Yes, ma'am.

The White Stripes and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs rocked me tonight. Good seats. Good sound. Reasonably unoffensive seatmates. I liked it very much. Jack White sure knows how to put on a show. There's just the two of them, and Meg is all but stationary, but he fills the stage.

My mom called and asked where I had been. I told her I went to a rock concert, and she said, "Oh, Mary. You're like a teenager." And I don't think she meant it as a compliment. Maybe I am like a teenager. A teenager who can afford to go see the bands I like. Lucky me.

Music is my bag. Few things are more prone to move me.

It might be Dylan's words, but it was Jack who put them in my head. I'm sick of love, and I'm in the thick of it.

First Light

Dawn greys my windows. I've been up for an hour or so. Watching it. Reading things online. Looking for something but not sure what. Judging myself all the while. When I first walked past the windows in my dining room, I looked outside and noticed that it was still completely dark. A lighted billboard on the horizon gave the false impression of dawn. I had a brief thought about the onset of daylight savings. And Halloween.

Some things are still new to me. Some things that have gotten old are still a surprise. I forget sometimes what it's been like. All that has happened. And I chastise myself for not memorializing the losses. Forgetting is tantamount to forgiving. And who ever thought that was a good idea.

"Fire Victim Rages at Life's Caprice"

A story in the Sunday Los Angeles Times began in this fashion: "Michelle Spence, burned and debilitated in a Rhode Island nightclub fire that killed 100 people, finally felt good enough to see the rock band Poison recently."

The article goes on to say that Ms. Spence's 10 year-old daughter was hysterical and fearful that her mother would end up in another harrowing disaster. Her mother's wounds were sustained at a Great White concert (in case that wasn't clear from the lead-in), after all.

I don't want to sound heartless, but the idea that the mark of her recovery came in the form of her desire to go see another has-been hair band strikes me as both ironic and sad. It gives one cause to experience less grief on behalf of the 100 who died, seeing as how this is what they would have had to look forward to. I have been embarrassed by many things. I only hope that the list won't one day include the circumstances of my death.

Sharp Intake

I keep having these strange anxiety attacks. Very mild. But I keep feeling as if I am not able to breathe. Or maybe that I am not able to breathe enough. Especially when I am trying to sleep. And in a few other situations. I end up having to inhale very deeply and I still feel as if there is something wrong. It's either Sudafed or psychosis. And who cares about the Emmys? Well, I guess I will (grudgingly) if I am ever up for one. But they just make me feel left out at the moment. Like a great song just came on and no one will dance with me. And not just because it's some fruity new wave song, either. My taste in music is fine.

Boredom Kills

It's sunny out. And still warm enough to make sleeves a bad idea. I don't like having to dab at my moistened brow. That's icky business.

I've been having nasty dreams lately. I wake up angry or sad or with a feeling of betrayal or railing at the injustice of something I can't remember. It makes sleep less of a reward. And it makes distractions like the personification of a sub sandwich wearing a cape on the corner of the strip mall I where I used to lunch so frequently a welcome addition to today's vista.

Mezzanine

I went to see Eddie Izzard AGAIN last night. I know how this must look. And, yes, I'm nutters for him and glad to have been able to see three of his six sold-out performances here in town. I singlehandedly kept several other desperate devotees from being able to see him at all, and for that I am most proud. My work here is done.

I am a child of the orchestra.

I went to see Calexico at the El Rey last night. The Frames opened for them. From out on the sidewalk where I was picking up my tickets, I could hear them performing, and the song sounded a bit like "Oh Yoko." When I got inside, I found that they are a five-man band with an electric violin, they have an interesting and great sense of humor -- both musically and otherwise, and that the singer is sort of like Chris Martin with an Irish pub flavor. I liked them, and I bought two of their CDs.

I am also very fond of Calexico, but seeing them live got me even more excited about them. I think that's the magic of live music. Maybe that's why politicians go out on the stump. Seeing it in person, getting pulled into the tide of the crowd, buying merch -- it makes it real. Three CDs and a T-shirt were my takeaway. And a rekindling of my affection for the sound of mariachi-style trumpet duos. There were six guys onstage (there are seven guys in the band, according to the web site, and they each have at least three instruments listed on their bios, except for the guy who was "Keyboards and Sampling & Mixing," which almost looks like three instruments, and it's also interesting that none of their bios lists "vocals," but there's definitely someone singing a lot of the time), and they played many things, including marimba, accordion, trumpets, melodica, steel guitar, upright bass, keyboards, and a number of odd- and normal-sized guitars.

I just find it all fascinating and motivating. In addition to my many violins, I have three melodicas (one a toy), a mandolin, a Tonette, and two big drums that I use as endtables. I don't intend to play those drums, but the rest is fair game. I was shopping for keyboards a while back, and I do think I should have a guitar of my own. My friend Josh wants me to play with his new band Cento. We've been planning my involvement for months. We talked on Monday, and he asked if I want to learn to play bass. Right on, I say. I'm always keen to get my learn on. And I'm anxious to tackle my somewhat inertia-related fear of the bass clef once and for all. The only circumscription comes in the form of my not wanting to actually have to wear a one-man band outfit. The bass drum would spoil the line of my clothes.

Anyway, I like to see live music. And I loved the show last night. And I like to buy T-shirts. And I don't usually like to get up early in the morning, but I'm always glad when I find that I am. A curious juxtaposition of the transitive and intransitive forms of the verb "to be" maybe. I should go back and relearn French.

Bravo

For some reason, I have been watching a lot of Bravo. The West Wing and Columbo more than Queer Eye. Today, I watched that episode of The West Wing where everyone gets shot at. It was the season finale a few years ago. I remember hearing it being talked about. That was back when I was never home on the nights of the week when the show aired. I rarely ever watched it, and I don't remember really missing it. I knew it was popular, and I enjoyed the episode or two I had seen. But I wasn't dismayed at how much I didn't see. I remember when the entertainment news talked about how the big shoot-em-up at the end of the season was going to assist in negotiations, because anyone who didn't sign back on without a fuss could just be written out as dead. A somewhat Machiavellian bent to creative narration, I thought. I don't, however, remember who ended up getting killed or what the shakeout was. Fortunately (I think), the next episode will air tonight, and I'll find out without having to wring my hands all summer long. I'm a genius in that respect.

Bravo runs so many of the same commercials, though, that I find myself lampooning them after a while. Even the heartstrings-tuggers. Like the one for Saint Jude's Children's Research Hospital. In the voiceover, a father applauds the team at the hospital, saying that good isn't enough for them. They demand greatness. And I keep picturing the next sequence being a cancer-ravaged child crying on the balance beam, being barked at by some Svengali-like Eastern European gymnastics coach. It could be on a treadmill, too. Any number of scenarios will work. My sense of humor makes some people think I'm mean.

Time Capsule

September 18, 2003.
Johnny Depp is a seemingly unstoppable box office draw.
Queer Eye for the Straight Guy has been deemed a sensation.
Eddie Izzard is on tour.
There's a hurricane happening somewhere.
Arnold Schwarzenegger is trying to win the women's vote on Oprah's show by comparing pumping iron to "coming."
People are still wearing white. Me included.
Asparagus is being served at restaurants but sparingly.
The White Stripes sing the blues.
Hillary Clinton is not running; Wesley Clark is.
In an unrelated story, I have goosebumps.

Sitting Up High

Eddie Izzard was brilliant again tonight. (Yes, I went to see him again.) And he's on Jay Leno right now. I was only watching because Martín reminded me that Sean Cullen was going to be on, so I tuned in and tolerated. But bonus -- Eddie Izzard was also guesting and brilliantly. He was sandwiched by the boringness of Beyoncé Knowles, but he looked dashing in a suit of aubergine, and I had the added elitist satisfaction of knowing I saw him only hours ago (but actually hours after the show was taped). I win! Don't I?

I'm so very tired today. I can only hope that sleep will come like something quick. I didn't sleep yesterday. I was in that tunnel vision state that causes you to forget that you ever need human things like rest and nourishment and sweet hydration.

Television grates on my nerves.

Neck of the Turtle

Finally! It's cool enough to warrant the resurrection of my sweater look. What a relief. I was cold enough last night at the show and the restaurant afterwards that I felt confident in extracting a turtleneck from my dresser drawer and donning it, and the sun hasn't even gone down yet. I'm the daring sort, I am.

On the Downs

Sometimes I cry. Not big sobbing bursts of tears. Just wetness quietly leaking past my lashes when my head is tilted to the side a little bit. A burning sensation in the eyes. A sighing in the lungs. Sometimes I think that being so tired and calm is a greater sign of sadness. There's very little left of me for great emotional outbursts. It comes from not sleeping much and not enjoying being awake in the interim. Simultaneously, I'm indicting myself for allowing things to get to me. What a big baby I am sometimes. It's not the end of the world. I'm not made of stone. Somewhere in the middle, the twain shall meet.

Over Getting Over

I'm watching The West Wing on Bravo. I do from time to time. And lately, with my renewed vigor for democracy and fairness and crusading against bad policy, I catch myself envying characters who get to serve in the White House. I imagine it's something magical to be part of a presidential administration. But I also imagine that it must be hard to get used to the idea that it will one day be all over. To give yourself over to that cause for four years and know that it's going to end -- some people get really emotional when high school ends, too, you know. I wasn't one of them. But I saw it with my own eyes.

I was talking to my friend Lia about this recently. I told her how discouraged I was when I took note of the fact that I used to be unstoppable. Tireless. I used to work and try and perform and rehearse, and there never seemed to be enough time for rest or paying bills or seeing movies. I was always GOING. And it never really drained me. Or exhausted my resources. Or made me wish I could just have a quiet evening at home. I was sometimes sitting in an orchestra pit until midnight six nights a week. And I never thought about ditching for a night or just napping or getting pizza. It was similar when I was in school. No amount of extracurricular commitment or exam stress or friend fun could have kept me from wanting to keep at it. I used to go to school when I was so sick I could barely sit up, but I didn't want to be kept from a debate tournament or a yearbook deadline or whatever it was.

But I'm not unstoppable anymore. That bottomless reservoir of motivation and life force has been tapped dry. Now, as much as I get angry about government and politicians, I think to myself, "I could never do that." I don't have the energy. I imagine you have to just go twenty-four hours a day when you're part of a campaign. You have to get up early and stay out until it's early again. You have to smile and think and be present in the moment. You can't slack off just because you're feeling a little down. You can't stay home and feel reclusive and uninspired. There's no time for it. I don't think I have enough energy anymore to make a difference.

Of course, I also sneer at the record of our current president, who gets high marks for giving himself time off and taking vacations like they were going out of style (which they are, incidentally, for everyone else). But he seems like an anomaly to me. I think most people working for a presidential administration work really hard. Hard enough to put me to shame.

For the record, I would have voted for Bill Clinton again and again and again. But that's neither here nor there.

Anyway, I feel a bit sad thinking about the finiteness of things. Maybe I spend too much time anticipating the ending and too little time experiencing the part before. Maybe that's what's wrong with me. I get sad when I think about how it will feel when I have to look back on a part of my life and see that that part is over and that I can never have it back. I am putty in the hands of nostalgia. And I lament the amount of regret I feel. Because a girl shouldn't always have to feel so sorry. A girl shouldn't always have to look back and think that it was all such a waste of time. I am guilty of too often betting on the wrong horse. And maybe this is because I pick my horses with very little science. "Cool name," I think. Or, "I've heard of the horse who sired him." I bank on things for no better reason than because I don't know enough about them to know better. And it's my näiveté that keeps causing me such pain and consternation. You'd think by now I'd have been covered by a great suit of jade. It's a wonder.

Dark Pavement

It's night and raining on the television. It makes me want to travel in time. Or live in a movie. It's night and raining.

Venom tastes like venom. No surprise there.

I don't know what the per capita allotments for disappointment and despair are. Maybe I'm right at the average mark. Maybe even slightly below. I'm not so arrogant as to believe that I'm the only person who is made to feel bad about things. Or that I am the only one who suffers. Or that I get a great deal more crap in my life than anyone else. But there are times when I would wager I've had my fair share and that it's about time people who call themselves friends stop trying to upend me when I am most vulnerable. I wonder if there is some phrase you can say that forces a wolf in sheep's clothing to decloak against his will. "Masks off!" I would cry. And my falsest pals would suddenly be forced to reveal themselves as unkind or disloyal or vicious, whichever they happened to be.

But that's not it, really. It's not that I keep being tricked. I think the details under the mask are being made plain to me rather frequently. But it's no less unhappy to find out that someone doesn't care about you when you thought they did. It's no less of a jolt to know that hurting your feelings caused some person no loss of sleep or batting of eyes. It's such a surprise to me every time I realize how easy it is for some people to be hurtful. A great mystery, the solving of which brings no satisfaction.

I'm not trying to be cryptic. I'm just trying to keep my dirty laundry in its tidy little sack. You can make reference to the sack that holds the dirty laundry without actually being so crass as to air it, can't you? That's the principle by which I operate tonight.

I went to see Eddie Izzard's Sexie. It was super terrific. However, failing a seat in the first three rows, I feel so frustrated at live shows that I can't help but already be hastening in my mind toward the day I get to buy the DVD of the show and watch it in the quiet, unobstructed view provided by my living room. Of course, given how long it took Dress to Kill to come out on DVD, I may have to rely on Ol' Faithful -- my memory, that is. Anyway, it was good fun, and I can't be persuaded that it wasn't.

I don't have to write such long entries. I know that. Watch as I realize it...right....now.

A Change of Taste

I recently realized that I like westerns. This came as a surprise to me, because I was often known to say that I adore Technicolor and that I would watch ANYTHING in Technicolor -- even a western. This was my smarmy way of saying, "I don't like westerns." And for much of my life, this has been true. There are a few exceptions, but by and large, the dusty backdrop of the open plains and the gritty veneer of the unwashed characters made me wonder why saloons didn't build entire doors instead of just those hinged shutters which were miserable at keeping things from getting dirty. Made me wonder why even the well-to-do folk traveled in wobbly stagecoaches with large, flimsy wheels and very poor shock absorption. Made me glad to be alive now and not then. Now in my clean times. With showers at the ready and air conditioning for the taking. And what of paving? Let's not forget the advances paving has allowed in footwear design and cleanliness and remaining allergen-free.

So I was turned off by the western genre. If there were pretty girls in the pictures, that was fine. And if it was a musical, I could probably get by. But dirty cowboys riding dirty horses over dirty roads peppered with ramshackle jaileries and whorehouses did little to inspire my imagination.

Today, however, while watching a promo on AMC for a spate of western flicks they are about to play -- and also at the comedy show when Patton Oswalt lauded the merits of The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly -- I realized that I actually like quite a few westerns now. That I like the actors and the cliché heroism. That I liked Unforgiven so much, I nearly peed in my pants just to avoid having to step out before the end.

I like westerns after all. What a wonder. I thought about it and lumped it in with my evolution in the areas of spicy food, Spanish-style architecture, and cabbage -- all things which once brought a scowl to my face.

How does that happen? Is it just age? Or is it that adulthood robs us of the will to hold onto our youthful predilections? Do we just get lazy and decide it's not worth it to continue to hate leafy green vegetables? Do we become more inclined to join in, unwilling to allow our picky preferences to alienate us from our co-workers and friends? We who once winced at the taste of beer and coffee, we who once yawned when the news came on, we who once preferred the books with pictures in them -- somewhere along the way, we stopped bothering to keep the list of "things I hate." And everything just melted in. And now, we like cheeses and orthopedic footwear and a commitment to regular exercise.

Or do we?

Is it all a lie? Maybe we just acquiesce. Maybe we just get lazy about being a staunch adversary and decide to let people heap things on our plates, even if we swear they will make us sick. That's how I learned that I like cottage cheese, for instance. But there was a time, when I was about eight, when I went to someone's house for dinner and the wife/mother figure put some sort of an orange Jell-O salad on my plate, and it had cottage cheese curds in it, and I nearly thought I would vomit trying to eat it. My throat closed up, and I had to turn the stuff away, politely ejecting it into my napkin and making a sour face to my sister, who sat knowingly beside me and shared my dismay. I'm still like that with any of the blue cheeses. But who knows. Maybe by the time I'm a retiree, I'll love the stuff. And if I do, I wonder if I will feel like I sold out. I never felt like a sell-out for liking brussels sprouts or spinach or lima beans, all of which I liked even as a child. This should come as no surprise. I was also fine with escargots, pork tongue, and brains scrambled with egg. Yum yum, I say. Although, I used to have a dickens of a time trying to tell myself I could get used to the taste of plain milk. I suppose I should give that another go now, too, since I've since learned to adore nearly every other dairy product around.

I don't have any great point, really. I was just noticing that I was thinking about watching westerns, and it didn't make me grimace. And I wondered if it meant I'd grown up, or if it meant that I had somehow lost myself. That like hair and skin, tastebuds and emotional preferences might completely molt every seven years or so, leaving behind nothing of the person preceding. I wonder if there is any remnant of the child I was in this current self. The only things that manage to stick around are poor self-esteem and sun damage. And that's nature's way of reassuring me that soft lighting is an investment worth looking into.

The end and not the beginning

I looked around and thought to myself that it was strange to be waking up at this hour, but a glance at the clock and few quick calculations told me that I wasn't waking up at all. I just hadn't really managed to fall asleep properly. And that's a frustrating thing to figure out by way of math.

I don't care if I never get back.

My father invited me to go see the Padres play the Giants tonight at Qualcomm Stadium. I hadn't been to a baseball game in ages and ages, and my entire family was going, so I really had no choice. I drove down from L.A. this morning and enjoyed some quality time with my parents and my sister's dog. Then we headed to the ballpark, where we were far earlier than we needed to be, which created the disappointing hitch of seeing our hot dogs eaten long before the first pitch was thrown out. And that leaves a lot of time to kill.

Surprisingly, by the fourth inning, I actually caught myself paying attention to the game. I know a great deal about baseball, because I once dated a guy who lived it like a religion. But I haven't followed baseball for many, many years. And even when I did, it was sort of under protest. But tonight, perhaps because I was seated so far away from my father that I couldn't really talk to him or interact with him comfortably, and perhaps because there was nothing else to look at, I started watching the plays.

Giants fans were out in force, and they were really very rude, most of them. I was dismayed. I kept thinking it was really unsportinglike for them to be yelling out "Padres suck!" on our home turf. I'm fine with "Let's go, Giants! Let's go!" Cheer all you like. But why must you bait the home crowd? I'm not rowdy like that. And I get a little nervous when I think someone might lose their cool near me. But maybe I'm just a big baby. Anyway, I was annoyed by them, and -- while I no longer have any great amount of emotion invested in the outcome of the Padres' season -- I was gratified to see the Padres pull it out in the bottom of the tenth. Extra innings and an exciting last-minute hurrah -- it's great when that happens. I'm so used to rooting for the losing team. And I don't know why my record has always been tilted in that direction. I live in L.A. now, and I suppose I can cheer about the Lakers most of the time, but I've never gone to see them play, and I'm not entirely sure I feel like they're MY team yet. Say nothing of the Dodgers.

There was also a great deal of promotional stock at the stadium, because next season, the Padres will be playing at the brand new Petco Park in already-crowded Downtown San Diego. I'm sorry that it's going to be called Petco Park. That really doesn't sound very tough, does it? I don't think I like corporate sponsorship-named stadiums anyway. Why can't they give it a person's name and then just insert the corporation as a possessive. Petco's Ted Williams Park. Sort of like Ruth's Chris Steak House. And if they also cooked their steaks in butter at kiln temperatures and served them on a dangerously warm platter, I'd root root root for the home team every night of the week, rest assured.

Perhaps because of the need to move, they were selling a lot of Padres logo merchandise at 75% off, and Beulah and I cruised past the booth and were reminded of the old days when she was a big baseball nut and I used to take her to the games whenever I could get tickets, and I would buy her souvenirs and just generally spoil her as I did in every other respect. We went to see the Cincinnati Reds play one night, because she was a great fan of Eric Davis. And I bought her a little miniature Padres baseball bat, that she kept for a long time. Tonight, she said, "You know how that bat ended up, don't you?" And it turns out that, when my father used to ride his mountain bike around the southern Italian countryside, he would bring that bat with him and use it to defend himself against the wild dogs that would accost him and his Snickers bar. I have photos of my father standing proudly beside his bike, wearing a cycling helmet and biking shorts and a large grin. I found it endearing back then. And picturing him waving his little miniature baseball bat at his canine assailants makes me smile.

I guess I don't care very much about sports. And I generally steer clear of the cult of the sports fan. And I don't enjoy smelling of the outdoors. But I had a nice time tonight. And I liked spending time with my family. What are the chances?

Foster Child

Cosette went home to her daddy on Friday. I miss her. Ever so. She stayed with me for nearly two weeks, during which we spent entire days together and went for countless walks and napped and snuggled. I scratched her belly for untold hours. And I delighted in her every movement.

I do miss her. And I curse my fragile, sentimental self for being so vulnerable to tender feelings and overabundant outpourings of emotion. Just looking at these pictures of her, with her proper little frontpaws, and her rear paws in that strange perpendicular posture. Or her shamelessly comfortable body all curled up on my supposedly off-limits 800 thread count pillowcase and raw silk duvet. I miss the clicking of her nails on my floors. But I despise feeling sad about it. Even in that bittersweet way that nostalgia works.

Sometimes I would just prefer to be Vulcan.

Giddyup

Here's the thing. Sometimes, I think I should just be this person who writes humorous observations and self-deprecating confessions that make other people feel somehow better about themselves if only because they don't have a personal story that involves eating something out of the garbage.

And then other times I come across as this morose girl with downcast eyes and a grim outlook. And maybe that makes people feel better about themselves, too, but it's not nearly as funny.

And sometimes I admit to myself that I might write entirely different truths if I knew no one else was reading them. I have several other private weblogs that I update on a pretty frequent basis. A few months ago, my web site statistics led me to fear that someone else was reading them, and I got a little nervous. Not just because I'm less careful about typographical errors but because there's some seriously personal and private stuff in them, and I realized I was not ready to share any of that indiscriminately. Sometimes I write things that are so honest that I don't even like going back and reading them as it stings a bit.

And I worry that if you were reading me for the first time, you would say, "Oh, chuck this. This is just some self-absorbed depressed person with nothing to say." So I'm sure to throw in a brief anecdote about how I got lost in the parking garage at the gym and saw the same Asian guy three times in and around the elevator and was sure he knew I was lost and an idiot. Or one about how this girl was getting a neck and shoulder massage while I was at the nail salon, and I've never seen anyone get one at this salon, and from the way the employees were looking at each other and talking to each other (in Vietnamese), I wondered if the girl asked for a rubdown, and her attendant shrugged and said sure, as demeaning as it is to be asked to provide a service that isn't offered on the menu. I looked over the list. Silk wraps. Fills. Acrylics. Airbrushing. There was nothing on there about massage. It made me feel weird and embarrassed. The way I would feel if I went to a restaurant with a friend and they insisted on ordering something not on the menu and not even from the cuisine the restaurant offers. Of course, the rubdown girl didn't come with me. But neither of us speaks Vietnamese. And in that respect, we're both from the same town, if you know what I mean.

I wonder why I can't shut up tonight.

Blue Skies, Bleeding Gums

It was a beautiful day today, here in Los Angeles. Mild, breezy, only vaguely hazy in the skyward view. I was relieved to see it. And at the same time, I was strangely sad. Strangely ill-at-ease. I always look forward to the fall. I always look forward to the cooler weather. To sweaters and Duraflame logs and knee-high boots. And over the years, the nostalgia the autumn brings has become unique to that season. Even as the nostalgia itself evolves. I have been hopeful in this weather. I have been triumphant. I have been devastated. I have been alienated and destitute. I have been starkly alone. I have been comforted by companionship. I have been new. I have been old. I have been ageless. And maybe recalling all of this -- today, for some reason -- caused me to sink a bit. I felt sluggish somehow. Held up. I felt this strange lack of motivation. This unwillingness to GO. I went anyway. I got my gym membership. I got my nails done. I got tired. I got discouraged. I didn't get my money's worth at the nail salon. I made a sandwich with bread that got overly hard under the broiler, and I tasted blood with each bite. Just a little bit of blood, sure, but blood nonetheless. And the only up side was that the blood was mine and not the sandwich's.

I'm more aware of the roof of my mouth than most people. It's a linguistic thing. When you study other languages and need ways to articulate a sort of mechanized protocol for performing a sound, the phrases "alveolar ridge" and "soft palate" get tossed around a bit. So, when I hurt those parts, I experience an abnormal fear that I may never be able to order sushi properly again. I'm sure there's no serious harm done. And yet, I can't keep my tongue away from the tenderness right now. Ever notice that? How sometimes you're drawn back to the pain? You keep pressing on a cut to see if it's still sore. You stretch aching muscles to see what you can get away with. You do this, dont you? I've never researched this. So I realize it's possible I'm the only petty masochist who does this sort of thing. That's an interesting possibility. On a day that made me blue to begin with, it's a little disconcerting that I have to find reasons to further question whether to check the box next to "nutty as a fruitcake." Sometimes, I'm surprised by my own weirdness.

This isn't my favorite time of year. Anyone who knows me (or reads me) knows that I am most fond of that time in late October/early November when the fireplaces go into use and the trees begin undressing themselves and the sky takes on a stark greyness that makes every hour of daylight feel like that bit before dusk. This isn't my favorite time of year, but it reminded me that my favorite time of year is just around the corner. And it reminded me that there have been a number of years when -- at that fireplace-using time -- I have had difficulty remembering why I liked it so well. I have trudged through those autumn days without a glimmer of delight. I have cursed them. Maybe I'm feeling some sort of fear about how those days will be for me this time around.

This is the trouble with comparative memory. The trouble with sizing your experiences up against the ones that parallel them in your linear history. It's not useful. Or practical. It's just frustrating. And it only serves to remind you that everything changes. And change means more or less or better or worse. Change means different. If today is happier than it was last year, you feel a sort of sad nostalgia over the way it was. If today is less happy, well, that's no mystery. I don't know of a way to benefit from these reveries unless one finds oneself laughing about it all. If I can look back and find myself ridiculous, then any of the happiness or sadness is irrelevant. Those are merely the ravings of a crazy person. But when I am sane and sober and real, I know that I am feeling something that cannot be dismissed, and I therefore know that there is danger in it. Danger of any of it really coming true.

I don't have one of those blogs that lets you choose an emoticon for the way you feel today. I don't label my mood each time I write. I don't document things that way. Maybe it's for the best. Maybe I would only become discouraged to find that I'm not so complex as to be unable to find a facial expression to convey my state of mind. What did Kierkegaard's face look like anyway?

I'm not writing for any reason today. Perhaps the absence of a message will keep me from being silent for days on end. I have often written a great deal when I had nary a thing to say. Sometimes it's just nice to have some proof that you're here. I keep a journal (in pencil on white paper in a hardbound book with a drawing of a horse on the cover), but I'm not terribly disciplined about it. And when I thumb through the old pages and see that I didn't write for weeks at a time, I feel disappointed in myself. I surmise that I must have been unusually happy then. Or unusually sad. Or confused. Or preoccupied. Or perhaps just overwhelmed and tired. But I think to myself that it's no excuse. How will I ever know what those days were like? Those silent, blank days. They might as well have been left unlived.

So, I'm writing today. Maybe I will write again tomorrow. Maybe by then I will have something I want to say. There's no way to be sure.

It's cool tonight. I have goosebumps on my arms. The fall is lurking out there, waiting to descend on me with its cooling ashes and woolen sweaters and holiday demands and turning back of the clock. I wonder how I will fare. And I wonder what I will make it from the vantage point of the autumn after.

Fact Finding

I read Al Franken's Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right this weekend. I hope everyone will. But I know plenty won't. I don't claim that it isn't partisan, but it's also funny and insightful and really, really informative. And I'm beginning to become disillusioned at how lazy we are, as a society, about how we get our ideas and opinions and information. I am guilty of it, too. I have allowed clips on the news to sum up a story for me. I have trusted broadcasters and believed what I read. But it seems that the onus of honest reporting is no longer part of what is expected of journalists and publishers. I remember recently watching Fox News Channel at my parents' house when we were just letting it fly at Iraq, and the ticker that ran across the bottom of the screen would often present some statement in quotation marks that was a paraphrased reduction of what had only just been broadcast on the video feed. I would see a senator make a statement, then a few minutes later I would see a quote from that statement running across the bottom of the screen, but it would be edited and inexact. And I wondered if Fox News Channel has people working there who were never required to learn the sacred value of the quotation mark. Do they really not know that you can't -- especially as a news agency -- QUOTE people with paraphrasings of their statements? I'm certain that no one who attended my junior high school English class with Mr. Clauson (and I'm panicking with the certainty that I've forgotten how he spelled his name) ended up a bigwig at Fox, but it's really a shame. I learned all of that stuff there. I also learned that I enjoy diagramming sentences, that people with dentures sometimes swivel them around in their mouths out of habit and a quest for periodontal comfort, and that you shouldn't wear a strapless bra to school when you don't have the "wherewithal" to hold it up. When I noticed my fancy new bra had scooted down and was now encircling my waist, I was embarrassed and humiliated. Especially because it was this mean, freckled kid named Michael or Mark or something similarly beginning with an "M" who pointed it out to me. I don't remember his last name, but I think it was an alliteration. As I recall, he had sort of a Dorothy Hamill haircut and was aspiring to grow up to be a mercenary. I don't know if he's toting his gun in the jungles of a Southeast Asian nation at this very moment, but I do know he wouldn't use quotation marks with such recklessness. Mr. Clauson was very stern on this issue.

This standard was further reinforced in high school by Mr. Fritz, who was famous for talking to your bosom (if you were a girl) and for sponsoring girls' athletic teams. I don't remember what class I took with him. I think it was some sort of time-passing nonsense class. Like S.A.T. preparation or something like that. I went to a Department of Defense high school. We were sometimes required to waste time sitting in a classroom for an entire period literally doing nothing. I remember knowing Senator Phil Gramm's name at a very early age on account of the Gramm-Rudman Bill whose budget slashings kept us from being able to use buses for extracurricular activities and forced the Far East Speech and Drama Tournament to be held via videotape. That's right. We performed our speeches and scenes in front of video cameras and then mailed our entries on VHS to Korea, where they were judged. It was the lamest version of an away game I have ever experienced. I don't think the athletic teams were required to compete via videotape, but I can't be sure. Perhaps they awarded wrestling medals on the basis of a long distance volley of rock scissors paper. But I would imagine those boys were still required to wear their singlets and make themselves puke before weigh-in. Some things are still sacred.

Where was I? Oh, yeah.

I wholeheartedly and heavyhandedly encourage you to read Al Franken's new book. It made me laugh repeatedly. But it also made me very angry. I have been unashamedly declaring my liberal leanings for many years now. I vote Democrat, and I like it. So, I realize that anyone who disagrees with me politically will probably snort and harumph and say a lot of lame things like "yeah right" and "surprise surprise." That's partisanship. People who aren't liberal will assume that liberals are getting their pants in a knot at the hands of a propagandist. It's a shame, too, because there is a mountain of factual data in the book that you might not have heard or read, regardless of your party affiliation. And chances are, if you're getting your news from Fox News Channel or the Today Show, you will never be exposed to it. And chances are, if you're getting your news from Fox News Channel, you don't want to be.

Oh, there. I went and got all partisan on you. I didn't intend to. I just wanted to tell you what I was reading this weekend. Okay, so, take it as you will, America. I hope that we get a chance to pretty up before history takes our picture. Posterity can be so very cruel.

Epilogue

I think his name was Michael Marking. I'm going to Google him now. I wonder how many rebel factions he's destroyed or how many unmandated governments he's helped to overthrow. It's been a number of years. I should think he'd have quite a résumé by now.

Epilogue Two

When I was in high school, I studied sophomore English and three years of French with Kara Killingsworth. When I was watching Al Franken's appearance on C-SPAN (which you can view in Real Audio here) this past summer, one of the other panelists, introducing her new book Bushwhacked: Life in George W. Bush's America, was Molly Ivins. Her speaking voice and diction and dialect and sense of humor brought back echoes of Ms. Killingsworth, of whom I was immensely fond and who was one of only a very few teachers in my student years to vigilantly push me to be more than I was. I long ago Googled her, but to no avail, much to my chagrin. Being an English teacher herself, I feel confident in asserting that she knows that obscure rule about the use of quotation marks, too. Incidentally, that C-SPAN link allows you to view the entire Book TV panel from the Book Publishers Expo, where Al Franken and Bill O'Reilly had words. It's interesting to watch, because Bill O'Reilly is a case study in jerkdom and an irrational commitment to being wrong. My father watches his program, which is a sticking point for me. But then, my father also never liked boats and didn't like to wear hats, but he joined the Navy as a teenager and served until retirement. Go figure.

Walker, Texas Ranger as Passive Aggressive Customer Service Revenge Tactic

My cable box has been acting up. It's not the first time. There's no program information in it. When you go to the guide, it just says, "To Be Announced," over and over again. So, I never know if I'm actually watching Columbo. Very unnerving.

Last time this happened, I waited a few days and then called for service. They brought me a new box. Now, it's happening again. So, I called and asked them to hit the box with a signal -- like they do -- and the guy at the tech service desk told me to turn the box to a cable station like channel 8. So, I turned it to channel 8, which happens to be the USA Network. Then, he sent the signal and explained what was going to happen. That is to say, he explained that I would have to leave the cable box on that station for twenty or thirty minutes until the guide data reset itself. And now I'm stuck for the next half hour with Walker, Texas Ranger playing. In my imagination, I'm writhing on the floor, clutching a fatal bullet wound, croaking out the defeated words, "Ya GOT me!"

Wherever you don't happen to look

I sometimes forget that you can get surprise glimpses into other people's lives when you go out and walk around at night. With their windows open to the summer night air and the drapes pulled back, you can see your neighbors busying themselves with their evenings, and it feels secret and wonderful and you like them more than you normally would. Like when you look at a child while he sleeps. No matter what a terror he is in the waking hours, you can't help but coo over him when he sleeps.

So, tonight, I was taking my temporary doggy for a walk, and I saw one of my neighbors playing the cello next to a grand piano in the portrait window of a very grand house that I don't think I'd ever noticed before. He had art on the richly-colored walls and a handsome fireplace and soft, warm lighting. One of the upstairs rooms was painted a deep green. The lights were on. I wondered what happens in that room. It looked like a nice place to read.

For a moment, I thought about what I would say if I bumped into him during the day. I might say that I play the violin and noticed him playing his cello, but then what? It's a peculiar triumph you feel when you realize you have something in common with someone. It's like a bit of armor. Something to protect against the sharp edges of awkwardness and estrangement. It's why my mom makes friends with people just because they are Chinese. They've got that in common. Who they voted for isn't important. Besides which, my mother doesn't vote. Shame on her.

So, I live on the same street as this fellow. And we both play stringed instruments. And we both walk upright and many other things. But the chance that we will ever be friends? Slim, I suppose. I only saw him in profile. I don't know that I would even recognize him on the streets. Unless he was carrying his cello. And wasn't also Yo-Yo Ma.

New menu. No new choices.

My brain has gotten all muddy. Cramped with concern. Swelling with urgency. Dull with pragmatism. Percolating with ambition and the split rays of unfocused desire. I even forget sometimes to look forward to the things I never fail to enjoy. I forget to grasp onto the enduring hope that tonight is the night I get to see a good friend and a favorite performer, thinking instead of all the plates I'm failing to keep spinning and also dreading the Baked Honey Chicken. It's sickeningly easy to sour the milk of optimism. And not in any sort of delicious cheese or sour cream sort of way.

I cut my finger badly yesterday. Not on one of my new knives. Rather on one of my old knives that had to be put away to make room for the new knives and their gargantuan housing. As knife blocks go, this one is a mansion. These knives live in splendor. But the other displaced knives, banished to live out the remainder of their rust-attracting existences in the jangly bottom of a drawer that jerks when you try to open it, had their revenge on me last night. I was having trouble getting the drawer open, and I realized that my very fancy cheese grating device had lodged itself in such a way as to block the drawer from opening but a fraction of the way. I thrust my hand in to shove the other gadgets and utensils aside, pressing with great force against the exposed blade of a knife I once wielded. And it was sharp enough to cause me great harm and to make me wonder if the knives I now have are really so superior. (Trust me: they are. I had to slice tomatoes later in the evening and my faith was restored -- it was like magic!) I hurried to the bathroom to plaster an Anakin Skywalker as Pod Racer bandage (they were on sale a long time ago) on my bird finger, dripping blood all over the sink and delaying the completion of my Indian dinner preparation. I'm fine now. But my finger is sore. And Lenny Bruce is dead.

I'm looking after a friend's dog this week. She's lovely and affectionate and awfully nice to have around. She's dozing in the living room with Ghost World on the television. She's a canny one, that Cosette. Also, I heard Ghost World being promoted on a pay channel today. They were giving the evening line-up and announced it as a "dark comedy," and I found myself in disagreement. But before I began investing time and effort fashioning a cogent refutation, I remembered that labels are crap and seldom informative and summing anything up as the actual category into which you can best chuck it is lazy and dismissable. And maybe I'm more keyed up on the topic because of recent arguments stemming from the use of words like "conservative" and "liberal" and "right-wing" and "hot," but I'm entitled to prickle at the sound of our language as much as the next guy. I also do not read the TV Guide.

If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow, why oh why can't I?

I was watching a program about Judy Garland yesterday on Turner Classic Movies. And, while I have always enjoyed her performances and admired her talents, this time, I learned something crucial about myself. A cameraman was talking about when they were shooting Summer Stock, and how, after shooting had ended, Judy went off to lose weight, but they hadn't shot her big Get Happy number yet. So, she came back after two weeks and had lost twenty pounds and looked fabulous. Because of this, I learned that I am shallow and obsessed with weight loss, because all I could think about after I heard that was how she managed to lose twenty pounds in two weeks. What's wrong with our society? Me, that's what.

Neverending Blue

I started writing something yesterday, but I never finished. Now, I've lost it. That is my least favorite thing.

I wrote this on July 30 at 9:57 P.M.:

"I just found something on my hand and tasted it to see what it was. When did I become someone who indiscriminately ingests substances I find on my skin? It was A1 sauce."

I let things pile up in my office. Stacks and stacks of things sit there undisturbed. In some future excavation, the disctinct strata may reveal to scientists and diggers much about me and who I was at those times. It's disconcerting.

Sometimes, I'm looking for stamps or something I know I saved, and I come across words I scribbled on the envelope my insurance bill came in. Or I see a phone number I keep losing. Or a magazine I never finished reading. I'm just a mess of distraction. And I need more drawers.

I watched Bowling for Columbine last night, at long last.

I enjoy voting.

There was an amusing bit in the West Coast edition of the New York Times this morning. I was sipping iced black tea at Starbuck's and laughed bubbles into my drink when I read how a campaigning Bill Simon introduced himself to a patron outside an In n' Out Burger, saying, "Hi, I'm Bill Simon, and I'm running for governor." To which the patron replied, something to the effect of, "Me, too." And then he asked his companion, "What about you, Jim? You running for governor?" And Jim said, "Sure, I am."

Sure, part of me felt sorry for Bill Simon, perhaps the only legitimate name that would be on the would-be ballot. And part of me felt sorry for me, being resident of a state that occasionally makes such a laughing stock of itself. And part of me felt sorry for the people who argue that this is a great idea and applaud the power of the people. (What a bunch of maroons.) But mostly, I just thought how much I will savor my jaunt to the ballot box, where I will receive my keen "I voted!" sticker and promptly affix it to my outerwear. No one likes voting more than Mary Forrest. You can take that to the bank and inform the clerks of it.

"Under the spreading chestnut tree, the village smithy stands."

I have a little calendar on my desk . It promotes the character Sof'Boy™ and has little calendar pages that you tear away each month. A few of the other months' pages are strewn willy-nilly across my desk. There's June. A glimpse of May. Remember April? What a mystery, the passage of time. I almost wish we would not mark it as we do. Sometimes the fact of it is nearly overwhelming.

Someone has watched me grow up over the years. Someone else has watched me remain the same. It depends on the casting of the chance encounter. "I can't believe you're all grown up!" Or it might be, "You haven't changed a bit!" Or, "Wow. You turned into a WOMAN." I suppose as we get older, maybe we are comforted when someone says we haven't changed. I, for one, can't stand it. I'm not asking anyone to take a set of calipers to my crows' feet, but I think I've changed a great deal, thanks very much. Physically, spiritually, every which way. And one can't deny the accelerated aging I've been subjected to at the cacophonous hand of my upstairs neighbor. That's hardly my fault. You should hear him right now. If I could sneak up behind him and chop off his head, I would.

I do see pictures of myself from time to time and marvel at how old I look. Or how young. I realize so much of it is the product of the flash. Photography can be your enemy and your friend. Just try and keep your head in a position that discourages the appearance of a double chin or puffy eyes. That's what the movie stars do. And for god's sake, suck it in.

Sometimes, I can see dewy skin and girlish freckles. Sometimes I see a sallow complexion with visible sun damage. Don't take any cues from me, America. My self-image is all flake. I hope your confidence is rooted in something less mercurial.

I can't recite much poetry. And much of what I can I learned from the cinema.

The smith, a mighty man is he, with large and sinewy hands.

the tinkle of ice in an advancing cocktail

Summer makes victims of us all. The heat. The late dusks. The rush to wear one's whites. The impending end of it. The fear of the lamenting that begins when you've failed to squeeze that last breath from the season. Failed to have that last poolside barnburner. Failed to get your bikini body out of the mothballs. Failed to quit smoking. Failed to reinvent yourself. Failed to move. Failed to remain still. Oh, but for another shot at that last big hurrah.

That's not me, I'm afraid. My years have ceased to mark themselves with the borders of academia. Each month is just another month. I measure my happiness. Take stock of my shortcomings. Remember what this month was like for me in its most recent iteration. Or the one before that. Summers often manage to slip by me unnoticed. But for the change in my wardrobe, one might never know I was paying attention.

No, I would never wish for an endless summer. I do not do well in the heat.

More of the Truth

This is something I don't like people to know. I have picked up a habit that perhaps comes from the poverty of my early twenties or possibly from growing up in a cash-conscious home. Whatever the progeny, its manifest has been the propensity to consider eating food that is spoiled and should be thrown away. I do this all the time. I hate to waste, but I always cook too much. or I bring home leftovers and then kick myself for letting them spoil before eating them. I remember when my parents' house burned down, things were quite tumultuous, but just before the fire, we had gone out for a birthday dinner for me and I had brought home most of a gigantic piece of prime rib. But with all the running around and tending to things the post-fire time required, I hadn't gotten to eating it. And when I opened the styrofoam container and found the pink, spotty, slimy evidence of spoilage, I distinctly recall thinking, "Well, maybe this part over here is still good." It's really horrible. I'm terribly ashamed of it. To my credit, I seldom actually eat the rotten stuff. I just feel bad about throwing it away. And on the occasions when I've given spoiled food a try but found that it was vile and garbagey-tasting, I have promptly spat it out. I promise. I never serve old food to my guests. This is a standard of mine. But nothing seems to be too old or too dried up or too withered for me to consider making a sandwich out of it. Even if that sandwich occurs between bread slices that have had to have their moldy bits excised with careful fingers. I won't blame you for finally deciding I'm a freakshow and not to be trusted. But this is the nature of confession. Perhaps some out there will find my honesty endearing.

You're never thinner than when you've just thrown up.

I am in the mood to rid myself of things. Or to replace things. Or to acquire things. Any of these at any given moment. I can't make up my mind.

"I did not come here to be devoured by symbols of monarchy!"

I have errands to run and no time to run them. Blast!

But I can sing the praises of having Casino Royale playing in the background while one is getting dressed. Try that the next time your cable goes out. You'll be walking a mile in my shoes at long last.

Epilogue to what preceded this

I was reading in bed shortly after writing my last entry when I saw a moth flitting about. I kept still for a minute or two until it flew within reach, and then I snatched it out of the air with my bare hands and crushed it good and dead. I felt very Chinese at that moment. And by that, I do mean superior.

Admissions

For nearly all of the weekend, the sultry Southland pall was on me in a thoroughly clammy way. Along with the scent of sunshine and the desire for a swim -- whatever that smells like.

I eat things that appall some people, and I've grown comfortable with that fact. I don't read off my dream menu just for inherent shock value; in fact, I am more often inclined to keep my whims to myself except in the company of very close friends who are less likely to make a face and then an exit. But even my own sister thinks I should take my culinary cues from Fear Factor. When she was visiting earlier in the week, we caught the last half of Hannibal, whose gore appeals to her. And I thought (tacitly) that that bit of pan-seared brain was probably delicious. Truth.

I am a bit of a broken record when a dog is on the scene. I have to exclaim, "Doggy!" or sing praise-filled songs of its cuteness. Even I don't find this amusing anymore.

I can be a bit manic about bugs. If I see one flying around in my apartment, I usually embark on a quest to either end its days with an artful whack of a bit of junk mail or chase it out a window that I can close before it knows what's in the works. And I have been known to utter taunting words of triumph when either of these finally occurs. I have traced the origins of this behavior to the Great Fly Infestation of 1994, a story I will save for another day.

I don't sleep as well or as often as statistics suggest that I should.

Injuries in the Home and How They Can Be Prevented

I was flipping through the The Goodrich Almanac for Farm and Home 1937, and I found a number of quaint bits of advice and charming old timey illustrations. I was looking for inspiration for my journal, but this sort of thing poses a problem for me. If I have a book or booklet that isn't already scrapped, it's difficult for me to tear it up or to use parts of it without feeling the anxious fear that I will suddenly realize the stuff on the reverse side of the paper is more wonderful than the stuff on the front as soon as I've glued it down. This must be what has kept me on the outside of the art world for so long: fear and neurosis.

Towards the back of the booklet (intact but for a missing corner of the cover), I found a feature called Injuries in the Home and How They Can Be Prevented. I laughed when I saw "Gun Shot Wounds" as one of the listed items. How perilous it was to live in 1937! The rest of the items were also surprisingly dire. These weren't just your run-of-the-mill in-home accidents. These were disaster-caliber incidents like "Asphyxiations and Suffocations," "Poisonings," and "Other." But as a reminder of the sweetness of that age, the illustration shows a mother gently bandaging the unsevered arm of her young girl child. I guess a sketch of a corpse with its eyes bulging out and a bottle in its hand marked "XXX" would have been too gruesome.

On the facing page, Helpful Hints Courtesy of "Successful Farming" beckons with entries like this:

Don't overlook the possibilities of old headlight reflectors for light shades about the farm buildings. When coated with aluminum paint they make extra good light. --M.H., Pa.

A useful device for the children in figuring, drawing and so on, is a dark-solored window shade fastened on the wall. It can be written on with chalk and can be easily erased. When not in use, it is rolled up. --M.W., N. Dak.

Turn a clear glass bowl over the alarm clock in the sickroom. You can then see the face perfectly, but the patient will not be dusturbed by the sound of the ticking. --Mrs. O.N., Nebr.

I'm not painting, but I sure am learning a lot. Did you know that the "B.F." in "B.F. Goodrich" stands for "Benjamin Franklin" -- I didn't.

All this, and still no artwork in the happening. If I say I paint with words, we can just keep the fact that this is a cop out between us. That way everybody wins.

Hoist him on your shoulders and carry him around the town, will you?

I'm speaking, of course, of Paul F. Tompkins, whose brilliance only continues to amaze, delight, and defy me. His show tonight was especially wonderful, and he embarrassed me, as he often does when I'm sitting in the front. But I got some balled-up paper to take home as a souvenir. So, all's well. Truly.

He made some timely comments about the passing of Bob Hope and the sort of getting-carried-away of saying he provided the world with one hundred years of laughter. He applauded Mr. Hope for providing the world with, say, fifty years of laughter and "twenty-five years of terrifying, bloody red eyeballs." I was engulfed in whelps of laughter. I know some people don't like to make jokes about sad subjects that are fresh and tender, but I admire those who do. I have always said there is no line. And I stick to it.

He also performed Folsom Prison Blues with the Watkins Family and made my favorite Johnny Cash song even more favoritey to me. If anyone can push the limits of a superlative, it's Paul F. Tompkins. He's really too wonderful to be spoken of in mere mortal terms.

But enough of my gush.

I want to drink cool water until it comes trickling out my ears. And it's not just because of the momentary rainstorm we had.

"I wanted to play every piano in the building, and it was exhausting."

I feel fatigue weighing down on me like a great bag of something heavy. It was a long, long weekend that ended in a sunny interlude and a sense of abject gratefulness that a breeze was happening through my car window. Even with shoulders stooped by the downward pull of the need for sleep, I can recount a many-layered tale of early morning parking searches and sidewalk adventures. When I am sent on my way with a great lot of memories, I am usually closer to content.

It's getting cooler and later and older and wiser. It's getting better all the time.

Don't know why there are clouds up in the sky.

I was introduced to a paper store today. It had many beautiful paper products in it. It made me want to make paper. That's a problem of mine. Tomorrow, it may be chickens made of felt and Clorox bottles. But today, it was fancy papers. The entrepreneurial spirit is not dead in me. But it isn't fully stabilized either.

The night ended with cool breezes and the promise of fall. I can't wait.

To entertain you and tax your intellect...

Victory Quiz is the name of the filler program currently airing on Turner Classic Movies. It is a parade of wartime factoids, melodramatic demonstrations, and ultra-keen miniature models. It even has a quiz clock with a moving hand and a bell that rings when time's up. And I just learned that the parachute was invented circa 1496. So if I'm ever going to be traveling back in time and have the foreknowledge of falling from a very high place, I will want to find myself in an era that postdates 1496. Because my possession of the power of time travel is not an automatic assurance that I will have also acquired the ability to fly.

Give me vintage television AND give me death. That, sir, would a perfect evening make.

Inner Monologue

I was in the grocery store, passing an older woman in the aisle containing bar soap. She was reading from the packaging of a four-pack of Ensure Light she was holding in her hand. "Seven dollars? For this? Hm. French Vanilla. That might be good..." I never looked at her. Never saw her lips moving. I could just as easily have been in a movie, striding forward, into and out of the zone of her voiceover narration. She sounded like a nice lady.

I talk to myself. Not always out loud. But the words are almost always going. I wonder if -- when I get older -- I will also inadvertently speak my thoughts. If so, prepare to be bored. I burn a lot of brain fuel thinking about things that don't matter at all.

I also take note of the fact that I am nearly always running through things again in my head. Retracing the steps of conversations I've had. Looking for details in my memory as if feeling around in the dark with my hand outstretched, fingers taking on that tarantula-like movement that is the hallmark of cautious touch. Sometimes I find something I forgot. Sometimes it adds to my understanding. Sometimes it enables me to be furious in retrospect. Or to be amused. Frequently, I find the bases for making a better argument or for proving my point.

When I look at my hands, I notice that they don't ever really lie flat. And when I press them together, palm to palm, I can apply pressure so selectively, from muscle group to muscle group, that I feel as if I can count nearly every delicate bone. I never found my hands to be terribly delicate. They are small. But they are not dainty or graceful. They are not as elegant as I would have liked nor as dextrous. They have been hurt many times. Superficially. They are the front lines of my clumsy corporeal army. I stopped wearing fancy watches at one point, because I was always marring their faces by knocking them against door frames and the like. I allow my hands to flail out wildly. They knock into things. They get scratched. Or bruised. Or pinched. Or crushed momentarily. They get slammed in things. I have grown into the habit of not being careful with them.

But I am also keenly aware of them. And I use them constantly. I am always, always taking stock of tactile sensation. I touch things lightly. Lightly enough so I can feel the things touching me back. I touch my hands and ask the left hand what the right feels like and vice versa. I run my fingertips over the sensitive skin of my inner forearms. I like the way it feels to both my arm and my fingertips. And I wonder what it feels like for someone else. When I touch someone, I wonder what it is like. I wonder if my clumsiness is apparent. Or if the uncertainty seems somehow more delicate. I wonder if my hand feels particularly small when being held by another larger hand. I forget to think about it while it's in progress. I remember so much more in retrospect.

My hands look young to me. Looking at them right now, I wonder whether I will remember having this assessment when I am old and my skin is translucent and crepe-like. My mother had a friend who wore white gloves while driving. I never wanted to be old enough to find that a necessary or good idea. I never thought my hands would be old enough to display jewelry or to wear nail polish properly. My fingers are still unadorned, and nail polish is very infrequently on them. So there's still that. I think one's hands never look younger than when they are wearing mittens.

Captain Jack Sparrow

Hot, muggy day in the town of Los Angeles. Me with back pain from improperly lifting musical equipment. Things feeling dismal and full of mistakes. Hopeful thoughts at a premium.

But I went to the movies and saw Pirates of the Caribbean, and it wasn't as riddled with Bruckheimerisms as I thought it would be (although they were certainly there, and that should not be overlooked or excused). I was disappointed in the score. It could have been massive and swashbuckling and grand, but it wasn't; it was supervised by Hans Zimmer, and it sounded to have been. But Johnny Depp is wonderful. And not just because he's dreamy.

I had to sit too close to the screen, but perhaps it's for the best that I was challenged in my ability to properly view the teaser for the Haunted Mansion abomination Disney has in store for us. I can't wait to see how they bastardize the surely-forthcoming Main Street U.S.A. feature. Why do people still go to watch movies with Eddie Murphy in them? Why?

I'm not really in a reviewing mood. I don't have all my marbles in place. I'm sticky and tired and a bit adrift in all my free time. But I enjoyed the movie I saw, even at the angle I saw it. And I felt bad for the actors who ever realize how fat they all look when you're sitting too close.

Final word: Johnny Depp is dreamy. Ever so. He makes me think of romance and dirty stuff.

Soundtrack of Memories

I was singing this song yesterday to my sister's dog. It reminds me of my mid-90s mix tapes. I used to wish someone would make me a mix tape with this song on it so I could pretend to be surprised and charmed, but secretly I always believed it was written for me anyway. Which proves that I am insane.

Phoenix Song

My father told me about how he once pinned up a statement that he didn't want to forget, and it read: If you scratch the surface of a cynic, you will find a frustrated idealist. Something to that effect, anyway. We were having a chat, and it came time to choose up camps. Am I an optimist or a pessimist? I think I concern myself more with which label I wish to be applied to me. How I am perceived is paramount. I am almost ashamed to admit that. Because of how it might cause me to be perceived.

What magic is required to interject hope and something sustainable? What keeps one from giving up? What catalyzes the shift from the bleak to the blazing? Why is it that fire ruins everything when all I ever seem to be is burning?

The Freedom of Cable Television

Comedy Central was broadcasting the South Park movie tonight, cursing and all. Somehow -- in a way that is typical of me and yet inexplicable as well -- I'm encouraged by that. Especially because I nearly declined to watch it, assuming that it would be stripped of its maiden vulgarity to accommodate censors and sponsors and the generally dull-minded. The first swear word came as a surprise to me. In almost as profound a way as the film originally did when I went to see it on a matinee day at a little suburban cineplex I used to live near. With that sort of wide-eyed, giggly giddiness that makes you want to look over at the person next to you and compare your reaction in search of camarederie and normalcy, it startled me. And I realized that I was delighted.

But that doesn't change the fact that a number of people gave me cause for displeasure today. I grow weary of it.

Slice!

I have a jim-dandy set of Cutco knives I bought from my little sister's boyfriend (if you're interested, ask me!), and I love them. But, quite honestly, I have cut myself every single time I have used anything other than the table knives. Tonight, I was bashing a clove of garlic, and I sliced my palm open. Earlier, trimming broccolini, I opened the tip of my finger. I just think you should be forewarned that -- should you be invited to dine at my home -- you will probably be ingesting some small portion of what courses through my veins. And if not, you will surely be hearing me yelp in pain before I go looking for that bloodstained piece of tissue I recently set down on the counter.

Mangiar bene!

Sweltering

Do I love the sun? Do I hate it? Am I resigned to the fact that its absence would mean the end of life on the planet? One thing I know: a hot day has a way of having its way with me. And sometimes I feel childishly angry that such a small thing can have so much power over me. But then, I'm a girl with a lot of turtleneck-y things in her clothes cupboard.

Remedy

I went for a very challenging run, and I'm a sweaty, throbbing mess. But I can attest to the restorative powers of sunshine and dance music. A fire engine full of firemen drove past me twice in Beverly Hills. I almost waved at them, because they were all looking at me and a few were smiling in a suspiciously non-derisive fashion, but I'm shy that way.

Right. I need a shower.

Severance

I'm actually amazed to be able to access my site today. Last night, the inability to check email evolved into applications returning errors of unknown usernames and bad passwords and still no cogent response from my hosting service. During the blackout, I experienced this profound sense of frustrated isolation. Maybe this is a smidge of what it feels like to be stranded on a desert island. You send out messages in bottles, and the tide keeps bouncing them back to you. You wonder if the croaking of the seagulls and the carrion eaters circling above you can be translated into a message of some sort. Think of all the communication you are missing out on. Maybe someone is trying to improve your mortgage rates even now.

Amidst my electronic paralysis, I worked on some art projects and finished a book I've been reading. Finishing a book is a strange sentimental experience for me these days. I usually take my time getting through books. I have a pact with myself to read a chapter each day -- usually right before going to bed -- no matter what condition I'm in. But I often read no more than the one chapter, and that makes for slow going in some thicker tomes. So, it may take me a month or two to read a book, and then those months forever become a period labeled by that book. Like when I was rereading The Lord of the Rings over the holidays. It's a pity to close a book finally. Metaphorically or otherwise. And there is a strange disconnected feeling that comes over me when I matriculate to the next title. How will the world look to me when I end each day with the words of Donna Tartt? Or James Joyce? Or Tony Millionaire? Okay, comic books don't count.

So back to my tale of the web hosting jack. In the end, I lost all copies of email I received and sent between June 18, 2003 and June 24, 2003, so if you are reading this and would like to forward me messages you sent me or messages I sent you during that period, you will help me keep my archives complete. Also, yesterday, my email was being bounced back for about 16 hours, so if you have been trying to reach me and have been unsuccessful, try, try again.

I went ahead and signed up for a new account with Dreamhost, so now I'm just waiting for the DNS addresses to be switched. There may be some downtime involved there, but one hopes it will be worth it. I will also be able to host all of my other ridiculous domains there, so perhaps this will be the beginning of something beautiful.

Anyone want to place a bet as to whether my current hosting service will refund any of the annual charge I paid in February?

I think I will go for a run. Surely this brand of frustration is carcinogenic.

Kvetching Is a Crappy Business

I prefer not to resort to this sort of thing here, but I am so furious with my web hosting service. My site and email were down for hours and hours, and when they finally became available again, six days' worth of email and web updates were just somehow deleted. Gone from my IMAP folders. Gone from my FTP. And my email and site have been experiencing periodic outages from minute to minute. I can't send mail. I don't know if I received mail. I can't retrieve mail I sent and received this past week. It's almost like having a housefire that burns six days' worth of records and valuables. The smarmy tech support responses I've been receiving don't really help matters any either.

It's bad enough that I have a sore throat and a waning desire to live, isn't it?

I got chills. They're multiplying.

Perpetual unrest is taking its toll on me.

I got a manicure and a pedicure, and that's an excursion I can recommend, but it's hard to paint when you're being careful of your nails. I suppose priorities might occasionally be at odds when one is a girl and fond of feeling pretty but also a brooding and driven producer of that which sets the left and right brain at odds. It's possible a lot of people who accomplished a great deal didn't have perfectly painted nails in the end. I wonder if they were judged harshly for it.

One Down

I finished filling all the pages of my first artist's journal. That means I spent a lot of time in the past few weeks waiting for pages to dry.

I kept meaning to go back to bed today. Eyes sore and burning. Stomach a bit off-kilter. Back on the unfriendly side of achy. Head swimming. But I never managed to do it. I'm impossible that way. My upstairs neighbor was playing Prince's Diamonds and Pearls album at an unbelievable volume up until just a few minutes ago. And apparently -- ironically -- he felt the need to talk over it, as well. In a way, it is a blessing that I seldom seek out slumber. He would turn me into a raving madwoman if the opposite were true. Why can't deadbeat musicians who are living off their girlfriends also keep regular hours?

Every day, I want more than I get.

Love, Loss, Impotence

My uncle passed away this morning. The announcement filled me with a familiar but unexpected grief. And a helpless compassion for my father and the rest of my family. I am angry at myself for being so ignorant as to assume everything would be okay. And I can't stop thinking I should have tried to call more times than I did. There are so many things I should have done. It's easy to mistake tears of sadness for tears of guilt and shame. And that is a cruel border to cross.

Whatever the sort, the tears keep coming. In unexpected waves. I can no longer count the number of days I awoke with no idea what sort of pain and disappointment was in store. It makes it difficult to proceed without the overcaution of recently burned fingers.

Tea Leaves, Tossed Cards, and What They Portend

I am up late. Again. Scanning documents for my little sister. Going back and forth to the table to see if those photos I doused with red paint have managed to dry yet. It makes me cagey.

And I feel as if I have been under the spell of some paralytic tongue-tying device that has pressed me into silence against my will. The more I paint, the more the trickle of words seems to slow. Maybe I can only have one sort of idea at a time. I'm inclined to disagree, though, because it seems I have at least two things going on in my head at all times of the day, and one of them is the same idea that never leaves me. And I am often able to pretend I'm not thinking it at all.

Poetry comes in three-word phrases over the span of days. My journal entries have evolved into hieroglyphs. Even the expression on my face is hard to read. Even for me.

I didn't buy the green pants. They were too big. But the peachy pink ones behind them came home with me that day.

When you were young and your heart was an open book

You know you did, you know you did, you know you did.

Scented Men

My dreams are so vivid that I usually think to return to them if given the opportunity -- even when they are angering or irritating or just sort of plodding on and on. And I wake so frequently that I have many of them. A lengthy series of disconnected brain movement making no sense in the long run and having precious little staying power. I read a few chapters in a book before preparing to be annoyed by punctual birds a smidge past five in the morning. I sometimes query this notion of input and its effect as a stimulus in dreams. Even the daydream sort. My mood can change for weeks on the basis of the book I'm reading. This is something I've both noticed and feared.

It's gorgeous sunny out today. I will make a point of putting sunscreen on the part in my hair to avoid getting a sunburn whose aftermath will look like the most embarrassing sort of scalp malady. The stuff I use on my face smells of sweet oranges and makes me wish I was gulping down great glassfuls of fresh-squeezed, pulpy juice. In the end, I would feel sick from drinking too fast. But a girl gets greedy when she hasn't had juice in a while.

My father's cologne is a potion that conjures memory and nostalgia and a strange and distant comfort. Even when he's no longer in the building and the scent is only an olfactory echo of his strides through the hall. Nostalgia has had a cruel sort of effect on me recently. I can almost not bear it. I've realized a desire to be free of sentiment and to see things for what they are. But I wonder if I shouldn't put off such edicts until after the mostly tentative high school reunion that is supposed to be happening this summer. Without the convenient tool of reminiscence, I imagine that event will be unbearable.

Why oh why will these paints not dry? They're watercolors for the sake of someone to be named later.

Eavesdropping

Amongst the many old things I have been collecting, I found a letter dated September 24, 1942, from a Mister Herman C. Rodencal, writing from Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, to his wife, who was apparently receiving her mail at Conkeys Book Store in Appleton. (From another letter, I learned that her name is Vera.) It is written in pencil, in a fine hand, on white paper that is turning brown at the edges. It required three cents to mail. This is some of what it says:

                                                                                          Thur, 4:15 --

Honey,
     I had such a nice birthday. I came up to the room this noon and there was a whole stack of mail. I couldn't understand so much mail. I took time out to open every one and then went back to eat lunch. Thanks so much dear and say thanks so much to Mother & Anita & Lester. Do you know -- I had 8 cards & a letter. Boy talk about getting mail -- I wonder what the mailman thought -- I bet he knew it must be my birthday.
     I feel okay again -- must have had the stomach flu or something. It's there a little bit yet but I'm really okay -- I was in bed by 4:45 and woke up when Dad came in at 7:30 and went back to sleep and slept most of the nite until the alarm went off. The lodge where we eat gave me some orange juice -- I felt a little foolish coz none of the other men had it but it went down very nicely and today my lunch tasted good.
     Its raining so we aren't going to work tonite. Dad & I may go to a movie after supper. Just as we were ready to leave the yard it snowed. Sort of wet but it was snow and now its wet out -- doesn't know what to do.
     My birthday has been nice honey. Thanks to the many cards -- I can't wait for my gifts until Sat -- The work went good and I felt better so all is well. Be seeing you soon -- honey -- We'll be eating at Bill's tomorrow eve. Sat isn't far away -- and I'm not sorry --

                                                       I love you dear --
                                                            a kiss for you on my birthday --
                                                                 and more Sat -- XXXX
                                                                           Always your
                                                                                Herman

Pardon My Advertisement

This is one of a crop of freshly scanned photographs appearing on my new Lomography feature Diario di Lomo. Most of them are not of me. This one is. I like it okay.

Oh, My Pregnant Head

I have been unable to stop this song from playing over and over in my brain since sometime last night. I even heard it in my dreams. And what dreams.

My errand outing took me past a bookstand beside which a middle-aged fellow was loudly shadow boxing karate-style. In a way I envied him. His assailants may be invisible, but he seems to know where they are. You can't really pull funky jujitsu moves on the silent killer, ennui.

Some of my photographs turned out pleasingly. Others showed me that I've been getting lazy about the use of the camera. I think every other batch has that problem. I get confident when my film comes back great. Then I have to learn the lesson again, that it comes back great only when I know what I'm doing.

I wish I could go somewhere tonight and look at the stars.

What I Need and What I Don't

...in no particular order...

time
license
a break
the doom and gloom
drama
another drink
lipstick
a new look
a new outlook
steady hands
a reason
an excuse
an audience
relief
eagerness
aptitude
arms to fall back into
a cushion just in case
more Adam Sandler
more closet space
a massage
girl power
cargo room
a nickname
guilt
consternation
scrutiny
a singing voice
running shoes
shelving
headache pills
something to look forward to

The Rosy Cheeks of Communism

Something Jade

Today is the thirty-fifth anniversary of my parents' wedding.

It's hard to believe they've been married longer than I've been alive, but the math works out.

June she'll change her tune.

I have been painting.

The grey, cottony ceiling of the gloomy sky today was welcome to me. The chill was welcome. I didn't long for sunrays, as I sometimes do. When it's grey like that, you don't mark the passing of the hours so clearly. You don't pay attention. There is no telltale rose-tinged sunset hue to foretell the coming of night. The night just comes, and it's upon you all of a sudden. And you've had the lights on all day anyway.

I let the art supply store inspire me today. I let myself have dreams and plans of the showing off of skills still out of my reach. But I did not fear reaching for them. I longed for it. I can only be pleased when I am set off in a day when I feel like making a great, greedy lunge at my future and whatever ambitions attract me. It's like being set on fire with the only hope of dousing it a palpable handful of something to be proud of. Sure, it slips through your fingers quickly, but while you're grasping, it has emollient properties.

In restless walks, she'll prowl the night.

Lyric Echoes

The book I was reading just before I went to sleep invaded my dreams somehow. Awake now, I'm charged with unrest and vacant memory and a sense of inexplicable nostalgia brought on by memories I don't actually have. What a wonder. You can fail in your dreams without ever even trying. And you can wake with the sting of failure still on you even when you can't remember anything else.

Those old familiar goosebumps are on me again. A chill that recalls times in recent years when I wrote in the wee hours because of vicious illness or idea-charged fatigue. I used to read that chill as a warning. Caution: nerve endings exposed, synapses firing. You're going to open your arms wide in welcome and be completely caught off your guard when something falls from the sky and crushes you, embrace and all.

I take the tingling sensation with me back to bed now, where I will scold myself for memory and feeling and trying to make sense of it all. Sometimes all this thinking is just a big fat indulgence.

"a weigh-above-average wardrobe"

This advertisement appeared in the September 1948 issue of Calling All Girls Magazine. I was flipping through the issue -- one in a stack -- and I stopped on this page, read for a few moments, and then laughed and said, "Oh, my god!" before running to the scanner. The text of the ad reads as follows:

"Don't worry," comforts your mother. "You'll thin down in a few years." But--who wants to waste precious Teen years, just waiting for pounds to melt off? Much smarter and smoother to wear Chubbette fashions, designed to minimize; sized to fit.

That there was ever actually a brand of fashions called "Chubbette" is a marvel to me. The caption "Photographs by Zogbaum" is only slightly less amusing.

Shoot

I think I'm drunk. And I didn't mean to be. But I'm far gone enough to be unable to draw a martini glass in my journal, so I think that means something. It's a pity. I expected to have a wealth of things to say. Instead, I can barely type. Save me, will you?

I feel bitter about certain things. And pensive about others. I feel as if I have been filled with this sense of dread this week, and I'm not sure why. And it's all the more frustrating, because I'm too tipsy to type properly.

Barn Dance & Hay Ride

My day was stress-speckled, but I think I managed to set things right. I went shopping for fresh produce and meat, and I made myself a lovely dinner -- something I often lament not making the time to do. There's something about eating prepared foods bought in a store that makes me feel unloved. Also? The lyrics to that song Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman? by Bryan Adams and Michael Kamen from the Don Juan de Marco soundtrack indicate that no one has ever really loved me. Isn't that a shame? These are some of the reasons it's important for me to make my own dinner. In addition to the fact that I should enjoy it now while I can -- I don't think they let you handle cutlery when you're locked up in the booby hatch.

I saw Henriette Mantel at Whole Foods. She looked like she had just had her nails done.

Oh, my aching back, and other exclamations of misery and discontentment for want of pity and relief.

I have objections to it always getting to be so late so quickly. And to watching television programming that brings tears to my eyes when I've got so much work to do. I just end up sitting in front of the computer -- eyes burning -- resenting that I taxed my eyes at all to begin with and knowing that I'm going to end up wearing some very unsatisfying corrective eyewear one day soon. And I'll deserve ever cursed moment of it. I treat my eyes like vermin, and they're beginning to get wise.

Here is something I wrote down a while back. It is a list of retorts made by a character in A Confederacy of Dunces. I was entertained by them and caught myself hoping that, one day, I might be able to have a dialogue with someone wherein I got to say these very words in this very order, sandwiched by the disagreeable responses of my discussion partner, who would be none the wiser and would likely find me hateful and difficult in a miscreant sort of way. Here they are, though, in their original order:

What am I seeing? Tell me soon or I'll die.

You really are insane, aren't you?

Are you kidding?

Get with it, please.

Oh, you really are on the moon.

Oh, you're truly fantastic.

Where will you ever end?

Marvelous! I can't wait to disagree with someone! How pithy I will get to pretend to be for a few sentences! Coincidentally, the dialogue I dream about is actually the construct of an improv game we do at the theater called "Pick a Play," but I'm sure I'll never get to say these things on stage, because we don't have A Confederacy of Dunces in the ratty old bag filled with dirty, spider-infested scripts and plays and restaurant menus that we use as fodder when the game gets played. Which is probably a good thing, because a lot of that book is not funny to me at all, much to the chagrin of many of my peers. I didn't dislike the book. But I was bewildered by the number of people who described it to me as the funniest book they had ever read. Please. This just wasn't at all my experience.

Anyway, the point of this was originally that it's late, and I'm tired, and it always seems to be late, and I always seem to be tired. And my back really does ache from the curvature it adopts when I work. I don't believe in catching up on lost sleep. But there are times when I wish I did.

In the absence of any sort of segue, here is another photo from last night. I like it, despite the fact that it makes me look sort of scary and insane.

Dilemma and Dawn and the Inevitable Fade

I took hundreds of pictures in the last twelve hours or so. Hundreds. If I hadn't taxed my digicam battery, there would have been even more. It was an evening riddled with photo opportunities and visual splendor and comical circumstances and titillating glimpses of secretive sessions in dimly lit corners. I have the desire to share a great many of them, but I am bleary-eyed and wasting away.

I liked this picture especially. I thought it might be one of the frames on the Viewmaster reel of me that will never be made. It's a shame. I rather fancy the idea of my life advancing in frames with the depression of a lever. One that makes that slight scraping sound that my red plastic Viewmaster always did.

Fitful dreaming commences in a matter of minutes.