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?!