoroughly staking down his tent. Even though he had gotten explicit directions from my sister not to stake down his tent until she had arrived and even though the ground was hard enough to tap dance on, none of this deterred him from battening down the hatches. He excitedly showed me all his new and unnecessary purchases: an Eddie Bauer blanket, a shiny red hatchet, a foldable cot, an inflatable mattress, a suitcase-sized bag of batteries, enough snacks to feed the local middle school, an assortment of lures, rods and bait and, most importantly, a tent purchased for my birthday. In the flurry of product and the disposal of packaging I asked him where his sleeping bag was. Oops! I could tell from the way he was ignoring me that he was starting to have one of his panic attacks. We better call my sister before she leaves. Dad, are you gonna call her? Dad? He continued to stand face flushed, sweat beading on his forehead. I stopped bothering him and sat down to wade it out.

No sooner had I collapsed into the collapsible Sports Mega Chair™ recently purchased from REI, than I recieved a sharp blow to the knee. What the? A fluorescent Frisbee lay on the ground beside me, it's owner conspicuously absent. As I sat rubbing my knee and writhing in pain and as my dad, now awoken to his senses, dialed my sister, the Frisbee-wielding maniac jogged over to apologize. Yeah, your site's right next to the course. Come tomorrow this place is gonna be a sea of Frisbee golf players. It's a pretty serious sport. He jogged off from whence he came, a backback full of colored Frisbees whats significance remained a mystery to me, in tow.

Within minutes our neighbors cranked up their radio. Man, I love this song! a voice barked. To one of Classic Rock's unarguably most shining moments, our neighbors sang along to some Lynrd Skynrd: Ooooh that smell. Can't you smell that smell. They were well into the Coors and, at four, were beginning elaborate 'cue preparations. Case, hey, there's a tarantula. My dad voice was calm. What? He pointed to the ground—the ground right next to our tents—as the biggest and hairiest arachnid I have ever seen ambled by. As the tarantula rounded the corner, I noticed a series of holes in the ground. Another Frisbee-wielding maniac, backpack hanging off his shoulder, jogged by. Oh, yeah, a tarantula. He's early. They usually don't come out until October. I inquired if the hillside holes had perhaps anything to do with their housing. Yeah, they burrow in holes just like those. But don't worry, they're harmless. Not only was our campsite in the middle of a treacherous Frisbee fly zone, but we had parked it on top of a row of tarantula condominiums. We better not tell my sister.

We were, as it turns out, camping not only with our family but with about a hundred other families, many of them in recreational vehicles, some of them with generators, all of them with way too much stuff and most hoping to have the kind of outdoor experience where neither they nor their offspring were ever bored, remained relatively clean, and were always safe from danger. Danger being any experience in nature without the right Coleman endorsed product.

The thing is that my family is fun. We crack jokes. We out-crass one another. We make do with what the good lord has pawned off on us. When my sister and brother-in-law arrive, dinner is well into the making. Although it takes over an hour for our kabobs cook, and although the spicy papadums I brought make everyone choke, we sit by the fire and season our coats with the smell that proves we have been "camping".

Our neighbors smoke a bong and begin a game of cards. Steve Miller. Joe Cocker. And of course Fleetwood Mac. They argue about the hands: two pair totally beats three-of-a-kind, they incorrectly call games: dude, let's play texas hold up. And then, they get really really mad at each other. Scary mad.

Quit calling my hand.
You got a flush and you don't even see it.
This is my hand. I'll play it how I want to play it.
You can't even count your cards. You have a flush!
Do YOU wanna play this hand?

This goes on forever. The smart or smart-er one keep calling the dumber one's hands. At least, we think, they are entertaining.

How long have you been playing this game?!
I play every Friday. For five years.

It's a shocking discovery. They seem to barely know the rules. Midnight fast approaches and they show no sign of retiring. My sister has brought earplugs enough for everyone and, at this point, we eagerly accept her handouts like free posters at a BoysIIMen concert. Earplugs in place, Thermarest underneath me, and flashlight beside me, I sleep though the night. The following night, however, will make this night look like a relaxing day at Burke Williams.

New York Conversation

2006-09-27T21:40:00.000-07:00

I have a friend in New York who is one of those telephone friends. We can talk for hours about the most random things, but it is a disembodied relationship. I haven't seen him for years, even though I sometimes find myself back east. Well, we have our own complicated history and one or the other always threatens to come out for a visit. There have been some near visits: a note scrawled on the porch, a voicemail retrieved a few hours too late, an apology after the fact. Sometimes the absurdity of it hits me. And I just have to laugh. If I were to write a screenplay (and totally fictionalize the conversation) here is what one would read like.

He: Not many people know this about me, but I used to have a collection of stuffed animals-
She: Laughing. Do you realize how funny that sounds? Laughing some more. I mean, didn't we all?
He: Well, I was really into them. I had, like, an army of them. And I was really into being equitable.
She: Equitable?
He: Like, I rotated each night who got to sleep next to me. I didn't want any of them to feel left out. And then when I was in 6th grade I started having friends come over. And they'd throw them around. Kinda make fun of me. But there was nothing I could do. Like, I had to just go along with it. Cuz I needed the friends. And then one time we moved and my stepmom just through them out. All of them.
She: Parents are always doing that. She prolly thought you were too old or didn't think boys should play with stuffed animals.
He: Yeah, but she never said anything like that. I mean, they were just gone. She never liked me. I think it was her way of getting back at me.
She: I had this Snoopy doll. It was all ratty. I used to chew on it's nose so all the stuffing was coming out. And then one day my mom said she was going to give it a bath. And then she came back and said he fell apart in the wash. I got a new Snoopy. After a while, it became my Snoopy. But then months later I found the old Snoopy in the closet. There he was. And he was fine! Years later, I am still trying to piece it together. Why would she do that? There must be so many stories out there like that. There must be so many stuffed-animal mysteries still waiting to be solved.

What is it about parents who think they can make executive decisions like that? Like finding an exact replica of the guppy that died, lying about an embarrassing stuffed animal, or insisting the twelve-year old boy stop playing with his Baby Mary Jane? We all have our shameful secrets. Kids just wear theirs on their sleeve.

May I Borrow A Light?

2006-09-25T20:39:00.000-07:00

Fire. Heat, light and flame. Always a crowd pleaser. Entire festivals devoted to its name. It ignites. It burns. It undulates. It changes the air around us. It melts. It warms. It cooks. It kills. It casts its spell on us. We know how to start it but not always how to put it out. Soot, smoke, and ash. We sing about it. We use it in ritual, in death, on a birthday cake in celebration. Friction, flint, and spark. We use it to talk about love, about passion, about sex. We do not know all of its alchemic powers.

Our world began in fire. Our myths explain that we stole it from the Gods. It is said that because of our need to contain fire, we built our first homes around it. Indeed, we have spent a good portion of our history trying to control it. Firearms, fireworks, firefly. Some would say it protects, some would argue it destroys. We associate it with the devil himself. There is no end to the power, to the mystique we give it. We are drawn to it. As a family, as a community, as the couple lying on the bearskin rug. It the heart of our home. It is the center of our belly. It is the beast in our loins.

Mesmerizing You

2006-09-22T09:48:00.000-07:00

I had composed an entire post in my head last night when tossing and turning in bed, listening to the lonesome whistle of the train blow, but, of course, I lost it now. I am pretty sure it was damn profound, though, and probably would have changed your life.

Instead, I offer up this video. I could watch the tide rise and fall on this walkway forever. It'd be a great place to do some timelapse and I pledge to come back with one.

I am going away from the computer this weekend, away from work, away from my house, away, away.

TEFKAFE

2006-09-20T23:43:00.000-07:00

TEFKAFE enjoying a cupcake

Favorite Ex has responded that he does not, in fact, appreciate his moniker. When asked why he did not like to be referred to as Favorite Ex, he could not put a name to it, other than to repeat I don't like it over and over. He also took offense to being quoted in the blog. He would like it to be known that he does not believe he ever used the word zingers in conversation with me whether by telephone, email, text message, instant message or in person.

I showed Favorite Ex—who will now be referred to as The Ex Formerly Known As Favorite Ex—a first draft of my creative non-fiction piece for the Modern Love column. Not surprisingly, TEFKAFE was unencouraging. Sex and the City and Oprahesque were two unkind phrases I heard. In fact, if you are a woman and a writer, there is possibly nothing more damaging one can hear other than possibly invoking the name of Bridget Jones and her goddamn diary. I guess TEFKAFE did not understand the non-fiction aspect of the piece as he kept saying things like that never happened!, you did that? and I can't imagine him saying that. TEFKAFE has always been a tough critic, but at least he read it from beginning to end and I guess that's saying something. Just not sure what.

Speaking of TEFKAFE, he is coming out for a visit next month. And bringing his new girlfriend. Supposedly, they're mad for each other, or some such nonsense and for the first time since, well, since we stopped going out, I will have to share his presence with another. Sure, I am happy for him, and yes, it's about time (six years!) and I bet she is wonderful (he has great taste in women), but, I am just not sure I am up to the challenge. You know, what with being recently d-i-v-o-r-c-e(d) and all. It's bad enough I hardly ever get to see him since he lives on the opposite coast and now instead of hunting down obscure Chinese Islamic food in the Sunset with me, he's going to be busy giving her a tourist's welcome to his old stomping ground.

At least I know for the week or so he's around I'll eat well. I'll probably see some good movies. I'll snort out loud and choke on whatever I happen to be eating/drinking. I'll walk a lot. I'll get into 3 or 4 heated arguments. I'll damn him at least once. And then, as soon as he leaves, I'll be checking Jet Blue for flights back east.

The week(end) in pictures

2006-09-17T20:35:00.000-07:00

The Artist and I went to as many garage sales as was feasible this weekend. We visit one geographic area at a time and this weekend was allocated for none other than the new sleepy town in which I live. What you learn about a town from it's garage sales is astonishing. OK, well, surprising in any case. And what did I learn about my new sleepy town from this weekend's garage sales? I live in a town where someone will not only try to sell a bar of Irish Spring for $.50. not only try to sell half-used bottles of nail polish for $.25, but try to sell a perfectly good box of tampons—ok, maybe opened and ok, maybe used a couple and then cleverly taped the box shut—for an undisclosed price.

I made a pact with myself to make it to the Beltline Railyard this weekend. What's the Beltline Railyard, you might ask? It's 22 acres of railyard that's been abandoned by the railroad company that once owned it and is in some kind of legal limbo with the city who would like very much to purchase it. And what that means to us, is that it is an undeveloped wasteland slowly being reclaimed by nature, smack dab in the middle of the city. And what that means to me, is that it is an interesting place to explore. Now 22 acres is not a lot. You can't really get lost in it. But the only beings I encountered on my entire walk was a confused raccoon and some kids at the adjoining park yelling at me to not graffiti (I wasn't). Because it was dusk and the light was perfect, I snapped, like, a bizillion pictures. What could be more photogenic than rusting metal with pampa grass growing through it, all cast in an orange-y dramatic light? Besides the busted-up shopping carts, the dumped car batteries, and enough railroad ties to line your driveway, the highlights included an old demolition derby car covered in graffiti with a few cement blocks thrown on top for good measure. But the real find of the day was a metal sign, the colors reminiscent of a pepsi can, squashed into a perfectly wonderful hemisphere of sculpture, now adorning the walls of my new apartment.

Which takes us to Sunday. And a walk through the local coastal marsh. As one of my I-have-a-million-different-projects-I-am-working-on experiments, I have taken a vow, an oath, to ask one stranger, one question every day. Today's dialogue went something like this:
me: Is that a catfish?
him: Catfish. 22 inch!
me: Wow. You caught that right here?
him: Yes. Right here. 22 inch!
We were both impressed. (Photo not provided.)

Which brings us to Sunday afternoon. The day the Matthew Barney exhibit closed and the day everyone and their mother (including me) opted to (finally) check it out. I skipped the exhibit itself to stand in line for sixty minutes for the one hundred and forty five minute film that had an entirety of five lines of dialogue. I can't really say it was enjoyable, but then that is not why one goes to see a Matthew Barney film (even if this one features wifey Bjork.) You see a Matthew Barney film so that you have something to talk about. But since I went alone, I had to wait until exiting to call my friend in New York, who it turns out hadn't even seen it. All I can say is that it made me want to each sushi and gave me a headache (although the coffee and empty stomach could, chances are, have more to do with the headache than Bjork's score.)

Which closes my weekend with: the phone conversation. I told Favorite Ex that I was trying to write a creative non-fiction piece for the NYTimes Modern Love column as per The New Friend From Residency's suggestion. I told him that what I was writing about was Ex Numero 4. Not, as I had thought when I began writing, Numero 5. He asked if he was to be included. To which I replied no, I didn't really go back that far.

C'mon, he said, you can cough up a coupla zingers about us.
I can't even think of any.
There's gotta be something.
It's a 1200 word article! And I am writing about break-ups. Ours was nothing!
I want our relationship to be immortalized in print!
Well, you did have that annoying habit whenever you came over of pointing out all the things that you thought belonged to you. Like six years later.
That's perfect. Work it in.

Sorry Favorite Ex, you are another story entirely.

I didn't

2006-09-16T11:24:00.000-07:00

JIMMIE DURHAM
The flower of the death of loneliness

This morning the light was all shiny in my apartment. The place felt like home. I made coffee and sat on my couch and looked around. Saturday. I didn't have a plan. I could do whatever I wanted. Whenever I wanted. I read. I made breakfast. I debated going to the gym. I did some dishes. I watered the plants. I stayed in the same clothes in which I had slept.

I felt content.
In the way a woman who can do whatever she wants, whenever she wants, does.

I felt content and, for the moment, happy.
The way you do when you are single and life is just much less complicated. Much less tumultuous. The highs more even and the lows less deep. I generally go to bed at the same time, wake up around the same time. I don't plan too far into the future.

I didn't envy my friends with kids. I didn't wish to fall in love. I didn't pine for anyone.
I didn't want to talk on the telephone. I didn't care to check my email. I didn't mind being alone.
I didn't need anyone.

And, alone in my newish, smallish apartment, considering the future that lied ahead of me, and considering the obstacles I would no doubt have to face, and pondering my ability to stick to my guns, I felt pretty damn good.

The Break Up Film

2006-09-14T17:47:00.000-07:00

It's ironic that I first came upon the idea of The Break Up Film during my last relationship. Now that I've, ahem, broken up, it seems appropriate that I drag that idea (kicking and screaming) from the nether regions of the closet. It's a project that is near and uh, not so much dear as piercing to my heart. Perhaps you can be of some assistance.

The Pitch

We all know that breaking up is a painful process: our hearts are torn, our emotions a mess, and our lives suddenly void of meaning. After the immediate shock and the logistics of the parting, there are still the smaller issues to contend with: what to do with all the detritus of the relationship?

The Break Up Film invites people to tell the stories of these more tangible objects. Whether or not it's burning birth control pills in a beach bonfire, painstakingly labeling each artifact as if for museum curation, or consuming all existing love letters after tearing them into bite-sized pieces, we have all devised rituals to bury the pain of the relationship. There are the wreckers, the returners, the hoarders, the desperate-to-hang-on-ers, and the ones who simply walk away like a snake shedding it's skin.

Tell me (caseyinmudville@gmail.com) your story.

The Single Girl's Guide to Staying Single

2006-09-12T09:38:00.000-07:00

Wonder Woman, Emy Calucin

Decide in moment of incandescent illumination to depilate my legs. Pull out highly-recommended-self-waxing-kit-gathering-dust-in-bathroom-cabinet and precede. Legs hairy enough to confuse Diane Fossey. Warm wax as instructed, self-inflict pain as instructed, marvel at leg smoothness. After finishing one leg, realize not enough wax strips to depilate other leg. Walk around for two days with one leg hairy, one leg not. In vague kind of way, as in when at Trader Joes or in line at bank, look for wax strips. In defeat, shave other hairy-as-an-ape leg.

Spend hours, okay days, roaming aisles of dreaded Swedish manufacturer of cheap put-it-together-your-damn-self crap in search of storage solutions for new apartment one fourth size of last. Compulsively buy, sheepishly return, rinse and repeat. New apartment one-fourth-size-of-last remains in boxes because can't settle on fucking bookshelf! that won't fall apart when placed with, uh, books.

Log in to online dating site where nearly one-year old ad languishes like remaindered book on bottom shelf at back of store. Ambivalence + pain x regret=hasty retreat.

Decide in another unique moment of incandescent illumination to take moonlit walk on beach walking distance! from new apartment. Silhouetted figures engage in romance languages. Small dogs attack. Sneaker confronts tar. Fog rolls in. Rain ensues. Moon no where to be seen.

Read first book by highly-acclaimed, young (relatively), male author taking up significant amount of (now) scarce bookshelf space. Forced to look up vocabulary words at alarming rate. Alarming rate invokes feelings of ignorance, stupidity, and patheticability in reader. Read about central male character's fling with college student while professor at esteemed college. Wonder why never had such encounter when student at college. Wonder were to be professor if fling with college student would happen. Consider switching professions. Ignore unknown vocabulary words. Fall asleep with light on. Loose place in book.

How do you say goodbye?

2006-09-08T13:53:00.000-07:00

I was going to write all about my last night in Wyoming. About my trip to the cowboy bar in Sheridan where the ice water is free, an 8 foot 4 inch long rattlesnake skin hangs behind the bar, and hundreds of cattle brands are burned into the rustic wood logs lining the bar. Where the Wurlitzer would play were they to turn off the football game on the TV, where Jim Crumbles sits at the bar, his ass close to sliding out of his pants, but his white hair as neatly braided as Willie's and where Glen Getter, age 29, claims to be an eligible bachelor as of approximately two weeks ago when he got his job pumping for Coal Bed Methane and when he finally got a place of his own.

But here I am stuck in Phoenix, en route home, having missed a connecting flight, and suddenly dreading my apartment with its boxes still unpacked, a discouraging lack of storage space and a newness I haven't yet decided if I like.

Sigh.

I guess adding to my meloncolia is the fact that I just finished a really good book and there's something so disappointing for me in that moment. The moment you close the book and realize there are no more pages, no more stories, no more time to be spent with the characters in whose lives you have just become so engrossed. The moment you have to say goodbye forever. Well, let's just say, I am getting accustomed to that moment.

Add to that the fact that I am no longer officially designated as an artist as my residency is over.

Add to that the fact that I have just left a place I really liked and really liked the way I felt there.

Add to that the fact that it's turning fall and there's all those back-to-school sales in the stores and the light's suddenly much more yellow and the air is sharp and crisp and the leaves are starting to turn and for reasons inexplicable to me, all that makes me unbearably sad.

Add to that the fact that I am returning to my normal life and I don't yet know what that is or what it means or where normal really fits into any thing in my life anyways.

How do you say goodbye? To the season, the story, the place, the person, the reasons we once thought were right?

Attracted to Light

2006-09-06T20:47:00.000-07:00

Doug and Mike Starn, Attracted to Light D

They told me I should make sure I wake up early and see the dawn before I leave. And so, this morning I did. It was all rosy glow and bambis in the alfalfa fields and big pink sun peeking through the low morning fog bank. It was crisp, clean air, the kind that makes my lips cracked and my nostrils dry enough to bleed. Sunrise is always less dramatic than sunset, but just knowing that you're one of the few witnessing it makes it pretty damn, um, well, special.

Walking around at midday, I realized I just never get sick of looking at the plains no matter how dried up and scourged it seems. All that yellow and brown, and then the place where those two colors meet. The smell of sage each time the wind stirs which, on a day like today, ain't that often. All that scrub and barbed wire and rocks so sun-baked you keep thinking you see bone. All that agony and expanse and then, like fireworks, the bluest sky above it all. I could never get sick of looking at all that distance. The worst that could happen is that I would fall in.

That is to say, it's been good for my heart. Poor scarred and mended heart! I have taken it out often, bloody and pulsing, to examine. I have compared it to other hearts, some with less scar tissue and others lumpy with disease. I have hurtled it onto the highway at night, wishing for it to be driven into the ground. I have shoved it under my pillow hoping that that might help me sleep. I have swallowed it, pummeled it, hidden it and retrieved it. I have foisted it onto others who have seemed sympathetic. The kind ones simply hand it back; the cruel ones, well, we know what they do with hearts. But still. It flutters. Like the moth toward the light.

Roadside Attractions

2006-09-04T19:51:00.000-07:00

click on photo or here to watch

Deep West

2006-09-04T10:32:00.000-07:00

I've been immersing myself in the literature of this country. Stories and poems full of extremities, solitude, pride, the aching blue of the sky and a dark, haughty sense of humor. I can already feel my departure coming upon me and I want to let go of none of it. Every little star in the sky, I want to remember, absorb, and carry it back home. It is a place I know I will return.

Birds Too Fat To Fly by David Romtvedt

John tells Margo she is placid.
She worries he secretly means bland.
But one bright fall day she saw
a group of eagles—Golden and Bald—
feeding on a carcass. They
were like vultures, so full
they couldn't leave the ground.
They lurched up and down
the hillside relearning the lessons
of their youth. They were,
Margo told me, "Birds too fat to fly."
And laughed, "What a great phrase -
think of Trouble, Harold and Penelope
alone together on winter range
and when we go to get them,
we have to coax them in, shake
cans of oats and promise them endless
warm barns and clear fresh water
and no saddles." It's a game.
I say the sky is the sky
too blue to believe. "Come on,"
Margo sweetly taunts, " You can
do better than that." And throws me.
Cold too bitter to breathe.
Draws too deep to defend.
Erosion too aged to erase.
Grass too gone to green.
She really laughs at that last
and names the whole: "Ranching
too disastrous to deny."
But who cares -
happiness too holy to humble
and life too lovely to lose.
She puts her arms around me
and stands placidly, motionless,
whispers in my ear,"Birds
too fat to fly..."

Notes from the Field

2006-08-31T20:40:00.000-07:00

Kathryn Spence, Horned Owl

Midnight-

Wake up to lightening and howling winds. Realize tripod, extension cord and camera are all still outside down by studio. Momentary panic, followed by struggle with self about whether or not to get up and run down there and rescue equipment. More lightening, more wind, more interior debate. Get up. Get dressed. Hop on bike. Bike against strong headwinds, holding flashlight, heart beating fast because you've heard what they have to say about lightening on the plains. You've seen the trees, the grass blackened by fire. Wind shakes through trees as if they are screaming, go home, you fool, turn back! Safely arrive at studio. Retrieve camera, tripod and extension cord. Decide to sleep in studio on futon. Find old electric blanket and pillow in closet. Lie down and listen to the wind. Rain finally comes, but it is short burst. Fall asleep.

Morning-

Ride bike back to cabin. Coffee, breakfast and shower. Call UPS about much-needed $8 cable that was supposed to arrive day before. Discover during phone call that package is delayed by late plane. $8 cable due to arrive at end of following day. Despondency followed by arguement with self about own stupidity followed by resolve to make list before any travel abroad. Decide to take the afternoon off by riding bike to nearest town of Clearmont ten miles away in search of hat to purchase.

Noon-ish-

Leave on bike with two cameras in basket, bottle of water and sack lunch. Vow to do whatever the hell feel like. Hit the highway and quickly reach smell of death. Everwhere. Remember staggering amount of deer and sadly come to realize even more staggering amount of dead deer. Roadkill after roadkill. One-speed bike moves slow and ten miles stretches into eternity. Stop at marshy lake to listen to birds. Hear cacophany of cows in background and discover they sound exactly like zoo elephants. Record sounds by lake, but too close to highway to omit trucks pounding by.

Afternoon-

Reach destination: Clearmont population 110. One bar, one post office, one school, one gas station, one historic jail, one quilting shop and no hats to be purchased anywhere. Buy soda and chips and walk around. Saddle sore. Find arch over abandoned cabin made entirely of antlers fastened together. Would like to get closer but afraid of what antler-arch fabricator might do to trespassers. Approach Red Dawg Bar, but intimidating large woman in doorway who does not smile when smiled at, changes mind. Buy envelope at post office for lack of anything better to do. Engage in mindless chatter with friendly clerk who seems eager for company. Wander over to historic jail--located on playground--but can't locate any placard to explain significance.

Before dinner-

Land back at ranch starving. Much-needed $8 cable has arrived! Dinner to be served at 6! Ass completely numb! Before reaching home, sight two red-tailed hawks circling in sky. At studio confirm sighting in Sibley's Book of North American Birds. Tell fellow residents about adventure and hawk sighting. Fellow residents return that missed great cattle stampede. 200 cattle crossing the road and stampeding the fence and air-conditioning units at back of cabins. Destruction and cow pie warnings. Fellow residents continue talking about stampede through dinner and into evening. Vow not to miss next cattle stampede or to make up better story next time.

New

2006-08-29T16:26:00.000-07:00

Lindy Smith
Intermediate Wheatgrass, 2004, Wyoming

Lindy made these sunprints during her stay at Ucross.

Yesterday was all tangled knots and frustration as I was inundated with technical problems and my own short-sightedness. Questions like where was that damn cable?, why didn't I bring a hat?, and where is all the red wine I was promised? haunted me throughout the day and then the night. I had expectations that we would drink heavily, stay up late and meet some local cowboys—none of which has happened so far. It seems these artists are really serious, really hard-working, and doing serious art like writing novels or poems about nature or painting in oil. I feel like a clown in comparison, with all my hard drives and devices and plugs (or lack of them, as it turns out).

But then the dusk came and after a day of yelling at the computer, scratching my head and pulling out my hair, I stepped outside. Sure the mosquitos were in full force, and yeah, I suddenly realized I only had about an hour and a half of daylight left, but who would let go of dusk? Why aren't we all setting aside that time of day, every night, to walk outside, whether we are in the city and the gold light is reflecting on the sky scrapers, or in the country where the light casts upon the hills, the trees, the water and the meadow equally and without prejudice? Even if it is just for a minute, just long enough for the sun to dip, the color to shift from lion-yellow to cotton candy-pink, how can we ever forget the sun setting, the first star, and that ghost of a moon? It's enough to change your life, let alone your heart and those bullies of a thought.

For reasons that are unclear to me I keep listening to that Brian Eno/David Byrne album, My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, inspired by the titular 50's African novel by Amos Tutola (which I haven't read). If you don't know, it's an early example of "sampled" music, or collaged music, before they actually had samplers—and after avant-garde composers like Cage, Reich and Bryars had already done sampled songs. They used found recordings from radio stations across the globe—angry talk show hosts, Arabic singers, empassioned evangelists—and put them to music. From the repetition, stacotto and emotion of these disparate voices, which they literally had to play by tape cassette against the music tracks, they made music. And music in which we as listeners found congruence and meaning both musically and emotionally. The author as curator instead of writer or singer. One thing Eno said that really struck me was that he was interested in making the ordinary interesting and in finding music where music wasn't supposed to have been. It's not a very shocking statement, nor particularly unique coming from an artist, but it pretty much conveys where I am coming from and how I see the world. How I, in fact, struggle to see the world, because it's hard, you know, day in and day out, to make the ordinary interesting. Even to yourself. How do you make the ordinary not just interesting but beautiful and important or if it needs to be ugly and dramatic? How to you imbue it with pride and dignity? How do you escape the monotony of the ordinary, that which we all are? How do you make the ordinary unfamiliar, and in so doing, make ourselves anew?

Day One

2006-08-29T08:10:00.000-07:00

So turn me loose, set me free somewhere in the middle of Montana
Gimme all I've got coming to me
and keep your retirement and your, so called, social security
Big City turn me loose and set me free

Iris DeMent, Big City

editor's note: the author has been corrected that the above was not, in fact, written by Iris DeMent—although undoubtedly a memorable cover—but rather, written by the esteemed Merle Haggard

Today I took a tour of my new locale: Ucross, population 25. There is a big red barn, an old train depot, a creek I'm told I can swim in, and acres and acres of land. You can't turn your head without seeing a rabbit. The fields are full of wild turkeys. The amount of deer is staggering. Cottonwoods line the creek, cattails spring up from the marsh and if you turn your face to the sky you can catch some ospreys in flight.

I'm told it could turn to fall the short stay I am here, but for now the sun is bright and bold, the sky, of course, blue, and the meadows quite dry from summer. Besides the lovely studio space, I have a bike, mountains of books every where, a carefully-stocked kitchen, the requisite flashlight, and no way to leave. For the next coupla weeks, I will learn what it is like to be alone. Right now the moon is just a sliver, so I'm going to do what any city gal would. I'ma go look at the stars.

Embark

2006-08-27T18:24:00.000-07:00

less bandwidth?

Embark. It sounds so biblical, doesn’t it? Like you are about to board Noah’s ark. Like you are about to go on a journey of indeterminate length. Like you are being told by God to travel in this direction and you’re not allowed to ask any questions why and you can only hope to one day understand its relevance. I guess that’s how I feel today. Like I am about to embark on a venture whose significance I will only know in looking back on my life many years from now. For now, that’s enough carry-on to take with me.

By tonight, you see, I will be in Big Sky country. I will have two weeks to do whatever I like in a remote and dramatic part of the country where I know no one and where I will be pretty much left alone. For two weeks I will be on paid vacation as an artist and I will have to figure out how to act the part. Packing my bags at the last minute, I frantically tried to find the few books I have read about this part of the country: a collection of short stories by Annie Proulx, now made famous by the movie about two cowboys in love, and Michael Dorris’ first novel, A Yellow Raft In Blue Water. I found neither, so I elected to take with me two books—besides the novel I am in the midst of finishing—my tried and true collection of poems by Mary Oliver and a Norton anthology of the Twentieth Century’s best short stories. That outta keep me busy.

Other tools I bring with me: my laptop, a hard drive, two video cameras, a tripod, one digital camera, one Holga, one blow-up doll, a pair of scissors, some Elmer’s glue, a sewing kit, a red shirt, and seven photographs of a teenage boy acting out various teenage fantasies. Alas, I have no scanner so I can’t show you any of those, but I can describe them. The photos I found in a suitcase that was full of my high-school ephemera. And yet, the boy looks completely unfamiliar to me. Did I have a pen pal? Was this someone I dated briefly? A secret admirer? Were they simply some photos I swiped out of someone else’s locker? I never found the note or letters to go with the photos. They are snapshots, taken in one of those 70’s luxury apartments, the kind of apartments with mirrored closets, gold-flecked walls and a kitchen-counter bar.

In photo number one he stands chin-up with a wine glass in his hand, cheering the camera. In number two he is playing guitar, rock-star style. In another he looks suavely and seductively at the camera, a black silk shirt buttoned to the top. Yet another, he is a blurred figure in the midst of a karate kick. In the final shot, taken in profile, he wields a gun, pointing it like a television cop both arms together, legs poised for action. In looking at them, I keep asking myself what was it this boy was trying to convey to me? What impression was he hoping to make? Which version of masculinity appealed to my adolescent self? And beneath it all, who was he really?

Not too long ago, a man told me that I had the kind of face he would never get bored of looking at. Ironically, this was a man I neither fell in love with nor whom fell in love with me. But it is one of those things I carry with me. One of those things I bring out and turn around on the dark and lonely nights. I have never read the play, Long Days Journey Into Night. But it was the play Eugene O-Neill lived his entire life to write. It was the play he wrote after which he made his wife promise not to produce until twenty-five years after his death—and that it never be performed (she waited three). A play he wrote at the end of his career, after already winning Pulitzers and a Nobel Prize and a house on the beach and three wives. It is a play—autobiographical—in the day of a life of a family penned together in the prison of their home. A play in which each character has its own black nightmare of a secret to share. It is a play about who we are and how we are and the terrible and beautiful things we mean to each other.

An excerpt:

I was on The Squarehead, square rigger, bound for Buenos Aires. Full moon in the Trades. The old hooker driving fourteen knots. I lay on the bowsprit, facing astern, the water foaming into spume under me, the masts with every sail white in the moonlight, towering high above me. I became drunk with the beauty and singing rhythm of it, and for a moment I lost myself, actually lost my life. I was set free! I dissolved in the sea, became white sails and flying spray, became beauty and rhythm, became moonlight and the ship and the high dim-starred sky! I belonged, without past or future, within peace and unity and a wild joy, within something greater than my own life, or the life of Man, to life itself! To God, if you want to put it that way. And several other times in my life, when I was swimming far out, or lying alone on a beach, I have had the same experience, became the sun, the hot sand, green seaweed anchored to a rock, swaying in the tide. Like a saint's vision of beatitude. Like the veil of things as they seem drawn back by an unseen hand. For a second you see, and seeing the secret, you are the secret. For a second there is meaning! Then the hand lets the veil fall and you are alone, lost in the fog again, and you stumble on towards nowhere for no good reason. It was a great mistake, my being born a man, I would have been much more successful as a sea gull or a fish. As it is, I will always be a stranger who never feels at home, who does not really want and is not really wanted, who can never belong, who must always be a little in love with death.

We are all alone and brave and singular and fleeting and liars and dreamers and bitter and breathing. You and I, we are the same. And we are all just waiting for that moment when our airplane leaves the ground.

I have arrived

2006-08-24T09:53:00.000-07:00

The new place is small yet sweet. The new town is sleepy and suburban and renegade in its own way. Every morning I get coffee and internet at a little place right in front of my new apartment. And every morning the koffee klutch can be heard debating the merits of an Inconvenient Truth, the lack of night life on the island, or other heady topics such as is grey hair on a woman sexy. This philosophy club, from what I can make out, is composed of the mayor, an elderly gentleman with glasses who smiles often but offers little in the way of discussion and who seems best known for his diplomacy; Jesus—and here I prefer the Spanish pronunciation—who, while looking not unlike a fan at a Lynyrd Skynyrd concert, appears to be the cockiest of the bunch and the ringleader, the kid, an under-thirty-year-old black guy who holds forth often in direct opposition to Jesus and complains frequently about the town, the hottie, a, well, hot Latino with a coupla kids who may or may not own the cafe and who smiled at me this morning, and one or two strays either tagging along or inciting the club with some preposterous theory about intelligent design.

There is much to discover here as there is much to unpack and much to get used to. The only thing that fits into my bedroom is my mattress. I appear to be the only one in the building who does not have a pet of some sort. And I live across from a very active ball park, the kind with the stadium lighting that doesn't seem to turn off until about ten. There is a nearby pub that specializes in Kiwi pies—and I don't mean the kind with fruit—but closes at the questionable (for a local pub) hour of nine.

Did I mention it's an island? Sounds exotic right? Remote? Well, not really. The island is, in fact, man-made, created at the turn of the century by dredging a channel to allow ships to pass and thus creating a port industry where none before existed. Besides boasting the oldest municipal electrical system in operation in California, 10% of its residents report German ancestry, and 10% report Irish. Other uninteresting facts include: a total of 4 fatal motor vehicle accidents between 2001 and 2003, a local gay index of 209 (the national average is 100), and, that at one time, it was known for it's famous—somewhat—Neptune Beach, the Coney Island of the West, whose largest roller coaster was named the Whopie.

little while

2006-08-21T07:45:00.000-07:00

Working out the kinks but here is a new side project and a lovely little site.

Gone Daddy Gone

2006-08-17T21:46:00.000-07:00

Cindy Sherman's Film Still #48

On the eve of my departure, with a room full of boxes and nothing left but my comforter to be packed, I take a moment and look around me. My time here was marked by my time not here. For the last five months I lived in two places and one could say, for that reason, that neither were my home. As one who has been most comfortable as a consummate nester, this nomadic existence has been both anxiety provoking and, well, simpler. A lot simpler. Once I relinquished my role as a property owner, once I downsized to a room in someone else's house—and a suitcase of clothing at my boyfriend's house—I realized how little I needed. If I could live with my stuff in storage for five months, I could prolly live the rest of my life without it.

In the mean time I have become accustomed to the sound of packing tape being stretched taut across cardboard boxes—in fact I have quite grown to like that sound, the tidy finality of it, it's punctuation marking my progression. One more box packed.

I will truly miss the excellent Thai Town cuisine so cheap and so close to my house. And the Thai Elvis, the Thai cover bands, the Thai karaoke and the soju drinks that come with those meals. I will miss driving home and driving directly towards this city's landmark sign. I will miss the midnight bike rides. I will miss moving away from my neighbor, Johnny Knoxville, whom I saw on at least two occasions. I will miss the sprawling Sunday farmer's market, the perfect place for heirloom tomatoes, sprouted bread, or celebrity sightings. I will miss my close proximity to the most excellently named strip club this side of the Mississippi: Jumbo's Clown Room. I will miss Tommy, the guy who cut my hair short, showed me several cell phone photos of his six Ducati motorcycles and who had the same Halloween birthday as me. I will miss the New Beverly Cinema, possibly the greatest and least expensive place to see double features anywhere (try on Kramer Vs. Kramer and The Squid and The Whale for size.) I will miss the wildly affordable Korean spas, the underutilized subway system, the grand yet crumbling downtown. I will miss the late night excitement of this town, it's sheer exuberance over itself, and every one's blind optimism. And, on a good day, when I am feeling benevolent and merciful, I will miss the film shoots on every corner, the filming permits on every door, and the dreams and aspirations of every struggling actor and actress gallantly posing for head shots on whatever stretch of grass they can find.

And, of course, I will miss you.

current events

2006-08-15T10:34:00.000-07:00

The first thing you should know is that I am knee deep in boxes for the third time this year. Coming across my old high school journals, college readers and graduate school papers once again makes it that much easier to let it all go. Among other things, I came across a quote from Anne Sexton I used to have hanging above my desk many years ago.

Jonah made his living
inside the belly.
Mine comes from the exact same place.

Despite the chores of packing and lifting, despite the slight embarrassment of old love letters and over-earnest journal entries, despite the quick nostalgia that comes from sifting through one's life, I was glad for it all because I was given again that quote.

I met a man in his early forties the other night at a midnight bike ride. I'd never gone before and there were hundreds of people—stopping traffic, pissing drivers off and hooting and hollering. I guess the man sensed I was new to this, gathered that I was riding alone and befriended me before the group took off. We rode together the entire night telling each other the kind of secrets only strangers can tell one another. Riding through the empty streets of this city's downtown, through the still malodorous meat packing district, and the city's famous cemented river, we ruminated on our lives, on the lives of others we knew our age, and the faded glamour of this town I am soon to be leaving. We talked about our married friends, about whether or not, given today's political climate, it was a smart idea to even have kids, and how it's incredibly hard to get people out of the house to do anything any more. I commented that I supposed we could hang out with a bunch of twenty-year olds and he replied calmly, look around. That's exactly what we're doing. You and I, statistically speaking, are an aberration. I am still wrapping my head around his comment. An aberration. I have always been proud to live my life differently than the rest, to have chosen the road less traveled as Frost would have it, but every now and again it just strikes me like a sharp slap in the face. It is lonely. It is unknown. It is not the path I always want to be on. But that road, that road, it belongs to me.

the saddest song in the universe

2006-08-10T10:41:00.000-07:00

Thank you for your concern. The letters of encouragement re: the breakup and the countless offers to take me out for the time of my life have buoyed my spirits. Where would I be without you? Drowning my sorrows with a bottle of Jack Daniels and a liter of Coke, no doubt. Now I have the benefit of doing so to the constant chatter of your IMing, emoticons and all. You are the best and I stand by that!

The idea to cut off of all my hair was a brilliant one. Not only do I feel like Sinead O'Conner sans the combat boots and pope vendetta, but I have the extra added bonus of making sure no man on the face of the planet would ever confuse me with an eligible straight single woman. How liberating!

And breaking up with him two weeks before my 400 mile move back to his home town! What counter-intuitive strategy! I'm so glad I listened to you. The non-refundable one-way airplane ticket purchased in his name will surely come in handy for the airlines who will, no doubt, lower their prices that much more the next time I need to purchase one. Finding someone to drive the Uhaul and move all my crap has been no easy task, but surely that's just part of the geniusness of this plan. I have faith it will all be revealed to me in time and I will look back with great satisfaction on the sly maneuverings of what now appears to be the biggest mistake of my life.

Sigh. Because really. I love being single. I love dating in my 30's. I love the challenge of that biological ticking clock. Men reaching 40 and beyond, that have been bachelors their entire lives, are exactly the kind of men I want to date. And there are so many more I have yet to meet! Such fun awaits. You were right. As usual. I can't wait to listen to whatever advice you have to give when the next time comes around.

Yours truly,
Casey—moving back to Mudville soon

Farewell, My Lovely

2006-08-08T22:41:00.000-07:00

Today I read an article in Time. It doesn't happen often, the exception being when I am at the doctor's office or, as I was at the time, running in place at the gym. It was one of two magazines available that day on the rack—the other one being Yoga Today—and I was drawn to the cover, which promised to explain to me—and other Americans too busy for in-depth analysis—the struggle in the Middle East. In bite-sized nuggets I read about the crisis, I read the sidebar definitions about the differing warring factions, I perused the cleverly highlighted maps indicating bombings and borders, I turned the page. And then I read something else entirely. Something hopeful, like the kind of fluff piece you would expect after reading a disparaging story like the never-ending conflict in the Middle East in the kind of magazine like Time.

Does it make me look shallow to admit that this story moved me more than the previous one of major global significance? That on this particular day it resonated on a more personal level, that it spoke to me of promises yet to come, that it perhaps was the exact thing I needed to hear on a morning after waking up to the alarm, an alarm with a pre-recorded voice that happened to be the voice of my now ex-love, owner of the red shirt and keeper of my heart?

Not particularly well-written and ending before it ever seemed to develop, the article was about a marriage. A marriage between two young people with Down syndrome. A marriage cleverly orchestrated by two loving families. A marriage unexpected and innocent but no less impassioned than a Shakespeare play.

The couple, after meeting at a Valentine's Day party, began speaking daily by phone. Their parents explained that they could talk about things—like what they plan to eat for lunch that day—that they'd get bored with. Normally when disabled adults marry they loose a lot of their benefits. Add to that the general societal fear that they could reproduce and you can see why marriage in such situations is so rare.

But love is out there. And it's for anyone. Everyone. And that was what—in the parking lot of my local YMCA, keys in the ignition, perspiration evaporating—for one shining moment, took my breadth away.

Hamburger Theory of Love

2006-07-27T13:15:00.000-07:00

Hamburger Theory of Love by Beth Alice Cook

What more can I say than that which has already been articulated by this artist? Click to enlarge.

pool

2006-07-24T16:33:00.000-07:00

if that don't work, try this

Who put the Oh in Combine?

2006-07-22T16:09:00.000-07:00

Collection, 1954, Rauschenberg
oil, paper, fabric, newspaper, printed reproductions, wood, metal, and mirror on three canvas panels

When I go see art in an art-viewing context, like say in a museum or at a theatre, I try to have an open mind and a courteous span of attention. I try not to judge too soon as in this is soooo self-indulgent, what a wanker! I try not to be cynical as in my two-year old could have done that! And I try to engage with the art as the artist might have hoped his or her audience to do so. I know, I know, it's a best case scenario, but when it's been 103 for a week-in-a-row and the museums are—not only open late—but free on Thursdays, I seem to be able to give myself up quite readily. Seeing one piece of art by a particular artist is one thing, but a finely-tooled retrospective lends itself to a much more enriching—not to mention satisfying—experience.

Enter Robert Rauschenberg and the Museum of Contemporary Art. When you look at Rauschenberg's combines—what he called his paintings that combined collage, sculpture and the occasionally taxidermied chicken—you recognize the beginning, middle and end of a thought process. You see the imprint of the artist's hand in drips, wide house-painting brush strokes, and globs and globs of paint squeezed from tubes. And you are invited to make of it what you will: not quite told what to think, but not left to sit alone with the stringent arguments of the abstract expressionists who refused to admit that they were in fact communicating anything at all to their audience. It's not a bad place to find yourself on a Thursday night as the sun lazily sets, maybe at 8:30, maybe earlier, your body still retaining all the heat from a weeks worth of living—if you can call it that—in your non air-conditioned abode.

Rauschenberg, you see, was a prolific yet crafty devil. More than once, a combine was created during a live performance. During one such performance, and I can't remember if it was a musical or dance performance, Rauschenberg worked on a blank canvas facing away from the audience. Throughout the performance he painted, fastened and nailed furiously. At the end of the performance he simply walked off the stage without ever showing the audience the finished piece. Similarly, when interviewed on a Japanese television show, Rauschenberg's cagey response was to begin making a combine on a nearby Japanese screen. As the interviewer became increasingly frustrated, he asked the interpreter to write down the questions and hand them to Rauschenberg. Rauschenberg simply affixed the paper on to the screen.

One of the most startling details I saw, was of a rusty metal roller skate strapped into a brick. I don't know why, but the small, precious, cast-off roller skate—and I was an ardent child roller skater—juxtaposed with the utilitarian and somewhat violent connotation of the brick was an image that has stuck with me for days. And that's pretty much what the show is about. It's a small show of a very limited period in the artist's long-standing career. But within that you really see him push, pull, bend, hammer and work with the materials in a such a way that you begin to understand why that dialogue is so important to him: to come to the stuff—ordinary stuff that one could just as easily call junk—with newness, with as few preconceptions as possible, with the possibility of something strange and exciting being born from the combination of it all. And isn't that how we should all greet the day?

a room of one's own

2006-06-29T23:22:00.000-07:00

el cheapo version

pull to exit

2006-06-14T09:46:00.000-07:00

the low rent version

Going Away

2006-05-29T09:56:00.000-07:00

Or try this low rez version.

you can't make a new old friend

2006-05-26T21:56:00.000-07:00

_{Chad Roberston Zombie}

This from my wise friend, The Art Teacher, who dragged me to a wine bar tonight and whom I, in turn, dragged to the local bookstore so I could buy a used copy of The Day Of The Locust, the next book on my self-prescribed LA reading list. The Art Teacher also quoted fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me, but it was in an entirely different context which bears little relevance to what I will be getting into here.

We were talking about life. About growing old and feeling young. About how to greet each day and grab the most you can from it. How to keep passionate in the midst of banality, how to hang on to your values in the midst of a valueless culture, how to be strong and defiant and unique and courageous even though you are constantly doubting yourself, your ideas, and the outfit you donned when you were still feeling frumpy in the morning. Today was another tough day for me. A crying-on-the-freeway, getting-lost-in-the-valley, irritating-errand-running and wondering-what the-hell-I-am-doing-with-my-life day. Nothing that a well-priced Malbec and a conversation with a fellow comrade couldn't cure. But curing I needed. And it took someone who understood me unequivocally, who could call me on the kind of bullshit I slung around daily, and knew, too, when to shut up and just let me bitch. An old friend, you could say.

We are both having a hard time in this city. Even after three days where I felt semi-victorious, somewhat accomplished, and mostly loyal to the things I agreed were important to me, it only took one morning of another marine layer, 3o minutes of driving in traffic, and the growing suspicion that I was perhaps starting to PMS, for the good intentions to go straight down the toilet and the dam to burst open.

I know I complain a lot around here. And I am sure you get that that is the point? Right, mom? You needn't worry.

BUT:

relationships can make you feel insecure

old friends are hard to make

you can be whomever you want to be in a new town

profiteroles are one of The Art Teacher's favorite desserts

patience is not one of my strong suits

That was sorta the gist of our conversation. And, I must say, it put me in a better mood. So thank you, too, for listening. I feel even better now.

watcha

2006-05-22T10:32:00.000-07:00

or try this lower rez version

From here to there

2006-05-19T00:03:00.000-07:00

The nights here are strange. The weather is warm, the windows are rolled down, dining is done al fresco, and I, I go to the movies alone. In a strange coincidence of events when I entered my local, rather-fancy-yet-open-late grocery store, ABC was playing by the Jackson 5. Now that may not strike you as strange, but it happens to have been the number one song for the year I was born. And I happened to have been reading that curious fact in a little pamphlet I was perusing under the fluorescent lights. Somehow, the combination of seeing a movie alone, the warm nights, and rather pedestrian coincidence led me straight to the spirits aisle, when, in fact, I was only there to pick up some milk. Instead, I found myself choosing from a selection of Kentucky bourbons, stealing two cubes of caramel from the bulk candy section, and plumb forgetting the milk. I bummed a cigarette outside, drove past my high school and saw a ragged--ok, when aren't they--coyote running down the road in front of me as I drove up my canyon. My canyon. It sounds weird. Like not quite right. Or not quite real. I heard a rolling sound from the back of my truck bed and someone had thrown an empty beer bottle back there. I guess, you could say, I am getting used to my new life. A life that constantly reminds me of the last summer I spent here, back when I was 18 and freshly returned from my first year of college.

It's not the worst thing feeling like you're a kid again. And it was a spectacular summer, particularly because I knew it was my last. Because I knew I was changing. Because I was somehow outgrowing this vast metropolis. And here I am again. And every turn I see myself driving down the same streets in my old yellow Toyota Corona with the bench seat, girlfriends beside me, ready for adventure, ready to see what the night would bring. I used to love driving as a teenager. Hell, who didn't? It was so liberating, so grown up. We could drive for hours. And did. Aimlessly. Windows rolled down. Stereo turned up.

The good news is I am exploring this place in a way I never did as a teen. I s'pose I took it for granted. All the history here. All that it has to offer. For chrissakes, I live right next to Thai Town which is adjacent to Little Armenia. Where else in the world do those two populations make neighbors, let alone make neighbors with me? I walked to this city's famous sign, I rode my bike 30 miles on an errand I didn't even need to make, I went to the 98 cent store and it was good.

But I kinda feel like that aimless teen again, minus the girlfriends. Where is this all gonna take me? When will the journey end? And yet, like any teen will tell you, the destination is not really the point.

the red shirt

2006-05-11T23:08:00.000-07:00

_{Paul Mullins, Sugar}

The red shirt is the red t-shirt and it's what I wear to bed at night. I wear it because it smells nice, it is made of a synthetic blend that is rather soft, it fits me well, and, oh yeah, it's not mine, it's his. Call it the equivalent to a locket of hair, a lipstick-kissed envelope, or a perfumed handkerchief. We work with what we have when we don't. Our imagination grows in direct proportion to our loss. The mind is a powerful thing.

On the drive back I listened to This American Life. It was an old program, one about love, specifically romantic love and, appropriately, it was called Chasing Love. The thing about romantic love is that it is a relatively modern invention. In it's absence we are miserable and lonely. In it's presence we are, at worst, confused, insecure and, often, still lonely. It prays on our fears. It continually alludes and yet, occasionally, when all the planets line up correctly, it pulls us in, draws us forth and we feel like super human beings because of it. For a brief moment in time we are satisfied and fulfilled, we are plump with desire, we are drunk with passion. We are not alone. We are, in fact--despite our darkest doubts--lovable and desirable and, more importantly, understood.

It is no biological accident that we are driven to choose--or obsess over--one mate to the exclusion of all others. We need someone who will stick around when the babies are born until the children are capable of taking care of themselves. And, Lord knows, that could be years. Scientists are now proving that our brains are hard-wired for romance. "If you think of romantic attraction as a kind of drug that alters how you think, then in this case it's allowing you to take some risks you wouldn't otherwise." Yeah, remember that Roxy Music tune, Love Is A Drug? Apparently, some people have a stronger romantic drive than others.

The red shirt is also my equivalent to the red shoes. I can't stop missing him when I wear it. It is hard to part with in the morning. But it is equally hard to don it in the evening because I know, full well, what it will conjure up for me. His absence. The distance. My loneliness in this new town. I have worn it so much, the red shirt no longer smells of him. It smells of me. And in that sense it becomes only a reminder of my feelings for him. And those are quite complicated. And on some days, quite impossible. And on others, quite sustaining.

Some people would rather have their freedom, their time, the space in their heart. They could do without the heartache. And some would give up anything for love. They are in love with falling in love, they easily become empty only to be filled by someone else. With only 400 or so years of romantic love as a social convention we are still figuring it out. 300 fewer years if you figure it no longer has to have anything to do with procreation, or even marriage. What is the social contract we sign when we say I love you? Surely, it's different that I do? But nonetheless we place a lot of weight in those three tiny little words. We imbue them with meaning far beyond their capacity. Three tiny and rather unpoetic words. The key to our happiness? Or merely a mirage?

We are taught from an early age to be individuals. We are encouraged to think for ourselves, to reach for our dreams, to develop our independence. At the same time, all the books, movies and music around us hold up love as a holy grail, the highest form of enlightenment, the purest path to self-fulfillment. It is between those two contradictions we get caught. One definition of romantic love is that it must take you by surprise. And it's true, it is an impossible thing to go out and look for. But it is easy enough to put on a red shirt. And, although I no longer remember what the red shirt looks like on him, and I can hardly recall him even wearing it, there is a man out there missing his red shirt and I, now wearing it, am missing him.

I am Spartacus

2006-05-05T16:38:00.000-07:00

There has been a lot of talk here in California about the various marches for immigrant rights held throughout the months of April and May. You will know where I stand on the issue when I tell you that I found myself crying in the middle of the day in the middle of a cafe on the pages of my new town's free weekly paper and it's articles devoted to the May Day march. Much like the day of the march itself, which I attended in yet another popular Californian town, I get all weepy and teary eyed when large groups of people band together in the hope of change, optimism and solidarity. And I beg the question, how can you not?

Really. Is it not a beautiful thing to want to better yourself, your family and your community? It makes me want to sneeze just writing about it. That and the fact that, during the previous march that took California by surprise, when others complained about the fact that there were too many un-American flags defiantly waving overhead, those same people and their supporters understood that reaction and pulled out all the stops with American flags galore for this recent march. Honestly, I have never even seen so many American flags any where let alone, Fourth of July or at the height of any Gulf War. And not just waving them, but wearing them. And when have you ever heard of a McDonald's closing in support of it's workers? There is a movement underfoot. One not led by liberal, educated and middle class white people. One not led by idealistic student revolutionaries. One led by those in the trenches. One led by families, by abuelitas, by children at school, by nannies, by construction workers, by gangsters, by AM shock jocks, by small business owners, by your neighbors, by your day care providers, and by, yes, even your priests. Who doesn't want to join this winning team?

Duh, it's a complicated issue. You can't let everyone in and you can't simply kick them all out. Who would do all that work for chrissakes? Who would take care of our kids, pick all our food, wash all our dishes, change our grandparents' bedpans and build all our homes? Who would do this work? Where would we be? How would our economy function? Do they not spend nearly what they earn within our country's borders? How could our already over-crowded jails hold even more people just for being here illegally? And without these workers where would all the bosses be? And when the bosses start recognizing the need for their workers to have certain rights and allowing them to take the day off to protest and, in fact, joining in the boycott themselves by shutting down their businesses for one day, do we not pay heed? Are they both not telling us something important?

And oh, about the anthem? Isn't mimicry the best form of flattery? How many languages, after all, has the St. James Bible been translated into? And oh yeah, Our Star Spangled Banner? It's already been translated into German, not to mention the fact that it was translated into Spanish some 80 years ago. Does that not just attest to it's power and poignance? Wouldn't you want your words, if you thought they were important, translated into as many languages as possible and heralded by as many people as possible?

I leave you with this, because it sums up my general feelings quite succinctly:

Besides, entering America illegally, agitating for rights, and watching as a foreign government grants you recognition under pressure isn't a sin: It's called the Declaration of Independence.--GUSTAVO ARELLANO

Love, Mom

2006-04-26T20:25:00.000-07:00

_{Jill Greenberg Revelations}

Every day I make a running list in my head of the difference between here and there. I will save most of that for some other post, but a couple things happened to me today and they were the kinda things that would have been nice to share with someone because they were funny yet entirely inconsequential. Because I haven't shared with them with anyone yet today, I offer them up to you here.

I went on a hike today, not a big deal hike, really something more of a walk to a park called Treepeople. It was a very nice park with lots of informational placards and kind reminders to pick up your dogshit and to not smoke. The funny thing was--and this brings me to the difference-between-here-and-there portion of this little post--is that everyone was dressed for major physical activity. I kid you not, I was the only person I saw in jeans and muddy sneakers and not carrying a water bottle. There were many wearing portable electronic devices that played music or allowed them to talk on the phone hands free. I saw some very well-coordinated track suits, and every one was dressed to the nines in their athletic wear.

But, as happens, when people are walking and passing nearby, I overheard some bits of conversations that made my day. I am not even sure if they will translate here, but I will try. One young couple--and when I mean young, I am guessing high-school--were on a sort of date, it seemed. The young girl was very, um, perky but in a tolerable and cute kinda way. She was talking about a bike ride she had gone on in a group and how flustrated she was that she could not keep up. She kept finding herself dead last, with no one else around. It brought her to tears, but she kept persevering. When she thought she could take it no longer, she looked up from the steep road in front of her and realized there were sunflowers six feet high on either side of her. I know what she means, sunflowers can have that effect on me, too. As if we are looking in a mirror and seeing, instead of our own dour reflection, something smiling back at us with unwavering determination. Sometimes it is just the thing we need. I used to plant sunflowers, for this very reason, every summer. It saddens me that I no longer have a plot of land in which I can plant, neither a vegetable garden nor these cheery flowers, for those long summer nights when it is just me, the yard, and the slugs.

The other funny--okay I think maybe it's not really funny, but actually sweet--thing that I noticed today happened when I was in line at the post office. Now, normally I can get away with not standing in this line and using the automated postage machine which I love. But I forgot to tape my box and I needed to buy insurance, so along with everybody else who arrived at ten of closing, I had to stand in line. But if I hadn't stood in line, I wouldn't have noticed the young guy in front of me, checking his email on his cell phone. There he was scrolling through, when I happened to catch the last, salutary line on his message. And it said love, Mom. It was a nice closing to what had been a rather brutish day and, once again, gave me faith in humanity, young boys and their mothers, and kids in high-school going on a hiking date and revealing the most important details of their lives. We are not so different, after all.

Wait Until Spring, Bandini

2006-04-22T10:13:00.000-07:00

My day got off to a pretty good start, even though I accidentally went off into the day wearing my house dress, which I realized upon my first stop, was just a bit more Jayne Mansfield than is necessary at 9am on a Friday. Um, oops. But oh well, the weather was nice and it got me a lot of help from all the salesmen. Where was I headed? Downtown. My new favorite place. Thank you to Mo for reintroducing me to this elegant, rundown and forgotten part of town.

First, I would like to introduce you to the Dancing Girls building. This is a building that I would love to live in, convert to lofts and light up the sign. C'mon, how great would that be: the Dancing Girls Lofts? I am starting a fund now for which you can donate to the cause. And I will keep you all posted. Hmmm, maybe the cleavage can help in some way! I see a theme emerging...

Next stop, the flower mart. Because I was a florist for three years way back in college, whenever there is a family function, I am the one called upon for my special talents. And I don't mind. I love cut flowers. I love knowing the names of them. I love their smells. I love holding them in my arms like the winner of a beauty pageant. I love the simple flowers, like daffodils. I love the overtly sexual ones, like anthuriums. I love being snobby about the flowers that people--okay mostly men--think are appropriate to give to women whether in courtship, in apology or in some mild sense of gratitude. The flowers that are so trite, unimaginative, and well, lame, that they are the equivalent of a Hallmark greeting card. Are we as women so appreciative of any small gesture a man is willing to make that this is acceptable? Or am I being a total unnecessary elitist here? Well, I digress and it's really not my argument these days. Let me get back to the poppies. Is there anything as life-affirming as a poppy about ready to unfurl it's petals? Like a baby's fist holding on for dear life and then suddenly letting go. It's a pleasure to behold, I tell ya.

I also planned ahead. I brought my knife to be sharpened at the cutlery store nestled nearby. It only takes 20 minutes, so I walked across the street to the Grand Central Market for my juice. There is a mind-boggling array of juice available: celery, watercress, beet, not too mention apricot and pomegranate. All freshly squeezed and distributed out of these neat little contraptions. I settled on pomegranate, apricot and banana with some protein powder thrown in for good measure. Delicious.

I also had time to buy some tropical fruit. Large, ripe papayas grabbed my eye--hard to miss those--as did the Meyer lemons, and while the guayabas were not ripe yet, the cheremoyas certainly were. Everyone was super friendly and even the more so when I spoke Spanish to them. Many an introduction were made, a few de donde eres's and I got the lowdown on when to come back for the guayabas.

I came back for my knife, it's sharpness demonstrated to me by one swift slash of the newspaper in which it was wrapped. Chatted about which knife would be a best second knife--next time I have the extra 80 dollars or so--and marveled at the wide selection of hair clippers available for purchase. This place has been around for ever and they charge you on the length of your blade. It is quite reasonable. I think this quote about sums it up: Two brothers and forty years of business.

Finally I peaked into the famous Bradbury building next door. Famous, not only for it's eclectic Victorian architecture designed with the utopian ideals of Edward Bellamy in mind, and famous not only for being featured in Blade Runner, but famous to me because it is where I shot my first Super-8 film back in high school. A special thanks is now in order to my sister, for agreeing to climb this famous building's fire escapes for my little movie. No longer available commercially, you can contact me directly for your copy. Hell, for 20 dollars, I will even sign it.

For $15

2006-04-10T23:07:00.000-07:00

You get access to the spa for as long as you want. For $2 you get a scrubby sponge. For $30 you get a Korean lady in black bra and panties giving you the scrubdown of your life. And so it goes at the Olympic Korean Spa. Oh, there is more on the menu--a full body waxing at $120, for example--and I hear the facials are of particular note--but honestly, the $17 is all you really need to spend to feel rejuvenated, transported and healed.

It's different from the zen Japanese and fancy schmancy Burke-Williams with-their-cucumber-water spas. It's not about aesthetics. In fact, it's not really even about relaxing. It's sorta about putting your body through the ringer. It's about cleansing. It's about invigorating. And it's about healthy glowing skin. We could call it an exercise in extremities. Slough off the skin. Burn yourself hot. Then freeze yourself cold. It's a spa for the masses. We're talking proletarian, women of all sizes, share-your-plastic-washing-stool-and-bowl-with-your-neighbor kind of place. There is even a utilitarian restaurant for those who enter or exit hungry.

I'd recommend starting with the charcoal oxygen room. A quick bath at the communal, um, trough, for lack of a better word. Jump into the dark and mysterious Mugworts tea bath. Plunge into the cold dip. Warm up in the wet charcoal sauna with jade floor and burning herbs. Slip in next door to the dry stone sauna. Rinse. Lather. And repeat.

Sigh. I could do that for hours. I could practice this ritual daily. But tonight we arrived near closing, so with the hour I had, I made the best of it, frantically jumping between baths and showers and spas. Chances are, though, when you do leave, you will be leaving like I did, with a jump in your step, cheeks all aflush and, like the sign says, replenished.

Everything is Everything Take 2

2006-04-07T09:02:00.000-07:00

If yesterday were opposite day, I'd be saying what a fucking horrible day! It's good to know that for me things like my general emotional state of being can change in a heartbeat. Yesterday, my friends from Mudville were in town and not just any friends but The Amazing Family whom I love more than anything, each family member in it's own special way. Just the mere fact that they were here brought tears of joy to me, but an actual outing into this strange new city of mine brought me to a nearly ecstatic state just anticipating it.

The day went up from there. When we got to the expansive botanical gardens to which they had invited me, special just for us, there was no admission fee whatsoever! We wandered the gardens and guess what? All the cacti were in bloom! Purple, orange, pink, chartreuse! It was as if we had called in advance and reserved a private blooming. We were all very excited as you can see by the photo. We traveled from the desert to Japan to the English countryside and to the tropical rain forest and back again. We saw carnivorous plants and rare orchids. We traversed bamboo forests and hid among the orange groves. And guess what else? You can be a volunteer there! Hmmmmm. Something to think about.

On the ride home, I got a chance to talk to one of The Amazing Family's friends who is a local here. She is also an artist and not just any kind of artist--well, ok, she's a painter, too--but a conceptual performance artist to boot, my favorite kind of artist, the if-I-could-do-anything kind of artist. So, she had some suggestions of hikes, mentioned a 10 acre marsh area not too far away, and most important of all, assured me I would come to like it here. She herself arrived only six years ago, not too far from where I hail, has managed to explore what there is of the wilderness here and hereby, and come to love it, accept it, and call it her own. We saw some cute pollito graffiti near her house, an unexplored Haitian bbq joint with a curious sign reading goat show, and talked about how you can still get any kind of drugs kind of like a drug drive through, right down her street, same as when I was growing up here.

That night I attended the inaugural reception to the Lady's Auxiliary Art Salon or Whateverthehellyouwannacallit of which I am a proud new member--there are now three of us--and founder. We came up with many hairbrain schemes, non-viable ideas, and the completely perfect horror film. For obvious reasons, we decided to proceed with the completely perfect horror film, even if that had little to do with anything we were individually working on. By the end of the night, I felt enthused and excited in a way I really haven't yet. Almost as if I was beginning to fit in here.

Everything is Everything

2006-04-05T22:38:00.000-07:00

Friends, brothers and sisters, let's just say, today was just one of those days. I woke up and unpacked, listening to every single PJ Harvey album I owned and ended the day on the treadmill staring straight into the anonymous face on the opposing treadmill with Danny Hathaway. One thing you should know: right before I cry, I feel like I am going to sneeze. And let's just say, I spent the entire day feeling like I was going to sneeze. I could blame the miserable weather, daylight savings, the state of the union, the liver cleanse I am trying out, my hangover this morning (yes, that's right those last two decidedly do not go together), or just the unfortunate combination of things. I could blame myself: my doubts about the move I just made, my guilt about not working, my insecurities about oh, fill-in-the-blank. Or I could blame God if only I thought he was somewhere out there. Friends, brothers and sisters, not even my new haircut could lift my spirits.

Which brings me back to Danny Hathaway. Because sometimes all we have is music. The closest we can get to god, heaven, or hell. The closet I can get when my misery wants company. The best explanation when I have none, is often someone else's. Does that make any sense? Does it make any sense that when Hathaway sings to be young gifted and black, my noise starts to twitch? Does it make any sense that when I hear that chorus of voices shout out everything is everything my heart simultaneously breaks and then mends itself? I ask you: does it make any sense any of it?

Today, the word of the day that was found in my inbox, was gestalt. I thought it rather ominous. The definition given was: most often used in psychology to describe a theory or approach which aims to see something as a whole rather than breaking it into separate parts. But all I read was breaking and separate parts. I think you get what I am trying to say here. Every now and again a day comes and it just gets you down. And everything that happens in that day seems proof of how horrible or ugly or difficult things really are. Nothing helps except the day ending. The sun setting, the moon rising, the pillows calling. Nothing helps except to sit and wade it out. Next time, it will be someone else's turn. But for now, I'm gonna turn down the sheets, close my eyes, and listen to my gospel.

P.S. I look exactly the same.

Ground Control To Major Tom

2006-03-27T20:33:00.000-08:00

Nothing beats a Natural History Museum. All the post-modern conceptual art I saw in the last week (and I saw a lot) couldn't hold a candle to those wacky old-school dioramas and a good old-fashioned planetarium show. My friend The Writer and I visited my favorite city's Natural Museum of History and it totally kicked ass over any other Natural Museum of History I had up to that point attended. It's like the freakin' Louvre. You could spend a few days there easy and that's not even reading all the copy the good curators have provided for us. Honestly, it was the highlight of my trip and this prolly makes me an even bigger dork than you imagined.

Due to the vastness of the museum--all its halls, floors, wings, science centers, shops, bathrooms and food courts--we got separated and I ended up attending the planetarium show alone. Oh, but it did not disappoint! Into the dome shaped room we were herded. In the true fashion of the city I was visiting, when the announcements to turn off all cell phones, pagers and other electronic devices came on over the loud speaker, the audience immediately chided back and make sure to keep breathing to a minimum, stop all heartbeats, and keep your head tilted back at all times. The lights dimmed, we simultaneously looked up and if I had been there with a certain other, I would have slipped my hand into his. From the darkness a soothing yet recognizable voice emerged. Robert Redford! Ushering us into the universe! He told a tale of a giant explosion, of debris colliding to form the moon, and of a great meteorite that wiped out entire species. We've come a long way from the Pink Floyd laserium shows of the past. It was a poignant story, filled with dramatic three-dimensional recreations, and we did, in fact, hold our breaths.

Inside the museum my friend regaled me with quotes, both his (the next Bob Dylan is not going to be a musician) and those of others (Dad, this is boring, all the animals are DEAD!) The kids were out in full effect as were the lovers. And we couldn't stop thinking of Bowie. Who else knew best how to use space as a metaphor? Entire albums devoted to outer space! We walked around singing Bowie songs (For here am I sitting in a tin can, far above the world, Planet Earth is blue and there's nothing I can do) and looking at those beautiful, panoramic Hasselblad photographs of the Apollo landing. We felt small and inconsequential, but as the same time we felt a part of things, we felt a part of the universe. And for that day, the universe belonged to us.

I'm in love

2006-03-23T07:52:00.000-08:00

I am in the greatest city in the world, or maybe we could call it the best place in the country, or perhaps the east coast, or, uh, my exact favorite coordinates to find myself. I am on vacation in a city where I eat and walk and see art and hear really good snippets of conversations and drink and eat and rarely look up from the street. But when I do look up I still feel equally exhilarated. And oh, I also stay up late, spend lots of money, talk about literature and fantasize about how great it would be to live here. Like if I had a decent paying job--scratch that--a really well paying job, and appropriately warm yet stylish clothes (which upon arrival, I quickly realize, I never do). And it's not just the city itself. It's the people I know here. The things they like to do (when I'm in town), what great hosts they are (plying me with liquor and letting me sleep in their beds) and how they are always game fur anything (it's 2am, let's go grab some pommes frittes and watch Jon Stewart until we collapse).

I always have the best star sightings here and this one was one of the best cuz he seemed to be on a really romantic date and not afraid to show it and because I really liked this movie and he sat right next to me on the same bench throughout my entire meal. My friend The Writer claims that even the readings are better here, because let's face it this is a literary town, a town of publishers and people who read and read voraciously and read the papers and the book reviews so even if they haven't read the book, they've read the synopsis, and indeed, the one reading I attended did not disappoint during the Q & A. Because of a certain question I asked, a man with a waxy, handlebar mustache and bow tie approached me and handed me his card. He told me that if I ever wanted to talk about how best to dispose of my body after death, he could help me. His card read, Director of Anatomical Donations Program and honestly, I knew not that such a program existed.

I can't help but gush. It's just my personality. I'm sure there are other great places to be and other great things to do and other amazing things to eat. But really, for now, I'd rather be here. Even if it's just to get turned around and around on the subway system, to get knocked in the shoulder repeatedly when I am caught looking over my shoulder, to get blisters on my feet from trying to wear anything but sneakers, or to be told by a rude waitress that my choice was not the best one to make. And thankfully I am.

To Whom It May Concern

2006-03-17T16:49:00.000-08:00

_{_{"Al and Mae" by Judith Wigren-Slack from learning to love you more}

I hope you grow to love the house at 845 Mudville Drive as much as I have. I wanted to leave you with a few of the idiosyncrasies of the neighborhood, the house, the yard, and just random bits of information I have culled over the years. Inside this envelope, you will find a postcard for the guy who painted the mural on the steps and side door. He was really cool and lives nearby. He has been known to wear a pink cowboy hat on more festive occasions. You will also find some pictures the previous owner left me of the remodel downstairs. Those I am afraid are not terribly exciting but they now belong to you. In addition I leave you with some literature: the manual for the sump pump in the downstairs bathroom and possibly a manual for the washing machine, although, it could be the manual for the previous washing machine. Finally, I include the electrician's grid of the electrical circuits, a scrap of paper that I have never really been able to make sense of.

The neighbors: The ones on your right are a great, really big Nigerian family. The father’s name is George. The children's names are Mercy, Grace, Kindness, and Precious. The father knows a lot about gardening and has a wonderful vegetable garden come summer. The kids will throw many things over into your yard and knock sheepishly at the door to retrieve them. Invite them in! They are extra curious and equally courteous. In the adjacent apartment building on the other side, the occupants are quirky but well meaning. You might hear them early in the morning, yelling from their door to the person honking their horn in the street. One of the tenants, a woman whose name I believe is Kiki, will have a modest garage sale every Sunday come summer. She will sell very little. You can be sure however, that if you ever want to get rid of any stuff, there will be plenty of takers on the block.

Across the street lives a family of brothers who bought their house in the last year or so. Don't park in their driveway even if it looks like, and in fact is, a non-functioning driveway. They are cool other than that. They plan on raising the house and doing a lot of work as soon as their permits come in. Of course, they've been saying that for a few years now. On that same side of the street, the owner of the two Rolls Royces is the same owner of the three identical white houses with the identical rose bushes. He also owns the truck full of crap that you will often find parked in front of your house. He remains a mystery to me, but he knows everyone and will let you know how he almost bought your house a few years ago for a dime, but for some reason didn't. The kids on the street are really great. You’ll see them when the weather warms. Sit on the porch or work on the front yard and you’ll meet all the neighbors, one by one.

The house: Many of the windows don't open. I've made multiple attempts and valiant efforts at unsticking them, but they do tend to settle during the winter months. Sorry. Both bedrooms face the neighboring apartment building, giving them a fishbowl feel. I suggest curtains. My favorite place has always been the dining room. It's a small room, but cheery. A little table by the window is really all you need. The stoop, of course, is another great place to hang out, even if you don't smoke. Grab a treat from the ice-cream truck or just catch up on the latest R & B hits as the cars roll by. Three o'clock, when the schools let out, is another fine time to find yourself outside.

The backyard: The climbing vine, the first thing you see as you exit the back door, is a trumpet vine. It grows quickly. Watch out. There are two jasmine bushes that really should be better trained. There are about five or six wild strawberry plants near the rosemary, but the rosemary might be crowding them out. You might get a total of a dozen strawberries per year--and that's if the birds don't get them first--but sweet they will be. Every year, a wild artichoke plant comes up in the far right vegetable planter. It never ceases to surprise me. You might see also see some wild tomato plants. If you do, consider yourselves lucky. California poppies and cosmos usually turn up throughout the yard, as will one single Echinacea flower smack dab in the middle. The lavender towards the front is getting pretty woody and is probably ready to be pulled. Beware of the river plant on the left fence towards the back. That thing will grow like crazy and I have tried unsuccessfully many times to uproot it. Good luck!

That's all I can think of. May my ex-home bring you as much joy as my all of my other exes. There just comes a time--no matter how sweet the journey--when it's best to let go.

Casey}

Who ever made music of a mild day?

2006-03-12T21:06:00.000-08:00

_{photo by John Humble}

Pinch me. Okay you can stop doing that now. I'm wide awake.

Today I did what few people dare to do in my new town: I walked. In the cold. And for a long time. Sure, I could have driven and no, there was no sidewalk where I was walking and yes, my mother's jaw dropped open when I said I wanted to see how long it would take to walk to my sister's house. After mapquesting the two addresses and discovering the distance was definitely doable, I set out the door. And let me tell you the experience was wonderful. The air was brisk, my ears were cold, the sun was setting, the clouds dramatic, and the walk mostly downhill. I only got honked at 3 or 4 times, passed only one angry chained-in-the-yard rottweiller, and got comfortably used to the smell of exhaust. Despite it all, my hour-long walk made me deliriously happy. Like the crisp air, I felt like I really saw everything in extra sharp focus. Every house, every parked car, every street sign as I neared each corner. People were friendly, engaging in short but meaningful conversations and most importantly, I remembered one can walk here, even without a dog, and not only walk but enjoy themselves while doing it.

The earlier part of the day was spent driving around in the car with my parents, checking out different neighborhoods and going to open houses--not because I can buy a house right now, but because it's kinda fun to do. I bullied my parents into stopping and loaning me the bucks to get an extremely overpriced soy latte, and then, a coupla hours later, stopping again--they waited in the car both times--to buy two tacos al pastor for the very reasonable price of $2.16. I discovered some neighborhoods that I totally adored and some houses I totally can't afford. At the same epiphanic moment, I realized I have just moved to a new place (sort of) and there are limitless things out there just waiting to reveal themselves to me (there really are). I would like to make a list. And on it would be some kind of walking tour (I hear there is a woman whose art project it is to walk here every day and she is looking for people to accompany her), getting a new library card, and eating the best ramen soup about which I read an article only today in the city's free weekly. I would also like to climb this city's famous sign, walk to as many friend's houses as possible, converse with a few cabbies, and become a regular at at least one local establishment.

These all seem like reasonable goals, and while I don't want to get overwhelmed by reading some kind of what to do in... book, I am looking for other suggestions for what to do when you are new.

going, going, gone

2006-03-08T21:03:00.000-08:00

Today I officially left Mudville and drove the 5.5 hours down to my new home in Suck City. On the way, I listened to Springsteen's Nebraska, and though it wasn't the Jersey turnpike, nor the badlands which I passed, I did feel the expansiveness of the universe as I sailed down south, a coupla bags of groceries beside me, a half dozen of my favorite plants on the floor, and three suitcases thrown into the bed of my truck. Now I'm not gonna make any disclaimers about The Boss, you either know, or don't know, the brilliance of that album, but thar's a traveling album if there ever was one. I mean, c'mon, look at the freakin album cover for chrissakes. When Bruce howls my skin starts to crawl, and I'm thankful I'm not listening to this at 3AM, driving down the highway, with nothing but a cup of gas station coffee to keep me warm.

Well, the mind starts to wander when you travel, particularly so when one is leaving a place for which one--okay me--has oceans of memories, friends, and fond feelings for in general. Particularly so when the future still seems so distant, like the horizon you can never quite reach, or so indecipherable, like the disappearing ink bought from the back of a comic book. For a while I am without my stuff, not yet in my new place, and traveling back and forth. You could call it limbo. I would be lying if I said I wasn't afraid to put down roots some place else. I would be lying if I said I could completely uproot myself from my last home. I would be lying if I said I know what the hell I am doing. But again, sometimes the important thing is just doing.

I wanted to say goodbye to the people I will miss most: to The Bachelorette who is going through a real tough time and with whom I agreed to go on some kind of bold adventure when we finish the projects that are taking us forever to finish, to My Second Favorite Ex who was also my closest neighbor, the brokest motherfucker I know and subsequently the most sentimental drunk, to The Amazing Family who took me in when I most needed to be taken in and who have presented the most hopeful case of love, decent parenting and exemplorary being I know. But I can't seem to do it. And I am hoping I really don't have to.

Along with the expansiveness of the universe, the other thing I was thinking was this: if two people (energy) are traveling at the same rate (velocity) towards one another, how long before the inevitable (force) happens? Is there a quadratic formula for love? If so, what bearing would distance have on this equation? And finally, if you go too fast do you become a black hole?

The man I just met

2006-03-02T14:27:00.000-08:00

The man I just met likes to check the weather. Last Sunday morning, the day of my barbecue, my going away barbecue, he called to say he had bad news. It's gonna rain today. For sure. It seemed there was nothing I could argue there. Well, what's the good news, then? Pause. I had a great time with you last night. Yesterday we were talking on the phone and he checked the weather online for Wednesday, the day I am driving down to my new home. The day I leave for good. Forty percent chance of showers he reads. He can't see me on the other end of the line, nodding my head. Things like checking the weather: these are things I am not very good at.

The man I just met is exactly that: a man I just met. You could call it bad timing since I have met him on the eve of my departure. But you could also call it good timing, because, after all, we did meet and like my therapist would say as far as problems go, it's a good one to have.

There are mountains of things the man I just met doesn't know about me. Like that I hate it when I can't think of anything to say. That I don't care much for eggplant. That there are certain words, I will always mispronounce. But so far, what he does know, he seems to like. He seems to get. He seems to be okay with.

I can't really say much more about it now. All I know is that he is a man I just met. A man who's not afraid to show me his quirks, a man who can't always tell when I am joking, a man who offered to loan me his computer when mine stopped working. All I know is that he is a man who thinks to check the weather, and even, to check it ahead of time. Perhaps it is because he likes the certainty of science or maybe it is because he owns a boat he would like to be sailing, and then again, maybe he likes to plan ahead, as much as one can, for disaster.

But he is a man whom I have seen noticing the patterns of the wind, a man with a pinhole leak in his house that drives him crazy, a man who has stood outside and looked up and convinced me, it wasn't going to rain.

I want to dive into your ocean

2006-02-28T11:42:00.000-08:00

Today's theme equals rain. Wet, pouring, windy yet oddly not-too-cold rain. I have always loved the rain. I once lived in a house that felt much like a barn and when it rained I always felt like Noah. I used to hope for it to rain for 40 days but I think the most I ever counted was up to 10.

There are songs with rain in it. That old

Here comes the rain again
Falling on my head like a memory
Falling on my head like a new emotion
I want to walk in the open wind
I want to talk like lovers do
I want to dive into your ocean
Is it raining with you?

song.

And then that other one that Missy 'Misdemeanor' Elliot sampled from Ann Peebles:

I can't stand the rain 'gainst my window
Bringing back sweet memories
I can't stand the rain 'gainst my window
'Cause he's not here with me
Hey window pain do you remember
How sweet it used to be
When we were together
Everything was so grand, yes it was
Now that we've parted
There's one sound that I just can't stand...

Rain as a metaphor for loss, for love unrequited, for feeling suddenly and starkly alone. I guess the rain makes us feel small, like looking up at the canopy of stars or looking down at all the grains of sand that fit into the palm of your hand. I guess the rain reminds us of tears. How often have you sat with the car parked and watched the rain come down, blurring your windshield and thought how much can the heart take? How much can one feel before one spills over like all the droplets splashing on the glass? Moments like those and I think, this little car, this is my ark, this might be all I have to save me.

And then there are the movies: that noir shot of the melancholic hero, a reflection of a rain-streaked window pane on his face as he suddenly realizes everything that he thought was good and true is suddenly wicked and false. Or rain-soaked lovers vulnerable and yet ready, suitcases beside them, water dripping from their shoulders as they become each other's umbrella in that final embrace as the orchestra crescendos. Or the rain pounding the pavement in some gritty city street, traffic lights and neon signs blurred, a siren wailing in the background, all clues telling us that life as we know it is about to change.

When you're a kid your parents are always telling ya to stay outta the rain. That you'll catch your death a cold. That you need to stay dry. But you know what?

It's not even true.

None More Black

2006-02-22T19:44:00.000-08:00

_{ALEC SOTH
Two Towels, 2005}

Today was one of those days where I just felt like a rock star. I can't really get into the whys and wherefores, but suffice it to say, I was in top form . The air was crisp, the tiny spring buds about to burst, and I, in my sunglasses, was doing something that I love and doing it quite well, if I do say so myself. Add to that fact that I survived some potentially undercooked yet very tasty homemade ravioli last night, polished off a decent bottle of wine, slept a handful of hours, and still felt on par with the rest of our Olympians, and you'll understand what I am talking about.

After doing the thing that I love quite well--and despite the fact that my computer along with, oh, all it's precious documents and archives, may be DOA--I came home and, like a true rock star, listened to music that I love . Gee, you might ask, what kind of music is the kind of music that Casey loves? Well, lemme tell ya. Today the album was That Skinny Motherfucker with The High Voice? and the artist of the aforementioned album is Dump. How can I articulate how much I love this album? How much it means to me? Well...I can't.

You must love Prince. I mean you really would have had to have grown up listening to those early formative albums over and over until the record wore out, until your throat was hoarse, until your thighs ached from pulling all those Prince-like maneuvers. This is an album of Prince covers. Covers you know well. So you have to like covers. You have to be able to appreciate them. Especially when they criss-cross genres. Especially when they criss-cross ones like pure pop genius (Prince) and pure indie rock eclecticism (yo la tengo) and arrive at something as special and brilliant and surprising and sweet as this album. But really for me, it's just one of those albums I can completely sing along with--unabashedly and unapologetically--shit-eating grin plastered all over my face, hips a rockin', toes tappin'. Talk about rock stars.

you can't take it with you

2006-02-18T11:56:00.000-08:00

_{Mazatlan pinholes, Ri Anderson}

My kitchen table is gone, as is the coffee table, the sideboard and soon someone is coming to grab my supremely out-of-date stereo. The house is cold and emptying fast. I feel like those little bits of sand left in the hour glass. Every day a part of me disappears. I call up friends and it's as if I am writing my last will and testament. You'll take this chair right? My butterfly palm I bequeath to you. These records? Enjoy them. Everyone gets a little sumthin'. A little piece of little ol' me.

Time, my friends, is running out. And the cold hard truth of the matter is that I am not ready. Well, a part of me is. I mean, letting go? It gets easier and easier the more you do it. I understand how people do this over and over. Pack up and move. Leave it all behind. Search for something new, some thing else, some thing better than what's in front of them. But part of me just ain't. Ready. I like it here. It's not a bad place to be, after all. And really, who can bear to say goodbye? I can't. And so, I imagine, I won't. How do you say goodbye to a place that has become home? A place where you make sense? A place that fits like the best worn t-shirt of the last two decades?

I came here straight outta high-school. My parents drove me up. And then, they dropped me off. I was ready. I never went back. I never looked back. It wasn't until the last coupla years, the thought even occurred to me. There were flirtations with other cities. There were extended vacations. There was study abroad and temporary employment elsewhere. But mis cosas, the important ones, always stayed here. The difference is I always knew I was coming back. It's not that I'm scared. I usually land on my feet. It's not that I don't like surprises. And it's not that I'm moving some place I don't know. It's just a moment of mourning. A beautiful agony. A little bit of death.

the great equalizer

2006-02-15T17:57:00.000-08:00

De Lauer's. Say it again. De Lauer's. Feels good dudn't it? Try on De Lauer's Super newsstand Since 1907. And it's walking distance from me. Not just a newsstand but a super newsstand. Not just a super newsstand but a cigar shop. Not just a cigar shop but a place to buy racing forms. Not just place to buy racing forms but a place open twenty four hours a day. They won't kick you out no matter how long you peruse their shelves. In fact, they seem to invite it, as there is always a warm cup of coffee just waiting for you in a styrofoam cup. Try walking by it without stepping in. Try walking by and not being enticed by all those international newspapers. There are over 100. Try walking in and not stopping to browse the literary journals. Try not peeking into the Italian Vogue, the paper thin Mexican comics, or the overpriced New York art rags. Try not dropping 10 or 15 or 20 dollars.

De Lauer's. A local institution for sure. Let me tell you what De Lauer's is like at 2AM on a weekend night. First of all, it's bumping. A group of Ethiopian men gossip and sip coffee over a month-old newspaper from their homeland. Drunk hipsters fall in and buy, maybe an Artforum, maybe a copy of Nest. They leave change behind. A bum quietly comes in and buys a cheap cherry cigar. There are lone men in the back leafing through the porn mags, which I hear houses quite an eclectic collection. Twenty-year old hustlers will scamper in and out, happy to have an audience to bullshit. The clerk is patient. A TV blares Arabic news behind him. There are drugstore romances. There are hobby and craft magazines beside feminist zines stapled together. You can buy monthly subway and bus passes. And outside, that same bum will sell you a half-used bus transfer for fifty cents. The bars empty and De Lauer's, in turn, fills. There is always a cab out front and there are always a few cabbies huddled inside. A cop walks out and not too much later a drug dealer will waltz in. The important thing to note about De Lauer's is that we are all there. We may be in our own worlds. We may, in fact, hate like hell to ever leave that world. But inside De Lauer's we are all welcome and we are all quite content.

The sign says

2006-02-13T18:57:00.000-08:00

African Jamaican
Vegetarian Vegan
Soul Food Juice Bar
And really what more could you want in an establishment? The place is good. The place is home. And the place is yet some thing else that I will be leaving behind.

Every neighborhood should have one of these in it. You walk in, you order, you try the smoothie of the day, you chat with the other customers, you leave, you feel much better. Oh, that everything were that easy! You might try the tofu burger, the no meat treat, the soup of the day. You might just settle for some fresh coconut juice. No matter what you decide, there is always a lot of dill action. You will, naturally, be listening to some reggae. You may or may not get schooled as in, this Bob Marley record is about the burning, mahn, of Kingstown but all they ever wanna play is One Love. You will become a regular and you will find that satisfying. You will smile as you read the saying of the day, neatly printed on the chalk board. You will look forward to the twelve-block walk it takes to get there. And you will handle your own money at the cash register as the proprietor doesn't get involved in that business. It's not that the food is that great, nor that much of a bargain, and it's not that I plan on becoming a vegetarian; it's the whole package, the whole easy package.

_{Dinner Plates, 1998 by James Kerry Marshall
Set of five
Edition of 15
$ 1,000.00
$ 50.00 shipping}

There's no place like home

2006-02-10T21:09:00.000-08:00

Leaving a place you have lived after 17 years is something akin to saying goodbye to a limb. There are lots of things that I will miss and never forget. I could prolly say goodbye everyday until I leave and then about 3,234 days beyond that. But for today we will start with something simple. Something lovely.

Will you look at this? This is a plum tree. This is what it looks like in Spring. This is when it looks its best. With its little pink buds, like a newborn's baby toes. So delicate. So surprising. So happy. Like a signpost telling me Holy shit senorita, it's springtime! Dust off your huaraches and don your sunglasses. This sun is about to shine.

Well, along with the plum tree we have a smokebush yet to grace us with her dramatic purple leaves. Not to mention the sweet scents of my wisteria as it blooms, not once, but twice each year. The jasmine out back, the wild tomatoes, the artichoke plant that grows back every summer. My god, the artichoke plant! That bold ghetto plant that bears fruit no matter how little sustenance it's given. No matter how many weeds crowd around it, no matter how many ants climb it's brittle stalk. Oh, artichoke plant, I can always count on your brazen, thorny purple crown to rear its head above us all.

Ah, there is always so much to look forward to. Can I tell you about the crazy trumpet vine? What about the clamouring loquat tree? Or the bees and the lavender? A cactus that will bloom? That singular echinacea flower? The dozen or so strawberries that come late summer and bring with it such sweetness in such a delicately small package? And what about me? And my hands in the dirt and my freckled skin and my bluejeans faded by the sun.

The things she carried

2006-02-04T22:05:00.000-08:00

She no longer is.

Remember about a year ago when I started this electronic blog and ended my non-electronic relationship, I mentioned that Tim O'Brien collection of stories, The Things They Carried? It is the kind of collection that, for me anyways, makes me sob uncontrollably throughout its entire reading. Like stick-to-the-page-until-they-turn-brittle-and-yellow-and-so-seal-the-book-shut-forever kind of tears. That can be a good thing. A cathartic thing.

Well, in preparation for leaving Mudville--after seventeen years--I am hocking my wares on Craigslist. And the stuff I have been carrying around with me for all these years, I am now letting go of. Faster than I am prepared for. Faster than I can say goodbye to. So, in homage to these sentimental pieces with which I am now parting, I formallybid adieu.

The coat rack. Many people have enquired about this dandy little coat rack given to me as my good friend, The Writer, as he escaped from Mudville and headed towards that publishing capital on the Eastern Coast. The coat rack stood in the entrance to my house for many a year. People used it to hang their coats, their scarves, their purses, their hats, as they made themselves at home, and I, in turn, did the same. The coat rack had a warm presence of its own and sometimes in the middle of the night, I would think for a moment that someone was standing there. I loved nothing more that to hang my pork pie hat on it.

The turquoise-y bookshelves. These came in a pair and even from this slightly blurry picture you can see how sweet they are. A woman came and bought these shelves for her son's nursery. I find that a fitting ending to my relationship with them. It kinda felt like I was giving them up for adoption and that I had found them a very good home. The thing about these bookshelves was that they were always sunny, even when I was not. They often traveled from my bedroom, to the office or to the living room, depending on my needs. For the most part, they bore books. And they wore them well.

The wooden desk. Plain and simple. Comes with two drawers. This was my mother's desk when she split up with my dad and, for a brief period, lived in Florida. We were all happy when she came home. And I was also happy to be given the desk. The desk was pleasant to sit at, particularly when sitting on a wooden chair. It felt very writer-ly. There was a period when I used it as a bar in the dining room and that worked surprisingly well. It was just the right size.

The chrome lamp from Urban Outfitters. I was fine parting with this and I parted with it at a very low price. The funny thing about this lamp is that my boyfriend had the same lamp and when he moved in we suddenly had two of them and that was quite redundant. Then he moved back out and I was left with one lamp again. And that, my friends, is the short story of my life.

The ex-boyfriend's heavy oak swivel chair. This chair weighs a ton. It was left to me by an ex-boyfriend, the one who broke my heart back in college. It is rather fitting that I have been lugging around this chair for all these years. But I think I really am ready to let it go. It has, however, served me well: it's been sturdy, it swivels, it rolls. It has been a reliable and handsome piece of furniture. But, a chair without a desk is a lonely thing to be, indeed.

Which leads us to the bed. The heart of the nest you could say. And a bed which has been with me through two relationships and a few other courtships. A bed which many have come to look at, but none has yet to claim. A bed I am really hoping to now get rid of. When I first laid eyes on this bed in that little furniture shop that has long since gone out of business, I fell in love with it immediately. I don't know the story behind it, why it was reupholstered with the Chinese fabric nor when, but it was my first non-futon bed and it felt at once, both grown-up and old-fashioned. This bed needs a change of scenery. $125 OBO!

Who Is

2006-01-31T16:33:00.000-08:00

There was a time when I was really broke. There have been a lot of moments in my life when I was cash poor, but for the most part, money was gonna come in some time.

Except this time.

I was just out of college. I lived in an apartment. I was the apartment manager, so my rent was cheap, like 300 bones a month. But somehow that wasn't cheap enough. So I got a roommate. And he lived in the living room of the small one-bedroom, third-floor walk up. Let's call him The Skateboarder. We were both ass broke. I wasn't working. He was waiting tables. But only a couple days a week.

This is how broke we were:

We would go to Goodwill and swap pricetags so we could get the blender we for some reason so desperately needed, for even less.

When The Skateboarder did work, he got free meals. But he would always sneak me in with the wait staff so I could eat for free, too. Then, when he knew he wasn't going to work for a few days, he would take home the bread they could no longer sell and we would eat that. For days.

We stole toilet paper rolls from the university I had just recently attended.

We paid for gas in quarters, dimes, nickels and pennies.

And still, we never had any money.

We would go to garage sales and buy up what we thought were fashionable vintage clothes and sell them back to the fashionable vintage shops by the college.

Happy Hour was an important event of the evening.

Burritos and mac n' cheese were our staples.

And still, we had no money.

The Skateboarder, since he was only paying me 150 bucks to live there, was supposed to split the jobs associated with being the apartment manager, like vacuuming the halls, taking out the trash in the laundry room, and keeping the recycling area clean. But he never did. And I guess I never pressured him.

I never made my credit card payments and my interest rates sky-rocketed. I bounced checks and was always being charged huge bank fees. Up until then, I had been living on student loans and I had been working, but I just did not have a plan. And then, my big plan was to go back to school and incur even more debt. I called and had all the application fees waived.

I drove without insurance. I got parking tickets. I drove a car that did not have any reverse for two years.

I took the greyhound home for the holidays. Once they went on strike and I had to spend the night in the downtown bus station because nobody could come pick me up and I didn't have money for a cab.

I must be thinking of all this because I am unemployed. And ineligible for benefits. And trying to do a different kind of work than what I am used to. I must be thinking of all this because suddenly the future looks like a really blank slate. And that can be scary. I must be thinking of all this because I look back to see who is she gonna be.

I Heart My Job

2006-01-26T19:34:00.001-08:00

Would it be ridiculous if I said I f$#@*g love my job? And mostly I mean, I love where I work. Because mostly I mean, I am actually unemployed and in reality working for myself. And the best part is I am a great boss to work for! Thanks to a small grant from the government, I can afford to do this for approximately one month. I just need to figure out how working for myself can translate into paying the bills on a longer term.

Top Ten Reasons Why I Heart Where I Work

1. Giant Pocky
As if regular-sized Pocky wasn't good enuf.

2. Bubble Tea
Everywhere I turn my head there are bubble tea shops with a million different flavors. I love soy mango. I love the huge straws. I love huffing up the giant tapioca balls.

3. Banh Mi Sandwiches
$2.75. I repeat two-fucking-seventy-five!

4. Dim Sum
Also ubiquitous. Also extremely affordable. Also fresh hot steaming dumplings and instant gratification.

5. It's bustling
OK, we've finally gotten off the subject of food. People are walking around here. And I, in turn, walk around, too. It's so bustling, in fact, people are actually shoving each other. Out of the way. And I love it.

6. Sanrio
And stationary stores. And Afro Ken. And puffy stickers. And Totoro. And gorgeously misspelled notebooks, envelopes, t-shirts that say things like the sun is gentle sea time. And then, it really makes you think about it.

7. Chinese New Year
Friends, it is about to turn year of the dog, and I, my friends, was born year of the dog. And who doesn't love all that gold foil paper and firecrackers?

8. The fortune cookie factory next door to me
It smells great all the time. I love walking by it. And a giant bag only costs a buck seventy five.

9. The office adjacent to ours teaches adults English
All day long I hear people shouting with great enthusiasm: the alphabet, my name is..., and fun 3 letter words.

10. Crazy fashions
Not only are there shops with some intriguing rhinestone, applique and florescent sweatshirts, there are people walking around in the streets rocking the same rhinestone, applique and florescent sweatshirts.

My Hero and also the woman I hate. Scroll down to CLICK HERE

The Last Day

2006-01-23T08:11:00.000-08:00

Thursday was my last day of work. I am trying hard to come up with things I will miss; surfing the internet on someone else's dime, that horrible commute, my obnoxious boss, the chronic back pain from sitting in a chair all day--uh, nope. Ok, maybe that fist thing. With the advances we've made in technology, I can still surf the internet at home, but it's just not the same thing. I mean, now that I'm not getting paid for it, it's just not as much fun to see who bids on that Tony Danza tee circa Who's The Boss? I guess, I'll have to find a new hobby to fill all my time.
All my time.
Yikes.
The other thing is that I am moving. Out of my house. And I love my house. My house is cute. It's charming. It has a fireplace, for chrissakes, inlaid wood! Some would even call it a Craftsman! What the hell am I doing? The snowball is rolling and I just want to scream, stop!
I have plenty to do what with moving and looking for work and my secret project I'd really like to finish before I move. But I wanted you all to know.
It's Monday morning.
9 AM.
And I am in my pajamas and bathrobe.
Drinking coffee.
And it feels quite lovely.

Today's awkward confession

2006-01-18T13:04:00.000-08:00

_{Ana Mendieta's "Untitled (Body Tracks)"}

There are a few things you should know about me.

I fall in love on the first date. It's not like love at first sight. It's more like, I just know whether or not I could fall in love with you. And then it's up to you, whether or not I do. I have, on occasion, been pleasantly surprised. As I have, on more than one occasion, been not. At times it seems--to me anyway--as if I am perhaps not that picky. And although I find that thought more than a little frightening, I guess it also means I am a pretty open person.

But what I really would like to confess here is that I have this bad habit. Let's call it the projection habit. It's sorta similar to when you think you are going to die and you see your life flash in front of your eyes. That happens to me with, oh say, men of a certain age. It could happen with the suit next to me on the airplane, the tow-truck driver as he changes my flat, the school teacher with the brown-bag lunch patiently waiting at the subway stop. Suddenly and quickly, I see my life flash forward with this person. I see us falling in love, I see us moving in together, I see us growing old. I see the details: the coffee I bring him before work, what he looks like asleep in bed in the morning, the empty plates after a mid-week meal. It's nothing I can stop, it's nothing I have control over, and it only gets worse the older I get.

It's rather embarrassing and I can't believe I just told you.

But it's kind of funny, too. With the suit it's me bringing him coffee. With the tow-truck driver, it's a can of Schlitz and with the middle school teacher, it's freshly squeezed orange juice.

Sigh.

There are many things to worry about. And then there are just things. I'm trying to learn the difference. I'm trying not to be one of those night-guard-wearing women. I'm trying to live in the moment. I'm trying, well, let's just stick with that: I'm trying. For the time being I have all of my fingers attached--minus the bit of an index finger I lost in a soup accident. I have one or two skills under my hat. I have wit. I have composure. And I have at least a few more mistakes to make.

Keep your fingers crossed.

Be Bold v 2.0, Now New and Improved

2006-01-14T14:45:00.000-08:00

Last night, a friend of mine told me about an idea she pitched for a magazine. It was to be bold every day in some big or small way and then write about her experiences. Never mind that this was for some O-style women's rag, The Bachelorette and I loved this idea immediately and were begging her to be participants. Who couldn't use a good dose of Be Bold v 2.0? BB v 1.8 is so 2005!

We would check in daily, be witness to each other's boldness, and the article could be about our cumulative experiences. I'm thinking she could call it, Big, Bad and Bold. Hell, with a title like that we'd be pretty well-positioned for world domination (or at least, one helluva good name for a line of cosmetics).

So where to begin? What does BB v2.o look like? Sound like? Smell like? Uh, maybe we can skip that last one But, chances are the answers would be unique to each of us. Personally, I think quitting my job and moving to a new city without nary a plan qualifies me for about a year's worth of boldness. But you already made those decisions, The Bachelorette informs me as if I don't already know. So like the rest of them, I, too, have to start at the starting line.

Quickly, we discount dating and relationships with the mens. We can only use that, like, once, because it's simply too obvious. And that would just get boring and predictable for our readers. Yeah, we could ask the hot cashier at Trader Joe's we've been crushed out on for months for a date. Yawn. Sure, we could call that loser that dumped us back and tell him how we really feel. Snooze. And, hey, that's what Harlequin's are for. Another round of drinks and we move on to the badder of the ideas.

The Bachelorette suggests she shave her head. But you just got such cute hair cut! I shout back. I suggest moving to New York and then we decide maybe a combination of the two could work. But wait a minute, this is BB v. 2.0, why not move to Argentina, why not sell all our things and travel the globe? Why not become ex-pats? Why not make a film about it? A memoir? A reality show? We try to think about things our mothers couldn't do at our age bogged down with children and husbands and households. In the process, we end up getting off track and cursing women's liberation for giving us too many choices. We curse our high ideals, our unrealistic expectations, our empty beds. We curse our extended adolescence that leaves us still reeling like teenagers but inching towards being too old to actually having kids of our own. And then we get back on track, sort of.

There are the bigger ideas. The daily ways in which we could be bold--after all that is what we are supposed to be talking about. We could ask our neighbors over for dinner, the ones that kind of scare us. We could take the time at work to talk with someone whom we really don't know. We could ask that homeless guy about his childhood. We could have real conversations with our parents about things that really matter to us and assume they will understand. We could give a spontaneously give a friend in need 50 bucks. Not loan, but give.

We walk home in the rain. We raise our fists in the air. Tourists keep asking us questions as if we know all the answers. We fall asleep brave and proud and bold.

And then we wake up. What bold thing are you going to do today? awaits me in my mailbox. I honestly respond that I feel a little hungover and well, not terribly bold. Plus it's all rainy out, I didn't sleep well and...What about you?

No, nothing at all.

Which goes to show, we are all looking for a little bit of inspiration.

Last Year's Resolutions

2006-01-10T13:31:00.000-08:00

So I have been busy quitting my job, painting my house, boxing up my things and selling a house. I have been having garage sales, looking for a new place to live, revising my career choice, making soups, watching the L Word, and oh, catching up with friends. Yeah, busy. Too busy to actually come up with any New New Year's Resolutions. So let's just stick with the old, kay?
Last Year's Resolutions
1. Learn to bake bread
Since I did not, in fact, learn to master the art of baking bread, the good news is that I can still keep this one as a resolution for '06. I would like to learn at least one extra-curricular activity that I can do really well. I think learning how to bake bread would be more beneficial to my figure than say, learning how to bake cakes , plus it's an activity that can be done standing as opposed to being hunched over a computer. And baking bread smells the best.

2. Memorize all the two and three letter words in Scrabble™
Again, did not happen. This one is part of my plan for Scrabble™ world domination. Since I have too poor of a memory for crosswords, and Soduko™ is, as of yet, not a social sport, and since my family can whoop my butt in charades, this is one game in which I actually have the chance to take someone down. So what, if it's my four-year old niece?

3. Internet date
OK, this one we actually got closer on. Interrupted periodically by non-internet dating; I think the coast is now clear, we can proceed full steam ahead. Just as soon as I take the perfect picture and write the perfect profile and come up with the perfect witty handle.

Which brings us to the more vague, chronic resolutions:

4. Figure out what I want to do with my life, get in shape, eat better food, take control of my finances, be happy.
Whew, I can check all those off my list! It's good to know I can now concentrate on more important things, like, learning calligraphy and mastering tether ball.

Just Drive She Said

2006-01-02T08:39:00.000-08:00

If you know me, chances are you've heard me mention my life-changing-drive-across-the-country about a million times. The drive actually occurred what seems like ions ago, but its impression is still fresh. We took 3 weeks to reach one coast, intentionally got lost, and frequented the local watering hole every stop we made. To wit, we drank our way across this great land of ours and I danced with a lot of coyboys.

To pass the time--and since I was verboten to drive the stick shift driveaway we were delivering to Boston--I read aloud to the man in the front seat. It was odd that I didn't get car sick as normally I do. But I guess my body's equilibrium adjusted to all that constant motion. Well, one of the short stories I read was Annie Proulx's Brokeback Mountain. It has since been one of my most dearly beloved short stories. It didn't help matters much that I was extremely crushed out on the man in the front seat with whom I was driving. Oh, and that he wanted nothing to do with me--at least not in the sense I was after.

Well, the other night we went to see Brokeback Mountain, the major motion picture. Me and the same man in the front seat that I read that story to some 4 years ago. I no longer have the crush, and we have remained good friends. And the movie was good and all, but sometimes, some things are just much bigger when they can remain in your imagination. I feel like the short story I read on that road trip has been snatched away from me and replaced by something much more generic and pedestrian.

Anyway, I look forward to finding someone to whom I can again read aloud my favorite short stories. Preferably in bed.

Here's to 2006.