delighted, like poetry

Current mood:floaty

i'm leaving in three or so weeks. leaving here. going back to where i came from, in some sense. that feels weird to me. the thought that i actually came from somewhere else. and that there it is much much colder.

for instance, the computer tells me that it's 57 degrees outside right now, but that can't be true. because i am freezing. absolutely cold. what's the california equivalent of wind chill? there must be one.

maybe i'm getting sick.

but i feel this heaviness, this drag, on the thought of returning to massachusetts, to spend what amounts to the whole goddamn winter in a place that fills me with such sadness. it's terrifying and exhilarating and ... terrifying. i have visions of productivity, of a vacation from my life here, of writing and making music and basically figuring it all out. and then i have nightmares that i will be unable to do anything, to even move. that the heaviness will get heavier, until it crushes me.

christ, how melodramatic.

but i'm discovering how much i need my friends here in california, how i need to take pieces of them with me, that i hope they will send me words and hugs and trinkets and kisses, wrapped in clumsily-fashioned homemade envelopes and sealed with wax and glittery stickers. perhaps i am needy right now, perhaps i ask too much. or maybe i just need to know who my friends really are.

i'm kinda scared. and i need someone to hold my hand.

Currently reading: Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction By J. D. Salinger Release date: 01 May, 1991

random for you

Current mood:achey

all i want to do is sit down with a ukelele that's out of tune, an accordian that's too big for me, a keyboard with ridiculous samples, and sing out all the aches and confusions and oh-so-sorrys. i will bang on tin cans and beer bottles. it will not be emo, or girly, or full of whines. it will be great.

i know there is an extra layer beneath my skin, a layer of tears and vinegar that linger and slosh. these things try to get out at inappropriate moments. like knives.

i don't mean it. i can't help it. i'll figure out how to stop. someday.

sheesh, guy

Current mood:cranky-pants

i gave notice at the photo lab. or, rather, i left notice. i left a letter of resignation after my ten hour shift yesterday, with "dave. important." writ large on the front. i feel light, airy, full of possibility. i didn't realize how very much that place gave me a pounding headache until i engineered its passing from my life. and the pain in my head lessened a little.

and i may be going away. probably soon. but though that was the most obvious reason given for my leaving, there is so much more behind it. so many things built up upon my brain.

and it's not so much the place, or the fucked up way that our employer has of dealing with people. or, rather, not dealing with people. or the lack of adequate monetary compensation. or even the fact that i have moved from being a skilled professional, a "printer," who actually took pride in my work, to being a machine, an "operator," who pushes a button on a computer and waits for another computer to render an image that looks like crap.

it was, in the end, the lack of respect. the fact that i was rendered imbecilic by the new machine that i could not understand, and that nobody thought it worthwhile to teach me to understand. that when things went wrong it was my fault, and when things went right it obviously had nothing to do with me. that only twice that i can remember i was told i was doing a good job, that i was a person they thought it worthwhile to keep around.

and i know that that's business, that so many people i know have it so much worse than i do at the photo lab. but when a place makes pretensions of being a different sort of business, it's so much more offensive when you are able to discern the lie. everything after that just piles insult upon insult.

friday, november 3rd is my last day. the next day smirk and shotwell are playing a daytime barbecue at thee parkside. then sunday and monday are my two day birthday celebration. details are murky, but on the way. come celebrate with me, and dance and sing and feel crazy free. you can hold my hair while i puke. c'mon, its a birthday tradition.

i love all you all.

Currently reading: Everything Is Illuminated: A Novel By Jonathan Safran Foer Release date: 01 April, 2003

sheesh, guy

Current mood: cranky-pants

i gave notice at the photo lab. or, rather, i left notice. i left a letter of resignation after my ten hour shift yesterday, with "dave. important." writ large on the front. i feel light, airy, full of possibility. i didn't realize how very much that place gave me a pounding headache until i engineered its passing from my life. and the pain in my head lessened a little.

and i may be going away. probably soon. but though that was the most obvious reason given for my leaving, there is so much more behind it. so many things built up upon my brain.

and it's not so much the place, or the fucked up way that our employer has of dealing with people. or, rather, not dealing with people. or the lack of adequate monetary compensation. or even the fact that i have moved from being a skilled professional, a "printer," who actually took pride in my work, to being a machine, an "operator," who pushes a button on a computer and waits for another computer to render an image that looks like crap.

it was, in the end, the lack of respect. the fact that i was rendered imbecilic by the new machine that i could not understand, and that nobody thought it worthwhile to teach me to understand. that when things went wrong it was my fault, and when things went right it obviously had nothing to do with me. that only twice that i can remember i was told i was doing a good job, that i was a person they thought it worthwhile to keep around.

and i know that that's business, that so many people i know have it so much worse than i do at the photo lab. but when a place makes pretensions of being a different sort of business, it's so much more offensive when you are able to discern the lie. everything after that just piles insult upon insult.

friday, november 3rd is my last day. the next day smirk and shotwell are playing a daytime barbecue at thee parkside. then sunday and monday are my two day birthday celebration. details are murky, but on the way. come celebrate with me, and dance and sing and feel crazy free. you can hold my hair while i puke. c'mon, its a birthday tradition.

i love all you all.

nerd

Current mood:elate-o-riffic

things rotate and twirl around and flip over. things happen again and again. and then they don't. i feel like i'm in this transition period, that everything is changing and my head just can't quite keep up. but it's ok. it's all going to be ok.

i started working at modern times bookstore, as a part-time sub. the other day i was asked to move the u.s. history section to the back of the store, and it took me hours and hours because i couldn't stop reading. every other book i shelve calls out to me. it fills me with a constant, electrical buzz, being around this store. i really am going to get "book worm" tattooed on my knuckles. even if there is already some skinny, most-likely-adorable boy supposedly somewhere in the northwest with that tattoo. or so i hear. he may actually not be skinny after all. or adorable. but he sure is someone after my own heart. whoever he is.

so, come by the bookstore sometime and we can talk about my favorite cover designs, or how certain people need to never ever write another word, or how certain people need to write more words right away. i don't have a set schedule yet. but even if i'm not here, you should come by the store, because we are so cool it hurts.

yes.

Currently listening: In the Aeroplane Over the Sea By Neutral Milk Hotel Release date: 10 February, 1998

transference of subject and object

Current mood:apocalypse-y ache-y

i'm not sure why, but my head constantly pounds with a dull pain behind my eyes these days, the only relief pushing fingers into various parts of my skull until my sinuses say "give" and begin acting more responsibly. everything seems to make my head hurt.

and i know that there are reasons for this pain. i know that my head is actually sickly. but most of the pain seems to come from my mind.

if i could take things back i would, suck the words backwards through teeth clenched in fear and anger. un-nod my head, release your fingers. if i knew how to do these things, we could return to something that perhaps i don't want, but that allows us to function like human beings who care about each other.

dreams dictate my reality. every night i lay down my head to personal movies of betrayal and loss. everyone i've ever met shows up to play a part, turning their heads away in turn. after a while, it begins to feel true. and i pull away some more, feeling like i did, so many years ago, when i started to shut the door on so many things. on you. because it was easier than feelings. because it was easier than truth.

words should fly out between us. they should be as easy as running. but they get caught in my throat and eaten alive. i'm through repeating words, repeating actions, repeating thoughts. parroting who i used to be. i don't know how to go forward from here.

please help me.

"all you really wanted ..."

Current mood:headache-y

i find myself dreaming of rambling ranch houses in small midwestern towns, wide, sagging porches, never enough screens in the lopsided windows to keep the mosquitoes out. of rocking chairs that tangle themselves in warped floorboards, while i sit and look at the giant night sky, bigger than the world. of thunderstorms. of room to stretch out.

i want to take you by your indecisiveness and drag you far away from here, somewhere where we can be a community of two, you and me against the world.

but i know i'm a city girl. that the quiet would chase me back here. that maybe we would not survive.

but it's a really nice dream.