I'm sorry, I meant to meet up with you sooner, but there have been obstacles. Tough ones. Familiar ones. Unfamiliar ones. It's been very difficult to relate to other human beings on the simplest terms of things that should be universally understood except that when I make the calls to those things there is nothing more than empty drawers and dead lines. The ringing is back. I must have spent a solid twenty minutes looking for a telephone in my bedroom before it occurred to me that I keep my phone on silent. Then I went out into the hallway. As soon as I touched the door knob it stopped. As soon as I went back inside it started again so I went to bed. Then I woke up to the sound of my phone ringing with it's single beep (the beep it makes when it's set to silent). Fourteen times today and not once was it actually going off. And then the name calling started and stopped and started again. No one in my building knows my name. I know their voices though and no one in my building has a single one of those voices.
I've been trying to eat, but it's horrible. Ridiculous stomach clenching anxiety. And then the sounds my body makes while it's digesting. And then feeling like any second it's all going to come straight back up. It's hard to deal with. It felt like it was all control. All I had to do was keep my fingers on my head functions and the rest was easy and now even with that awareness the rest rips away like a table cloth in the hands of a retarded magician and sends it all to pieces on the floor. It was a nice sunny day. I tried to go outside. I really did. I got so far as putting on a sweater before I had to take it all off and start over again. I didn't do it right. And then it was dark outside, but the bus stops were all full of people and I can't go out like that. Not with them there.
What is there to be afraid of? What is there to be afraid of? I don't know, but it's fucking there. I've been trying to fight sleep, but it's the only place I know and feel secure in. When I'm sleeping I don't have to eat anything. I don't have to go outside like here. I don't have to hear my voice talk. I don't have to hear their voices talk. I don't have to hear at all. I don't have to rely on my stupid eyes. Just hearing the neighbors talking through the walls, apart from the untrue voices, made my head feel like it was busting like glass in a poorly packed cardboard box. Everything is people. I'm so fucking nerve wrecked at work because I have to keep checking to make sure I'm not being watched. I don't have anything to hide, but I'll be damned if they think they can hunt me like some oblivious dog. They think I don't know, but I do.
There were keys in my door locks earlier today. I thought my chest was going to cave in on itself listening to the locks open and the door swing, but I got up anyway to face it. There was nothing there. Not at my door or the neighbor's door. Still scared the living shit out of me. I don't understand where it's all coming from. I just want to go to bed and not have to be awake anymore. Whatever it is I want it to come kill me already. How long is this chase supposed to go before it's over?
A friend of mine passed away recently. Maybe that's what's eating up my control. I hate myself for a lot of reasons, but mostly for not being more accessible. I don't know how to fix that. I can't make people want to spend time with me in the same way I want to spend time with them. Who want's to hang out with a fucking retarded person who can't talk straight and who, when he can put words together out of his mouth, can't relate complete ideas the few times there are complete ideas to relate? I wouldn't. It's not about being normal or not. It's just massively frustrating. I would ask what is wrong with me, but I already know what's fucking wrong with me. And I feel selfish for even wishing he'd gone farther out of his way to hang out. That's simply ridiculous. I am the seldom seen fucked up individual with the bad history and the not so great outlook and why the fuck am I licking my own perpetual gashes...I don't know. I want the spit to make me better, and it doesn't. I don't miss him so much as I miss the him that everyone else got to know and that fills me with so much fucking rage.
And I can't even grieve properly because trying to focus in on the meaning of his absence is like trying to fire a gun from the rocking deck of a vessel burning and sinking at a target so far distant I can barely see it clearly. I'm sorry. I just can't put it together. I'm slapping the god damn pieces back on and more fall off and the whole thing is functioning if only just. The closest thing to a functioning family and I'm so far out of the loop out of necessity. I'm just trying hard. I'm trying hard not to lose all grip, but it makes me so fucking tired. I still have so much left to do. I just have to gut it out. And if that means screaming into a balled up sweater for minutes or hours till the shit turns off then fine. If that means locking myself away safe for days or diving into the safety of unconsciousness for 13 hours then fine. Not fine. It's not okay. I'm sick of telling people it's fine. But, I have to wear that. I've already learned once that it's unreasonable to share this with people. I guess that's why I've been dodging you for so long. It takes a lot to get up everyday and it's completely unfair, just wrong, to spread the dysfunction. He should still be here. I guess, more than anything else, my life is committed to ending it's proliferation. I should not be here. And the means to that end is also this blueprint to understanding why that has to be so.
///Morcheeba - "Diggin' a Watery Grave" ...not all at once
Clean with alcohol only. Do not attempt to replace blown fuses. Do not remove access panels. Return to certified mechanic for regular maintenance. Made in the USA.
3/30/11
3/25/11
I Found
So I had this idea about humor. About genuine humor. Not the niggling humor that munches at the ankle of obviously flawed ideas, but the throated humor that vomits little mountains of spontaneity and thought. I was wondering if I could compose some.
I'm not going to try it here. Partially because I know that I am not intrinsically funny. And partly because I haven't forgotten that I didn't want to try it here. Humor is like singing. It's not so much about talent as much as it is about the construction of a head. Some skulls just have crappy acoustics. Most do. But some don't. The ability to hear yourself outside of what encompasses the space of your higher order functions is key to being a great singer and I think the same holds true for comedy.
Remember when I told you I was going to go look for the hissing? I think I do. I found it last night. It wasn't as scary as I thought it would be. It wasn't scarier either. It just was. It was the heart of a thing, if you can imagine it, a thing large as three story building and as wide as it was tall if not wider. The sound of my teeth grinding woke me up before I could get close enough to really make it out.
It was a strange trip. I didn't close my eyes and there it was. I had to do a ton of foot work, but I avoided the subways because I tend to get lost down there. I stayed above ground and it got darker and darker until it was dusk and I walked for a long time until I reached a great big brick thing. It could have been a wall for all I knew. The city simply stopped and there was this brick wall that could have been a building, but I didn't walk around it because it joined up with the two buildings on either side of the street and it was too dark to see if it terminated at some point above me or if it simply continued on forever.
I went in the door and inside the lights were like setting suns and I went down for several seconds, but I couldn't have gone deeper than ten or twelve feet unless there was some kind of compression happening, which I doubt. I doubt it because - I suppose I actually don't have a reason to doubt it. It's simply been my expectation. It was the feeling. There were no sutures of skips so I assumed. At any rate the staircase ended rather quickly and the floor was so immense that I could see it's curvature, but the light was too low to see anything beyond the immensity of the space. I walked on, directly away from where the stairs landed and after several dozen minutes the darkness began to turn a dull red and then this weird bronze pink and I followed the shifting gradient, keeping the brightest hues front and center, along the curving floor and there was a massive pounding that kicked through the air and thumped inside my lungs so bad that it was starting to hurt and I walked on and on and on until the intensity of the dullness, the sheer missingness of presence was making my head hurt as bad as my chest and I fought to resolve it and it came into focus and then I realized I wasn't breathing and the sound of my teeth grinding woke me up at 5 in the morning. It was awful. I learned nothing.
I'm not afraid tonight though. I guess, a huge part of what makes us fear is the not knowing. I don't need to know what exactly it is, or why it is, all I need to know is where the boundary of safety is. Where the envelope ends. And now I know.
I'll show you tomorrow. Whenever that is.
///Talvin Singh - "Soni" ...and then...
I'm not going to try it here. Partially because I know that I am not intrinsically funny. And partly because I haven't forgotten that I didn't want to try it here. Humor is like singing. It's not so much about talent as much as it is about the construction of a head. Some skulls just have crappy acoustics. Most do. But some don't. The ability to hear yourself outside of what encompasses the space of your higher order functions is key to being a great singer and I think the same holds true for comedy.
Remember when I told you I was going to go look for the hissing? I think I do. I found it last night. It wasn't as scary as I thought it would be. It wasn't scarier either. It just was. It was the heart of a thing, if you can imagine it, a thing large as three story building and as wide as it was tall if not wider. The sound of my teeth grinding woke me up before I could get close enough to really make it out.
It was a strange trip. I didn't close my eyes and there it was. I had to do a ton of foot work, but I avoided the subways because I tend to get lost down there. I stayed above ground and it got darker and darker until it was dusk and I walked for a long time until I reached a great big brick thing. It could have been a wall for all I knew. The city simply stopped and there was this brick wall that could have been a building, but I didn't walk around it because it joined up with the two buildings on either side of the street and it was too dark to see if it terminated at some point above me or if it simply continued on forever.
I went in the door and inside the lights were like setting suns and I went down for several seconds, but I couldn't have gone deeper than ten or twelve feet unless there was some kind of compression happening, which I doubt. I doubt it because - I suppose I actually don't have a reason to doubt it. It's simply been my expectation. It was the feeling. There were no sutures of skips so I assumed. At any rate the staircase ended rather quickly and the floor was so immense that I could see it's curvature, but the light was too low to see anything beyond the immensity of the space. I walked on, directly away from where the stairs landed and after several dozen minutes the darkness began to turn a dull red and then this weird bronze pink and I followed the shifting gradient, keeping the brightest hues front and center, along the curving floor and there was a massive pounding that kicked through the air and thumped inside my lungs so bad that it was starting to hurt and I walked on and on and on until the intensity of the dullness, the sheer missingness of presence was making my head hurt as bad as my chest and I fought to resolve it and it came into focus and then I realized I wasn't breathing and the sound of my teeth grinding woke me up at 5 in the morning. It was awful. I learned nothing.
I'm not afraid tonight though. I guess, a huge part of what makes us fear is the not knowing. I don't need to know what exactly it is, or why it is, all I need to know is where the boundary of safety is. Where the envelope ends. And now I know.
I'll show you tomorrow. Whenever that is.
///Talvin Singh - "Soni" ...and then...
3/23/11
Something's New Some Things Old
I've been looking at you all evening and trying not to move. It was putting off the inevitable. Well, I mean, I didn't have much to say before so I wrote what was floating on top because I don't have the equipment to go swimming with any guarantee of safety. Which is what I was worried about. Which is why I was trying not to move. Basically I didn't want to have to open my door. There were some strange happenings earlier and I was waiting for them to die down, but I've spoke too soon again. Unauthorized border crossings, if that makes sense. I don't have a grip on it like I thought I did. It's not something you can be okay or not okay with. It's just something that is and then you learn to live around it. It makes me jumpy during the day. It makes it so that you have to look and hear and make a complete judgement about an entire setting because you don't really have time to work through details in everyday life outside. It's disconcerting. So many times I just need more time to investigate to know.
I used to wear keys everywhere to remind myself that I was awake and moving around and to track time. It's nice to have the option of taking them off and not participating in the movement of time and place. Sometimes though it burns through and it feels like forced induction. I don't like being tracked. Well, not tracked, but followed. Physically. It makes me nervous. Whenever I'm walking and I hear the neighbor walking in the same direction I stop what I'm doing and do something else. It's not bad luck. I just don't want our lines coinciding. It's like using someone elses network. I don't want whatever's over there coming over here. There's enough wildlife over here as it is.
There was something I was supposed to do today that I didn't do while I was avoiding I don't know what it is. I'm trying not to think about it. They don't like being talked about so I'll skip it.
I'm thinking about starting another repository of words. I haven't decided yet. The formulation hasn't struck a critical mass of need, but it's getting there like a bad itch. I'm sorry. I just don't know much today. Something's coming and it's heart breaking because for once all I've been doing is watching the kids play cards on a throw rug and they're playing so well and everybody's home and I don't know why. Well, maintenance has suffered some. I don't want people to be afraid of me. I'm not just like you, but... but what? You don't have to hate being around me. I like being around you? I don't know. I thought I did. Where is it coming from? Something has been built and it's doing work and I don't know where to begin on it. On protecting the rest of me from its function. I don't even know what it does, but I do know its activity is dragging the guts out of the fabric and the stuff back there, inside there, needs to stay over there. It's like waking up and there's a gas leak and the gas has made you sleepy and high and sick and it needs to be fixed, but I'm not a gas specialist. I would look for the hissing, but everything is hissing. I can't leave. I live here. Proximity alarm. But what the hell am I close to? I haven't been paying attention and I ran out of channels.
It's not in the factory. I cleaned that out already. Well, not cleaned out, but repurposed. Actually, I wouldn't even go that far. Just moved some things to the junk yard like Russian submarine pens. I am scared to go to sleep tonight. Not because of tomorrow. Tomorrow will be good. I am scared of what's out there thats creeping through here and I wish I had something that would put me down cold for eight hours. I can option out of waking space sometimes. That's easy. Optioning out of sleep induction can't be done on will alone with any sort of success rate. I don't want to go there. It strikes me, or has struck me, just now how that has flipped. Somethings have come and gone. Just passing through. This one feels different. Whether I want answers or not, I'm going to get some fairly soon. I wish that knowing something is wrong could translate into fixes. Knowing your teeth are bad means you go to a dentist. Ir knowing you're about die of high cholesterol means eating differently. Knowing means nothing. It's like thinking it's about to rain ten pound stones. All you can really do is stay inside or find a bridge to huddle under with the rest of the stray souls till it's over.
///The Orb - "Montagne D'Or"
I used to wear keys everywhere to remind myself that I was awake and moving around and to track time. It's nice to have the option of taking them off and not participating in the movement of time and place. Sometimes though it burns through and it feels like forced induction. I don't like being tracked. Well, not tracked, but followed. Physically. It makes me nervous. Whenever I'm walking and I hear the neighbor walking in the same direction I stop what I'm doing and do something else. It's not bad luck. I just don't want our lines coinciding. It's like using someone elses network. I don't want whatever's over there coming over here. There's enough wildlife over here as it is.
There was something I was supposed to do today that I didn't do while I was avoiding I don't know what it is. I'm trying not to think about it. They don't like being talked about so I'll skip it.
I'm thinking about starting another repository of words. I haven't decided yet. The formulation hasn't struck a critical mass of need, but it's getting there like a bad itch. I'm sorry. I just don't know much today. Something's coming and it's heart breaking because for once all I've been doing is watching the kids play cards on a throw rug and they're playing so well and everybody's home and I don't know why. Well, maintenance has suffered some. I don't want people to be afraid of me. I'm not just like you, but... but what? You don't have to hate being around me. I like being around you? I don't know. I thought I did. Where is it coming from? Something has been built and it's doing work and I don't know where to begin on it. On protecting the rest of me from its function. I don't even know what it does, but I do know its activity is dragging the guts out of the fabric and the stuff back there, inside there, needs to stay over there. It's like waking up and there's a gas leak and the gas has made you sleepy and high and sick and it needs to be fixed, but I'm not a gas specialist. I would look for the hissing, but everything is hissing. I can't leave. I live here. Proximity alarm. But what the hell am I close to? I haven't been paying attention and I ran out of channels.
It's not in the factory. I cleaned that out already. Well, not cleaned out, but repurposed. Actually, I wouldn't even go that far. Just moved some things to the junk yard like Russian submarine pens. I am scared to go to sleep tonight. Not because of tomorrow. Tomorrow will be good. I am scared of what's out there thats creeping through here and I wish I had something that would put me down cold for eight hours. I can option out of waking space sometimes. That's easy. Optioning out of sleep induction can't be done on will alone with any sort of success rate. I don't want to go there. It strikes me, or has struck me, just now how that has flipped. Somethings have come and gone. Just passing through. This one feels different. Whether I want answers or not, I'm going to get some fairly soon. I wish that knowing something is wrong could translate into fixes. Knowing your teeth are bad means you go to a dentist. Ir knowing you're about die of high cholesterol means eating differently. Knowing means nothing. It's like thinking it's about to rain ten pound stones. All you can really do is stay inside or find a bridge to huddle under with the rest of the stray souls till it's over.
///The Orb - "Montagne D'Or"
3/19/11
Yikes. Oh Wait, Everything's Still Fine
Well, the hit parade came to a punch drunk halt. And my relationship with my job has also been resolved. It's fallen back into just another place I go and do stuff and wait to come back here and live again. Which is nice. Disappointing, but nice. It was a great honeymoon Both things coincided. It did, however (I'm littering balled up conjunctions), let me see what is possibly the only upside of sending and spending people to University study: it puts them in direct contact with similar people. Even if not similar, people possessing the capacity to understand human complexity, or maybe just ... ah whatever. Universities are full of people who do not have that capacity, but if you need that and have the money, it's where you'll have your best shot of connecting with the world and a purpose and those kinds of people. Which is neat.
I thought the internal interview went awesome, but what I realize now is that not answering the questions with made up situations no more complex than See Spot Run with Little House on the Prairie moral endings means the HR woman, who more than once asked the same question, was not understanding what I was trying to say. I should have picked up on it when she said "I don't understand how the conflict was resolved with the coworker," after I explained that through introspection I understood that my disagreement wasn't between the coworker and I as workers, but between my ethics and her practices and as such only needed an attitude adjustment on my part because, according to the union agreement and policy book, she wasn't technically doing anything wrong by not staying later than her shift regardless of the amount of work still left to be completed.
I've got to learn how to lie on these things. Or learn how to get into situations specifically to create simple answers to questions like "talk about a time you had a disagreement with a co-worker". Possibly both. I think the next time I'm at work I'll just throw cans at the manager and then we can talk about why I disagreed with his right to life and then we'll resolve the conflict by... no that's too complex. I can't even orchestrate the dumb two dimensional conflicts I'm supposed to be getting into. At any rate, it's nice to know this position has gone as far as it will so I can relax and poke around for something that pays a little better and let's me use my brain parts as much as my hands, and what's even nicer is that it's not as ridiculously urgent as when I had to punch out of New York or die.
Waking up today has been alright though. Took a personal day. I can get away with three of them every 90 days without getting written up and having a little sad is as good a reason as any. Also duct taping a butcher knife to your back, going to work, and stabbing the shit out of everyone and then beating them to death with a 15 pound chain and lock while they bleed out is probably a good reason to stay home and have some self reflection too. All of us talked about it and the consensus is that it's their loss, some of me more angrily than other parts. It was kind of funny hearing the collective gasp in my head and the one that said "see told ya" when I opened the email with the bad news. It probably also didn't help my chances that the Ass Mngr butt into the room I was interviewing in over the phone and spent several minutes loud talking at me how he was upset with me for having an interview instead of finishing my shift and banging around the office for several minutes before leaving in a huff. So I'm glad. Yesterday was way too good for too many reasons and I'm still feeling high and it's a thin world out there, but I'm okay with that. I'll find the depth I want eventually. In the meantime I'm gonna lace up and keep loving this Pittsburgh weather.
///David Bowie - "Space Oddity" "...here am I sitting in my tin can far above the Moon / Planet Earth is blue and there's nothing I can do..."
I thought the internal interview went awesome, but what I realize now is that not answering the questions with made up situations no more complex than See Spot Run with Little House on the Prairie moral endings means the HR woman, who more than once asked the same question, was not understanding what I was trying to say. I should have picked up on it when she said "I don't understand how the conflict was resolved with the coworker," after I explained that through introspection I understood that my disagreement wasn't between the coworker and I as workers, but between my ethics and her practices and as such only needed an attitude adjustment on my part because, according to the union agreement and policy book, she wasn't technically doing anything wrong by not staying later than her shift regardless of the amount of work still left to be completed.
I've got to learn how to lie on these things. Or learn how to get into situations specifically to create simple answers to questions like "talk about a time you had a disagreement with a co-worker". Possibly both. I think the next time I'm at work I'll just throw cans at the manager and then we can talk about why I disagreed with his right to life and then we'll resolve the conflict by... no that's too complex. I can't even orchestrate the dumb two dimensional conflicts I'm supposed to be getting into. At any rate, it's nice to know this position has gone as far as it will so I can relax and poke around for something that pays a little better and let's me use my brain parts as much as my hands, and what's even nicer is that it's not as ridiculously urgent as when I had to punch out of New York or die.
Waking up today has been alright though. Took a personal day. I can get away with three of them every 90 days without getting written up and having a little sad is as good a reason as any. Also duct taping a butcher knife to your back, going to work, and stabbing the shit out of everyone and then beating them to death with a 15 pound chain and lock while they bleed out is probably a good reason to stay home and have some self reflection too. All of us talked about it and the consensus is that it's their loss, some of me more angrily than other parts. It was kind of funny hearing the collective gasp in my head and the one that said "see told ya" when I opened the email with the bad news. It probably also didn't help my chances that the Ass Mngr butt into the room I was interviewing in over the phone and spent several minutes loud talking at me how he was upset with me for having an interview instead of finishing my shift and banging around the office for several minutes before leaving in a huff. So I'm glad. Yesterday was way too good for too many reasons and I'm still feeling high and it's a thin world out there, but I'm okay with that. I'll find the depth I want eventually. In the meantime I'm gonna lace up and keep loving this Pittsburgh weather.
///David Bowie - "Space Oddity" "...here am I sitting in my tin can far above the Moon / Planet Earth is blue and there's nothing I can do..."
dear (______):
Dear Nike,
Your shoes are sexy. Your commercials are all sass. But the bottom line still is: I need to put food in my stomach more than I need to help you move units.
And besides, have you ever worn your shoes for more than the length of a sporting event? Please fire everyone in your ergonomics department or whoever handles the fitting half of "fit and finish". They've been dropping the ball for twenty years.
Yours,
A person with feet not shaped like geometric wedges or airfoils.
Your shoes are sexy. Your commercials are all sass. But the bottom line still is: I need to put food in my stomach more than I need to help you move units.
And besides, have you ever worn your shoes for more than the length of a sporting event? Please fire everyone in your ergonomics department or whoever handles the fitting half of "fit and finish". They've been dropping the ball for twenty years.
Yours,
A person with feet not shaped like geometric wedges or airfoils.
3/18/11
3/17/11
dear (______):
Dear New York,
I will concede this, and only this, in our halting relationship: you make a damn fine pizza. It is, and I absolutely mean this, the only thing you've gotten right
I will concede this, and only this, in our halting relationship: you make a damn fine pizza. It is, and I absolutely mean this, the only thing you've gotten right
3/16/11
Best I Ever Had
Touching my computer and getting misty. Love at first sight all over again. Also, in case I haven't stated it enough already: Pittsburgh > NYC.
So much other stuff to tell you, but I gotta bed down first. Well, first I've got to make out with my computer for a while. Then bed down. Then I'll tell you all about it.
///Junkie XL feat. Saffron - "Beauty Never Fades"
So much other stuff to tell you, but I gotta bed down first. Well, first I've got to make out with my computer for a while. Then bed down. Then I'll tell you all about it.
///Junkie XL feat. Saffron - "Beauty Never Fades"
3/9/11
Weaponization
I'm sorry. A lot of things are going on. There's been a partial weaponization of mechanisms that I'm in the process of undoing without damaging myself. It's hard. I've been trying to get it done at higher resolution and it's working and not working. Something was screaming at me for so many hours today I felt like an egg was going to hatch inside my ear canal and whatever came out was going to chew its way into my throat. I wanted to badly to smash my head against the lip of the concrete wall beside me on my walk home just to get it out of there. It's gone now. I don't know where. Do you ever get this feeling that something is waiting for you to go to sleep to pluck your spinal cord out of your back like an elastic cord out of a candy bracelet? There's something in my nose, but if I try to get at it I'll reopen my last attempt at it and then have bloody snot for another week. I should email my former therapist. Just say a quick hello. What up, Jeff? You wouldn't schedule me so I waited at your car for you to get off work. Nah, I'm not gonna do that. Who has time for that? I have time for that. But I'm not going to. They'd probably call the real police this time.
I adopted a new mother. She doesn't know it yet and I'm not going to tell her because that would ruin it for both of us. She tells me I do good jobs on things. I didn't realize how much I missed that. Encouragement is taken for granted. Not just a pat on the back. Those are worthless. I mean the encouragement that is this: I was there when you started. I saw how hard you worked. Now I am seeing the results and I'm liking what I see just as much as you are because not only do I know and understand what it took, but I appreciate the value inborn through the evolution of your process. That hole will never stop hurting. I hope their deaths are long and painful.
That last sentence hung for some time. I have no idea what to follow it up with. My mind is a complex with only so many rooms. Granted some rooms open onto worlds and other complexes. Some rooms have only one door. Some have no windows. They all contain things. Like walking through any home, you cannot access rooms at will. You have to go through a kitchen to reach the garage. A bedroom to reach the master bath. I don't always know or announce where I am and who is there with me and doing what, but sometimes I find myself cornered and facing the darkness dribbling from the light fixtures that compels me to move before I'm ready. Resistance to compulsion. The complex is half factory. The floor is littered with the tools of the tools of destruction. They must be dismantled.
///Unkle - "Bloodstain" Come back, two five tango.
I adopted a new mother. She doesn't know it yet and I'm not going to tell her because that would ruin it for both of us. She tells me I do good jobs on things. I didn't realize how much I missed that. Encouragement is taken for granted. Not just a pat on the back. Those are worthless. I mean the encouragement that is this: I was there when you started. I saw how hard you worked. Now I am seeing the results and I'm liking what I see just as much as you are because not only do I know and understand what it took, but I appreciate the value inborn through the evolution of your process. That hole will never stop hurting. I hope their deaths are long and painful.
That last sentence hung for some time. I have no idea what to follow it up with. My mind is a complex with only so many rooms. Granted some rooms open onto worlds and other complexes. Some rooms have only one door. Some have no windows. They all contain things. Like walking through any home, you cannot access rooms at will. You have to go through a kitchen to reach the garage. A bedroom to reach the master bath. I don't always know or announce where I am and who is there with me and doing what, but sometimes I find myself cornered and facing the darkness dribbling from the light fixtures that compels me to move before I'm ready. Resistance to compulsion. The complex is half factory. The floor is littered with the tools of the tools of destruction. They must be dismantled.
///Unkle - "Bloodstain" Come back, two five tango.
A Sense of Urgency (or The Real Reason Black Men Don't "Get Ahead")
So I'm at work and I basically kill it every night. Sure I'm a little hyper. Sure they probably think I fire a couple lines into my brain before my shift. Whatever, I don't care all that much. One thing that happens in the disincentivized environment is that the only reward for a days work is the satisfaction you personally derive from putting in a solid days work becomes its own reward. That and the paycheck.
Where was I? Oh yeah... I'm trying to keep this tight... so I basically go in to work with the perspective: I am going to destroy my work load today. I see everything that management does as a direct challenge to my capabilities and every single work day is staked with taking their expectations and ramming them down their throats. "So you think I'm going to struggle with X or Y, well check this shit out: I'm gonna set X on fire with how pro I am and Y is gonna get put in its place like a redheaded step child and go tell its friends about how badly I kicked its ass and its friends will rue the day I show up to work 'cause its gonna be on from the second I walk through that front door."
Which brings me to why black men, aged 18 to 40 will, by and large, never get ahead. They're way too busy trying to convince everyone that they're unruffled. It's beyond "too cool for school" or "too cool for pants that fit" or even "too cool for rules." It's this projection of well in hand that, more than anything else, fires flares of stupidity in all directions. Well, not even that. It's not about being on time, or late, or clothing, or rules, or education. More than anything else it's this projection of such super lensed self consciousness that is so tightly clamped around their throats that you just want to shake them and scream "will you wake the hell up!?"
Maybe it's a symptom of the layers upon layers of stereotypes that are, essentially, the new slavery. Growing up beneath that burden and governance can turn the most capable human being into a club footed clown. I feel bad for them. Well alright, I'm getting loose again and dropping a lot of "wells". Let's refocus. I'm training this kid and the equipment I'm trying to explain to him is located in a lot of different areas and we have to keep criss-crossing to see the things that I'm trying to teach him about and so much time can be killed walking too and fro so I'm walking at a little better than my usual clip. I walk like I need to get somewhere unless I'm just getting lost for the sake of forgetting the world. Time is short already, without adding in the burden of having to stop and explain everything I'm doing, so I'm making tracks and this guy is just lagging.
I have no idea why. There's no one else in the area except him and me. There is no one to judge him or make fun of him for walking fast. There's no one to make fun of his pants if he tightens them up so he can actually use his gotdamn legs for ambulating. Is he worried that he might get made fun of later or that I'm made fun of for moving so quickly and speaking fast and sure? I have no idea what his problem was. I get where I'm going and the whole time I'm thinking, well hell if he would make an attempt to keep up I could explain more shit to him en route instead of having to do it all onsite. So I get there and I have to wait for him to come moseying along.
I'm all for taking time where time is available, but for the love of God when you're on the clock will you pull up your fucking socks for once and act like something more than whatever the hell you fucks are into is worth showing up for? No, I don't always want to be at work. No, I am not always buzzing at 100 miles per hour. No, I am not best friends with management, but fuck my life if someone is paying you to do something then do it right and do it on time and fuck image. At some point you have to just say to yourself "I do not care what the rest of my peers think of what I'm doing because THEY DO NOT WRITE THE CHECKS THAT BUY ME FOOD OR (insert whatever thing it is that sustains your well being).
I don't know. I guess I'm venting. I'm sure there are exceptions because I know some of them. But until we get over this weirding thing we're socialized and typed into we are going to have a black history month that says to the rest of the world "hey, we do stuff sometimes too."
Idiots. Give me two of this guy I'm training and I'll have half the output I need. Disappointing. I'm sure he's a great kid too. But personality by itself does not get shit done.
///Goldfrapp - "Deer Stop" pick them off, one by one. There is no urgency among them.
P.S. it really is just sad how self... self... what's the term... self reciprocating? I sware it's like an entire segment of the population is involved in this recursive loop. I'm no social climber, but how is it that the things I view as standard are viewed among them as exceptional, strange, and ridiculous. So mad. Retards. When the world ends, they're all going to die like lemmings. Worse than lemmings. Like deer before intelligence. Why is intelligence so eschewed???? I need to relax. No I don't. Obviously it's not just them, but I feel among them this weirding thing is most rampant, rooted, and disgustingly viral.
Where was I? Oh yeah... I'm trying to keep this tight... so I basically go in to work with the perspective: I am going to destroy my work load today. I see everything that management does as a direct challenge to my capabilities and every single work day is staked with taking their expectations and ramming them down their throats. "So you think I'm going to struggle with X or Y, well check this shit out: I'm gonna set X on fire with how pro I am and Y is gonna get put in its place like a redheaded step child and go tell its friends about how badly I kicked its ass and its friends will rue the day I show up to work 'cause its gonna be on from the second I walk through that front door."
Which brings me to why black men, aged 18 to 40 will, by and large, never get ahead. They're way too busy trying to convince everyone that they're unruffled. It's beyond "too cool for school" or "too cool for pants that fit" or even "too cool for rules." It's this projection of well in hand that, more than anything else, fires flares of stupidity in all directions. Well, not even that. It's not about being on time, or late, or clothing, or rules, or education. More than anything else it's this projection of such super lensed self consciousness that is so tightly clamped around their throats that you just want to shake them and scream "will you wake the hell up!?"
Maybe it's a symptom of the layers upon layers of stereotypes that are, essentially, the new slavery. Growing up beneath that burden and governance can turn the most capable human being into a club footed clown. I feel bad for them. Well alright, I'm getting loose again and dropping a lot of "wells". Let's refocus. I'm training this kid and the equipment I'm trying to explain to him is located in a lot of different areas and we have to keep criss-crossing to see the things that I'm trying to teach him about and so much time can be killed walking too and fro so I'm walking at a little better than my usual clip. I walk like I need to get somewhere unless I'm just getting lost for the sake of forgetting the world. Time is short already, without adding in the burden of having to stop and explain everything I'm doing, so I'm making tracks and this guy is just lagging.
I have no idea why. There's no one else in the area except him and me. There is no one to judge him or make fun of him for walking fast. There's no one to make fun of his pants if he tightens them up so he can actually use his gotdamn legs for ambulating. Is he worried that he might get made fun of later or that I'm made fun of for moving so quickly and speaking fast and sure? I have no idea what his problem was. I get where I'm going and the whole time I'm thinking, well hell if he would make an attempt to keep up I could explain more shit to him en route instead of having to do it all onsite. So I get there and I have to wait for him to come moseying along.
I'm all for taking time where time is available, but for the love of God when you're on the clock will you pull up your fucking socks for once and act like something more than whatever the hell you fucks are into is worth showing up for? No, I don't always want to be at work. No, I am not always buzzing at 100 miles per hour. No, I am not best friends with management, but fuck my life if someone is paying you to do something then do it right and do it on time and fuck image. At some point you have to just say to yourself "I do not care what the rest of my peers think of what I'm doing because THEY DO NOT WRITE THE CHECKS THAT BUY ME FOOD OR (insert whatever thing it is that sustains your well being).
I don't know. I guess I'm venting. I'm sure there are exceptions because I know some of them. But until we get over this weirding thing we're socialized and typed into we are going to have a black history month that says to the rest of the world "hey, we do stuff sometimes too."
Idiots. Give me two of this guy I'm training and I'll have half the output I need. Disappointing. I'm sure he's a great kid too. But personality by itself does not get shit done.
///Goldfrapp - "Deer Stop" pick them off, one by one. There is no urgency among them.
P.S. it really is just sad how self... self... what's the term... self reciprocating? I sware it's like an entire segment of the population is involved in this recursive loop. I'm no social climber, but how is it that the things I view as standard are viewed among them as exceptional, strange, and ridiculous. So mad. Retards. When the world ends, they're all going to die like lemmings. Worse than lemmings. Like deer before intelligence. Why is intelligence so eschewed???? I need to relax. No I don't. Obviously it's not just them, but I feel among them this weirding thing is most rampant, rooted, and disgustingly viral.
dear (______):
Dear guy friends,
Just because I'm gay does not mean I want to have sex with you. I still like beer, football, guns, Chevy small blocks, video games, and rabble rousing in general. Which is why I like hanging out with you. Fear not.
Just because I'm gay does not mean I want to have sex with you. I still like beer, football, guns, Chevy small blocks, video games, and rabble rousing in general. Which is why I like hanging out with you. Fear not.
3/7/11
dear (______):
Dear Miracle Whip,
You're that girl from high school who wore tiny shirts who turned out to be an awful person if you knew anything about her who also chaired the yearbook committee and filled the pages with one hundred photos of her personal fan club with a few token shots of pep rallies sprinkled in.
I will continue to draw mustaches on your face whenever and wherever your ads appear in print.
You're a bad person. And not the good kind of bad person that makes life a little more interesting for everyone else. You're just not good at all.
You're that girl from high school who wore tiny shirts who turned out to be an awful person if you knew anything about her who also chaired the yearbook committee and filled the pages with one hundred photos of her personal fan club with a few token shots of pep rallies sprinkled in.
I will continue to draw mustaches on your face whenever and wherever your ads appear in print.
You're a bad person. And not the good kind of bad person that makes life a little more interesting for everyone else. You're just not good at all.
3/6/11
Brief Epiphany About Art
Well, I don't know where to begin so I'll not bore myself with where I started. It occurred to me today that a huge part of what makes art great is the cost of producing it, or at least the perception of the cost of producing it. Not in terms of money or materials, but in terms of human costs. The universal currency of time, blood, and sweat.
Seeing a nice installation is neat, but if it looks like, with enough money and a stockpile of whatever and a staff of interns, it could have been put together without much blood, sweat, or time, it had better be pretty mentally challenging to perceive to create a feeling of value, regardless of personal tastes. I guess that's what is galling sometimes. In terms of writing. Writing is ridiculously time intensive, but the perception is so often that the hard part is developing some new and insightful perspective. Honestly I think it's the other way around. Before I chase that rabbit though I want to go farther down the art hole.
Everyone has personal tastes and likes and dislikes. Whatever, that's not news. A major component of art appreciation transcends likes and dislikes. People can appreciate monuments, whether they like or dislike what the thing stands for, because they can understand the difficulty of moving a brick so many feet from one point to another point. Maybe not so much now with machines to do things, and construction being a shrinking sector and people growing up not understanding how to use hammers and wrenches and whatnot. And I think the clearer art can demonstrate the intensive effort of it's production the more easily it is appreciated.
Sometimes it means producing things on a huge scale. Sometimes it is fulfilled in creating things with dozens, maybe hundreds, of physical layers. In electronic media it may mean creating something by hand at a ridiculously minute resolution or something that evidences sampling over a huge span of time or archive work that demands exploration of a great span of time units, whatever those units may be. Or maybe selection and hand picking of complex individual components for inclusion into the final composition. Whatever it is, however it demonstrates it, the appeal of art is, I feel, in large part attributable to the perception of the effort required to produce it and entirely apart from the perception of skill, talent, and other addends that went into its development. That's what makes people want these things.
People who can identify the human cost of producing a thing want it, on some level if not entirely (assuming it doesn't fix their fancy to begin with), because they know that such and such an amount of someone's being is in it. Permanently. And they can own that part of that person's being. It's not a bad thing. It does make me wonder if the majority of art owners, if it is even possible to measure something like that, are male. I bet a big part of the art school curriculum explores these topics. I hope art student kids don't think of me as a poseur. "He didn't go to art school, he's not allowed to talk about art stuff." Whatever. The closest some people get to composition is writing their shopping lists for the grocery store and they think they can comment on writing. I wonder if writers, by and large, hate artists? Writing is just systematized art. Art is just codified writing. Poetry is the intersection. Alright, back to what I was doing before. Just wanted to think about art aloud for a few minutes. Can you imagine the cavemen debating over whose cave scrawls made more sense? Nope, neither can I.
///The Eagles - "Take It Easy" It's not a good song, but it is easy to listen to. I would recommend it for filler between things you really want to listen to. Perhaps, play it to fill the minutes you need to go use the bathroom. It really is like highway rest stop atrium music. Can't you hear this echoing on burgundy tile at 9 in the morning a couple hundred miles from your destination in a glassed up rest stop and your ass hurts and you don't really want to eat Roy Rogers for any reason, but you already ate Mcdonalds for dinner and had the worst shits of your life a couple hundred miles before you had to get out and take a leak and realized you were hungrier than a fox fresh out of eggs?
Seeing a nice installation is neat, but if it looks like, with enough money and a stockpile of whatever and a staff of interns, it could have been put together without much blood, sweat, or time, it had better be pretty mentally challenging to perceive to create a feeling of value, regardless of personal tastes. I guess that's what is galling sometimes. In terms of writing. Writing is ridiculously time intensive, but the perception is so often that the hard part is developing some new and insightful perspective. Honestly I think it's the other way around. Before I chase that rabbit though I want to go farther down the art hole.
Everyone has personal tastes and likes and dislikes. Whatever, that's not news. A major component of art appreciation transcends likes and dislikes. People can appreciate monuments, whether they like or dislike what the thing stands for, because they can understand the difficulty of moving a brick so many feet from one point to another point. Maybe not so much now with machines to do things, and construction being a shrinking sector and people growing up not understanding how to use hammers and wrenches and whatnot. And I think the clearer art can demonstrate the intensive effort of it's production the more easily it is appreciated.
Sometimes it means producing things on a huge scale. Sometimes it is fulfilled in creating things with dozens, maybe hundreds, of physical layers. In electronic media it may mean creating something by hand at a ridiculously minute resolution or something that evidences sampling over a huge span of time or archive work that demands exploration of a great span of time units, whatever those units may be. Or maybe selection and hand picking of complex individual components for inclusion into the final composition. Whatever it is, however it demonstrates it, the appeal of art is, I feel, in large part attributable to the perception of the effort required to produce it and entirely apart from the perception of skill, talent, and other addends that went into its development. That's what makes people want these things.
People who can identify the human cost of producing a thing want it, on some level if not entirely (assuming it doesn't fix their fancy to begin with), because they know that such and such an amount of someone's being is in it. Permanently. And they can own that part of that person's being. It's not a bad thing. It does make me wonder if the majority of art owners, if it is even possible to measure something like that, are male. I bet a big part of the art school curriculum explores these topics. I hope art student kids don't think of me as a poseur. "He didn't go to art school, he's not allowed to talk about art stuff." Whatever. The closest some people get to composition is writing their shopping lists for the grocery store and they think they can comment on writing. I wonder if writers, by and large, hate artists? Writing is just systematized art. Art is just codified writing. Poetry is the intersection. Alright, back to what I was doing before. Just wanted to think about art aloud for a few minutes. Can you imagine the cavemen debating over whose cave scrawls made more sense? Nope, neither can I.
///The Eagles - "Take It Easy" It's not a good song, but it is easy to listen to. I would recommend it for filler between things you really want to listen to. Perhaps, play it to fill the minutes you need to go use the bathroom. It really is like highway rest stop atrium music. Can't you hear this echoing on burgundy tile at 9 in the morning a couple hundred miles from your destination in a glassed up rest stop and your ass hurts and you don't really want to eat Roy Rogers for any reason, but you already ate Mcdonalds for dinner and had the worst shits of your life a couple hundred miles before you had to get out and take a leak and realized you were hungrier than a fox fresh out of eggs?
3/4/11
dear (______):
Dear person outside my window shouting someone's name,
THEY OBVIOUSLY CANT FUCKING HEAR YOU. Please shut up.
Thanks.
THEY OBVIOUSLY CANT FUCKING HEAR YOU. Please shut up.
Thanks.
Good Night
It was a productive night. Got some things done. Bits For Flames got an infusion of life. I still have to start composing the page indexes. Gotta do it by hand because there's no Wordpress to do it automatically, but that's okay. I'll start them later today. I feel pretty good about it. I feel calm. Almost undeservedly so. Be back at it later.
///Unkle - "Heaven" like sex with someone who cares more about you than you could ever care about yourself and you put it away in a box for a rainy day, though you can't remember the last time you checked the forecast or opened the pages of a newspaper and read about the rest of your world.
///Unkle - "Heaven" like sex with someone who cares more about you than you could ever care about yourself and you put it away in a box for a rainy day, though you can't remember the last time you checked the forecast or opened the pages of a newspaper and read about the rest of your world.
3/2/11
Note Taking and Big Wednesday and Curtains (Question Mark)
Here we are. All of us together, staring down the barrel of big Wednesday. It feels good to be, all of us, facing the same direction. It's like that scene from Seven Samurai. A rare union. It feels good to be all together. It's like standing on the viewing deck of a skyscraper and the entire city looks like a fold out map with colored streets and little geometric bits of color to show the landmarks and it's even better because all of your friends are there and it's not about getting lost in the moment as much as it is about the moment being an extension of the years you've spent with these people and the fact that together you all see it the same way, but spun enough to make everything everyone is saying worth each second of hearing.
The note taking at work is going well. I do think some people are beginning to assume that I am texting some girl friend somewhere (HAH) and oddly enough, me being the hardest worker there, they've started calling me a slacker. It doesn't bother me. What does bother me is that if I ever tried to explain that I am taking notes to use later in my compositions and poetry and fiction they would laugh, not believe me, and then continue to call me a slacker. So I won't explain until or unless I am directly confronted about my phone activities. Worst comes to worst I'll just have to start using paper. But my handwriting sucks.
Also I bought curtains. And by curtains I mean six bright yellow table cloths on sale in the Easter display for a dollar each. What I plan on doing is writing two inch tall font prose on them from edge to edge, cutting slats into them that are each about two to three inches wide, and then taking them up for window curtains. The way the sun hits my place in the mornings it's going to look amazing, I promise. If you came to visit once they're done, it'll probably take a day or two or maybe even a week to get all that writing done first, you'll love waking up here as much as I do.
Something silly funny happened today though. When I got home from work this morning I went to use the microwave to heat up some wind-myself-down-and-sleep-soundly greasy cheesy yummy food and I couldn't enter the time on the microwave control panel. So I'm jamming the buttons and finally I bend down to see what the little display is saying. Thought process:
"Aw, what the hell?? Who keeps leaving time on the microwave!? I can't use the damn thing if there's time left on it!"
Then I realized that no one could have done it, but me. Then I realized no one could have done it, but me, because I'm the only one who lives here. Then I realized that was a good thing.
I didn't do the whole moment justice there, but there were two paths of discovery that joined up in a single goof troop smile that made the morning pretty enjoyable. I may not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but blunt objects can solve problems pretty good too.
///DJ Adam Freeland - "Big Wednesday" This song makes me wish there was a God. It makes me think of sitting on the sun facing side of a dune by the great lakes and feeling the Earth breathing against the back of my neck like someone in love and I'm killing time and picking grass until I can go play in the water and meet the sun out by the buoys before nightfall. It also makes me think of riding. I need a car or motorcycle. Not necessarily to get where I'm going, but just to go out and drive and feel the veins of highway and the wind up my sleeves and my nose and the motor beneath my seat. I love the rhythm of motion and sea.
The note taking at work is going well. I do think some people are beginning to assume that I am texting some girl friend somewhere (HAH) and oddly enough, me being the hardest worker there, they've started calling me a slacker. It doesn't bother me. What does bother me is that if I ever tried to explain that I am taking notes to use later in my compositions and poetry and fiction they would laugh, not believe me, and then continue to call me a slacker. So I won't explain until or unless I am directly confronted about my phone activities. Worst comes to worst I'll just have to start using paper. But my handwriting sucks.
Also I bought curtains. And by curtains I mean six bright yellow table cloths on sale in the Easter display for a dollar each. What I plan on doing is writing two inch tall font prose on them from edge to edge, cutting slats into them that are each about two to three inches wide, and then taking them up for window curtains. The way the sun hits my place in the mornings it's going to look amazing, I promise. If you came to visit once they're done, it'll probably take a day or two or maybe even a week to get all that writing done first, you'll love waking up here as much as I do.
Something silly funny happened today though. When I got home from work this morning I went to use the microwave to heat up some wind-myself-down-and-sleep-soundly greasy cheesy yummy food and I couldn't enter the time on the microwave control panel. So I'm jamming the buttons and finally I bend down to see what the little display is saying. Thought process:
"Aw, what the hell?? Who keeps leaving time on the microwave!? I can't use the damn thing if there's time left on it!"
Then I realized that no one could have done it, but me. Then I realized no one could have done it, but me, because I'm the only one who lives here. Then I realized that was a good thing.
I didn't do the whole moment justice there, but there were two paths of discovery that joined up in a single goof troop smile that made the morning pretty enjoyable. I may not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but blunt objects can solve problems pretty good too.
///DJ Adam Freeland - "Big Wednesday" This song makes me wish there was a God. It makes me think of sitting on the sun facing side of a dune by the great lakes and feeling the Earth breathing against the back of my neck like someone in love and I'm killing time and picking grass until I can go play in the water and meet the sun out by the buoys before nightfall. It also makes me think of riding. I need a car or motorcycle. Not necessarily to get where I'm going, but just to go out and drive and feel the veins of highway and the wind up my sleeves and my nose and the motor beneath my seat. I love the rhythm of motion and sea.
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