famished girl selling pastries.

Last night I dreamt I was in a high-school, sitting in a bathroom stall.
I saw through the stall that there was a young famished girl sitting in one of the sinks, with a plate of twisted pastries beside her. She was really pretty, with tan skin and earth tone clothes. She had long straight brown hair with a couple of braids. She was asking the girls coming into the bathroom if they'd like to buy a pastry.

Two girls walked in, ignoring her. They stood looking at themselves and one was commending the other for being able to starve herself for a longer period of time than she was capable of. They were both stick thin. Then the girl in the sink asked them if they'd like some pastries. The girl who starved herself longer went into a stall and the other one asked the girl what they were and for how much. The girl replied, explaining what they were made of, and that they were 5 dollars. She debated it, tasting one. The girl in the stall yelled out to her, saying she shouldn't do it because they have such and such in them. That would make her fat.

I told my mom this part of the dream and she pointed out the irony. I don't know if I've ever had irony in my dreams before.

Another part of the dream I was in the art department at Western. My sculpture class was just ending, and I was working on a project that was about how everything is a part of everything. I was building a structure in which boxes fit into other boxes, then in the center there was a tiny box that held trinkets which also opened, like a locket and a tiny tiny hollow disco ball. The structure became a huge tower and I placed it inside a sort of crevice made of cardboard. It looked like a big crack in a rock face.
Then I was getting ready to leave the classroom when I remembered that a guy I know, Kevin, was in the next class, photography. A girl came in, an acquaintance of mine, and she said, "Hey, Kevin is in this class." And I replied, "Oh yeah? What's his last name?"
"Cornell"...totally not the guy's last name, but in the dream it was.
"Oh." I said disgruntled.

Then I sat down to put on my All Stars. It was taking me forever to lace them back together and tie a bow. While I was still doing it, Kevin walked in, but he looked like one of the dancers in "America's Next Dance Crew." It was the Asian guy in Supreme Soul, who actually does look a lot like Kevin. He walked in with a ton of attitude, walking like a gangster, baggy pants riding low, a backwards baseball cap, and a smug look on his face. He looked up and saw me. I said hi, and he just gave me a head nod, then turned away.
I was pissed. I stopped tying me shoes and stomped off, pushing tables and trash cans out of my way as I stormed out of the room.

Later what happened is too dream-like to describe. If only I could connect my mind with magical plug to a monitor and show you what happened.

to accompany the last post

today was a good day.

Today I woke up happy. No reason, just felt happy.
Had some coffee.
Did some stuff, including burning a bunch of movies and shows onto my laptop.
Then the sun came out blaring so bright that this New Mexican winter day felt like Bellingham summer. My mom and I sat out in it for a couple of hours.
I tried reading a book, but it was too wordy and I kept getting lost in the descriptions, unable to follow any plot. I'll take the blame for that though, I wasn't focusing very well. Anyway, I switched to just listening to music and sitting in the sun.

And I guess the access to sun set the tone for the rest of the day. I always forget what a difference sunshine can make in life and how everything is so rosy when you're full of vitamin d.

My mom and I had a couple of good laughs towards evening time. One was because she decided to put the Love Boat on television even though I clearly dissaproved. Then she started explaining that my sister Alisha used to watch that show because she had a crush on one of the characters. Just after she said that they were showing individual shots of each main character and we were trying to guess which was the one. The first was an old man with grey hair, the second a nerdy balding man with huge bulbous glasses, and the third an African American bartender with a full afro, mustache and swanky grin. Clearly, it was the bartender.
Then my dad walked in the room, and emphatically asked, "Why are you watching the Love Boat?!"

The other thing that made us crack up was when I looked up a movie they had downloaded on rotten tomatoes to check its rating. I saw 72% and said in an optimistic tone, "Oh that looks like it could be okay!" My mom sort of nodded, showing she was listening. Then I read through some of the plot and it sounded truly terrible.
And noticing my mistake, I felt giddy and began laughing really loudly. My mom looked at me and I admitted that actually it read 27%. Dyslexia is kicking in now too, at least my senility will have a companion.
I'm not sure why it was so funny. This is definitely one of those stories that doesn't translate an hour later.
Maybe it was the sun.

Anyway, I leave tomorrow.
Two weeks soared past us. I just got used to being here a couple of days ago. I like this place and now I just want to pose a question:
Is this really the last relocation of the nomadic Mann parents?

Casino and ancient carvings

Today's journey was a short trip over to Albuquerque to view some more petroglyphs.
On the way we stopped at a Casino and mom and I pulled some slots.
Unfortunately we lost all of them, leaving with a net loss of 5 dollars but fortunately each of us with a coffee in hand.








Part of that was true.

the golfishes that will save the world

At one point in last night's dream I was carrying a plastic bag with goldfishes swimming around in it. I was with a close female friend. Not sure who it was though.
She held a bag in her hand too.
For some reason these goldfishes were vital to the continued existence of planet Earth.
And as we walked through town, on our way somewhere, a couple of guys chose to bother us.
They were riding their bikes towards us and sped up, zooming past either side of us, brushing past our bodies. Of course we were worried about the little goldfishes.
Next they got back in front of us then forcibly zoomed between the two of us.
Again, same fear.

We arrived somewhere. A home, maybe my companion's family home. A woman took the goldfish from us, setting them aside in a safe spot for us.
Then we plopped around the house, I on the floor, and her on the couch. We just hung around chatting until night came.
All of a sudden we weren't feeling casual and relaxed. We looked at time pieces and looked at the fish, worried both held bad news. The fish, with some nudging moved again and were fine. The time pieces told us we were late. For something.

FLAMBOYANT

...is what I meant.

family visits, flamoyant cafe, recurring nightmare

My mom's family is visiting...her sister and sister's two kids and adopted kid.
Truthfully none of them are kids. They're all grown, of cousins Kim is 20, adopted Monique is probably also 20, Brian is in his late 20s, and Debbie is my aunt and I don't need to give an age because she's clearly not a kid.
Anyway, they're high energy which is cool but startling.

We just got back from the same cafe that my mom and I went to with the trans man and flamboyant man. Today we saw an interesting encounter between the trans man and a customer there with his family. Apparently they had gone to school together years ago so when they were making introductions the trans waiter said "Oh no, I know you. Wasn't your mother the principle of our school?" (or so I heard.) The guy looked shocked, and gave an uncomfortable smile. After the trans waiter left the men at the table leaned in together, all silent for a few moments with stunned expressions. Finally I overheard the older man quietly ask "Did you mention that she used to be a guy?" He said "yeah" and then they were silent again for minutes, each of them taking their time to let it sink in.
Later the flamboyant man came in and my aunt was teasing him about letting us eat pie because it had been done cooling a half hour longer than someone said she'd need to wait. The man's reply to her complaints was, with a flirtatious flitter of the eyes and a feminine tone of voice, "Everything is perfect." By the way, he had breasts today.


Also, this morning I woke up remembering every detail of the nightmare I had last night. I had the sensation that it was a recurring one I've had throughout my life. But because I didn't write it down soon enough, I've forgotten most of it. I tried holding onto the memory but a lot of it is lost in my brain somewhere.

What I do remember is:
I was in a white living room, clear of anything, with about three other people and a young girl. One person was a mother. The young girl opened the door and ran out of the house. Outside it was pitch black and snowy, there were no neighbors nearby, and we were surrounded by wilderness. It was somehow dangerous out there. The mother immediately was terrified. We ran outside to find the girl and she was gone. She had dissapeared the instant she stepped outside. We all shared the fear of what could happen to her out there, and so decided to get into the two jeeps parked just outside, and head to the police department for help. As we walked out on the concrete stairs I glanced at the door while the mother shut it. The door knob was actually a mouth in an open teeth-bearing snarl. When I saw that I knew something very wrong was happening, that we, or just I, had been set up and were in danger. I knew it wasn't safe to get into the car and as we approached it I noticed the police rangers were in the driver's seat of the vehicle.
That's all I remember so far. I wish I could remember more because recurring dreams must hold some significance.

why i feel like i just swallowed a brick.

"You are going to have some challenges in finding a job after you graduate with the market and business being in such bad shape.
Perhaps you will want to start networking soon."
-Grandma

This is also why I should move to China.

spoken word

I was just listening to some Saul Williams, began talking with my parents about spoken word and ended up showing them some of Anis Mojghani's work. His slam poetry is so amazing.
If you've got ten minutes to spare, listen to this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMS1SfHx8hk
if you have three minutes fast forward until the third poem, "Shake the Dust."

And if you like poetry, we should go to Monday poetry nights downtown sometime over the next six months.

waitressing

I dreamt I was in an alcove of a restaurant.
I was with my mom. We were drinking something warm.
The owner came by, a very friendly, jubilant Persian man with a cozy smile. He had a scruffy face. He offered my mom and I something...a food or drink item, or possibly even a compliment. I don't recall. It was an offering. That's what counts.

There were few other customers. It was early afternoon.

We mentioned I needed work and he said they could always use more people, so I agreed to come back that evening for work.

I did, and he wasn't there. The restaurant was packed with people at tables. It expanded past it's former alcove into a large living room size. It was dimly lit with candles and small lamps draped over in red clothe. It was soothing besides the noise level. Everyone was talking. Loudly.
I saw Taylor was there, but didn't pay him much attention. He was with friends. I thought it odd he was there though, since he was meant to be some far away place. I thought "how coincidental" and searched around for an employee to tell me what to do.

I saw one girl with black clothes and an apron writing down orders at a table. She was clearly very busy, so I decided to figure it out on my own. I noticed a table of people resting their chins on their hands, elbows propped up on the table top. Their faces were expressing clearly their annoyance, so I went to them and asked "Have you been helped?"
"No" they all lifted their heads to say.
"Okay. Just one second." And I ran to the back, through the beaded curtain into the stock room/kitchen/washroom to find a pad of paper and pen. The pad was long and had a grid covering it, like you find in a graphing notebook. The pen was like five pounds heavy. I thought "how did I end up with this STUPID pen." I went back to them and wrote what they wanted, the pen wobbling from side to side uncontrollably as I attempted grasping it like a normal pen. After I took their orders I realized I still had my hobo gloves on. They were huge. They made my hands feel three times their size (like in Science of Sleep) and my face went flush when I realized I still had them on while speaking with the customers. I took them off.

Then noticed to my side, near the beaded curtain, was a young girl also wearing a waitress outfit. I sat down at her table and said "Ni Hao!" (because she looked Chinese. This is not something I would ever do...assume someone's heritage like that.) She gave me a disgruntled look without even turning her face to look at me. The guy across from her at the table turned to me and gave me a huge smile. He was an attractive young Asian guy. His smile communicated forgiveness on her part for both my ignorance and her rude response. He made it okay. Then she took a cell phone from behind her other ear and closed it...that is why she didn't even turn to me. I told her I was a new employee and needed help. She was lazy and didn't care about what I had to say. She sat slumped in her chair listening to me and didn't help me. Taylor was still seated at a table, directly across from us, but I wasn't thinking about his being there. I could see him through my peripheral vision.

Without any help from her I kept on. Pretending to know what I was doing, I went to the next table that expressed dissapointment in their lack of attention. It was a large table of people, a family, one guy I knew sitting with them. A woman, seemingly the head figure of the household, pointed to a table across the room and said "We want that. That bowl of whatever it is." I looked over and saw two young girls with an enormous clear glass bowl of "whatever." It looked like salad with beans and something crunchy on top. I said, "Well, of course. Okay.... You know what? I'm very new here, so I'm not really sure what that is. It looks to me like a taco salad without the taco." The woman replied with a full mouth smile and agreed, "I think you're right. That is what it looks like. We'll have it. Looks delicious!" Everyone at the table had their arms on the table (like a symbol of their honesty and kindness.)
Despite the comfort they made me feel, letting off an aura of happy supportive family, I was immeditately stressed out. I had no clue how to find the cooks and didn't know what that "whatever" dish was, couldn't make it myself, had no help from fellow employees, didn't want to disappoint that nice family, and noticed Taylor had left.
Standing in the midst of people, noise, and warm light, I had no solution. Everything felt like it was trembling, the pen weighed down my right hand, and my brain was about to explode.

Then I woke up with a throbbing headache.
My first thought was "I could be a waitress some day."

movie

I now also strongly recommend watching the movie Slumdog Millionaire.

I hardly looked away from the television the entire movie.

photos

The first picture is of El Morro where my mom and I went to see where people had carved into the stone over time since the ancient days. There were petroglyphs as well as the names of individuals who passed through in the 1800's.
The second is the view of Mt. Taylor of Grants through the rear view mirror as we drove to El Morro.
Third is some store through the car window under the snow fall of today in Santa Fe.
Fourth is where I got my father with snowballs in the parking garage. One on the head and one on the upper back. Killer shots. He got me too, but that's not important.
Fifth is maybe an electrical box? on the sidewalk in Santa Fe, painted by a youth mural group. It was pretty sweet.
And finally a tile mural, maybe concealing/beautifying a small sub station.


p.s. flight of the conchords is back.

Santa Fe and Michael Jackson

My parents and I just got back to Grants from Santa Fe.

As we found out, they have a a large number of welcoming galleries, including many displaying contemporary art. There is so much more to see, so much that we didn't have the chance to. The snow built up over night while we were sleeping...or lying in bed in agony attempting sleep...leaving all of the city draped in about a foot thick blanket of snow. So, we didn't see many galleries.

Nevertheless, while there we got to see the Georgia O'Keefe museum, some of Yves Klein's own patented ultramarine pigment in a glass case, some highly skilled ikat weavings, a Tunisian man with the most gorgeous eyes I've ever seen, and quite a few snowmen scattered around town.
We also got to eat the most scrumptious crepes and drink what should be, if not already is, award-winning espresso (served by a man with large-framed super stylish glasses that I wanted to simultaneously compliment and steal.)

On the way back to Grants the roads progressively became worse. First there were icy patches on the road, then we drove into the looming snow clouds ahead. As we entered the snow a pompous man on the radio began making a big spiel about the "breaking news" on Michael Jackson's death. My mom and I were frustrated with this man for speaking so nonchalantly about a real man's death. I can't describe it, but the tone of voice he announced the "news" in was worse than abrasive. It felt like he was proud to be saying it. Yuck yuck yuck. Thinking it was the truth, we were upset with him, but continued to listen to the station because they were playing his songs as a tribute to his life.
Eventually we turned the station off, annoyed with the arrogant announcer.

The rest of the ride home was scary.
We were swerving on the icy snow, and I didn't notice until we stopped that all of the muscles in my body were tight.
I didn't want to end up in the ditch like the four different cars we passed, or worse, off a cliff.
I'm happy to be seated and still with no rational potential for death or injury.

And now that we're back, with access to the wonderful honest internet, now we see Michael Jackson is in fact alive and well.

hunters, flamboyant gay men, and a laughing Indian

I neglected to mention a few things from the other day.
My mom and I went on a short road trip to a nearby village. On the way we saw three men in camouflage walking off the shoulder of the road into the desert brush with rifles in hand. I had never until that day seen hunters in real life. It kind of blew me away, as well as created an intense fear their aim would be off and we, driving through hunting land, would be shot by accident. (intensified by the imagery of the book I just finished Invisible Monsters in which a woman's face is shot off and mutilated by a gun while she is driving her car...)

We stopped into a small cafe/espresso place to experience the one coffee shop in hours of driving circumference from my parent's home and to meet the flamboyantly gay owners. The waitress that handed us our menus I strongly believe was actually a man, or at least previously had been. "She" had long black hair and thick eyebrows, a large head, and large hands, with an atypically hipless body (for a woman.)
"She" hardly acknowledged our existence, looking out the window as she handed us our menus, not once looking at either of us.
Then after ordering our fudge pie, a tall slender man came sauntering in with black leggings, a poofy white jacket, mascara, and a beanie. He was pretty. He got himself some noodles from the back and sat down to eat, quenching his thirst with a Mountain Dew. Before seating himself he asked if we'd been helped. When he looked in my eyes I was stunned for a moment, not expecting such pretty eyes on a man.
Preparing to leave, we took our bill up to the counter where a man was seated searching recipes on a computer, skipping past Paper Planes on to a preferred song in his hip mix. He was nodding his head and upper body to the beats, seemingly oblivious to anybody else existing. I assumed he was high but obviously don't know that as a fact.
It was an interesting place. Apparently nobody working was as flamboyant as they had been when my parents stopped in months ago, when the pretty-eyes man broke into song and scooted them over to make some room for his tiny tush at their booth.


Skipping inconsequential events...

And on to today.

We just got into Santa Fe. It was a two hour drive out here. Back in a city. I've been reminded once again how much I thrive off of being in an area with people and lights. I enjoy being surrounded by life.

We put our things in the Comfort Inn hotel room and headed off to an Indian (India Indian, not Native American)restaurant I saw on three separate pamphlet slots in the lobby. We sat down, decided what we wanted, and took our order. As we completed explaining what we desired to eat, the man taking the order looked at me and asked "mango dksndflksdlf!? hahahaha." I said "oh...hahaha, no thanks. :)" I assumed he was suggesting I order a mango drink, and I didn't really want one, but was charmed by his smile so smiled back while rejecting the suggestion.
I told stories of festivals in a village in China as we waited for our food. Then a man stepped in with a gorgeous fur coat on. I couldn't describe it to my parents who hadn't seen it. It was soooo...gorgeous. It was thick and long, reaching to the floor. It looked like leopard or siberian tiger. Something exotic and endangered. He had large gauged earplugs, a shaved head, and a nose ring with a chain draped across his cheek, the other end attaching to an ear piercing. (early Janet Jackson style.) When he walked past my parents understood why I hadn't been able to describe the man.
He was beautiful, but as we all noted, the girl he was with was drab in comparison. I expected an equally stunning individual to be eating with him. Apparently, as he sat down he took off his jacket, leaving him only wearing an undershirt, which my parents referred to as "underwear."
When another waiter was asking us if we'd like dessert, the man who took our orders came over again and said something in Hindu to the other man and laughed. He was saying something about or in regardsto me. My parents and I laughed and my dad urged the other man to translate. He said mango somethingorother. Again with the mangoes?
Then I was given a dish of mango pudding, which was delicious.
As I ate it, the mango man came by, looked at me eating and laughed.
I felt undeservedly privileged and self-conscious.
The mango man came back to give us our bill, purposefully putting it directly in front of me.
We paid then got up to leave. We thanked the mango man on the way out. On my way towards him he had a smirk on his face, appearing as though he was struggling to contain himself and immediately after I thanked him he burst out in laughter.

I have no clue why he found me so funny, but it was contagious. We all laughed as we left the restaurant, walking out into a light snow fall.


....huh?

acoma and shadows

Some of these photos are of the Acoma pueblo. One is of a balcony. Another is of the scenery surrounding the mesa we were on top of, and another is of ladders leading to a place for the men to meditate on top of their homes. I also posted some on facebook and explained some more about the photos.

The other two are of crazy cool shadows cast on the door to the bathroom as my father worked on some circuits. Unfortunately I didn't get my camera on time so these aren't natural photographs. They're posed. They look just like the other shadows though. I had to say "pretend like you're still working! please...?!" to convince him.

post-graduation possibility

There's a chance I will be attending university in Beijing, getting a Masters in Fine Arts.
The plus to the particular school I'm looking into is the Vice President. It's Xu Bing! one of my favorite Chinese artists. When I saw that this morning I nearly flipped. Also, I happen to have the contact information for an art professor there who I believe is a Baha'i, which means he is friends with some people I met in Beijing over the summer who know my family there.

It would be a challenge, studying in another country. Classes are in Mandarin, but there is likely a requirement to study more Chinese before I could take the classes...if I'm accepted. It's the most prestigious art program in China and the art world is exciting there right now. I could go to the 798 art district as much as I want.
They have all the regular mediums--printmaking, oil painting, sculpture, drawing, design as well as traditional and experimental arts. It could be an exciting adventure and next step in, well, life.

Fingers crossed I guess.

sweet dreams

I dreamt I was back in the art department with everyone...Katie Borden, Moerrik, Maryann, Vanessa, Dominic...and next door a painter friend was opening up a chocolate shop.
It was night. The streets were wet with a recent rain, the street lamps were letting off orbs of yellow, comforting light.
I helped her open her shop.
And went to the opening. A ton of people came. It was like a gallery opening reception, but the food wasn't free, and it was all varying forms of sugar.
Behind the cash registers were shelves to the ceiling filled with different forms of chocolate...chocolate bunnies, huge chunks of dark, milk, and white chocolate from enormous chocolate bars wrapped in cellophane, rows and rows of truffles, cups of chocolate filled with mousse or whipped cream, chocolate covered coffee beans and nuts in plastic bags tied with a bow. It was beautiful.
The walls were painted peach and the employees had matching one-piece jumper skirts taut around the waist with a belt. They had on white tights and had aprons where they put important things like money and pens.
The store was built on a slant. The registers and rows of chocolate goods were at the top, beside the glass doors. The booths were built on the slant, leading down to a desk in the back.
During the opening they had a game. Everyone horded around the back table, requesting something like airheads without wrapping and stacked into a "sandwhich." You asked for certain flavors, or a pre-invented 3 part combination named on the back board, like "love" or "bubble gum" or "orange sunrise." They mostly tasted sour and they were difficult to chew, sticking to my teeth making my face tired. But I was determined to buy a lot, so I did. I in fact bought and ate so many that I eventually won a prize. One of the employees took me to the side, where a small couch was sitting in the middle of a room. She told me we had to find the green teddy bear so that I could claim the prize. She picked up a gift bag resting on the couch and looked inside and under it. That was all the effort she was willing to make. She wasn't very altruistic. I decided that wasn't enough of a search, so I lifted the couch cushions and found it tucked under there, a small thread sewn to the pillow. I ripped it off.
She didn't actually know what the prize was, but I was happy to have it.

Then the shop was closing and I said I would surely be back. In my mind, I feared the shop wasn't going to make it. I assumed people would only be interested in the opening, then stop coming.
Moe and I were walking home together, up the hill from the shop. It was a difficult walk and it was cold and dark, but I realized I hadn't gone to see the gallery show just beside the shop, so we turned around heading back to see it.

Then I woke up, afraid I had actually had all of that sugar during the night. Thankfully not.

p.s.

The place we ate lunch was called Chili Kicks on Route 66.That's the original Route 66.

a variety

So I'm in New Mexico now.
I arrived the other day. My two flights were delayed, the first by three hours, the second by one, making the total hours of the journey about 12. That's not necessarily a complaint though, because I enjoy airports. A lot.
I got a lot of reading done, and saw some interesting people. This is depressing, but I wrote it down from Invisibly Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk-my travelling read
"Besides, it happens so fast for some people and slow for some, accidents or gravity, but we all end up mutilated. Most women know this feeling of being more and more invisible every day."
It reminded me of Synecdoche, NY when Philip Seymour Hoffman is in the cart driving, passing the time as he is waiting and approaching his death.

On another note, it's good to see mom and dad. Oddly, it feels like I saw them last week even though it's actually been nearly half of a year. I think that means I'm maturing, or it means I'm losing touch with reality.
Maybe both?

Today we chatted, had coffee, found the Georgia O'Keefe book still packed in a box, ate New Mexican food, talked with the family who provided us with that food, had more coffee, went to the grocery store, watched Coffee and Cigarettes, then watched a series of other things.
Oh, and just found out Matthew Barney and Bjork are possibly broken up. That's both heartbreaking and relieving. So much genius fused together at once seems dangerous, it's probably better they're seperate to diffuse some of it to other parts of the globe.


Also, during and for a few hours after reading through some of Georgia O'Keefe's letters, I became very sad. She chose to move from NY to NM to almost escape civilization. She was generally happy in her independence, but loved a man still in NY and had close friends there. Through her letters you could feel her longing to be with them struggling against the ease she felt where she had settled. It made me miss certain people and I couldn't help but combine her emotion with what I've got on my own, amplifying my feelings to an unreasonable degree.
Anyway, I appreciate and admire her honesty with the people she loved. That's something I hope I have somewhat acheived so far and want to build upon with years...becoming more invisible to the world as it loves me less, and the world becoming more visible to me as I love it more.

once again

The full moon is out tonight.
I expect and hope to blog tomorrow about something crazy that will have happened in the coming hours...

a portion of last night's dream--a long memory

The part that really stood out last night was when I was at some sort of play or convention, sitting in the audience.
They began handing out gift bags that were made of thick malleable transparent plastic zipped shut and in the shape of women's pregnant bellies. They were so full of toys, the imprint of their parts were pushing against the walls of the bag and deforming its shape. The toys were all colors.

I unzipped the bag and began shuffling through my gifts. They were amazing. Mostly they were little plastic toys. I remember a motorcycle, a bugs bunny, an oddly shaped other bunny, and the famous something-or-other character that I never looked at and never touched, but knew was in my bag and was the central figure of this event.
As I sat there excitedly continuing to shuffle through my things, Rachelle (an acquaintance and a painter) walked by eager to find where her gift bag was. She looked around and then spoke to a man standing in front of the table I was sitting at. He said "sorry we're all out. we don't have enough for everyone." Knowing her, and seeing her disappointment, I felt guilty. I thought about it for a moment, debating what would feel best, then said "Hey Rachelle, come here. (motioning to my bag) See, this is what they gave us, a bag full of toys."
"Does it have the something-or-other figure in it??!"
"Yeah, I think it does. But I don't care about that guy all that much. You can have it. Also, you can have the motorcycle that he rides."
"Really? Cool. Thanks."
She went from flustered and angry to pleasant and suggested we play together afterwards. She explained that her walk home is like a journey and there are many places you must travel through to arrive there.
I agreed to come.

She lead me on a trail outside of the building, up a muddy hill. The mud went on forever. We were both in shorts and no shoes so the mud was slapping all over our legs. I could feel it squishing between my toes, and struggled against the resistance of a wet ground moving under my feet as I tried to push and propel myself up this hill. It was difficult. And she was far ahead. The sun was setting and the sky was a deep orange with some pinks.
We finally reached the top of the hill and immediately she began rolling on her side down the very steep slope. It was nearly a cliff, and on this side it was sand. She suddenly was naked and I watched her rolling all the way down to the bottom. Her hair was flaring every direction and she was rolling so fast her body was bouncing and jolting violently. She got up and smiled at the end of it, looking up expecting me to do the same.
I decided to ride down on my butt. It worked surprisingly well, for sand.

After riding down the hill we walked into the back of a building. We were in China or Chinatown. It was a busy street and night had arrived. The street was heavily lit by decorative hanging lights and lamp posts. Everyone was moving around quickly and we had to push our way through forcefully to get anywhere. We were looking for a store sign that had a cross on it, because we needed to find the church. This was a step in the path she took home every night, but she seemed very unfamiliar with it.
We walked along the street looking up at all of the signs with their busy words and beaming lights. I was getting frustrated, not being able to read any of it, realizing it wasn't Chinese, but a conglomeration of multiple languages. I also realized everyone around us were not Chinese, but from everywhere. People were wearing their traditional garb. I saw lots of African people wearing colorful head wraps and dresses and people with turbans and full beards. We kept walking, and finally turned the corner, to find the cross on a green sign mixed in with ambiguous text.

We walked in, but it was a shopping mall, not a church. We walked to a counter where a woman was doing a beauty thing like manicures or using hair spray. Rachelle knew her well. They chatted but I didn't understand. I was beginning to feel left out. I turned around to check out the new environment we were in. I turned back to face the beauty woman with her feet resting on the glass case in front of her, busy filing her nails. Rachelle had disappeared. It was just me and this woman with a spotlight beaming on us. Everything around was dark. She didn't look up at me. I thought to look behind the large mirror against the wall beside her. I pulled on the edge of it and it opened. I opened it too hard too fast and it knocked some of the woman's things over. One of them was a pink bottle of nail paint remover. I apologized, embarrassed to have disturbed her, thinking she must hate me more now. I looked in to a small unlit space, and looked down to see a hot tub bubbling over and wafting cozy heat at me. In the tub were Rachelle and three other people, all fully immersed with just their faces exposed, clothe covering their eyes and earplugs in. Somebody made the thought, you should come in and join us. (They didn't say it. They thought it, and I heard it.) I closed the mirror and stepped back.
Somebody was there, maybe. It could have been another me. I looked to it and said grudgingly "I don't want to go in there. I don't know what they're doing. I thought we were going somewhere. Ughhh," while thinking "that hot tub looked nice."

Then a next door neighbor was yelling and I woke up.

Put those moody teens on pills!

I just glanced at my hotmail home page and there was an article headline that read
"Brooding Teens: Are They Mentally Ill or Just Moody?"


"You know honey, Johnny has been real mean to me lately. He's been slamming his bedroom door and stomping around the house after we get in fights."
"Oh I know shnookums. He's also been calling me crude things and refusing to do his chores. The other night he even came home an hour and a half past the curfew we've set for him. You know, why might consider the possibility that he is mentally ill."
"To tell you the truth honey, I was thinking the same thing. He probably is insane. We should put him on some medication."

...

Synecdoche and pain

I just got back from watching the movie Synecdoche, New York. I'm not going to start writing about what I thought, because it's too much to ponder right now all at once.
But, I also think you should watch this, no matter what kind of person you are, because it's a movie about life.

On a different topic,
tomorrow I'm doing a performance piece about pain.
I'm pretty excited about it and slightly nervous. It's for my fibers course. We were instructed to create a wearable object--clothing, accessory, whatever we could think of. The plan is to have a "fashion" show to display our work. We were asked to choose a song to have played while we walk our piece down a "runway." That all seemed relatively cool, but I wanted to make more of a conceptual piece than a fashionable item appropriate for that setting. So instead, I'm playing the song Unravel by Bjork and am going to do what is probably distastefully too literal for the 3 minutes the song will play. I will have a red ribbon wrapped around me tightly and for the first minute or so, writhe on the floor in "pain." Then Maryann will come and make me stand up and begin to unravel me from the ribbon. She is removing the pain and suffering, leaving me standing there with a felt skin with sewn scars over one breast and under the belly button. I am still debating whether or not to be wearing a mask over my eyes while in pain in the beginning.
I'm not sure what that looks like since I can't see myself when I've got it on...
It's about the identity that comes from surviving pain and suffering in life.

I was thinking I should post my plans for this performance partly as a way to solidify my thoughts, and partly because it relates to Synecdoche.

Christmas on Mars

See it.
But as you sit down to watch it, prepare for art, or prepare for the Flaming Lips if you know them, or at least prepare for an unusual film.

The only thing I'm going to say about this movie is: the concept for this film was conceived in 2001, but they didn't actually put out a finished work until about a month ago.

I would encourage you to not look up plot summaries online because you can't really describe it. There are too many nuances of oddness for there to be a successful succinct explanation.

And p.s. most of the movie is black and white so this picture only represents moments of the film where fully saturated color appears.

my dreams are infiltrating reality

Dream:
Last night I was backstage for an impromptu play some people I knew were putting on.
They were doing a terrible job so I tried to help.
They weren't being funny and they were acting really awkward and self-conscious.
I thought maybe I could pretend to be an actor/comedian and make the show funny.
There were a ton of people in the audience.

So, I noticed there was a fake convertible made of sheets of plastic. It was low to the ground, and I sat in it and rode it across the stage while they were doing their thing. I made a silly face in hopes that it would make some people laugh. I heard a couple chuckles but apparently it wasn't amusing enough to save the show.
So, I asked Maryann to come help and we rode it together, into the scene, completely disrupting what the other people on stage were doing. We were delivering something to them, but I can't remember what it was. It was some kind of "funny" object.
It didn't quite work either.


Also last night I found out I dreamt something that didn't happen, but was completely convinced it had. It's confusing because it logically must have.
I dreamt that somebody was raving about this author who has written this Vampire series, of which a movie is coming out soon called Twilight. She was talking about how much she loved the books and showed Katie and I an interview on youtube where the author was speaking. She was totally convinced that the author looked like a vampire herself and Katie and I didn't quite agree so we were nicely encouraging while doubtful. Last night I was at Maryann's and she started speaking about this author. I remembered the encounter I just described, realizing it was about the same person, but for the life of me, could not remember who was showing us that thing on youtube. Somebody was also talking about Forks and the fact that the stories are set there. (I think this may have been real, at a local restaurant with some friends of Kevin's) I remember even looking at a map, trying to find Forks. I called Katie and asked her if the youtube encounter was real, and she said that never happened.
But it's crazy, because I didn't know anything about these books until last night when Maryann was talking about it.
That memory must have been a dream, but it was a weird prophetic dream.
I feel like I'm losing my mind and it's honestly a little bit scary.

I don't know what to do with myself

I got back from our art closing reception about an hour ago and I have this energy that I don't know what to do with.
I'm feeling too tired and spaced out to do any work, but have too many things on my mind to go to bed early. I wish I had some sleeping pills to take. I think that would be the perfect solution.

There were soooo many people there, far more than I ever expected. That was exciting. But going from that atmosphere with all those people to talk with and the commotion of the show to being at home alone is too drastic.
Gah!

What to do?!

katie

Last night Katie and I were downtown for 6 hours. Apparently I hadn't had enough of her, so I dreamt of her too.

We were in the art department and there was a substitute for one of my classes. She was tagging along with me the whole day. The substitute was actually an English professor at WWU by the name Margaritas. He had on his regular fancy shoes and khaki trench coat over a billion dollar suit. He turned on some film and told us to sit down and watch it as we streamed into the room. I felt annoyed immediately because he hadn't given any thought to the arrangement of chairs, leaving me with a spot totally uncomfortable. I had to make a fuss and move my chair to be beside him in order to get a good view of the screen.
(Just before I had been in a critique and everyone's art was mind-blowing. They were all students I didn't recognize as well.)
I put the chair next to him, then went to use the restroom. Instead of returning to the classroom, Katie and I walked around. We wandered into a room with mechanical equipment lining the walls. We sat down at the desk, equipped with microphones and all. Realizing it was set up for radio broadcasts, we decided to take advantage. I pressed the buttons and she talked. We aired a show during a regular time slot for some other boring show about hawks or ancient music or something. Immediately after I was paranoid that somebody was going to get really upset with us for messing with their equipment, and we would be punished for making fools of them on air. When I began getting paranoid, Katie got a call from some girls who just heard us on the radio. They asked if they could come by and talk too, to promote their women's healthy body image/sexual awareness/feminism club. They had an acronym but I can't remember it. Katie, being the nice person she is, said of course! and hung up. She told me what they asked and I freaked (mildly). I told her how stupid it would be if we actually allowed them to come by. I also brought up that she had just proudly announced herself by full name on the air so she couldn't avoid the punishment. And topped it off with a persuasive comment on how we were quickly getting out of hand and into trouble. She understood and agreed. Then we laughed and moved on.

no more giving thanks

Just got back into Bellingham from a short Thanksgiving stint of a break.
It was pleasant for the most part.
The food was perfect.

I'm still in pumpkin and comfort food mode so I've got a batch of muffins in the oven. I probably went too heavy on the clove because tasting the batter I got a similar numbing feeling on my lips that I get from clove cigarettes.
They should be interesting to eat.

It is dismal outside and I really do hate it. My mood generally lowers a couple of octaves when it becomes dark outside(if we were to measure our moods in vocal notes). I can't help it, the mood problem is some psychological thing lingering from childhood.


If you're reading this, could you give me some book suggestions? I'd like something interesting to read over winter break.

the sun is out.

I'm in Seattle now, as of yesterday afternoon.
Got to see Steve last night, after months of not. We had about an hour to catch up, so it was a rapid conversation of what we've been doing with a lot of brief explanations.
I'll see him again one of these days and maybe we'll have longer to talk.
One thing brought up that I need to think more about is the idea of returning to China after I graduate. For some reason, being back, I began to fear that idea, but I'm not exactly sure why. I want to figure that out, and then battle it, so that I can make plans to return without myself stopping me. :)
Thing is, my heart actually ached when I overheard a Chinese couple speaking to one another a few weeks back. I think I'm in love with China.

Leila is super duper pregnant at the moment. Her belly is projecting outwards, and you can actually imagine a baby curled up in there now. She keeps telling me to touch different parts of the mound, saying that the baby's whatever part is there at that time. You can feel some extra pressure, but not actual contours of body parts, like I foolishly expected.
They're at the airport or on their way back right now, picking up Leila's sister, Sheda.

We may actually postpone Thanksgiving until tomorrow because the ideal would be to spend the whole day in a joint effort to prepare the meal.

Let's see, what else can I say. I'm kind of bored right now. I just finished up prepping a Journalism poster, which I'll need to work more as soon as I return to Bellingham.

There are a lot of people outside jogging and speedwalking through the neighborhood. They must be prepping their metabolisms for the extra food today. Literally every other minute someone goes by, flushed cheeks and heavy breathing. I'm kind of jealous.

Haven't been remembering dreams. They'll come back though. I'm starting to think I remember them for about a month, then don't remember them the next. There's definitely a pattern.

dry spell

I thought I had a remembering dreams dry spell, until just now.
Something literally just came to me, but it's not a significant portion of the night's dreams.

I was sitting on a toilet that was raised really high from the ground. I had to climb up to get in. The barrier was a curtain. A man opened the curtain and took a hammer to the toilet seat exposed between my legs. I jumped off as he retracted his hammer and ran away. I later found him and yelled at him for being such a jerk. I blamed him for me losing my things, because it was a bathroom/shower, which meant I was naked, which meant all of my belongings I had left behind and in running away from him I also ran away from my them.
He didn't care. He would hardly look me in the eyes. I remember thinking I'd need to keep yelling at him so that he would understand what a ridiculous thing he had just done. I thought I could connect with him if I continued to badger him. I was desperate to make him feel compassion or guilt.
He never did. He was always blank faced and hardly spoke. There were people all around but none of them really cared either. They didn't want to get into my business.

I think this dream may have a come from my recent viewing of American Psycho.

Topic of Discussion

Today in Journalism the topic of discussion was 9/11 and the fact that the American media failed in answering the "why" leaving Bush to answer it for the public with an oversimplified and ideologically beneficial explanation.
Terrorists are evil. They hate our freedoms, so they attacked us. We need to go into Iraq, kill the terrorists, and free the people.

The professor argued that maybe if America had dealt with relations in the Middle East better that it could have prevented the attack. An example of a poorly handled issue was our relationship with Israel; the fact that we ignore the illegal actions they take against the Palestinians. He argued our support of Israel was one of the many things that ticked off the terrorists and caused 9/11.

It was sooooo strange for me to sit listening to a professor speak out against Israel in any way. Every teacher, every adult, and nearly every peer I've had in life so far (excluding one Fairhaven student and one Palestinian girl I went to school with) have been either pro Israel, or didn't know enough to have an opinion. Plus, I experienced the other side when a terrorist set off a bomb in Haifa, where I lived. Our city was always known as the safe city, so when it happened there I actually begun having fears of riding on public buses or waiting in any public space. Then for a period we had to carry gas masks around with us on the daily and have a safe room with plastic covered windows and syringes that would save our lives in case of a chemical attack.

So, after speaking with him in his office about the recent project, I brought it up. I told him exactly what I felt...that it was strange for me. I told him I generally consider myself open-minded but that today's lecture made me stretch a little further. I told him that there really are two sides to it and that I lived on the other side of the conflict. He agreed and went into detail about all the intricacies and the possible solutions. Luckily I didn't come off as offended that he had spoke out against Israel's policies. I wasn't. I actually just felt odd hearing it. I feel like I could sympathize with either side because clearly both have been wronged.
At the end of the conversation he thanked me for sharing.

I guess I realized those five years in Israel made me a little patriotic for that country. It was home.

to fix the first sentence in the Obama post

Last night soon after Obama gave his acceptance speech, I along with the room of people I was with finished drying our faces of tears and we headed downtown

Obama

Last night soon after Obama gave his acceptance speech, I and the room of people I were finished joy-crying, we headed downtown. When we got there, a larger than usual crowd had formed outside of the Horseshoe Cafe. We joined them. They yelled happy things about hopeful times and a promising new president. Then they started parading up the street, in the street. We continued to join them. We walked around downtown Bellingham for something between half an hour and an hour, in the midst of a mob of hundreds parading and filling the streets. Cops blocked intersections to control the mob and the few cars that got onto the streets we took over, stuck their hands out their windows for glorious high-fives from everyone passing by.

It was really epic.
And the most a part of something political or patriotic I've ever felt...or ever thought I could feel.

Here's a couple pictures stolen from somebody else's facebook page.

11-4-08

I feel kind of dizzy and spaced out right now. I think it's the cold medication from last night.
Also, I remember dreaming of dancing with someone I didn't really want to, but they were very into dancing with me. It was uncomfortable. Also, there was an enormous chain of those huge tires that little people were tying together with thick ropes. They were doing it by hand and struggling to maneuver the pieces. They put it all together over time and were lifting it with a crane while we were dancing. I was more interested in seeing how that was working than dancing, but I couldn't get away to look.

And I just peered out my window and it's nearly a monsoon right now...
walking to school is going to be a shower today...

costumes! :)

Okay, these are not in order but included in these photos are:
bob ross
bjork
the square
me
pumpkin
cowgirl
daft punk
old lady
young McCain

halloween in olympia

alright so night before last we went down to Olympia for a huge halloween party. it was pretty much epic. there had to have been more than 100 hundred people there, and all in costumes...making it one of the strangest evenings of my life.
they decorated the house to go with the theme heaven/hell so the upstairs was heaven, middle floor purgatory, and downstairs hell. downstairs they had live music, but there were a bunch of issues with the equipment so not much music really happened. in purgatory people just stood around and the walls had a huge spray painted quote on black bags covering the walls. Upstairs in heaven there were just a lot of pillows and white balloons so people could go rest up there or be in some peace and quiet. And outside there was a bonfire.

It was all really well thought out and the host spent a lot of time planning everything.

My favorite costume was the square, which was a girl wearing a shirt stretched over a big foam square she wore and she acted the part too. She went around talking essentially like the stereotypical librarian and she did it perfectly!
There was also a clockwork orange character, a carrot, prince, a dragon, and a ton of others. I'll post pictures once i've got them.

It was really fun being the one eyed one horned flying purple people eater, but my wings were trashed along with the equipment when hell got crazy.

Halloween

Last night me and the awesome group of girls who've adopted me went out dancing in our costumes.
I would post a picture, but I don't have one yet.

I was the one-eyed one-horned flying purple people eater. :) Some people actually got it immediately. That suprised me.
Maryann was Bjork in her famous swan dress. It was beautiful. At 80s night I tried so hard to get them to play a Bjork song but apparently the DJ didn't know her or didn't want to play her. That was a bummer. It would have been perfect for Maryann.
Vanessa was a really cute pumpkin with a little French pumpkin barret.
And rachelle was tinkerbell.

Tonight we're going to another halloween bash so I'll post about more costumes I see. I'm sure there'll be some interesting ones.

may or may not be tacky

I'm posting a photo of a snowy mountain so that later, when I'm navigating through dreams I can see an image that will remind me of what dream that was instead of having to read through all the blogs to find one.
I may or may not continue to do this.
I wish I could take a snapshot of a still from an actual dream scene. That would be far better.

10-30-08

I saw someone I've unintentionally hurt while at some science museum/art gallery/nature observatory. There were a lot of people there, mostly my age.
He came over to me with a big confident smile on his face and said, "We should talk sometime," and I eagerly replied, "Yes! How about right now!" We walked together through the crowds of people, across a wooden bridge and tried to find a place we had some privacy. I don't know if we ever found it, but I was so happy that he didn't seem upset with me anymore and we had the chance to hash things out finally. If only that was true...

Also my mom and someone went on a trip to the biggest snowy mountain in the country. Before leaving I told my mom it would be a really difficult hike, but she told me not to worry, that she was looking forward to it. It wasn't cold, but it was white. We took the famous hike up to the mountain, winding around large rocks and through vast fields. We passed by a waterfall I couldn't see the top off. The trail was really narrow in parts and difficult to navigate. When we got to the mountain the rest of the hike was straight up the steep incline of a snowy hill. We did it, and it felt vaguely familiar. I had been there before. At the top there were buildings for the hikers who made it, a sort of cool person club for those intense enough to climb the mountain. We hung out in there. I went to the restroom. The lighting was really dim in there and I looked at myself in the two mirrors on either sides of the corner.

Then we were back at the house, a large house. My parents were there, Alisha was there sprawled on the floor writing or drawing, Justin was on his way, and Shaun and Leila were there but I couldn't see them. When I was informed of Justin's near arrival I thought, "wow. it's the whole family!," but Sebrina and Madison couldn't make it, so then I realized that wasn't quite true and didn't say anything. Then I didn't really dream for a little while. I was just thinking. I was trying to remember the last time the whole family was together and when the next time potentially would be. It was too difficult to think about real time, so that didn't last long and I was back in dreamland in an instant.

Now that I think about it, I guess my sister's wedding in June will be the next time we're all together...which really will be the first time we're ALL together including Alex, her soon to be husband (if J and S come from China that is...which they should.) That's incredibly exciting and I seriously wish it were sooner.

That's all I can remember for now.

10-29-08

I was traveling on a train with two other people. At one point they started getting in a fight so I suggested we get off and eat some food. One person of us three hadn't eaten in a really long time.
I guess one of the people there was Sebrina, my sister in law, so she gestured to the conductor that we needed food. She did that by opening a styrofoam takeaway box filled with food...
Everyone on the train were happy to get off and take a break. I was suprised, I thought they'd all get pissed because we were supposed to be on a speedy train and it was taking forever already. When we all got out to find some food, the girl that we made them stop the train for decided she needed to find her hot pink boots right then. She was worriedly rummaging through all of the luggage in the back, taking it all out just to be sure they had her boots. Sebrina was annoyed. But apparently she needed those boots to put inside the waterproof boots we will use later to trudge through deep waters. She knew that and was ensuring she was ready.
Parts of the track were missing and in their absence they had lied down piles of large rigid rocks.
We were headed for Chicago, but we were in another country.

Then Vanessa and I decided to jump off the train and forget about the whole journey. (Vanessa wasn't originally there with me. I don't know when she came into the dream.) We snuck off the train at night and were left at a remote train stop in the middle of nowhere. We danced around for a few minutes, then pretended to be really stupid people who couldn't figure out how to get out of the parking lot. We locked arms and each started walking opposite directions so that we would be pulling on one another and not be able to continue. We cracked up about it. Then decided to move on, unlock arms and walk normally. Once we made it around the dark alleyway/corner of the decrepit station building we were on a path leading straight to the gym at Western. We went for a workout. Inside, Liam and another familiar person I can't remember now, were there taking turns on a machine. We ran up to them and I told Liam all about our adventure and how we got off the train because it was so tedious.


There was also something about hair....maybe a salon...

things i've been doing

I saw the circus last night and it was awesome.
I made it a life goal that if I have kids, I will take them to see the circus while they are still...kids. Because that show was mind blowing for me, as a grown person, so i can't even imagine how incredible it would have been for a young mind. Having not been to a circus before, i don't have the vocabulary to describe the event well, so I'm not going to. Instead, you should go to see a circus show. One thing I will say is that during the intermission I lied down and closed my eyes, resting my back from the cross-legged position we were sitting in on the floor. When I opened them there was a green stilted monster on for legs standing above me looking down at me.

The day before that I carved a pumpkin at a friend's house.

And before that built a cake with Taylor for Maryann. I recruited Taylor to help with the building parts like cutting the tops off to make the cakes flat and laying the fondant. Yes, fondant. It didn't work that well because it kept melting to itself, being primarily sugar, but it tasted alright. The design is a drawing of Bjork's from off of her Greatest Hits album. In place of the word Bjork, I frosted Birth with an umlaut over the "r." :)

10-23-08

Last night I dreamt I was rejected.

But then I dreamt of going back to China! It was a weird mixture of scenes. Meeting a random girl that wanted to practice English, then going to the squat toilets with her.
Talking with Justin and Sebrina about where to eat, then sitting down at this fried food and noodle store, which of course was next to three other equally appealing fried food and noodle stores. Walking around in the rain. Sitting at a table with the Chinese girl and a bunch of other native English-speakers.
She was left out of the conversation mostly, but after a while she turned to me and said something that's the equivalent of "what's up?". I responded with something that meant "not a lot". Our casual back and forth made me think she knew English really well. Understanding and using colloquial phrases appropriately seemed like a good sign. (The words we actually spoke were jibberish. I wish I could remember the exact sounds, but it was like goddlefaba moo? shnakee dadle...sort of not really, but maybe?)

It's my first dream about China since being back! I'm happy to know my concentrated conscious thoughts of China yesterday leaked into my subconscious firings for the night.

just a boring recount of an emotional day

Today turned out to be a sort of emotionally tumultuous day.

I went to my painting professor having a breakdown, deciding to start over on a project even though we're already halfway through the time to make it in. It just became something I didn't want to work with anymore and wasn't going to turn out in any way I would be pleased with. She was understanding of my emotional reaction and supportive of my decision. She even said I had integrity for starting over at this point because it showed that I recognized I wasn't doing something as well as I could. She apparently didn't think the painting was as bad as I did. She did however agree that it would be better as an installation. I was painting stacked televisions with cropped parts of Mao's face on each screen, making up a full image of his face. It seemed pointless. Why move that concept to a canvas when you could actually use televisions? So painting it was just tedious. Hopefully I'll actually be able to realize that installation if I can speak to someone and figure out how to break up his face on screens.
Changing plans meant I had to go to the store and get a new canvas. Luckily I don't need to build this one because she understands the time crunch. And then figure out what I was going to paint. I bought the canvas, bussed it back to school, then walked home to figure out some new images. I brought them back for her to see, and it wasn't suitable for the project's guidelines. I got upset again, and just sat there trying to think of how I could fix things. I must have looked mad, so she asked why I was pissed. That's when I cried. I didn't want her to feel I was angry with her, so I explained it all. It felt like failure upon failure. And this is my last painting class so I've been feeling this pressure that I should have things figured out by now. I'm a senior and after this I don't know what to do. I don't even know if I want to stick with the medium. And to not be happy with the beginning of the first real project in this painting class felt horrible and more confusing. I also told her how I've been doubting myself, feeling like I can't really paint. She assured me that wasn't true, that she had seen from the first series that I could if I set my mind to it.
Anyway, she was supportive and I'm glad that I was able to have a meltdown with her. The thoughts had been running around my head, and I definitely was feeling anxiety when I was painting...but the reasons weren't clear until I spewed them out at her.

10-22--08

I dreamt I was living with a family that I know. Their parents have recently decided to divorce so it was a stressful place to be.
I'm not sure if I was living with the father or the mother. It was like they took turns with the house along with the kids.
The woman hated the neighbors, but the man loved them. The neighbors complained to me about it. I tried reconciling the differences by explaining to the neighbors how the two of them are very different people, but both really lovely if you give them a chance.
The neighbor guy just shrugged my words off his shoulders and walked away.
I remember looking into their house and seeing the whole family at dinner, sitting prim and proper.
There was an enormous paper bag in the kitchen. It was about a person's length wide and half that tall. It had recycling in it, mostly bottles. The woman was really upset about this, and cleaned up after her ex-husband spitefully. She also moved a desk so that his favorite spot to sit was no longer available. She moved the desk up against the wall where that seat normally was, in order to "make room for more seats on the other side."

It was all really uncomfortable, being involved in their lives, knowing they were just trying to hurt each other.

goobledigook

After getting to school, still feeling like I was dreaming, things went very slowly and slightly surreal-y.
Every conversation I had with my friends, teachers, and acquaintances were painfully awkward. I just felt like I couldn't communicate most things properly, and definitely was failing at any casual banter.

Then in painting I had the longest dejavu I've ever had in my life. My professor was speaking to me about what I should do to make my painting better and the whole time I felt like I could see who was walking down the hall outside the room. I imagined each one walking towards me, making eye contact. All I wanted to do was run out there and see if it was reality in the moment, but I couldn't. I had to stay there listening to her feedback. Hopefully I didn't offend her because I know I must have either looked spacey, upset with her, or like I was completely ignoring her advice because I tried looking in her eyes but I couldn't engage in any conversation because I felt like I wasn't standing there with her.

On a related note, I understand my sister now. I understand why she used to say things like "I think I have a tumor." Because I think I have a tumor. Maybe not really, but today along with the inability to communicate on a normal level, and the intense dejavu, I've been having a throbbing piercing pain in the back of my brain.

And this isn't as strange, but I got a kick out of it. On the way into the gym today I overheard a couple girls.
"What are you going to do today?"
"The treadmill."
"Dido."
The word "dido" is just so rare it seemed noteworthy.

I feel like my conversations today would have been more appropriate if only they went something like:
"Hey, how's your day going?"
"Oh...Alright. I think I have a tumor."
"Dido."

10-21-08

Last night I had probably the strangest dreams I've ever had. So strange I can't even explain them. I can say though that one of the dreams was about someone else's dreams and I was attempting to have dreams like theirs.

I also slept something like 12 hours. I think my circadian rhythm is off...

Robin Pecknold

Fleet Foxes

Saw Fleet Foxes on campus last night. They were amazing.
I would think everyone left that concert with a heart limp from all the emotional kneading. I did.

And I, along with every other girl who have seen them, is in love with the lead singer. His voice is heavenly.
The band is funny as a group too. They chat between songs, and collectively act self conscious.


An interesting thing about the concert is that I kept thinking of 30 or so years later, looking back to it as a memory. Thinking of the current as the past, I looked around realizing everyone was so young--the band, me, my friends, the rest of the crowd. I was thinking of how it's just like when my parents would go see concerts at my age or so (I would assume they did that at some point...) I also felt reassured everything would turn out okay. That one day, we will all be sitting around reflecting on the the fond memories from our youth, this being one of them.

It was weird feeling so conscious of being in an early stage of life.

10-17-08

I only remember a little bit, but I was with a fellow friend/art student who is a sculpture major. He, another guy I met last night but only spoke the words "Hi" when he arrived and "nice to meet you" when he left, and I were somewhere.
We were wandering around chatting. It was friendly. It felt like we had been friends for years.

We happened upon this place that was sort of campus, sort of the grocery store. There were stapled shut paper bags placed all over the floor and big wooden frames with glass, and other random objects on shelves. It was some event where people like us-college students, or people of that age in general-could come receive free things.

We went over. As soon as we got there a swarm of people came so there was an air of competition for the best bags and objects. I looked down into a bag and there were a bunch of cereal boxes. I didn't really feel like a bunch of cereal so I let someone peering over my shoulder lustfully have it. Then I noticed this enormous thing. It was about 6 ft tall 7 ft wide and 4 ft thick. It was on wheels and was built of sturdy wood frames built into attached compartments and shelves. There was one large section covered in glass, like a display case, that had a wall with cords melded onto it. I didn't understand that part, and neither did my friends. We joked about how odd it was and how much I love it. Then I noticed there was a coffee press, a bottle opener, half a bottle of juice, and two really big toasters. One could fit 4 slices, another could fit like 10. I didn't want the toasters, but I wanted the other things, so I took it home.

We were back at my apartment and I was plugging in the new dvd player that apparently was also on the contraption, and my friend played video games on my roommate's console.

10-14-08 continued more

um, wow. I keep remembering more of my dreams from last night.

I also dreamt that Ben, an art professor at Western, was putting on an exhibit. It was interactive, and you had to crawl through it. It was pitch black and there was a series of rooms that you pass through. Each had objects inside that you're meant to feel and navigate. In one of the rooms there were lights and little couches. I sat in there with Ben, his wife, and someone else. We were talking about his exhibit and how profound it was. At the end of the maze of rooms you end up in a concert hall/club. There were a ton of people there and it was loud and had tons of colorful, moving beams of light.

At another point I was with Maryann and her group of friends in that club. They were all extremely excited about a song coming up. She yelled at me, "It's butterflies." I thought about it. She got impatient. "You don't know that song?! what's wrong with you?!" I was a little hurt, and at that moment thought it might be a Bjork/M.I.A. song and said, "Oh right, I think I know it." Before I finished my reply she was running off to join the crowd. I just stayed there, not feeling very excited about it at all.
The song started and it was hip-hop, nothing I expected. I recognized it though. It was some famous song from years ago.

Later I was at a public pool with Maryann and there were a bunch of old people there. They all looked morose and tired. I sat on the edge watching because I didn't feel like swimming.
At one point a couple "hot" old ladies waded into the pool and all the other old people turned to stare. They were really strange looking though. They looked fake. One of the them had a body of a young white woman in her 20s or 30s with a crazy bathing suit that had a big hole to show off her belly. It had diamonds too. Then from her right shoulder and up she was black. It looked like an enormous birthmark. Then her hair was partially a black woman's hair, then with blond attachments. Her face was bloated and just plain scary.
The other lady had a similar body but her face was emaciated and hollowed out.
I didn't understand why the other onlookers thought they were so hot. They were creepy.



I think that's all I'm going to remember from last night...

10-14-08 continued

AND
I just remembered there was a whole other scene of my dream where I was on a bus, kneeling down in the cramped quarters in front of a man. My line of view was directly at his lap where he held a lively ferret.
The ferret was beautiful and made me nostalgic for when I had them. We chatted about ferrets and life. I was admiring it for a prolonged period and he was pretty joyous about showing off his pet. I kept rubbing my nose up against the ferret trying to smell it. I couldn't smell the regular ferret musk and it was impressive. I said "wow, a ferret that doesn't smell! when I had ferrets I constantly smelled like them. it was kind of gross." He said "Oh it's there, believe me." (I'm thinking now, as I rubbed my nose across the fur of the ferret, I was probably rubbing my nose across my blanket.)

The ferret was light brown and so pretty.

10-14-08

Alright, so I'm going to be very vague about this dream because it's too embarrassing to explain the details.
I was hanging out with a friend of mine and my mom. We were all lounging around casually, then a conversation about a disagreement between my friend and I came up. My friend decided he needed to explain things to my mom in private, so they went out on the balcony and spoke together while I was left inside to mope about what I didn't get to know. They left through a pristinely clean, probably recently washed glass sliding door onto a balcony with a roof. It was nighttime and raining. Also, my mom was younger.

Then when they came back in, my friend had a list he handed me. The words were scratched into it in phrases and bullet points scattered everywhere on a medium sized scrap of crumpled then re-flattened paper. The list continued on the other side. It was all the reasons why he and I should not be close friends any longer. I sort of remember there being a significance about how many reasons there were, but I'm not sure of that number. The reasons were offensive and I'm not willing to write them here, but suffice it to say* I woke up after that feeling both hurt and confused.

I was genuinely upset, recognizing it was probably untrue but not fully convinced. I felt like I could go find that note and read it, so instead of having to wake up and potentially face the reality of reading that horrible note, I decided to continue sleeping, past my Journalism class.
I think this is the first time I semi-consciously decided to skip a class because a dream has made me so sad.

*Is that the proper use of the phrase? I always mess up colloquial phrases like that one.

10-13-08

Last night my mom was my sister in law, Leila, and pregnant. My dad was Shaun.
They looked like my parents but they were in the life situation of my brother and sister in law.

One night, as I was visiting them in their new home, my mom was complaining of feeling pain everywhere from the pregnancy. Her whole body was aching. My dad wasn't doing anything about it. He was busy with work and didn't realize her pain, because she didn't say anything.
I just knew she was hurting, so I went to her and asked if there's anything I could do. She said no. I said, there must be. So she lied down on the couch and rested for a while.
I had arranged plans for us all to go to a poetry reading, and it looked like we wouldn't be able to go.
She was still hurting, and dad came over and sat down watching.
I told her she should take a bath, that it might relieve the pain. She decided that would be a good idea, and indulged in the bath. Her deciding to do that, meant dad had to stay home with her and I either could sacrifice the plans for the evening and stay too...because taking baths is serious business. People need to be around for that...Or I could go and leave mom in dad's hands.
They both encouraged me to go to the poetry reading. So I did.

But I thought I was late so I scrambled rapidly trying to find the right clothes to wear. I kept trying on outfits and thinking they looked stupid, and inappropriate for such a cultural event as a poetry reading. I tried on multiple things, until finally I settled on a Grey hoodie and a soft brown fake leather skirt. As I put on the skirt I thought about how weird it was that I was the kind of person who bought fake leather skirts, and wondered how I had become that way.
I went back out into the living room, saw the time, and realized I wasn't late at all. My dad scoffed politely at me, and I decided to head out, since I had finally settled on an outfit right in time for me to leave, and have the time to walk their casually.

I just arrived at the symphony hall, where the reading was to be held.
Then I woke up.