Keeping it fresh. I got a gmail account. I’m trying to use it. It’s nice out. I think I’ll go out and read.
Halloween: It’s a beautiful day to be in love with a Grammy- nominated rock star. Otto wants to play dress-up tonight.
Eight years ago I used as inspiration the titles of a set of Gamma Go post- cards. And then I went to get coffee.
On Saturday night (isn’t it always on Saturday night?)...on Saturday night after Grubsteak a monumental reading by Landis Everson who is so very bravo.
Maybe it isn’t me who’s in love with a Grammy- nominated pop star (rock star?).
Then some wonderful stories by someone who died at age 31.
Today is Dragon Friday (so I suppose that it’s not always Saturday night). Daylight Savings Time ended over the weekend and the afternoon is likely to go on forever.
But it’s what I do. To check in. To say hi. When I feel disconnected or distant or when I’m dropping off luggage or waiting for a taxi. Other games we play include looking into a mirror for long periods of time, walking all the way back home and taking very long showers.
There’s just too much negativity (which reminds me: mental note: remember not to ask how he’s doing; it drives him back off the wagon [or maybe it’s back on the wagon, I always get confused]).
Anyway, I often get confused. That’s my thing. Especially lately. That and losing pairs of eyeglasses (mental note: henceforth, pay less for eyeglasses!). I used to find the ‘absent-minded professor’ thing charming.
I try to remain in character, though, no matter where the adventure takes me. Like now. Or. Sure. But. I’m not a record. I mean I like the idea of growth or evolution (becoming better, more adaptable, more resilient).
I went to the doctor with chest pains (my pain, not the doctor’s). EKG(!?) is fine; he says it’s probably stress or gas or a pulled muscle. Fine. I pour myself a glass of filtered water and two glasses of wine. I continue my research on Mozart for my master’s thesis. Halloween is just around the corner.
1988: the year I experienced high school dating. Or having a girlfriend. A somewhat foreign but fairly fortuitous experi- ment that took me into 1989 and toward senior prom. But, by then, the experience was pretty much over, which led to going to prom with a friend. Which was not a date. Once at the party, we went our sep- arate ways, and were both totally fine with that. But omigod it’s okay if I don’t write. Isn’t it okay if I can’t write about Doctor Atomic? About Peter Sellars’ libretto after 2 glasses of pinot grigio with Claudia? I’m not sure how long I’ve been trying to make this record. I don’t even think I’m being paid for it. What can I do? It’s a life. It’s a happening.
It’s kind of like a dream. I certainly don’t understand it. (The neighbor’s dog who hardly ever makes a noise is stirring up quite a storm of ruffs and barks, getting all the other neighbor dogs roused, and even Coco seems un- easy.)
Transition. Anything.
I find it easy to put on a mask when writing. To take on someone else’s voice. On paper. The only way I can comfort- ably role-play. Be- sides onstage. That’s
not true, of course.
The notion of just sitting, of being aware, of meditating. If it weren’t for my spine, zazen would be at the top of my list. My list. Is in transition. I’ve been in such a state lately that I keep a file of lists that I need to scrutinize, to sit on.
Fact or fiction: I just saw my favorite underwear? In a porn flick. I spent all day in bed buried in clean laundry. As soon as lunch arrived, I got a call and had to run an errand. Hence, no lunch. I played 95 rounds of Bubble Galaxy with Buddies™. All without any malaise or edginess. In reality, it seems like everyone’s out having a good time but me. At my workdesk I figure out how to bring back the balance. Because. Because tomorrow is October. Because tomorrow is Otto’s birthday party. Today, doing nothing but sending emails of myself sticking my tongue out to new friends and old friends I haven’t seen or even corresponded with in forever. Sitting ten hours in the box before getting up and walking over to purchase a digital camera. Oddly enough, that’s the mood I’m in. Saturday night. It’s mellow. And my chest hurts.
Curran called when I got home to say he’s now an uncle. Wild. Otto dropped off his art supplies so he didn’t have to drag them around everywhere. Later, I’ll have a drink with Alessia for her birthday. At Le Coloniel. Last night was Fred’s bon voyage dinner. We went to Chow. I met a few of his friends, all very nice. I was BEAT. At the birthday bash, lots of names come and go. Jenn was a riot. Afterwards, we ate pizza and watched AbFab. Anyway, now my back hurts but I will try to go to the gym. I’m not sure why.
I feel sorry for anyone that has to die. —John Ashbery
I’m in the leather daddy section, drinking a strawberry banana smoothie, trying not to be too rational. Fun. I could come here every Saturday. But I feel distant. Maybe I should
explore a lot more. What’s up? It’s a not-so- hot weekend. Standing in front of the Curran Theater in the rain. Then sleep (with parts of 8½ strewn throughout). Today is such a
blue day. I smack my head in the middle of it. The board meeting on Saturday; a getting up on the wrong side of bed thing. What else? Nothing. A few folks came over, got angry
because we were in the middle of a fight. But Sunday came. A happy morning walking to downtown and back (which is mostly like levitating, considering
our location). Then I napped. All without any sense of malaise or edginess.
Do not build the ‘extra-dollar’ vanity from Ikea. It seems none of us has begun to digest the meal of all our lives (John Ashbery). Yes, I am tired of patriarchy (tired of the patriarchy). Barf. That’s puke. Today, touchy. Very. These days it’s probably healthy to be able to joke about it. We ARE sort of pretty when we cross over that line of no return. Nothing’s floating around in my head but I keep reading sentences that make me misty. That last meeting was very vampire in the end. There are way too many meetings. Did the main character become a poem? Not to think about it further. Does that make sense? At a burger joint having a strawberry shake I feel really cool. Am I about to die? It’s a totally different kind of place. In a strange part of town. I feel distant. Or something severe. Perhaps I should explore a lot more.
‘of’ is such a top. ‘the’ is a total bottom. but what if ‘we’ was reversible, or, how do they call it, flexible, no, transparent? barf. that crosses the line, doesn’t it? ‘to’ is so healthy. when it fights, it’s good, but it still ain’t pretty. ‘is’ is, though. at first I thought ‘nothing’ was float- ing around in my head. but then, no joke, ‘that’ totally ended it.
If you think the butler did it ask him what happened in 1979. Hint: they don’t make those in Arkansas. My mother kept reminding us of how they had to ration stuff during World War II, like eggs and butter (milk, maybe?). I don’t know how to deflect. I don’t even know the name of the movie.
Several hours later I can TALK for pizza and cocktails. It’s some- thing to do every minute of the week. Hang on.
So I’m doing all my writing with calendars. It’s the new way. Be- cause this office has no soul. Barf. That’s puke.
Nothing but work and sleep yesterday. Perhaps I should steer clear of anything remotely “political.” What I actually wrote was “Perhaps my political poems suck. But Lemon Zinger Celestial Seasonings herb tea does not.” Nothing but work, sleep, bottled water, lemon zinger and Joseph Ceravalo’s “Spring In This World of Poor Mutt’s”.
...you provided the sideways like us with such rare and out-there company. —Tilda Swinton to David Bowie, March 21, 2013 at the opening of “David Bowie is” at Victoria and Albert Museum, London
She addresses him as Dave. And signs off as Tilly. My discovery of Tilda Stardust, a blog dedicated to the belief that Swinton and Bowie are one person. But why sullen?
Oh. It says right here that “I had an argument.” And right here it says “Exhaustion?” Also, right here, it says: ... ... ?! WTF does it really say he said that? ... ... ... Heartsunk.
Hi. Today I’m using Major Tom and Orlando as diversionary tactics. Not only that but mostly revelation. At the end of a week full of
eureka! And then realizing that I’m not the only love song, as it turns out. We both are. So why trouble myself with an escape plan?
Why strategize to divert? It’s a pretty day. I am sending messages here and there. Interspersing these very sentences and
fragments with text messages (more fragment than sentence, those). It says here that I then thank him for such an “articulate brat.” And
it says right here, just at the very bottom of the page, that “G-chat is not quite like Yahoo instant messenger.” In fact, maybe it’s even better.
Delight creeps in. Like watching Agnes Moorehead devour every single moment of screen time she has in The Magnificent Ambersons. Or watching Carol Burnett, Vicki Lawrence and Dick Van Dyke initially feign attempts to stifle laughter (and hence ‘break character’) by bowing their heads as if in prayer, and then each literally lose it, while Tim Conway (Tim Conway’s ‘character’) conveys in earnest (ever so slowly so as to accommodate audience laughter) a story about an elephant who was rumored to have fallen in love with its trainer, who happened to be a ‘dwarf.’ The pair come to a tragic end during a purported sexual act (the elephant has to be shot). They were buried together. Then, another long pause for audience laughter and camera concentration upon the rapt trio who’ve been attempting to exhibit restraint (and therefore ‘character’), but who are each beginning to fail, to succumb to their own (non-‘character’) senses of humor, to Tim Conway’s deadpan delivery of a silly story full of false endings (each one a punch line). After which Conway begins another story, this one about two circus elephants who were Siamese twins— they were attached by their trunks. When one of them would sneeze.....
After the movie, Curran mentions that it is rumored that Moorehead had a long fling with Debbie Reynolds.
Writing in the box, drinking a lemon zinger, finding my self particularly boring right now.
Horses puked
Nick’s back. He brought lots of goodies. I find myself soberly drawn to rhyme, a new addition to my attraction to rhythm, my north, my end less jungle,
Your hands are like dicks
and their motivation to commit (to be committed). To go on (and on). To concentrate on it. To culti vate it. The going of on.
everything is not okay. I am not fine. Sorry. And maybe that’s not okay. Maybe that’s a problem, it’s a problem for me to not be fine. This being not okay. Or maybe it’s just fine. This being not fine, not okay. This being a problem.
What I keep hearing out the living room window mornings of late is the lumberyard about a half mile or so away from where I grew up. Which, when things were quiet, when, say, classes were in session at the elementary school one block east of the backyard swingset, and no Fort Chaffee
artillery drills (which would often transpire near Potato Hill, which rose from a slight haze [light blue-ly]—like one-half of a modest bustierre—about a mile south of the backyard garden) were audible from anywhere in the backyard, say down by the grape arbor near the apple and peach trees (three apple and one peach, like the four of us: three boys and a girl), a morning-to-early-evening repetition of an elongated buzz (fifteen seconds or so) followed by the methodical Thud .. Thud .. Thud .. the muffled staccato of the fresh boards— Paul Bunyan’s toothpicks— being stacked .. stacked .. stacked.
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