Unsexy adult situations

As I'm typing this I'm watching a small spider go up and down on his web at face level, about a foot away from me. Is it a good spider or a bad spider? I do not know. My usual desire to destroy it is absent. As a friend once said about the mouse living in his house, "he's doing his thing, I'm doing mine".

I haven't written anything in awhile because my life has been full of adult, rated R type situations. Not the sexy kind but rather the sad kind. Who wants to hear about that? The world is currently fucked enough as it is without me adding more sad stories to it.

I will share this though. Today I was doing some research on the internets and the person I was looking for turned up dead. Four years dead as a matter of fact. This was a somewhat older person but they didn't die of a disease, rather they smashed their car into a tractor/trailer on an interstate somewhere in this great (possibly fucked) country. Instant death, violent, shocking.

Full disclosure: I didn't like this person at all. They had done some pretty bad things, but then they turned around and did some pretty good things. So there was some redemption. The situation I was researching for, would have given them another chance to do good. It is sad. But the more I've seen lately (and these past couple of weeks has been full of seeing) the more I think that things like missed redemption matter less than I previously thought. I'm not sure why I think this. I have been feeling the impermanency of all life and it doesn't scare me that much anymore. Maybe I'm depressed, but I don't think so. I think I'm forming some type of faith in a universe that wil keep on spinning regardless of unsquashed spiders or sudden, violent death. Good actions and bad. It's comforting in a fucked up way. But I'm not sure why.

alone I am nameless, fearless and faceless.

So, the day after I wrote that previous doubting paragraph I had a sweet opportunity come my way. Just a reminder to focus on what I want and the things I have accomplished.

I had a funny, fucked up day yesterday. I'll just give the highlights. I had to take my mom out to the doctor and I almost dumped her out of her wheelchair, totally not on purpose (jeez!). Then we got into an argument. There was some swaring, I think, by me. I should be set on fire. Worst daughter ever.

Then I went to a large chain bookstore. It was very crowded because the lead guitarist of K0rn was signing his book. Not to slam on the his fans, but one has to picture the bookshelves this sure to be classic will land on. I'm guessing not next to leatherbound first editions. More likely next to a lot of D&D books, perhaps some books on Majik strategy, and the Big Book of Skulls. A Satanic Bible or two? Anyhoo, I needed help finding a book , I wait in line and I tell the guy behind the desk I'm looking for a book. He says, "Um, I can't really help you with that". However, there is a search kiosk thingy two feet from his right hand. I point this out to him and he says, "Yeah but I don't know how to use it". It says on the screen, "click the mouse to begin searching". Seriously. I ask if I can use it, even though it is slightly more on his side of the counter. He tells me no, and that I have to elbow through the K0rn crowd to go all the way to the information desk, which when I went back there, was unmanned. Where were these do nothing retail jobs when I was in my early 20"s? There's no way I could of gotten away with treating customers like that. I wasn't pissed, I was fucking jealous!

I can say that I hope it will be worth what I give up.

So there's been some doubts and worries lately. The thought that I'm not getting any younger or any richer or further down the road I want to be going down. It's all good though. Part of the process of being a human that takes risks, I guess. I can't say I wasn't warned, just not by anyone I believed in.

I've been watching some shows on you tube lately (no TV here) and two of my faves are the First 48 and Banged Up Abroad. The first one is an A&E show about homicide. Kind of depressing, but also very interesting and when the bad guys get it, it's a fist pumping fuck ya! The other show is British ( I think) and tells firsthand stories (and reenacts them) of people (American and Brits) who were/are imprisoned in other countries. Lots of very naive people drug smuggling, but also a guy on a road trip through South America who gets captured by Colombian rebels. If you wrote his story as fiction, it would be considered over the top. Search for it on the you tube. You won't be sorry. I haven't seen a dull episode yet.

I also spent some time with the true crime genre and I learned some factoids. One is that only paranoid killers remove their victims eyes. Another is the three elements most serial killers have: brain injury, childhood abuse, mental illness. Pretty much most of 'em have the trifecta of doom. Last one: at any given time there are about 100 of them roaming around the U.S. Sweet dreams!

Are you street or art school?

Highlights from my weekend:
Danced my ass off at kick-ass dance party. It was a rager.
Caught up with friends who just spent two months on the Silk Road.
Took part in a jam session. Some of the instruments in said session: two guitars, harmonica, egg shaker thing, bongos, dinner fork and beer bottle, bagpipes. The bagpipes were the Godzilla of the jam session, fo' sure.
Spoke with a long lost relative. Also, got an email from a woman I was friends with from preschool until 7th grade. In 7th grade, she got pissed off at me because I said that Who's the Boss, sucked ass. I guess she's finally over it.
Diagnosed my car's problem. I actually looked under the hood, took a couple of things apart, and put it all back together with no extra pieces. I'm so fucking butch, I can't stand it.

Squirrely

Birds do it. Bees do it. Squirrels do it in my yard. A lot.

I had opinions that didn’t matter. I had a brain that felt like pancake batter.

Ooooh, I was in sort of a black mood tonight. Big, nasty, monster dogs chased my cats through the yard, stepping on plants I just planted, Big Sir turned his nose up at the dinner I cooked, and then I spent close to an hour on the phone with one of those credit report places, most of it on hold. My security question was “what is the name of your favorite pet”? I had typed in my hands down favorite pet (living). It didn’t work. I typed in my hands down favorite pet (dead). Didn’t work either. So I was locked out of my account. When I finally got to talk to someone (India) they insisted that I name the damn pet’s name. I told them that both of my guesses were wrong. He suggested that I name all my pets. Now, I have had a lot of pets, with a lot of stoopid names. So I start naming names like Poopiehead and Loverbutterfacepants and Dingleberry Derek. Man, I started laughing my ass off and more embarrassingly he’s laughing his ass off too. The list was long and of course the pet I named last was the secret word. Ironically, it’s the pet I actually dislike the most. I must have been high to type her in as a fave. Or maybe she’d been kissing my ass that day. Who knows. I felt bad for the operator, having to listen to my sordid pet history so I actually let him roll through his sales pitch for like fifteen damn minutes. Ultimately, I don’t think he judged me that much. I’m pretty sure they name those sacred cows some pretty hi-fucking-larious names over there in that India. Or if they don’t, they should. Makes life more fun.

I do have some bitter disgust to pass on to the art world. As if it reads this. It doesn’t.
Please, please, please for the love of all that is pure and good in this world, cease and desist using owls, deer, and skulls in art. It’s not interesting. It’s not cute. It’s not ironic. It’s stupid. And boring. And totally overdone. And completely fucking lazy. Lazy because a person doesn’t even to attach meaning to these images to show them and sell them in important places. The meaning seems to be that everyone else is using them, which isn’t meaning, it’s lemming bullshit. For some reason this keeps getting celebrated over and over. Artists, please stop using these images. Gallerists and curators, please stop showing this bullshit, Collectors. For gods sake, stop collecting it. It’s not going to be worth a g-damn dime in ten years. It’s an insult to artists who are effectively using unique, thoughtful, meaningful symbols in their work. Gah! I get all frothy mouthed about this issue.

Alright, let us not end on that note. Really quick movie reviews. As it heats up outside, I hide in movie theaters more and more. Big Sir and an animator friend dragged me to Wall-e. I had zero expectations. Actually, that's not totally true. I expected to hate it. And I didn’t. I didn’t love it, but you know, Disney preaching to me about corporations that turn people into sloths… Well, that’s a little more than I can take. But, I really liked the first hour. I wish we could have stayed there. The deserted, lost and forgotten earth was really quite beautiful. The only other movie I’ve seen is Encounters at the End of the World. What a great movie for a hot day. I really love Herzog and although it is no Grizzly Man, it is quite beautiful and interesting. Basically you get to take a trip to Antarctica with Herzog. Which I totally would have, but he never called me.

Cliché quota met

Lately, Big Sir and I have been getting up at 5:30 in the morning to go running. Who am I? I don’t even know anymore. I’ve also been going to a yoga class once a week which starts at 9am on Sunday morning. And I show up on time and not hungover or anything. Last week were asked to loop our index fingers around our big toes, while standing, and swing the arm/leg combo out to the side. Try it, your leg will feel like its starting to leave your hip socket. Actually, don’t. It’s too crazy. I also have given up coffee. And TV.

This morning while we were running not only did we see a bird catch a worm, but we heard a rooster crow. It actually went cockle-doodle-do. I mentioned this to Gypsy Prince and he said, “Wow! That reminds me of the time I was hanging out with our friend J. She was on acid, and we saw a white rabbit”.

Give that coyote a one dollar taco.

My mom lives in an assisted living facility. It is a very nice one and she is actually quite happy there. The food is pretty good, they go on outings at least once a week, she has had suitors. The people that work there have been there for years and are very warm and caring. It is the best case scenario for someone with a chronic, debilitating disease, which she has. The one real drawback is that the people who live there, die periodically. When someone dies, they put a framed picture of them by the elevator along with any announcements of pending services. When I was visiting this week, I noticed a picture of a guy I call Patchy. Patchy was actually fairly young (late 50’s) to live there. He had the diabeetus and probably other things too. He still drank and smoked and had lost a leg and an eye, hence my nickname for him. He was always really antisocial and sort of had a chip on his shoulder. I’m sure he had his reasons for his moods. As a fellow moody person, I’m not judging. I said to my mom, “Oh wow, look Patchy died”. My mom says in this very ominous tone, “We all woke up Monday morning….except him”. It was as if she’s seen the cloaked figure of Death tapping people on the shoulder during bingo. Maybe she has. She is on a lot of medication. I signed her up to go see Iron Man to get her mind off of Patchy.

Last Friday we went to meet some friends at a new bar that has like hundreds of beers. It is sort of an arty/yuppie/NY lookin’ type of bar. It’s a little fancy for our side of town. However, it is located in the middle of a neighborhood that is currently involved in a fairly active gang war. We got there 15 minutes before they opened (8pm on a Friday!) and waited outside looking desperate for a drink. They had a large, newly paved (empty) parking lot that they wouldn’t let us park in. “Employees only” we were told. So, we get in there and I’m thinking, “Two strikes on this place”. We get our drinks, which are excellent, sit for awhile on comfy, cool couches, and have a great time. The music isn’t too loud, there aren’t too many people there, the bathroom has a butterfly theme. It’s all good. Our friends get hungry, and we are too tipsy to drive. The bar only serves bags of chips. We go outside and the doorman tells us there are tacos down the street. Huzzah! We walk about a block and we see a huge grilling table on the sidewalk. It’s actually an industrial grill like you’d see in a restaurant, except there’s no restaurant, just the grill and a table with condiments on it. We get some tacos (a dollar each!) and while we are waiting for them, we see a coyote cross the street, moving fast, nose to the ground. It was one of those moments, eating illegal tacos on a darkened street, in a gang ridden neighborhood, while scavengers skulked around us, that made me glad I live here. It’s exciting even when nothing is really happening. We get back to the bar and the bartender gets pissed at us for eating the tacos inside. The reason being, “It’ll smell like a taco truck in here”. Strike three!

I'm learning things about myself

Because I symptom google like a good hypochondriac, I learned that this one thing I have, that I thought was slowly killing me, is not only meaningless, it has an awesome name. I have Exploding Head Syndrome.

From Wiki:
Exploding head syndrome is a condition that causes the sufferer to occasionally experience a tremendously loud noise as if from within his or her own head, usually described as an explosion, roar or a ringing noise. This usually occurs within an hour or two of falling asleep, but is not the result of a dream and can happen during the day as well. Although perceived as tremendously loud, the noise is usually not accompanied by pain. Attacks appear to change in frequency over time, with several attacks occurring in a space of days or weeks followed by months of remission. Sufferers often feel a sense of fear and anxiety after an attack, accompanied by elevated heart rate. Attacks are also often accompanied by perceived flashes of light (when perceived on their own, known as a "visual sleep start") or difficulty in breathing. The condition is also known as "auditory sleep starts." It is not thought to be dangerous, although it is sometimes distressing to experience.

Exploding Head Syndrome. God, that makes me feel so much better. Now I can focus more time on my twitching finger.

What's up scro?

Here's a few unrelated things I've noticed lately.
1. If you drive in a big city with lots of traffic, a good way to get around traffic is to drive through the neighborhoods that white people won't go in. Chances are the neighborhoods aren't as bad as their reps and there is a lot less traffic. One tip: At red lights, don't look too closely at anyone in the car next to you.
2. When you go hear live music, and the drums are really, really loud, so loud that you can feel them beating in your chest and their rythym joins the rythym of your heart... That's a really good feeling.
3. There really isn't anything manmade that can match the pleasure of eating cold, ripe, summer fruit on a hot day.

on sight

Recently, we went to a park and made paintings. This is something that used to be at the center of my artistic process, but over the last five years, has totally disappeared from said process. What happened? The short answer is academia. But, who cares about short answers.

For me academia was a good thing. I am eternally grateful that I went back to school. It forever changed my life for the better. I had to rethink the ways I was used to working and question what mattered to me. This led to new and interesting challenges, which led to changes, which made more people interested in what I'm doing. Communication being the end goal. This being said, there are certain things that are frowned upon in a contempory, academic setting. One of them is making paintings that looked cutting edge fifty years ago. Which mine did. My process used to be, go out and make drawings and paintings of an area. Collect items from that area (mostly rocks and bits of things). Go back into the studio and make finished paintings by combining all these things. Sometimes I would flip the sketches over and tear them up and then reassemble them into collages that I would paint from. Sometimes I would superimpose the rocks and detritus over the landscape. I would be as complicated or as simplified with this process as I felt the piece required. Sometimes I would throw all the stuff on the ground, mix it up and make a painting. I sort of left it up to intuition. Looking back, this turned out to be the real lesson. I learned to hone and trust my intuition, which is invaluable to me now.

But sitting in a place, taking it in, really taking it in, was at one time, the center of joy in my life. I doubt my paintings from this time communicate this. Although I do think they communicated my loneliness and detachment from the world, which people only want to look at, if it mirrors theirs. Mine didn't. I was definitely more interested in staring at the world, than participating in it. Although I now know that this is unhealthy, a very small part of me still remembers the pleasure and freedom of checking out. I guess the reason I equate on site painting with detachment, is because I was a concentrating, solitary figure in a moving world. A part, yet apart. What happened is that there wasn't an exchange beyond my pure reaction to the world. Now that sounds great. Pure is good. Pure is pure. Pure sounds like something good, nay, great art strives for. But ultimately it is a closed system. The dialogue ends where it starts. Never reaching into our shared world. At least for me it didn't. And I stuck with that shit for about eight years, so you can't say I didn't put the time in.

I guess the major change was more me than academia. I grew up, got in touch with my shit etc... Academia helped me through it though. It holds you accountable or more accurately, it makes you hold yourself accountable. Especially, if you pay for it yourself.

I think we are going to make this a regular thing. The "we" componant also being the major difference. No more solitary figure in the landscape. Now there are two figures hunched over concentrating. And better snacks.

So we went and made paintings in the park. I had no ambition, except to savor the moment. We found a great spot. On the lip of a canyon, looking directly at the other lip, with the city peeking out from behind a spikey bush to our right. A red tailed hawk circled above us. A sunny day. I chose to paint nature instead of the city. All those plants, bushes, and grasses merging together. It was formless and uncomplicated in its spirit.

Stories from the days of yore.

My brother (let's call him Gypsy Prince) came to town recently and brought with him one of our mom's college textbooks on Modern Literature. It was probably the 1950's equivalent of the comp 101 paperback that was called Contemporary Literature when I was in college, only instead of Joyce Carol Oates , it has T.S. Eliot and he's listed as being a living writer. My mom is pretty old, I know! She is so old that she remembers Civil War veterans marching in Veteran Day parades when she was a small child. She did say that the soldiers were pretty old. Still, I'm not that old, she had me when she was old. Okay, I'm seriously digressing and using the word old so much, it doesn't look like a word anymore.

One great thing about this book is not only is it full of what we now call Classic Literature, it's also huge, thick, and the cover is that shade of forest green that only books printed before 1960, come in. One other great thing about this book is that this is one book that inspired my mothers love of literature, a love that she passed down to me and Gypsy Prince, that has shaped us in profound ways. It has her notes and doodles in the margins. Among the great stories in the book, there is one by William Saroyan titled,"The Pomegranate Trees" that I had never read before last night. They had a short bio that included this quote by the author (also listed as still alive).

"You must believe that as much as death is inevitable life is inevitable. That is, the earth is inevitable, and people and other living things on it are inevitable, but that no man can remain on this earth for very long. You do not have to be melodramatically tragic about it. It is really one of the basically humorous things, and has all sorts of possibilities for laughter... Try as much as possible to be wholly alive, with all your might, and when you laugh, laugh like hell, and when you get angry, get good and angry. Try to be alive. You will be dead soon enough."

Someone who was close to me is now buried near William Saroyan. When I saw Saroyan's grave (which was marked by a hugantic obelisk, it lifted my spirits on what was otherwise a very sad day. I just love that quote because laughter is such a powerful reflection of the force of life that the two juxtapose quite nicely. It's just such a thoughtful thing to say and stated in such an inspiring and heartfelt way.

golden hour

My favorite time of day is the golden hour. Technically, the golden hour is two hours a day, so it should be golden hours, but this sounds less poetic. The golden hour happens the hour when the sun rises, and the hour it sets, for those who may not know. The light is magical, warm, soft. The deepest of blues. It's when the world slips into the magical, mystical moment of change. It's the time of day where the sky and earth begin and begin and begin to meet, until they finally do. It reminds me that all is temporary, that all good things come to an end, as do all bad. Here's a maudlin quote from a German writer Jean Paul Richter, "The darkness of death is like evening twilight. It makes all objects appear more lovely to the dying". Or if you prefer something lighter, there is always Oliver Wendall Holmes, "Love prefers twilight to daylight". I think I'll stick with the Doors," You know the day destroys the night, night divides the day, tried to run, tried to hide, break on through to the other side". Anyway, I've been going out for an hour or so after dinner and shooting the twilight with my new camera that I love very much and know how to use, not very much. But that's cool because the point of this experience is not to make good pictures as much as it is about understanding and observing this moment that I love. This moment that feels rare and important, but actually occurs twice a fucking day!

the boredom, the freedom, and the time spent alone.

So, recently my accomplishments were celebrated and this was a strange albeit pleasant occurance for me. I spend most of my time alone. I like this about my life, although I don't consider myself a misanthrope. I'm actually pretty social and I like talking to people, asking questions, sharing andecdotes and whatnot. But, to be the center of attention for hours and hours was tiring and simultaneously a really a fun experience. It suprised me to find so much pleasure in it because even though I enjoy people, I always felt like I could be one of the last people on earth and be okay with that. I have always enjoyed fiction about the last people at the end of the world (The Stand, The Quiet Earth, Where Have All the People Gone, After the Plague, god there are a lot more I'm getting tired of naming them). But tonite I watched that 28 Weeks Later and I don't think I can romanticize the apocalypse anymore. Sidenote: apocalypse means lifting the veil in Greek. I really enjoyed the first film, and I guess I liked this one (like is a weird word for such a hopeless, sad, violent film) but I also kind of felt emotionally abused by it. Like a little piece of my soul died while watching it. And I guess that's a good thing for a film, or any piece of art to make you feel, or is it? I mean it's something, for sure, but is more of bad. good? Anyhoo, I have rejoined the land of the talkers and the cocktail partyiers and the barbecuers for at least the temporary. And I feel pretty good about that. I love the people. I recently reread Revelations (for artistic research) and I think I'm going to trade it in for some People magazine for awhile. For the sake of my delicate heart, sometimes I gotta dial it back.

Am I secretly in love with Dave Eggers?

One person I really admire is Dave Eggers. He could have just been some writer living the high life on the upper East Side, with some super skinny, ironic, model girlfriend and coke parties galor. But instead, he's helping the kids, writing books about child soldiers and I'm sure a bunch of other generous shit we don't even know about. It's cool that his essence is in the world in such a major way that he probably doesn't even have enough time in the day to fulfill that shit. When I read his first book, I totally wanted to call bullshit on him and his Miranda July groupies. But, he won me over. And he gave a TED talk where he was nervous, so he doesn't even know that he's totally fucking awesome. Inspiring....

It's not easy to get off that ass.
And make a difference and make it last.

Setbacks, pep talks and the weather

Have you ever tried really hard (like for days or weeks) to do something great and then it doesn't turn out that great. You yell at your partner,the sky, the floor, they don't care. You can try with your whole being, but there is no guarantee that greatness awaits on the other side. No guarantee at all. But your being is great and it's greatness needs to ooze into the world. The world needs it dammit! This phenonmenon is like the weather. You can plan, you can intend, you can check weather dot come fifty bazillion fucking times, but that shit can change in a second and a pro just rolls with it.

black cat

There's this feral, black cat that has made it's home in our crumbling garage. I think the cat has mange, judging from the large hairless chunks that have been removed from it's side. It has these green, cold, dead eyes and it sleeps on a once exhibited, sagging sculpture that entropy is slowly (maybe too slowly) enveloping. Our non feral cats won't chase it away and seem semi-content with their new roommate. Big Sir is not content with this new roommate and has suggested shooting it with a BB gun, much to my horror and dismay. Where he sees a sly, unwelcome intruder, I see a small, scared creature that has never known love in this world. Or if it has, it was long ago and probably ended brutally. Even our meaner cat knows that she is cared for and I believe, is somewhat less mean for it. When I see Blackie curled up on the sculpture it makes me feel good that we have unwittingly created a home for a living thing with a (probably) unpleasant life. I guess Big Sir and I are experiencing a natural gender difference. Protector vs. Nurturer. It may sound silly, but seeing this cat every day or every other day, has made me reflect on how fortunate I am to experience love in this world. I actually teared up, in gratitude, thinking about this the other day. Of course, this hasn't inspired me to trap the cat, take it to the vet, and have the mange treated. Reflection is less complicated than action.

Here I go, bitches.

I told someone else's story and the universe said, "oh no you don't".

The best part of it was this.

"I checked the same pay phone return slot every day for months and it was always empty".

That may not be good enough for you, if that's the case then I am sorry, on behalf of the universe. We can only tell our own stories, although sometimes it's easier to tell other peoples. I have always thought I wanted to write. I have met a lot of people who had strange, sad experiences. They were the type of people who had no voice of their own, so in the back of my mind, I thought I could be that voice, for them. Maybe it was my destiny. Or maybe I'm a condescending, meddling pain in the ass. In any case, I never did anything about it. Instead, I've been waiting for life to happen to me. It happened. One way or another, it always does.