amid the blur

how can my life involve this one moment

and this mere hours later?

i suppose every moment cannot reek of bombast and whimsy, but seriously.
*
d is being inscrutable. why is it so difficult for (occasionally) heterosexual men to merely be friends? the best male friends in my life are gay. every other man i know shifts manically between swarthy and aloof. perhaps they just don't like me as a person and sexuality has nothing to do with it. that, however, is a particularly depressing theory.
we finished our 3-week stint of lomi lomi today. the class ended with a 20-minute massage trade, full-body, set to "native rhythms." i was face-down with nothing on but a sheet covering the crack of my ass. my skin is still viscuous with oil residue. we were told that lomi lomi will 'change your views of massage', and it is true. the all-encompassing, whole-body experience was awesome- both to give and to receive.
after class i mailed my application to take the boards. it's $195 to apply to take the exam; eventually they contact you with a test time, and then the state of washington has to dink around until they process the license. sending it off was rather thrilling. bittersweet. i walked out of the downtown post office into the muggy glare of 3rd ave and thought "what the fuck happens next?"
i have talked with people about pitching in on a 'co-op' environment- splitting the rent and creating a space. i don't want to do massage full-time, at least to start, and i don't want to feel isolated, and i don't want to work for anyone else. i still have the fantasies of a communal environment with doors that can be closed if need be. i am even toying with the possibility of finding a roommate, but that would involve leaving my fabulous (though rarely inhabited) lair.
chicago, et al, is temporarily sidelined. i guess.
the table next to me is enjoying a platter of mussels. i love presse. i love that i can sit here in my 'well that just sucks' scrabble t-shirt and lomi-oily hair and drink portuguese wine by candlelight, next to groups of well-heeled couples and girl nights and earnest men with newspapers. these are the moments when i remember how fucking glad i am to live the life i do.
the sky outside is that vibrant cobalt that occurs just after the sun sets. everything is especially outlined.
i just set up a meeting to procure something from a classmate. it's been decades, seriously, since i've done this- not waited politely for someone to offer it. but i've been stressed, and my face feels weird, and i have a neuro appointment on the 8th that may or may not include another mri, and my condition, as it is, is covered (however feebly) by state law. and i love making my world a wee bit more unusual. i think about moments like new years '08, when i was too stoned to go onto the roof and watch the fireworks- his skin was so much more compelling. the next day, feeling cottony and dull at work, i berated myself for not watching them. that is the problem i have with pot- the mundane* becomes fascinating, but possibly at the expense of the fantastic. then again, i passively wait for all things amazing to fall into my lap and rarely reach out to grab. this is a horrible tendency that exists whether i am sober or not.
*not that there was anything mundane about that specific situation
last night i went to a friend's going-away party. we ended up at someone's house. opening the front door was like walking into an animal's axilla: four dogs, three cats, an iguana, a bearded dragon, a cockatiel, a sun conure (that charged the cage, fluffed out and hateful, every time anyone walked past), a hermit crab (that i dropped on the wood floor). i left while everyone else was getting drunk on coors light. "i have a massage in the morning" i said, feeling responsible. today i did craniosacral and reflexology on k before class started. it's getting easier to feel grounded... but being grounded is also intimidating as hell.
there's so much i purposely don't let myself notice. walking around today, i made a point to make eye contact with everyone i passed. bless their hearts, they all looked back, and most of them smiled.

smelling other people's meat

from 2pm 19 aug 09:
seattle-bainbridge ferry, ~82 degrees F. a swarthy man with beaded sweat was trying to, i guess, hit on me. he was a smarmy 'lawyer from michigan' 'in town for the ring opera.' the first question out of his mouth was 'so what do you do?' god, i hate americans.
i am skipping class -lomi lomi, no less- to be in the open air. i feel guilty about this. my motivation is faltering badly, as it always does around the 5-week mark of the term. i just want to fall in love and enjoy the summer and have adventures... so i am looking at a keyboard instead of at the scenery, listening to children scream and chase one another across the deck. i woke at 545am after sleeping for three hours. i must have been dreaming; the first thing i remembered was smacking the headboard rather violently with the back of my hand. the sun peeked over the mountains at 613am. i made a caprese salad with tofu*, balsamic, and beth's garden-fresh basil. the 9am staff meeting lasted all of 45 minutes; i took a large bowl of fruit salad home. reread 'a paper life' and 'the devil's dictionary' whilst laying on the deck. blared 'change' whilst hating my wardrobe. it was sometime midmorning that the idea of massage seemed rather unpalatable; i don't want to fuck with the bag, with sheets, with being present. i shamefully realize that i can truly be adept at only one or two facets of my life at any given time... if that.


now, 930pm. i spent the afternoon wandering around winslow, remembering how tedious and twee that town is. surely a small community doesn't need a yoga studio and an ayurvedic chalet on every fucking corner. i was mildly heartened to see an honest-to-god trailer park, albeit across the street from some tastefully "homey" spankin'-new condos.
i acquired a sunburn. there were no visible jellyfish in the bay. it was pretty... i just felt ephemeral, a disinterested witness to other people's lives. couples were posing with the seattle skyline in the background. sunlight shimmered through hair. i craved some sort of portable music; it would have been a perfect moment to zone out with a song. i am probably the only person in the fucking first world without so much as a goddamn walkman.
i always feel a surge of adoration when i disembark in seattle. it's a nice place to call home.
*
last night a man, possibly transient, definitely inebriated, stumbled up to me at the bus stop and simulated masturbation. "are you fucking kidding me?" i shouted at him. i cocked my pepper spray, finger on the trigger. "i will fucking mace you if you do not back the fuck away." i charged at him. i wasn't really thinking logically, other than the fact that he did not provoke any intimidation in me whatsoever. he staggered into the street and a car slowed down to avoid hitting him. i lost sight of him after that. it was one in the morning at the socially-diverse corner of 3rd and pike and i spent the next ten minutes waiting for my bus whilst glaring into space and being quite aware that no one else waiting offered anything more during our 'altercation' than a furtive glance.
that really pissed me off, actually. perhaps they suspected that i had the situation under control, but i am more inclined to believe that people don't want to get involved in other people's shit, no matter how welcome their involvement might be.
if there's one thing the last month has taught me (though obviously, there are many, many things), it's that i'm not half as boo!-scary as i fancied i was. feigned poise and a sense of purpose means fucking nothing when they can simply tap you and knock you down.
that, i'm sure, helped contribute to my mood today. i'm just done. it'll pass. i want to be not fucked with. in every respect. surely it is not that lofty an ambition, except that it is.
i meet d in about an hour. we have plans to go swing dancing. we've already gone once and it was fucking marvelous. he first taught me the charleston on the sidewalk of 19th. passers-by politely dodged us; more than a few smiled.

today is the first day in about 3 weeks that my face hasn't felt funky. i blame the lack of sleep, copious caffeine, and abundant vitamin d.

*tofu is a horrible farce of a substitute for fresh mozzarella. vegan caprese salad is a sad thing indeed.

rise up singing

i go through flux. i won't write for months, then i'll write greedily for weeks at a time. it's not as if i get more insightful or articulate, obviously- perhaps 'manic' is the preferred apa term.
one of my favorite houses in seattle, revisited.

i get off a stop too late on purpose, just to walk past this. it's near 16th and john. tonight the neighbors, in the yard of their well-groomed lair, were industriously hosing their lawn in the wake of today's heat. this house, meanwhile, languishes in a downright regal manner. i would love to be a little kid in this neighborhood. i would spend hours devising ways to break in and discover the ghosts.
fuck, i'm doing that anyway. i walk by and plot how i'd break in. i took d by it one night. "i LOVE this house!" i bleated lustily. "check the meters to see if it's occupied" he suggested. his logic explained the blurry, unintelligable photos i found on my camera that next morning; i'd taken wobbly-handed pictures of the electric meters at ~11pm one night, sans flash, trying not to appear suspicious.
*
this is another favorite, on 12th S in the ID. i have loved this house for years. it has a tattered, jaundiced quality and seems clumsily out of place, stucco'd as it is. it also has a yard that suggests absenteeism, or at least indifference. i stood on the opposite corner to take this picture.

i went to a free show of the cave singers tonight. it was hot and sultry; i was packed against the used jazz cds with mere glimpses of the band through various sweat-soaked shoulders. my skin was slick. people were taking the dividers out of the cd racks to fan themselves with. after, i walked through seattle center and down 2nd avenue. the light was uniformly flattering. i found myself singing "wishin' and hopin'" as i walked.

(i love gerry rafferty. there, i said it.)

the corner of broadway & john, as dubiously reported months ago as being grazed for the mythical 'light rail' station (eta 2014?) has been... paved. the block on which i once stayed at a filthy hostel, read battered used erotica, bought piroshkies, and who knows what else, is now a fucking parking lot... minus the parking.

d and i acting immaturely at the 5 point.

i am addicted to these fucking nicotine lozenges. i finally read through one of the 'smoking cessation' pamphlets that come in every (expensive) box. one is meant to wean themselves off of these over an approximately 12wk period. the box even comes with chipper little stickers to place on your calender; the last one says "EX-SMOKER". well, i have not done this. 13.5 months later, i am still sucking on at least 10 4mg tabs a day. i tried the gum but it was fucking vile. i also tried simply *not* using the lozenges, but it turned me into a shrill, snively harpy. fucking nicotine. i love it, but i hate being 'reliant' on anything.
the cherry ones are currently my favorite. the mint ones are okay. i have not tried the 'cappucino' flavor yet, and i promise i never will.

the only thing less alluring than this blatant oral fixation? taking pictures of myself with the goddamn things in my mouth.
*
i am sitting at a cafe right now. a woman just came by my table, looking for extras for a 'thee emergency' video currently being filmed a few blocks away. instead i will be at d's in an hour to practice lomi lomi. time marches on.

feeling it

a stall at pike place market sells handcrafted glass beads. i love happy slices of the world... this 12" square of space rivals the window of different colors of glass at the stained-glass shop on N 45th for immediately improving whatever mood i'm in.

as of one week ago, fred fucking meyer was still shilling michael jackson merchandise. modern culture is so fucking hypocritical. i will always have fond memories of wandering chicago and hearing "billie jean" and "rock with you" blaring out of open car windows every time i stopped at an intersection. other than that, fuck it.

i predict this shall be the next 'architectural' casualty of downtown seattle. it was impossible to get a better angle; the alleyway is barricaded by construction fence. this motel shares a block with top pot donuts and a vacant lot where the dollar movie theater with the wacky orange roof and sticky floors used to be. i loved that theater. i think i saw 'pulp fiction' there once.

the cafe i'm at went from steve miller to the magnetic fields. i received a luxurious 90 minute massage in my lair as modest mouse's 'the fruit that ate itself' played 4 times on repeat. walked downtown in the mugginess, ate free caramel popcorn, read a trashy magazine, watched a photo shoot of some skateboard company. 'tis a good day.
i often wonder how i can even contemplate living anywhere else. but after all, there is time for everything. opportunities are rampant if i remember to pay attention.
*
A pirate walks into a bar, and he's got a steering wheel sticking out of his pants. The bartender sees him and asks, "Hey, what's that steering wheel doing there?" The pirate says, "Aaarrrr, it's driving me nuts."

in the army now

i have always been reticent to 'compartmentalize' myself, but i am most assuredly not a fucking 'goth'. wtf, aka d, aka t, 'is'. last friday we went to his friend astro's birthday party at the mercury, a member's-only Goth Club. because it is a 'club' and therefore not regulated by the state LCB, one can smoke cigarettes inside. hilariously enough, i ended up squashed at a banquette of about twelve surly assholes in ill-fitting garb of varying shades of black, only two of whom i knew, of which at least six were smoking cigarettes at any given time. i felt like a fucking dork, but i actually went outside for fresh air. once in the alley, i got into a very entertaining and nerdy conversation with someone about his camera.
i asked wtf if astro would mind me taking his picture. "are you kidding? he'd fucking love it."

but you know what? 'goths', or rather, people who 'self-identify' as anything at all, are fucking jerks. i was reprimanded by the wench of a mute boy who resembled the character 'powder' for using my flash in the light-free club. "he has photosensitivity" she said curtly. i apologized. he ignored me. it was so cliche as to be comical- ooh, pussy-whipped goth boy adverse to light! how dramatic! why don't you lay your pale hand across your beleagured forehead?- but i'd had two drinks by that point and the time i'd spent in that depressing hellhole had made me surly and intolerant. "i have to leave NOW" i hissed to wtf, who had my keys in his apartment. he agreed, once we were in the fresh air, that a lot of the people there were dickheads. he cross-dressed for me for the first time that night. he does not pass at all, but he certainly took a long time to get ready.
i didn't wash the eye shit off before going to bed that night, although i was very careful to change my clothes. i put my sweater on the deck to desmokify. it has since been rained on.
*
i finally finished 'confessions in a golden eye' last night. i recommend it. it's not great, but it is a slight mindfuck.
i am currently siphoning wifi at a place that hosts drag queen revue. i have heard 'the boogie woogie bugle boy' more times than i know. they are rehearsing behind a half-drawn curtain. i have stumbled upon a private eschelon of hell. i can never listen to this song again.
*
'don't focus on what the world expects from you. focus on what makes you glow.'

katman-don't

addendum: the murderer was in pennsylvania, at an "LA Fitness" health club, not in california (where LA is located), as previously reported. i apologize for the fucking error.
that onus has been bothering me for several days, anal-retentive that i am. this is my first chance to amend it. i am sure i am the only one who cares.
*
i started on my new schedule this week. the economy is not significantly better, but three people have left ACCES and we have all returned to FT hours to absorb their shifts. i work 3 13hr shifts now, which i requested... it's fine at the time but today, watching the demo for craniosacral holds, i nodded off on the sofa at school. monday is a long day. i have class 1-5p and clinic 6-10p. 3 shots of espresso helped. now i am inconveniently wired. this tends to be my pattern.
i noticed a few weeks ago that i am finally fucking confident. i give a really good massage. i actually know how to 'ground' and 'be present' and quell the dithering nattery in my brain. i have spent the prior year demurely declining giving people massages when they find out i'm in school- because i've been scared shitless. no more. today i gave three massages- one craniosacral, one a 'relaxation' massage, one with focus on the back and subscaps with more cranio thrown in. i made three different individuals almost or completely pass out. it rained during tonight's clinic; the city smells like wet dust. as i walked out of school, sidestepping puddles, i thought "fuck, i can actually do this." it's a really good, really unexpected feeling.
i am so glad i have this life.
*
yesterday a woman brought her cat to my work. she'd been missing for a week and reappeared on her porch. "i bathed her but she still smells really bad" the woman said. i took her to the ICU, unwrapped her from her towel, and a torrent of huge maggots spurted out of a necrotic wound on her hip. i really don't mind maggots- they are fascinating in their industry!- but i dislike being surprised by them. the doctor was dry-heaving while doing her exam. maggots skittered out of the wound and into the cat's anus, out of the anus and into the cat's vagina. and the cat, seemingly numb to the nightmarishness occuring in her own body, was purring the entire time.
*
the owner, who turned out to be a (human) physician, was oblivious to the maggotry until the doctor told her. she was horrified and apologized repeatedly to us "for bringing in the most disgusting animal of the night."
the cat's name is sophie.
and maggots do not drown when thrown in water. they must be squashed to die.
*
a conversation ensued among my coworkers as to what maggot infestation must feel like. "i suspect it's a ticklish sensation" i said, scratching the cat's head through a latex glove.
*
i washed my hands a lot last night.
*
the depeche mode concert should be letting out soon. they're playing at the fucking key arena, two blocks away. the patrons at the bar are loudly disbaraging the band "and the douches who went." i have no desire to ever see depeche mode, but i wore the 'violator' album out in 1996. i was working at a coffee house in anchorage and closed the place by myself. it was my cleaning-up album (occasionally changed out with sinead o'connor's 'i do not want what i haven't got' and 'jimi hendrix greatest hits'). depeche mode reminds me of espresso grounds and the smell of windex. it was a happy era for me, and that means a lot.
*
i love the people i know.

ironies

i have unwittingly stumbled onto a Magic gathering. this is quite surreal. i thought the guys at the table next to me were painters, for fuck's sake, and even leaned over to say "wow, that's really lovely"- i thought their boards were their artwork, like they were debating how to proceed with some fanciful ad copy, and that their boxes were full of pastels. "another centaur?" one of the men just lamented. i possess the only vagina in the room.
today a man murdered three women at a health club in california. parts of his blog were cited online. he was a sick, fantastically miserable fuck. the accompanying picture looked scarily nondescript.
"soldier soldier soldier soldier - levitation - death!" another Magic boy announces.
*
loneliness seems to be the fulcrum of his madness. nothing will fuck up a human mind more devastatingly.
people on the comment board for the article were making lascivious comments about the picture. "i'd hit that" one wrote. "he's in really good shape, although his eyes creep me out."

my body is fucking with my head

i found a button of paul pfeiffer! sonic boom was selling a rack of pins near the cash register with a sign proclaiming "nerds!" it was a toss-up between this and the comic book guy. it lives on my bag now. alas, i have received no comments about it yet.

my face feels like it belongs to someone else. i just spent 5 minutes in front of a bathroom mirror, testing different expressions to make sure all my muscles work. they do. but it feels like someone has poured cement on my skin... a heavy pressure, unnervingly clausterphobic. how much is my 'disease' and how much is just me? this tends to happen when i am chronically exhausted. this is the more likely reason... i have been waking up tired for the last week or so. sleep inconveniences me. i always worry that i'm missing something. i like MS for this- it is a physical bitch-slap to take more prudent care of myself.

that said, i am at a cafe with a gin and tonic. it's only 9pm, after all. the night, in my mind, is still young, even if i feel internally starched and therefore rather subdued and isolated.

*

this building on the corner of terry and howell (downtown seattle) has always appealed to me. it has a hideous, stumpy, dated quality; someone designed this with ambitions of what: a passe version of beauty? pure functionality? it never has fit in with its surroundings, which i admire. but part of me quietly suspected, especially once all the vile (and vacant) high-rises started sprouting up around it, that it was not long for this world.

today i was proven correct. god damn it, anyway.

i love its imposing angularity! it was probably an insurance company once. sadly, i don't even remember.

it has already been tagged by amateurs.

we finished reflexology and have started craniosacral manipulation. the instructor, pete, is the same teacher i had for muscular anatomy & kinesthiology (a 2-term purgatory). i had been warned that teaching the craniosacral classes "brings out his woo-woo." (that sounds filthy; i am merely quoting.) ten minutes into yesterday's class he was talking about 'power animals' and how 'we all have a spirit we identify with.' this was related to a tale he told about a friend of his who was visiting fairbanks, alaska (!) and happened upon a whale bone for sale in a gift shop. (i was sprawled on the floor, doodling, cynically wondering if selling whale bones was even legal. i never fucking noticed. my parents still have a 12' strip of baleen that they regularly polish with floor wax, but they bought it from a guy in togiak on the sly.) apparently this friend of his was mystically drawn to this whale bone "and realized at that moment that the whale was his power animal" pete said earnestly. "it was very expensive, but he bought it and brought it back to washington."
i was so close to making a smartass comment about oosiks, but i didn't. god damn it, i should have.
i have always pretended to be far more cynical about life than i truly am. i am actually the most gullible, idealistic person i know. but i was cringing inwardly at the, well, 'woo-woo' of it all -this is why massage has such a flaky rap! do i have to start liking fucking waterfall music next? are you going to tell me about my past life as a fucking princess?- until we did our first c-s exercise: the suboccipital cradle. son of a bitch, it was cool. i can't explain it properly without making myself want to vomit at the bona fide frippery of it all, but it was... buzzy. i felt my partner's occiput release beneath my right pinky finger. c-s is essentially 'listening to bone': feeling the fluid slosh around inside the skull, achieving balance, transferring energy. it requires complete focus on your partner and your own grounding.
maybe that's really what it's all about- focus. if properly focused, it is very difficult to fuck up anything. being receptive to what your 'client', for lack of a better term, is feeling, makes it impossible to give a shitty massage.
this can also be said of making love.
god, i sound like a fucking fruit.
today the ascerbity returned to the pedagogy. stickel, the abrasive little man, was teaching business. we are pretending to be motivated about our career plans once we graduate. "geezer massage will be the next big thing!" he announced. "this is the self-indulgent generation." we critiqued actual job listings and resumes that he'd pulled off craigslist. "yeah, this one sucks" he said dismissively. "and she went to school here."
*
i am always on the lookout for new and exotic seafood.

hotter than balls

it is 104 degrees in seattle, washington. i don't even own a fan. it's been in the upper nineties all week and will stay this way until at least saturday. i have been sleeping downstairs with an ice pack, the ones that come with my meds that i've thoughtfully saved in the freezer. the cats are miserable, sprawled out like victims of a cattle abortion storm. i will post pictures later, for it really is pathetic.
i am skipping class today because we're doing body wraps. having my skin slathered with shit is quite near the top of my "things i absolutely don't want to experience right now" list. and i have to work in tacoma at 7pm. i called yesterday to see if someone else wanted the shift; someone who, say, actually lived in tacoma and had AC in their car. the message was lost, or perhaps never written down. so i am taking a very long time driving to the bowels of pierce county, directly into the sun, surrounded by horrible traffic, an ice pack melting in my lap. sadly, it is cooler in my car than it is in my lair, for at least my car, with all the windows rolled down, generates a bit of breeze- when the car's not stuck in fucking traffic, that is.
heat makes me grouchy. i hate its inescapability.
everything in new orleans, at least, was air-conditioned.
last night t skipped class and we walked along the waterfront. i was in a pissy mood. his mental issues occasionally irritate the shit out of me- i get so impatient with what i see as his self-sabotage. and yet he's one of the most reasonable and self-aware people i've ever met... talking later helped enormously. we went to charlie's and ate fries. it was still 85 degrees at one am, so i dragged him out of his oppressive blood-red-walled apartment to the fountain at cal anderson. there were a lot of people still out, talking, playing in the water. it felt like a comfortable bath. we sat against the cistern and i took pictures of my feet, every bit a cliche.
*
today is geddy lee's 56th birthday- the man, not the cat.
*
"fuck 'em and feed 'em fish." -tony curtis

pull me by my hair and hang me from the heavens

the problem with good moments is that they fucking END. the glory passes and i am left with a jangled, unfinished caul over everything. that was yesterday. and it's hanging on, a bit, despite its pointlessness. life can be extraordinary. i should feel fortunate to be so reminded.
*
in the midst of this lovely spell, d told me he wants to be with me. he wrote me a letter on tuesday. it was a letter that blew my mind and made me cry and caused me to laugh vapidly whilst walking down the street by myself. however: i had written this off as a possibility a long, long time ago, for multiple and extremely good reasons, any one of which would be more than sufficient. our friendship has progressed to the point where the thought of being anything more would seem incredibly awkward. it would be like fucking a brother- a very, very confused and fucked-up brother who is way too effeminate and smokes too much and listens to the scissor sisters (who are, i guess, okay in very small doses) and swings both ways and these are only the minor, superficial things... traits that are endearing and which make him who he is, and make him someone i adore, but not what i would want in a, perish the term, boyfriend. i know what i want. i know what makes me excited, happy, interested, hungry for more, impatient to explore. and i don't think he's it.
i don't know.
i have had to talk myself out of liking him too much since i first met him.
*
yesterday i was subsisting on three hours of sleep and a sluggish sensation of remorse- when s left and i was driving away from the airport, the sun was shining and 'don't do me like that' was on the radio and i sang along as loudly as i could whilst wiping fucking tears out of my eyes like a silly little girl. i miss him in an empty, achy way. and then i feel stupid. and then i feel happy to be alive and able to experience the emotions that make us human.
we had the first spa modality class in school yesterday. i gave and recieved my first hot stone massage. it was fucking luscious, actually. it's slippery and oily and warm and wonderful and may help me get over my lifelong spa bias. i am planning a trek to hwy 2 next week to forage for proper rocks (basalt, flat, <8") to try the techniques at home. the teacher is one of my favorites, a sarcastic and abrasive little man who has taught our research and neuromuscular courses in prior terms. he was quite explicit about the pervasity of spa work. apparently 70-80% of massage therapists end up working in some form of spas... which i am revulsed by, as i still see my little ADA-disapproved garret with the acid house decor and fucking pete sinfield soundtrack, offering relaxation without the goddamn salt scrubs and aromatherapy... but the hot stones, like i said, are really fucking cool, so i will try to be more open-minded. as the teacher said, "we end up taking the first job we can and end up working for crooks, assholes, and dipshits."
d and i met last night. he asked what i thought about what he'd said. "your timing is terrible!" i blurted. it was a rather uncomfortable evening. i drank two drinks very quickly while he nursed one. there was a parking ticket on his car when we left the bar. he dropped me off and we hugged. nothing more was established. i entered my empty apartment, lights still blazing, and took a valium. i leaned against the wall and watched the cats sleep. i watched cars on the freeway. and i distinctly thought "there's more than this, because i have proof."
*
this morning i made raita for 'employee appreciation week'. i made something up. i carmelized onions with salt, cumin, garam masala, and garlic, let it cool, and mixed it into whole milk yogurt with cayenne and a shitload of fresh cilantro. i dropped it off at work earlier. people said it was good. i should cook more, if only because i love chopping things.
'horehound' is a fucking brilliant, filthy, amazing album. it is more suited for a dark room and raunchy sex than a hot car and sunny traffic, but it's helped me a lot today.
*
and i miss my fucking camera.

liberty: once a dream, now a bar

i am antsy as fuck. as usual. i will be in chicago in 48 hrs. my last final will be finished. i am seeing chicago as an opportunity to assess possible relocations- it's been on my fantasy radar for a while, despite its flatness- and, if nothing else, take a picture of myself interlocked within the constantly fluctuating reflections of the bean. i am almost more excited to see this stupid, probably underwhelming thing than i am to see van der graaf, actually.


i remember waxing hippie-poetic about the marvel of the bean. "it's, like, interactive art!" i think i slurred. "that's fucking BRILLIANT." i see the bean as a solid base: it's there, existing, benign. its job ended the day it was planted in whatever public square it inhabits. its livelihood, from that point forward, is solely dependent on the flux of its passerby- the way the sun hits the metal, the reflections of tourists in ill-fitting shorts and teenagers kissing and dogs being walked and day turning to night. it is never the same thing from one second to the next. it is art that is created by its environment. i could even go so far as to liken it to the grandiose miasma of Life Itself: always fluctuous, always changing, blink-and-ya-miss-it, a completely different angle and experience from someone else, even when they're standing just beside you- but that would be pretentious, so i shan't.
i have a new computer. my first, i'm-an-adult new computer. it weighs 3# and fits in my man-purse. i fucking love it. this is to blame for my sudden revisiting of writing on this narcissistic shitfest; i've been writing the whole time, just on my steno pad with a ballpoint... it is fascinating to look around and see exactly how many people are on facebook at any given time. the man to the right of me, for example. it comforts me somehow- validates my dorkiness.

i finished app today -anatomy pathology and physiology- and have one final left, for assessment, charting, and a massage based on the 'client's' needs. i am doing shockingly well in massage school, considering i haven't studied for shit and am rather burnt/indifferent on the whole thing. i did not study at all for the final yesterday and got 102% on the test- extra since i could blather about how urine is created in the kidneys. this makes me feel good, but guilty- guilty because i have no fucking idea as to how i'm supposed to apply this to my life, and when everyone asks me "so what are you going to do when you graduate?" i simper lamely "try to get into more school so i can push my loans out." i never had a dream of being a massage therapist. ever! BUT:


i am intensely interested in hospice care. i want to be the person who holds their hand. i want to reacquaint people with the bodies that have turned against them by way of disease. i want people to relax and be happy within their 'home.' that sounds so fucking fruity when i write it but: it is why i am in massage school. we have to do a case study next term: 5 visits with a client to address a specific condition. i want to find someone who needs reacquaintance with their body- they have alienated themselves from their physical needs via indifference, abuse, whatever. you have a fucking knee injury? i don't give a fuck. you want to increase your flexibility? i don't really give a fuck about that either. you want to feel good within yourself, as a human? allow me to step away and turn on, i don't know, iron & wine or similar. and then- relax.
*
i tend to take a lot on emotionally when i give a massage. it is going to be a detriment if i don't corral this tendency.

*

i was visiting a friend while she was housesitting for my former boss in tacoma. my former boss has an entire display cabinet filled with this:

it's fucking creepy! i enjoyed that sensation of "wow, i'd never have guessed..." but that quickly became "wow, i wish i'd never known."

my battery dies.

time for tea and meet the wife

life is going so fucking well right now.
w has a motivation tool he calls "the deck." a household task is assigned to each one. some are more questionable than others.

this was taken a few weeks ago when it was 89 degrees. narcissism flows eagerly in the lazy morning hours.

and i love this city.

i have three more days of this term, then chicago... and even yet still more intrigue.

don't publish this, self. no, really, don't.

canterbury
sunshine

i am lonely here. i feel that i've been lonely all my life. i want someone, one person, to give a shit. someone who gives a shit and accepts me for who i am- who is honest and communicative, who is grateful to know me, who feels better about themselves because of the adoration with which i look at them. i have met a brief yet appalling string of douchebags since living here- flakes, whores, vague and blase twits. i cannot blame seattle because they -mostly- come from someplace else.
...and i wear my neediness like a fucking veil. i have become part of the problem- unable to hold anyone's gaze, giggling nervously and turning away, eyes glazed over, staring at my journal or anywhere introverted where i can feign distraction- unsure of what i would ever say, and who would want to listen, should i ever have the opportunity to do so.
and i'm fucking mad. i'm pissed. i'm pissed that the 1st photo of b i've seen in 12 years made me squint, then inhale sharply. i'm pissed that what-the-fuck showed up at my house last night with a fucking hickey on his neck and i still gave him a 2 hour massage. i'm pissed that when p said hello i just smiled lamely. i'm pissed that i cut out of class this afternoon and went to georgetown and looked down or away the entire time. i'm pissed that i'm healthy -for who knows how long- and otherwise as successful and fulfilled as i've ever been in my life and i still masturbate on my trampoline. i'm pissed that i'm relieved to come home alone, to my own shit, knowing that i don't have to deal with anyone else. and i'm pissed that i only think about t when i remind myself to, and that something that i thought meant everything never really, and still never really, meant anything at all. anything.
i'm pissed that all my fucking journal entries sound the same. i'm pissed that every time i write, i'm by myself, alone in an empty room, opting for a table rather than a seat at the bar. i'm pissed that i have "be bilingual" as my fucking dream, my plan, and have never fucking achieved it. i'm pissed that my 'art' is limited to intricate doodles in the margins of every page of notes i've taken in massage school- and if that doesn't indicate that perhaps i'm on the wrong path, that my 'skills' may be better utilized elsewhere, what does? i'm pissed that my wrists are sore after using more pressure than i was comfortable with, pressure that he demanded, and his feedback was still snarky. i'm pissed that i didn't disinfect the table as soon as he got off, and that i'll have to before i feel comfortable laying on it again.
i'm pissed that i love this city as much as i do. it makes it really fucking hard to truly think about leaving- and it makes it that much more painful to stay- an unrequited crush, unreasonable, pathetic. i keep passively hoping that *things will happen*. things don't happen. and when they do, when the planets align, the birds sing- things never go as planned. when i crushed out on him 3 years ago i would have never fucking considered the reality i know today. and i'm fucking pissed that i'm forced to be jaded because of such things.
but, god damn it, i'm not. i am still so fucking idealistic and unrealistically hopeful that the cynical, lucid fragments of my brain cringe in disgust. i still believe in love. i believe in respect. goodness. honesty. knowing yourself before allowing someone else to know you. holding them to the same standards. being proud and comfortable with who you are and anticipating the rest of the world to fall into place. this theory does satisfy my annoyingly passive tendencies. this, whether i respect the thought process or not (which i really don't), allows me to justify sitting back and being an untouchable twit, hoping that eventually somebody who is socially inept (except when they approach me!) and disarmingly intelligent (with base-humor tendencies!) will saunter up and make themselves a major, major part of my world.
i hate to say this, hate to admit it: i need other people. i fucking need to feel acknowledged, appreciated, liked. and i don't feel that way very often here. i don't feel that way very fucking often here at all. and i get pissed off at myself most of all- wondering what i should and could be doing differently, what missteps i inadvertantly took along the way, why this is the norm i am both comforted and hungered by.
envy is an accurate sin. i just want what other people have. i want a casual arm around my shoulders, the smell of them against my skin, eye contact, shit-giving. i just want that. and in a mood like tonight it seems that i'm the only person in the world who's by myself. and i hate feeling sorry for myself. it makes me feel ridiculous and vulnerable and highly unlovable. writing it, making it real, is even worse. and the worst part? i will still be glad to go home alone, to wake up alone, to know fairly accurately what the day will hold. i rely on that. i push so much away before it even contemplates approaching.

*verbatim, from my journal, 05/20. making it public makes it comical and therefore not real.

priorities

soundtrack: a.c. newman

yesterday i drove to olympia after school to see my mother. i hadn't been to their house in months and my father was out of town and sunday was mother's day... i arrived about 8pm and she was already 2 glasses into a bottle of wine. i helped her finish the bottle and she eagerly opened another. i drank a total of 3 small glasses over 4.5 hrs and was pretty sober by the time i left; she had consumed, at that point, six glasses in my presence and was probably going to have more.
this is fucking hard on multiple levels.
-my mother is a gross but FUN drunk. she gets very loquacious (more so than usual) and animated and affectionate. i feel like a passive spectator to her one-woman show. quite early in the visit, it was apparent that conversation was going to be, as usual, fairly imbalanced. but her behavior also makes me feel ickily good. i feel like i can amuse her. i can keep her company. we are girlfriends, and i need friends.
-her fun-ness can turn nasty in an instant. she has never switched on me, ever, but she always acts hateful to my father. he, in turn (he usually starts the cycle, actually) treats her poorly, and it creates a horribly fucked-up dynamic that i dread being witness to. i vowed that i would never put myself in that situation, sandwiched between their malice, ever again. i grew up with that shit. i can leave it behind now. i know that she wouldn't have drank nearly so much if he was in town; she even said as much. there was something both giddy and pathetic about how excited she was about this. and i was a fucking enabler, just by being there. and part of me still thinks, "she's a goddamn adult. let her do what she wants. she gets a night off from being judged, she's in a happy mood? fuck it. good for her."
-i brought her an orchid and a... bottle of sake. it was a small novelty bottle of coconut lemongrass sake, on sale at fred meyer, that sounded both repulsive and intriguing. i always bring liquor when i visit my parents. once again, i enable. my weak justification: i know they'll use it. and it's easy. and i am a fucking asshole.
i love my parents to death. and she and i did have some good talks. but, as always, i felt sad and rather worried as i drove away.

ain't no sunshine

according to the lost poster, this cat "bites and swipes!" but his "momma loves him."

today, in the butcher's hill section of baltimore, an ~10year old boy yelled "fuck you, white girl!" at me. he was hanging from his knees on a jungle gym at the time, as kids do. my first reaction was to laugh, to admire his precocious opinions. but the fact that it was the second time in as many hours that i'd had that phrase, virtually verbatim, hollered in my general direction, made it a bit weirder.

i go through life with the naive idea that people are good. people are kind. when rudeness occurs, i blame myself for misinterpreting inocuous moments. when i feel annoyed, i consider it a personal flaw.

people are not always good or kind. people are fucking human. we are flawed, tactless, easily hurt, unwittingly caustic, deliberately cruel. and i shouldn't let it get to me. i should know better.

the sunset tonight was beautiful.

travelling=getting to watch 'goodfellas' on TV at 3am whilst laying atop copious hotel pillows

i woke in my small, less-luxe-than-anticipated room at the fucking sheraton, bleary and jet-lagged, thinking that the cats were screwing around with something. but the source of the noise, at 9am EDT on a saturday morning, 16 floors above the ground, was this:

a fucking window washer! and i hadn't closed my curtains! i hadn't felt it was neccessary... i'm on the 16th floor, god damn it! that, coupled with the noisy shenanigans outside my door at 3am and the placard in the lobby welcoming some fucking fraternity-sorority shindig (whose members were lounging around in hordes, falsely tanned and ballcapped), has made me rather disillusioned. bitch, bitch. i will complain about anything with enough sleeplessness.
i went to the conference today. several of the classes were awesome; one was awesomely dull. it was about 85 and sunny. i decided to leave before the last session and take a stroll. edgar allan poe's grave, at westminster chapel, is about 6 blocks from my hotel. people have put pennies along every ledge of his tombstone. i had no pennies, so i put a nickel in the R.

there is something odd about seeing your shadow cast over a gravesite.

parts of baltimore are gorgeous... like, "i could live here if x, y, and z were different." in other words, i don't know if i ever would live here, but it's lovely. the architecture is ancient and the trees are blooming. front steps abut the sidewalks. it feels like an actual fucking city, unlike the prissy placidity of seattle. and men are pleasantly lascivious here. i have been hit on more times in the past 12 hours than in the 7 years i have lived in the northwest. as a demographic sidenote: they were all non-caucasian, cheerily polite, and smiled widely. and i, dumb girl, smiled back. it is nice to be told i am beautiful and that "i should let my husband know someone thinks his girl is FINE."
little italy is especially picturesque. the streets were deserted, though. the only things open were restaurants with bored workers staring out the windows. and a lot of property is vacant here. a LOT.

it reminds me, almost, of new orleans.

empathetic soothsayer or gullible shit-magnet?

people have inherent radar. addicts find one another; the weak are drawn to the strong. i beckon jobless, unmotivated, overly intelligent flakes with mental issues. i always have. ever since high school, my mother used to call the men i was interested in "my little strays."
*
it's funny but painful. the more coherent and altogether i feel, the more fucked-up the situations i get myself into. i cannot settle for a mundane balance. if there is not preexisting drama i find ways to invent it. i like to take care of people, distract myself from my own bullshit, and not be bored. this is fucked up. i think i deserve better, but not always.
pipes along denny way, shining in the rare 70 degree sun:

the female loo at the five point. i finally got to see the men's toilet, with its space needle periscope- i almost stood in the trough-urinal. the women's facilities are, unfortunately, subpar. the quaint b&w tint belies the lurid green wall tile.

acid mothers temple are fucking good. they are 21st century can.

my parents found this photograph. my mother had these boots since the '70s. i always hoped i'd eventually be able to fit them; she wears a 9 or 10. i wear size 7. i have no recollection of ths picture being taken, but i used to dress up a lot.

true happiness comes from not giving a shit. but giving a shit proves you're alive...

honestly: i like him a hell of a lot. i don't even fucking care what happens, if it's reciprocal, if it's sensible... i am simply loving the feeling of wanting to know more. i love feeling 120% alive.