Does anyone else out there ever engage in this sort of behaviour? The type where you indulge a feeling/sensation/desire through every medium possible (photos/music/memories/words) in order to drudge up allllllllllll of the feelings you've spent so long rationalizing/processing/dismissing, just to feel that exquisite pain allllllllllll over again?
Does anyone else out there know how to stop?
12.29.2011
under the tree
I didn't get this:
or this:
or these:
but you know what I did get?
(oh, beyond family, safety, peace, home, food, etc.)
...
...
Did you guess?
AFRICA!
Hurrah for protracted adolescence. My parents are taking my brother and me on safari this fall. I am so glad I have failed to achieve true financial independence. I am so thankful my parents didn't give up on family vacations after the misery of dragging my ungrateful 13-year-old self through Europe. I am so excited for Africa. Being a frequent customer on Disney's Jungle Cruise, I feel pretty well-equipped.
12.21.2011
maybe this year will be better than the last
Last night I dreamt you kissed me during a Blue Man Group show. It was still pretty spectacular.
Tonight, with any luck, I'll fall asleep in Vancouver. All salt and wet and alive. I haven't been home in over a year. I am cleaving so closely to this happiness, which feels like a treasure each day, like something I have to pocket and keep close. I think it will be easier to indulge it at home, being with my family, hiking, skiing, baking, gifting. And I think, or maybe already know, that I will miss New York, and my life here, immensely. I am already excited to come back.
Big plane, seat 43K. I've got a New Yorker and an issue of Granta. I can't wait to leave them unopened and watch terrible movies on the long flight West.
See you soon.
12.13.2011
random act of bravery
Confessed a crush. Are crushes still endearing at 27? Or did they go the way of baby backpacks and crop tops?
12.12.2011
random act of bravery
The subtitle here could be: Bloggers! They're just like us. (Except with better footwear.)
Tonight I went to a book club hosted by a blogger I have long admired. It was lovely - all gingerbread and tea and generous spirits. I'll admit to lying awake last night much longer than I should have, lamenting my lack of clogs and the perfect vision that has long kept me from the glasses I believe would complete me. I should not have worried. These women - and one man with the most fabulous hair - were terribly kind and humble and welcoming, and that we were discussing Little Women only made the evening that much warmer.
Reading Little Women gives me the same feeling I have when peering in windows of the brownstones in my neighbourhood. I like best the empty, well-lit rooms, filled with bookshelves and carpets and photographs of faces I can't make out. Rooms that look as though someone is just about the enter them. It is always Christmas in Little Women. Someone is always pinning a flower to someone else's coat. There is no shortage of love in that book.
I filled the time between work and book club in a Chinese restaurant at a table for one with vegetable dumplings, soft, slippery blocks of tofu, and a pot of grassy tea all to myself. They were playing carols and I careened through the last few pages of the book and relished every moment of my solitude. It's strange how finally being content in my aloneness has allowed me an even greater appreciation of the company of others. A year ago I would have been too afraid to step into a little shop and open my mouth among these creative, intelligent, well-shod women, but tonight I hitched up my tights and just grew a pair. I hope Jo would have been proud.
Tonight I went to a book club hosted by a blogger I have long admired. It was lovely - all gingerbread and tea and generous spirits. I'll admit to lying awake last night much longer than I should have, lamenting my lack of clogs and the perfect vision that has long kept me from the glasses I believe would complete me. I should not have worried. These women - and one man with the most fabulous hair - were terribly kind and humble and welcoming, and that we were discussing Little Women only made the evening that much warmer.
Reading Little Women gives me the same feeling I have when peering in windows of the brownstones in my neighbourhood. I like best the empty, well-lit rooms, filled with bookshelves and carpets and photographs of faces I can't make out. Rooms that look as though someone is just about the enter them. It is always Christmas in Little Women. Someone is always pinning a flower to someone else's coat. There is no shortage of love in that book.
I filled the time between work and book club in a Chinese restaurant at a table for one with vegetable dumplings, soft, slippery blocks of tofu, and a pot of grassy tea all to myself. They were playing carols and I careened through the last few pages of the book and relished every moment of my solitude. It's strange how finally being content in my aloneness has allowed me an even greater appreciation of the company of others. A year ago I would have been too afraid to step into a little shop and open my mouth among these creative, intelligent, well-shod women, but tonight I hitched up my tights and just grew a pair. I hope Jo would have been proud.
12.11.2011
on the time we have
"Are you satisfied with your experiment, girls, or do you want another week of it?" she asked, as Beth nestled up to her and the rest turned toward her with brightening faces, as flowers turn toward the sun.
"I don't!" cried Jo decidedly.
"Nor I," echoed the others.
"You think, then, that it is better to have a few duties and live a little for others, do you?"
"Lounging and larking doesn't pay," observed Jo, shaking her head. "I'm tired of it and mean to go to work at something right off."
Marmee's very good advice: "Have regular hours for work and play, make each day both useful and pleasant, and prove that you understand the worth of time by employing it well. Then youth will be delightful, old age will bring few regrets, and life become a beautiful success, in spite of poverty."
"I don't!" cried Jo decidedly.
"Nor I," echoed the others.
"You think, then, that it is better to have a few duties and live a little for others, do you?"
"Lounging and larking doesn't pay," observed Jo, shaking her head. "I'm tired of it and mean to go to work at something right off."
Marmee's very good advice: "Have regular hours for work and play, make each day both useful and pleasant, and prove that you understand the worth of time by employing it well. Then youth will be delightful, old age will bring few regrets, and life become a beautiful success, in spite of poverty."
- from Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
12.07.2011
D.C.
It's nights like this - heavy rain, good theatre, and a wardrobe conundrum - that I miss you the most.
12.06.2011
random act of bravery
I’ve been struggling lately to leap a mental hurdle that popped up sometime in the course of this strange year. It’s a sentiment I’ve tried to articulate to a few people in my life, a sentiment that has been met with crazy face (not that I blame them). The ugly: I’ve become convinced, over the past year, that no one actually cares about anyone else. Fine, more to the point: no man cares about any woman. This isn’t about love – I believe in love, I do. But I have somehow come to the conclusion that romantic love is based more on a desire for stability, or for a certain lifestyle, than on an accurate, clear, intimate, compassionate understanding of another person. Basically, I don’t think they – guys – give a shit about the wholeness of the person they are with.
It’s ugly, right? It’s the worst. It’s not meant to be a gendered attack – there isn’t anger behind this. It’s just a sort of slow, gutting resignation. I can't even think about it for longer than a few moments without becoming totally bewildered by how bitter and depressing it all seems. And yet I can't convince myself otherwise. This ugly thought has also made me, at times, debilitatingly uninteresting. Since I'm convinced no guys are interested in who I am, I become little more than a mirror, asking questions, endlessly spinning the conversation back to them. And since I tend to date other artists, this is easy for both of us, as I'm legitimately curious and male artists can talk about their own work until their overwrought, abstract, dubstepping cows come home. I've spent intimate time with guys this year who I can pretty much guarantee would not be able to rattle off a single personal fact about me even if held at gunpoint. Which is, like, criminally boring, and totally not their fault.
Coming out of my hiatus has been enlightening mostly because I've determined that that imaginary boyfriend whose absence I was lamenting would actually be super annoying to the life I already have and truly love. Which has given me a kind of freedom I didn't have before, the kind that says yes to anything engaging or new, like spur of the moment trips to Philadelphia. Sometimes this means I get stuck uncomfortably sexting minor celebrity activists, but it also results in wine-fueled bluegrass jams with adorable Midwesterner's. I'm online dating! It's actually fun, now that I don't really care. And even though it is painful, I've been trying to stop myself from asking the next question and the next question and the next question, and remember that it's difficult to be cared for if you don't give anyone the chance.
(This was sort of depressing. Here's a great video to make up for it.)
It’s ugly, right? It’s the worst. It’s not meant to be a gendered attack – there isn’t anger behind this. It’s just a sort of slow, gutting resignation. I can't even think about it for longer than a few moments without becoming totally bewildered by how bitter and depressing it all seems. And yet I can't convince myself otherwise. This ugly thought has also made me, at times, debilitatingly uninteresting. Since I'm convinced no guys are interested in who I am, I become little more than a mirror, asking questions, endlessly spinning the conversation back to them. And since I tend to date other artists, this is easy for both of us, as I'm legitimately curious and male artists can talk about their own work until their overwrought, abstract, dubstepping cows come home. I've spent intimate time with guys this year who I can pretty much guarantee would not be able to rattle off a single personal fact about me even if held at gunpoint. Which is, like, criminally boring, and totally not their fault.
Coming out of my hiatus has been enlightening mostly because I've determined that that imaginary boyfriend whose absence I was lamenting would actually be super annoying to the life I already have and truly love. Which has given me a kind of freedom I didn't have before, the kind that says yes to anything engaging or new, like spur of the moment trips to Philadelphia. Sometimes this means I get stuck uncomfortably sexting minor celebrity activists, but it also results in wine-fueled bluegrass jams with adorable Midwesterner's. I'm online dating! It's actually fun, now that I don't really care. And even though it is painful, I've been trying to stop myself from asking the next question and the next question and the next question, and remember that it's difficult to be cared for if you don't give anyone the chance.
(This was sort of depressing. Here's a great video to make up for it.)
12.05.2011
Philadelphia
Hey, Philly! You didn't look anything like this, but I am very happy I got to spend 24 hours with you this weekend. You like public art! And Italian food! And bluegrass jams! You had a whole store devoted to accordions, and a market with 16 kinds of kombucha! (I counted!) I could walk on your wide sidewalks without being slapped by a crazy man! (This happened! In Times Square!) Your public transportation uses adorably arcane tokens! These were actually very annoying, but no matter! I think we should spend some more time together.
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