"Time to check your level of responsibility?"

This is a clipping out of the morning paper today. I like to occasionally gut something out of the middle that is everyday life oriented. It's fun.



These are some of the things I HAVEN'T done recently.


1.Returned "Search and Destroy" by Dean Hughes to the library.
2.Responded to e-mails from several good friends, including Linda in Ohio an Patty in Indiana. (I'm sorry you guys! I promise I'll write back!)
3. Made arrangements for a groom's dinner (can you believe it? ANOTHER son is getting married!) , even though the wedding is coming up pretty soon.
4. Paid a bill to my favorite florist, Every Blooming Thing, for flowers I sent in July.
5. Returned a phone call to Glenn at BYU. (Glenn! Dude! My husband wants me to tell you that he really did give e your message. It's not HIS fault that I haven't called back in the last two weeks.)
6. Washed my son's football uniform. (i've just been burning scented candles in his bedroom instead.)

These are some of the things that I HAVE done recently.

1. Found a parking ticket on my windshield because the meter was expired, to which I can only say, OF COURSE THE METER WAS EXPIRED. I never put change in the meter to begin with.
2. Forgot Emma's birthday even though she's pretty much the daughter I never had, which is apparently why God never sent me girls. He knew I'd just forget their birthdays and then they;d be all like "our mother is so lame."
3.Lost the family parrot. After 12 years of doing penguin-esque belly flops off the top of his cage, our African gray finally discovered that his wings work. Yea! That's the good news! The bad news is that he was outside on the deck when he figured things out. The other bad news is that I was the one who left him out there.

Anyway, as you can see, it's been an eventful few weeks in a nonproductive kind of way. In fact, I was sort of startled this morning when I made up these lists, because, actually, I think of myself as a highly responsible person. Hello. My girlfriend Gigi Ballif and I were members of the Color Guard in the sixth grade, which, AS EVERYBODY IN AMERICA KNOWS, they only let highly responsible kinds do. The last thing you wan ti n the Color Guard are a bunch of non-responsible six-graders who don't show up or forget their hats or wear their badges upside down or drop the flag on the ground all day long.

Looking at my lists, however, makes me wonder if it's time to do an update so that self-image matches the reality at hand. Is it possible I'm not responsible any more? Do I need to get a paper route to teach myself some responsibility again?

Is it possible I've turned into that guy who still wears double-knit slacks with a white belt because they looked good on him, and also on Joe Namath, in 1974, and he thinks they look good on him still? (ANSWER : No. I'm not a guy. And I don't have a pair of double-knit slacks.)

All of us occasionally out to do a self-awareness exercise. Do my actions say I am who I think I am? Am I REALLY (fill in the blank)?
It can't hurt, right?
(Unless, of course, you think you're a lost cause.)
(Which you are probably not.)
(Even if the teachers didn't choose YOU to be in the Color Guard in the sixth grade.)


-Ann Cannon

Ugly Little Dreams

Frances keep your mouth shut dear
We don't want the neighbors 'round
With their ugly little schemes
That make the pretty world go 'round
And there's a place in it for every one of us
I'll keep the home fires burning
Only don't make a fuss

And if you're not impressed
With the wares life has to show
You can take them or leave them
They choose their own fare who say no
There's some ugly little dreams
For pretty girls to buy
It's enough to make you mad
But it's safer just to break down and cry
It's a battlefield Frances
You fight or concede
Victory to the enemy
Who call your strength insanity

What cahnce for such girls
How can we compete?
In a world that likes its women
Stupid and sweet

I bet you rue the day
The angels gave you your share
Of bright cornflower blue eyes
And golden hair
And there's a lot of ugly little dreams
For pretty girls to buy
It's enough to make you mad
But it's safer just to break down and cry
It's safer just to break down and cry

-Everything but the Girl

------------------

EBTG has been a band I've kept up with over the years. What created the interest was their dynamic sound, investment in many instruments, and the leads powerful vocals. What kept the interest was what the lyrics touched on - ethics and rights within relationships, political commentary, and largely on the human experience.

Looking information up on EBTG, I ran into their focuses on their debut album which was pretty much what I described above.

Ugly little dreams is about those who were shocked and upset by women with too many ideas.

It's about Frances Farmer in particular. That struck interest -- who is she I asked and wikied it. What I found proved interesting... Frances in her youth won a writing contest in 1931, for her religiously controversial essay. Later when she was attending university won over another writing contest for a leftist newpaper. (which was probably moderate compared to these days) this won her a trip to go visit the Soviet Union which her family fiercely objected to.

Frances began an acting career in the big screen pictures. She was very unhappy with her career as she was only given 'pretty girl' and damsel like roles, instead of ones where she could find a creative niche with her talents. It was a time when movie studios were very controlling of their actors and actresses lives. As a result she clashed a lot with the buecracy within Paramount Studios refusing to mold.

I can't continue to depict her as a struggling artist and put her up as a complete martyr of her times. The trouble she got in later was of her own accord, as she developed heavy drinking problems. Her little incident with the police was interesting though during war time when all lights were ordered for a black out period. She went rebeliously driving down the road with her brights on. Then there is breaking her make up artists jaw (I would have loved to have been present) . Yet her contrary views led "proffessionals" to diagnose her with bipolar disorder, for her seeking things outside of accepted culture.


I do like her story though and it winds down to a comment by Ray Bradbury. "a man runs when he sees anything of a mind in a woman." (rough quote, I have handicapped quoting skills as I am sure one of you can verify in other situations) Thankfully this quote doesn't ring so true anymore, almost minus certain communities where women are ordained to be baby cranking factories. Yet it did bring a smile to my face, it does sometimes touch home minus the gender references and added in particular family references.


"I bet you rue the day
The angels gave you your share
Of bright cornflower blue eyes
And golden hair"

is a very interesting couple of lines from the song, I think. It has something to say on what is expected of women when it comes to men and the crowds for that matter.

I've had many a friend who felt overwhelmed by trying to gain attentions of the opposite gender. Many friends who felt that her worth was contingent on her ability to be attractive, and to be worthwhile. To be charming and sucumbing to prevalent demands for a girl to be entertaining. Well dammit those things aren't just about being pleased or entertaining. I've seen too many girls who don't find enough esteem in themselves and become dependent on whatever kind of security a relation with a guy can give her. Though it's not just ungrounded and self insecured girls that cling to this.

However I feel the opposite is true. I feel there is an underculture of women who are obsessed with glamour, power and manipulation over partners. Yet they still cling to the demand to be a particular genre of charming and entertaining outside of standard (by standard I mean common things like courting flirting and means to relations and such, what I mean is the whole charming thing is getting overblown.)

Bottom line: we shouldn't be expected to be any more diplomatically and dynamically charming than what is natural, than what men are (not to say that men and the stake of natural are directly synonymous or opposing). It's not duty to be pretty attractive alpha vixens contrary to what pop culture is trying to tell us all. I'd love to see pop culture grow in insight for once...

And I could go on about how the teen to adult road is practically non existent and how we still have 37 year old men and women who are paranoid about their upkeep on trendiness, acting and wishing they could be as hip as they were when they were 18. Hey what about other things of worth? We just generating lifelong super hormone charged teenagers nowadays?

How cute. . .

Even in these modern times excessive prerequisites for a woman to even be considered as attractive are too heavy. Sorry we're not all about acting pretty, and believe me what a sad act it is. Sorry to say there is something more between the lines there. I realized a sad truth when joking around with my younger brother. "Derek, this is sooo sad, you could have a guy be really ugly, obese, or freakishly skinny, who is the funniest and fun person ever and he could get a lot of dates. But if you turn it around and it's a heavy girl, or a not so cute faced kind of girl and she's left with slim pickins. if not dying alone" "yup" and we both laughed.

Yet why is this true?

Watching a television makeover show I was taken aback by a couple. There was a well built man with what most women would claim as being handsome faced and a mousy faced bushy haired girl who wasn't very easy on the eyes as some would say. It was very odd to see this couple hand in hand. I was a little confused by the fact that I was confused. Yet it's not nearly that startling when you see a girl go with a guy that is far far from being the next runner up for male model of the year. I couldn't explain the confusion at first, but then I realized more and more that its a sick and unfair part of our culture.

I walked past as my dad was watching Miss Congeniality on t.v. (great movie !) one of the pagent officials stammered on to say "I've been fighting my whole career against people like you, feminists, intellectuals:: Ugly women!" Yes I appreciate the humor but this brings up the point again. They focus less on being pleasing creatures to men. In this case I am referencing ugly as being unattractive in manner or in appearance. This kind of ugly she probably means as women who don't choose to apply cosmetics as a daily routine. I see no immediate problem with makeup as I wear it and wear it for myself only but I really do give a salute to women who don't feel it's a necessity or a requirement. :)


Kudos to Ms. Farmer, especially in a time when it was much much worse and unequal.

Kudos to EBTG composed of two members - one female and one male who support this belief.

OOOOOui!

my frog is getting chubby! :)

yeah...

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a september kind of feel

It comes near this time of year. The air becomes heavy; thicker and almost scented as autumn closes in. In the front of my mind I hardly ever know what month it is anymore. School schedules would pound that in nicely, my theoretical secretary would get the memo by the second day. How else to explain it but that each month tumbles into the next? Maybe I might notice.

But September always stands out.

I'm hoping and praying I don't have a someone else's old bills hanging over my head. I don't know where to even begin on that one. As to where I live now-- my parents usually seem far away, buried under debt of their own that only seem to deepen around this time of year.

Dammit macs don't crash, my ass.

On a plus note I stumbled into a collaborative blog and music forum the other day, centered on intellectual and eclectic varieties in music. It's refreshing to see others take music to another level other than a base form of entertainment. I see it as something to be celebrated as artistic, as a meaningful form of communication, sect of life, and a unique way to delve straight into the heart of any matter. Anyone who knows me knows that I can talk music for hours and hours... and hours after that. I'm thrilled because I'm already getting references for musical artists and groups that I've never heard of before. *grin* Had to geek out on this one.

God, my head hurts...

Earlier my dad and brother were watching a programming about the most recent conflicts in the middle east and how it could spell World War III. I sat there crosslegged on the floor completely spellbound and all at once screaming inside to discredit everything and claim ignorance. There was a segment on what the key element of chemical warfare could do. . .

I was asked to take a stance in an essay on the bombings on Hiroshima in an old history class. Unethical was my take... To me, nukes are way too powerful to be used as a means in human conflict. Woo hoo you brought a whole nation to opt out with repetitive crotch kicking. Who can call that victory?

I'm still a little out of the loop when it comes to the everchanging scene of this Holy Land. Yet if I got a pop quiz on the subject it would be easy to sum it all up, suicide bombings, evacutions, death toll, religious intolerance merging into genocide (if not xenocide at this point).

This country's war sometimes brings me to hang my head. My stance on the war can only be described as a photo-finish, one footfall making all the difference. That's beside the point.

I only wish that more was being done other than steal the flag. We need more social programs within the borders, not just treaties and military support. How is such an ethnocentric tunnelvisioned country supposed to be so warm and receptive to "Western" ways? If we don't take the time to fully comprehend what issues the public there is conflicted over, military efforts there will be in vain. If we don't do our part to best illustrate why the dramatic reforms are taking place, why they aren't an attack against their culture and religion then they will have everyright to join the resistance movements.

We're a diverse country, what we need is American Muslims and Americans with middle Eastern backgrounds to aid the changes of life there. Programs which promote religious tolerance, programs that respect Islam, programs that aid families and communities with the tools they need, programs to help feed the hungry there, programs to help the country to build political awareness. They're not going to listen to and relate very well with a bunch of white guys in suits. Why should they listen to politicians who may visit now and then, who come to speak only written words, who are mainly appearing for their own countries? Pro war or Anti War people need to see that dramatic shifts are taking place in a very closeminded arena. You don't storm into the operation room in the middle of your husband's brain surgery and cease all medical action. The incisions have been made.

While some military support is needed because we started the whole thing and leaving now would be rape, there should be more focus on internal aid and social reform, not military enforcement.

There's my two cents. I need to sleep before my body self destructs.

Fine.

Not all board games are boarding as hell.

come again?

"When a baby is born it is interesting to see the nature upon which it acts, which is inherently self centred and therefore sinful. The only thing that matters to a baby is it's own needs and desires, it is it's own god. But I do also believe in a babies innocence due to it's ignorance of it's own sinful nature. The key idea is that sin is a part of our nature from birth, thus a part of us and our makeup, permeating every one of the components mentioned above. Our mission is to turn our nature around, to "no longer conform to the pattern of this world" and to reflect Christ by working to change our character, not separate parts of it.

If we accept that we are inherently evil and need a complete renewal, rather than thinking we are actually perfect with a bit of excess bad bagagge, only then can we truly work to change.

The only value I see in separating the sin from the sinner is that it becomes easier for us to love all people."

-- http://www.sciforums.com/archive/index.php/t-2390.html



Meaning???

I recognize that this is from an independent religious forum, so I will be gentle. (yeah what's with the sci in the url?)


Inherently evil? I vouch that we have equal capacities for good and bad.

I do not understand the Christian doctrine of being born into sin. All I can sense from a newborn child is hope and innocence amidst the child's so called ignorance. What a beautiful stage of life, who can disagree?

"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed." -Albert Einstein

c;< C< c;< c<

Ooooo!!

Fishie!!! and my nervous frog.


<('o')> v\`--´/v

a right as you also have...

We were sitting in the front room, I lounged in my p.j.s . Dad usually doesn't talk much politics but there we were on the topic. President Bush. The war in Iraq. Protesters. Vietnam.

He lowered his head, whispered, don't tell your mom this but. I mean I hate Mayor Rocky Anderson, want to drag him from the back of a truck for a few blocks but... i was listening to him at work, and I *really* think he has a right to an opinion. I think so.

Don't tell your mom.

It is not our purpose to become each other; it is to recognize each other, to learn
to see the other and honor him for what he is.

Hermann Hesse

couldn't call them on it

The topic of the Keirsey sorter arose in a number of my classes in high school and once last semester. Any personality test I question the sensitivity of the results. I have a deep skepticism of any people sorting methods, took it again at the same site* Yet I came up the same. I thought it wouldn't seeing as it 'claims' that only 25% of the population have this temperment yet another source claims that it is little as 8%-10%, but no matter. I see these kinds of things being overly sensitive in their questionares usually, like the color personality tests. Still interesting though, little rebuttle from me this time.

_______________________________________________________________________________
YOU ARE AN IDEALIST

Idealists, as a temperament, are passionately concerned with personal growth and development. Idealists strive to discover who they are and how they can become their best possible self -- always this quest for self-knowledge and self-improvement drives their imagination. And they want to help others make the journey. Idealists are naturally drawn to working with people, and whether in education or counseling, in social services or personnel work, in journalism or the ministry, they are gifted at helping others find their way in life, often inspiring them to grow as individuals and to fulfill their potentials.

Idealists are sure that friendly cooperation is the best way for people to achieve their goals. Conflict and confrontation upset them because they seem to put up angry barriers between people. Idealists dream of creating harmonious, even caring personal relations, and they have a unique talent for helping people get along with each other and work together for the good of all. Such interpersonal harmony might be a romantic ideal, but then Idealists are incurable romantics who prefer to focus on what might be, rather than what is. The real, practical world is only a starting place for Idealists; they believe that life is filled with possibilities waiting to be realized, rich with meanings calling out to be understood. This idea of a mystical or spiritual dimension to life, the "not visible" or the "not yet" that can only be known through intuition or by a leap of faith, is far more important to Idealists than the world of material things.

Highly ethical in their actions, Idealists hold themselves to a strict standard of personal integrity. They must be true to themselves and to others, and they can be quite hard on themselves when they are dishonest, or when they are false or insincere. More often, however, Idealists are the very soul of kindness. Particularly in their personal relationships, Idealists are without question filled with love and good will. They believe in giving of themselves to help others; they cherish a few warm, sensitive friendships; they strive for a special rapport with their children; and in marriage they wish to find a "soulmate," someone with whom they can bond emotionally and spiritually, sharing their deepest feelings and their complex inner worlds.

Idealists are rare, making up between 20 and 25 percent of the population. But their ability to inspire people with their enthusiasm and their idealism has given them influence far beyond their numbers.




________
http://www.advisorteam.com/temperament_sorter/register.asp

*(a 'professional' personality website which charges for its indepth reports which only hosted a copy of the Keirsey test. c'mon people charging is for the birds... erm well in Hitchcockian times that is...)

too easy

"People naturally fear misfortune and long for good fortune; but if the distinction is carefully studied, misfortune often turns out to be good fortune and good fortune to be misfortune."

this is a clip from the Dharma of Buddha. How interesting. Can this say that fortune takes more responsibility and control than misfortune?

how easy it is for me to embark upon worry. whatever comes will come with my welcome. Total gain or loss in anyday, the joy and wonder still remain however hidden it may be. i accept that events may end in my favor or end against it. so I live it, know what is before me as best I can, it is fleeting without any promises to stay. Less worry, fear. It's about losing the contingence on third party promises. Life should not be feared, misfortunes and fortunes attached. I will enjoy my day.

I need no promises, other than the morning sun.

Legend of Zelda - Twilight princess was postponed again but only by two months... Not bad, nearly promising but I'm not keeping my fingers crossed.

November 2006. Plenty of time for me to acquire the means necessary. THOUGH I THOUGHT I WOULD BE PURCHASING IT AT GRAYWHALE. They release their games a day late and discount them a tad to compensate.

OOiuo, this is going to be one of those weeks...

Ugnh... Brains. And I thought I could sword fight.

ugh

The putrid odor of matrix perm treatment is taking my house by storm. The horrors of being down wind, this room of mine seems to always get the worst of it by virtue of the vents and location. Not to mention hair color, but that one was one me. But jeez two perms in a row? Hey ladies how bout I go and curl your hair for the rest of the week so my house can smell half decent. That way I don't have to wheexze and hallicinate with the combined fumes of matrix hair color, primer and latex paint, and perm curl settler and inducer? huh? huh? Never mind, it's truly a game of pick your poison, having to fluff up old women's afros or endure chemical warfare.

and it gets all the better when your mother decides to bring the source into your room to show miss perm rod scalp the new paint job. The smells I swear are alive... *gag*

as little left to say

I could go on and list all sorts of 'trivial' things about my evening.

Like how the week I began orange tags were half off and the week I left orange tags were again discounted. One of the regulars met me over at the jewelry case, stocky and tall, backpacked as usual finding curiousity at trinkets I would pass by. She always seems to pick out things with rustic elegance, much like herself.

There was this man who resales handbags on ebay, eccentric looking with a roman face. Huge rectangular glasses, thick hair like the scientist on back to the future. He came to the register back when I was all tied up and bound by the ropes I was trying to learn. I completely messed up on the transaction before him, and then blundered on his check out as well. "Don't worry its a part of life. We mess up and then go from there." was his rough wording. I expected him to be angry or impatient, but not in the least. I would have told him thank you but... I just shyed off.

Kara stopped me in the parking lot and asked me to call now and then, tell her how things are. I act stiff around her still. I don't think I have ever met a woman with such an contrasting presence, hard and scanning at the same time as caring and maternal.

"if you bore me I am comfortable, if you interest me I am scared." It's a quote I find so relevant to my personality.

As I was chucking things into the compactor I nticed Margaret lighting up a smoke. She'd just quit recently. She sat there on the dock with a willowly look to her, dangling her old and tired feet over the end.

I hated the politics of the place. No doubt about it. Obviously admist my complaints something kept me there longer than usual. I don't think I was meant to leave earlier than now.

I kind of choked up when I saw the gift basket they had arranged for me at the end of the shift. Chocolate, a candle, flowers, and a silly cat figurine, a card written in Margaret's beautiful cursive.

I thought about when Marché left. You should have seen her whir through those dressing rooms, completely up to par. There was something so hardworking and efficient about her. Marché would sit alone on breaks, with her igloo lunch box plastered with cat and starwars stickers. We left with about the same reputations.

My mom pointed out the other day that I get along best with the older employees. I shrugged.

I need to call them tommorrow. My card fell out in the store. I could go on about the little things.

too much fun

I really shouldn't be paid for these kinds of cheap thrills.

Dude. Tell me it isn't fun breaking oversized random objects into pieces!!!!!

Liz tried again and again to get the'bloody couch down into that frigging compactah'. I proceeded to jump into that compactor pit and slam the wretched blue couch towards the mechanism. I managed to beat the back off of the couch, and collaspe the arm. hee hee. I kicked a huge hole into the base too. The sides were reinforced with some sort of steel and wouldn't budge.

There was also some problem with some boards that were stuck above the compressor. Blah. So I handed Liz a metal bat who was jumping and stomping almost as maniacly as I had earlier on these boards. She took a few stabs and swings, let Erin take over. Erin's dread locks were flipping all over the place as she took a weight lifting bar and speared holes into the board and mumbled that this location should have an axe handy.

Erin takes the hippie award of the year, no contest. And seeing her take prey on this plank of wood made the day almost priceless. Holy shiot.


I'm trying to get the gumption to ask Haily my vegitarian coworker to hang out sometime. Try out some movie buisness as dangerous as that is. lol. There is something so otherly yet cultured about her demeanor that its hard to describe. *shrugs* I'll see how that goes.

I wonder where next week will take me.

i shouldn't think at night

The most intense rounds in life are fought with subtleties. A brief flair of words, a passing gesture, it's meant to be delivered with the same feverish trickle of a papercut.

Summarizing always angered me ever since I was young. With the boundaries of a summary I could never express my wonder or exasperation, the winding details that set an event apart from any other occurrence.

Then again, think about it. One word could be a thousand pictures, a picture a thousand words.

Something in me enjoys harping out the starkest attributes from my understanding. There is something to it, tacking something down as best as someone can through the medium of expression.

O'Keefe found the beauty of simplistic curves and gradualising color, pinning art down to its most basic elements. Whether it was painting a swirl of sky or oddly arranged skeletal remains amongst the spring blooms or a leave protruding from a stem. She drew interest to it. Though this is not limited to art.

The power isn't so much in the brevity as it is in the up close perspective.

Even the order of which you reveal the content of a message can completely rearrange the impression.

Interesting.

holy cow

Maybe I can muster up the sanity to finish my two weeks notice.

Emphasis on maybe.

Goodness I don't want to go today. I'm in no mood to be hounded after every minute I am on the clock by supervisors who are desperate to keep their jobs with an anal rententive manager. I just hope my coworkers can get out of there before it gets insane. There ain't no way they'd get me to sign agreements unauthorized by the company.

Until then there are a few distractions i still have. Like the supreme coolness of finding an awesome band you forgot about smack you across the face from some movie's credits. So 'Low' was responsible for the song Half Light... Muah ha ha.

Can I play my nintendo console on this mac?

I NEED my super nintendo! I need a nap, hot chocolate. Bloody frickin frackkin frunum. How am I going to make it through another ...

contagion or happenstance?

Rewatching "The Mothman Prophecies" has curiousified me again about theories of mass hysteria. the subject itself is interesting, sound or unsound, either way it will turn up as thought provoking. Either it's (but not limited to) a palpable pattern of social responses to archetyped conditions; a social state that can be logically explained or there is an additional element coming into play; that being the paranormal , influence of a divinity or elevated being or condition, or extraterristial happenings.

One time when I was at work I was asked to mop up an 'accident' in the rest I was the only one staffed who could stomach it. I admit I almost threw up myself looking upon and being so near the mess. Ick.

But there it is - a common reaction between people.
It is very common to become queasy and sick stomached at the sight and smell of puke or human waste. Many will have biological impulses to regurgitate themselves after nearing such. It creates a domino effect of biological manifestations of disgust.

Think back to a meeting within an organization in which you attend i.e. church or school. Someone among the seated crowd will probably yawn, and before you know it. Its like chicken pox. One initial yawner, three responding yawners etc. More dominoes.

::Yes... It is late. I'm even yawning. ::

Can this be applicable to independant matter that is well exposed to a public, which becomes archetyped after being well rooted in a publics affairs? Is it limited to biology? We are a intensly social species.


A few instances which some attribute group hysteria or shared delusions that immediately come to mind is the Salem Witchcraft Trials and the Red Scare that had the U.S. jerking like a nervous bird.

Paranoia is contagious. Have you ever been in an open area with friends at night when the surroundings have been a bit spooky, and the rest of them became spooked. Even if you don't get spooked yourself by such things, you still feel their growing fear. That fear will probably more than likely make you uneasy. I'm not salying you will be cowardized right there, but fear is something that is very easily signalled from one human to the next. How you respond is one thing, you don't have to squirm liek the rest are doing, but I am sure that that would be one of your more basest responses.

I've really got to look into this when I am more coherent and energized. Daaamn. I am soo sleepy. Perhaps I can salvage some vital brain cells while I sleep.

That went well

Strange.

"So we don't think we are going to stay till the end of the lease. We're staying with his mom in New Mexico."

"Yeah? Me too. I'm going in with my parents again"

"Yeah?"

"Yep."

"BUT THE FISHIES!?!"

lol

Quinn: "If Dad had died, I would've been freaked out for, like, years."
Jake: "That's the spirit, sweetie. Avenge my death."
Daria: "You're not dying, Dad."
Jake: "Avenge me!"

boxing

I get the feeling it will be one of those days.

Or these days... I do what I must.

I would have gotten boxes from work, but Savers flooded over. The drain in the emergency door let up, a small leak and as soon as they opened it, it was up to their shins. However that works. I did see the inside and the closed signs, water was everywhere.

I've already begun packing. My mom says she'll be scouting out for boxes. I'm thinking about renting a uhaul. Dad will be entirely less irritable. I'd honestly do all the moving if I could. I can, but not without throwing my back out again.

Tammie can't pay the bills this month, again. I'll do what I can to help her finish this month. Losing a little plasma never hurt. We can switch the names in the lease.

Fun things to work out now.

I feel strange wherever I go.

Leaving and coming 'home' is equally strange.

It's the Swiss I tell you!

Ohkay someone explain this.

How come Eiffel 65's "blue" never fails to get me excited? This another ramen complex?

Sheesh.

Or just shush, I am hearing a distant call, yes yes the circus. They'd do well with someone of my sort.

lol.

So Called Chaos

Funny, sad, interesting, common responses of mine. I want to get past learned responses, expectations of responses in conversations.

My mom became audibly comptemplative today, sweeping up the shop. "what is life about anyway, I mean theres gotta be a purpose." My jaw dropped right open, I rarely hear her say anything full of thought like that. It's unlike her usual topics, neighborhood gossip, nice little doses of high contrast religion, flow of the day, wanting to be rich again like when she was single, or humorous responses. She usually laughs at questions like that but with her back to the door, she looked down at her cracked hands withered away by shampoos and coloring chemicals, asked herself what purpose meant. She'd talk like that sometimes after her knee surgery, couped up in her room. That kind of talk from her will usually surprise me. Driving around, she pointed up at the moon, "i like those thin moons". Just seeing her in a rare state of wonder was satisfying.

Dreams are something I have been thinking about alot lately.
Everyone has dreams kept far from public. We usually see dreams only as just that --far. The present almost doesn't exist to us as humans. Always clouded by the trails of fear tread in the past, and an anxiety about the slow and thick curtain of the future. Only the known and the unknown. The current moment usually can't be lived, we as humans are scattered about in different times and places, never really completely present where we stand. Always clawing and and holding empty grips for more, and more once the ordered supply has arrived. We seem to judge things only by impressions and predictions, beforehand, and long reviews after the matter. But should we really have to have the door slammed shut?
Do things really need to leave before people can know the worth of something? I don't think so.

Why do we always hang our dreams up so high up and far away from us? Like the porchlight Gatsby would stare off at musingly, a speck of green in the distance. The pursuit had polluted him, he expected it to be more, to be different, to be enrapturing. He never could stay mystified by that light, or the woman who lit the light at dusk upclose, as the way he could from a distant stance. He loved mostly the tease, the luring of the dream, not the attainment of the dream.

Not to say that being subserviently content is the answer either. There is also danger in that. Awareness and a willingness to appreciate is all that is required. We shouldn't confuse the feeling of achievement with a drunken like bliss, or expect to be completely swept away. Live yourself into all things to misquote or requote Miss Keller. Why assume that achievement of our dreams will reduce themselves to our whims?

Emily Dickinson wrote "You love me best when I refuse". Though this is different from the topic of how we covet our dreams and easily discard them afterward, it can apply. No will drive someone up a wall. Yes, well, we expect yes. We stamp and label yes, treat it to dazzling lights, trumpeting music in the background of found glory. While aspiring and expecting dreams, We become petty, shooting off preferences at first sight of a yes. It shouldn't have to be you never know what you had until you've lost it. We need to know how to evaluate what is right with us, when it is with us. Past, present and future should be equally embraced, balanced and observed.

I really do believe that current humanity is afraid of anything too raw. We want coffee but not without milk, a pinch of sugar.

don't like really

Don’t talk about me as if I am already gone. Consider what you will do with the spare room when I am not around.

Nearly everything they said when I last saw them was about the expiring lease. Maybe they just look forward to privacy.

I know I am not around alot. Liz laughs at me whenever I tell her the ratio of nights at my parents to nights at my apartment. I just... can’t really stand the commute anymore. There are little things like the strangled looks in his and her eyes when I ask about splitting the rent three ways.

I don’t know what to do for a job. School, I think it’s too late for this semester.

I know I’m not around. I know you’re a little scared where you’re gonna end up. The fighting is no accident. You’re far from judgemental but you feel all his criticisms. You don’t like the stripes of rage in his anger, the arrogance when he’s corrected.

I know I’m not really around. I’ll think about it while looking for sleep tonight, staring the wall down trying to find sleep on someone else’s couch.

No wonder you want me around more. Even so I don’t know what to say to that.

noooo

Okay, I thought the swamper stank. We are soo calling the landlord.

Heavens have mercy.

I came home and the sink smells like decaying flesh.

There was a terrible accident right outside my house. I would openly weep if I totaled a mustang. It got jacked up so bad, the horn device jammed up and would not stop. I woke up to a neverending car horn. It was probably the first time I have ever seen anyone just gallop into an ambulance vehicle.

The heat... gonna kill me...

Oops

You said red blonde? Color swatch was...

semipermanent. okay, if you spent the money.

turned Purple?

Wha--?

little plastic castle

Perhaps I am doing good, the week has proved to be ‘khaotic’ and atypical, call it what you will.

Caity called me, after I swore to call her. I am terrible at calling people these days, migrating between cities usually takes a mental toll on me. I would go to my apartment more often but I can’t even rest knowing that in less than six hours I will get ready two hours earlier than usual, to take off to work, to go see so and so etc.

I’m about ready to pummel a few of her family members. Her breaking the news of being pregnant didn’t go so well with them. These days the boundaries of unconditional familial love are paper thin. How can they just treat her like a shame on their name. Her grandparents kicked her out, screamed at how worthless she was, and how she’s going to have to slave away to get any apology. One of them started breaking things, went on and on telling her how embarrising she was to the rest of the family. Hello? She’s taking the steps to be responsible, and is not afraid.

Ok, so much vanity in the family reputation we’re sorry, it just taxes on our needing to care about you in unfavorable weather. Bullshit.

As if this isn’t enough they are prolonging the frenzy by saying she’s also screwed up by where she chooses to get married. More like where not to. “How are you supposed to get to the temple and recieve it’s ordinances now? You are no longer worthy.”

I told her I didn’t care where she will or will not choose to have the ceremony at. I told her temple or not, your marriage will be worth something. No matter where you choose it to be. She loves him, she is preparing to be a mother and looking forward to it, I don’t see what the problem is. Her love for her fiancee is not any less, and the origin is not an insult to her child as they would suggest. I am just tired of people violently persecuting others, no, not just others, but family kin over bigotry and technicalities and zealotry over their own damn collective reputation.

That was how the week began. I’ve just felt so fragile towards others as of late.

Alycia, a physically handicapped girl and daughter of an old coworker came into my work the other day. I love the way that she looks at things, so distant and adoring of whatever she fixes upon. I would love to see through her eyes, she seems to have this unfiltered love for all the little things, for people and such. I remember her stare adoringly at two Chinese sculptures, ones that I never even looked twice at, (the detail, it’s ornamented so beautifully it’s so white!) She’s so softspoken, she waited ten minutes to just catch my eye to tell me she couldn’t hold her things anymore (due to her condition) so afraid to interupt anyone.

I asked her what her plans were now that she had graduated. Alycia talked of hopes of going into linguistics and law, hoping to aim for a position in the white house. She told me this between many short breaths, with a thin smile on her face. She hopes to go to law school. I just... She seems so delicate and softspoken, more sounded like a dream than anything. I really wanted that dream to be her most aimiable goal. That she would reach all that she hoped for. That her dream could be within reach. However I think of the skepticism and hard edged demands and specific qualifications that career would require and think, she would be eaten alive. Her hopes were so pure and raw. I watched everything about her light up as she explained this and I looked away, tears welling up.

I had a customer ask me about a blanket, I answered her question quickly and before going back to cleaning, told her she had beautiful green eyes, She said other wise and confessed she had been crying. Her ex husband had gotten into a car wreck and is in critical condition. Something about his arm being cut off, something about her wanting and not wanting to tell him how she feels about his drinking again. Or how she feels about his well being. Later when I was thrown on the register, I asked her further on...

Then there is Liz who doesn't know how much courage she has to watch her four year old go through his brain surgery, he's been in a haze of seditatives, sometimes responds when she is there. The swelling has been horrible and well he may just require additional surgeries due to hemorraging.

This week I have been increasingly sensitive to these things, however not injured by them. but just troubled by the complex habitat we all badly maim each other in our attempts to ‘share’ or just not share at all. It just seems like hard times for everyone these days.

Hearing Anna break into tears over my answering machine totally... Or Tammie look at me hopefully each time I tell her I am leaving, hoping I will come back. I swear she’s already accepted me as family and yet, here I am her roomate that has to pay visits to see her. There's my mom crying about her unpaid bills, and...

It's the life we live.

It’s just been a dismal week.

?

Oh my God.

Life is so...

Weird. Yes? no?

wallet magneto?

Oh god, the things I stumble into.

lol.

As I work at a thrift store I see plenty of things that have high resale potential. I never get the gumption to actually go through with it and do the whole ebay thing i.e. actual movie theatre films, foreign dolls and china, random home decor and such. I have a few customers who do such on the side, pick through the store for collectables, like designer purses, dishes, etc. (like those stupid Doonesbury purses wtf are they so popular I mean it's leather with a little ducky stamp) One avid customer I have comes in for handbags and suitcases, ebays them of for plenty the value.

I wanted to do a little punk jacket thing too, just spruce up an old vest with patches and studs and some kid in Chicargo will be like that is the shiznit! Perhaps I still shall. My roomates say it's a sure fire thing.

I just want to do it for the halibut, heh maybe a potential resume slot clothing design lololol.


I had a customer gawk over the value of eel skin. While sorting the wallets today, I happened to chance on an eel skin wallet. I decided to find the value of the wallet to see if it could be ebayed or something.




Do eelskin wallets demagnetize bank teller cards?

dude.

Weirdness.

A Slow Descent

I'm tired.
Cynical and broken, but wiser.
Heavy with a sense of resentment,
but i used to be so much different,
I used to have so much faith
when I started.
You knew that I always meant it.
I knew I could make a difference,
I struggled to be heard
and then finally, one day people started listening.
and I knew it
but as soon as it began it was ruined.
A slow descent from unique to routine,
over and over,
"just do it again and this time with feeling".
The spotlight.
The focus on the friends and the feelings.
That made those stupid songs all worth singing.
And don't you say a word
unless you're pretty sure that you want it analyzed.
So we drove
for what seemed like days
over roads
and four lane highways.
We said all we had to say
and I realized in time that it didn't mean anything.
Never,
not ever again.
Not like that.
"It's only a matter of time".

-Straylight Run

cartoon bandaids

"I decided to actually hug you because you almost have a cute outfit today!" Who are you and what the hell have you done with my widdle sister?

Asking the little punk about her well previous boyfriend I said well you been on a date with him or something? "No! 6th grade duh!! You don't really date or anything right now, just say that you are bf and gf and that stuff." Umm okay.

Lol. Getting weirder by the day. Perfume and clevage, how the hell did you figure these things punk? Oh my god. I call it multitasking, she's twelve and she is walking talking and lookin' like she's 16. These beastly preteen years.

No Quinn those earrings don't make you look fat.

She was smarter when she was a kid.

cause good is boring

If so I admire the way you bore. Cause sometimes, we aren't so different.

We both kind of feel like we are losing strength don't we? But it's okay. sometimes we need to regenerate I guess. Life takes us all to the strangest of places.

You did things I've never see you do before, said things that I've heard myself say.
___


Everything I do is judged
And they mostly get it wrong
But oh well
'Cuz the bathroom mirror has not budged
And the woman who lives there can tell
The truth from the stuff that they say
And she looks me in the eye
And says would you prefer the easy way?
No, well O.K. then
Don't cry

And I wonder if everything I do
I do instead of something I want to do more
The question fills my head
I know that there's no grand plan here
This is just the way it goes
And when everything else seems unclear
I guess at least I know

I do it for the joy it brings...

I do it for the joy it brings
Because I'm a joyful girl
Because the world owes me nothing
And we owe each other the world
I do it because it's the least I can do
I do it because I learned it from you
I do it just because I want to
Because I want to

-- Joyful Girl by Ani DiFranco

Before these crowded streets

"Yes I do see many of us afraid of scraps,
afraid of their big design" -Sandra McPherson

"There are times when a brief passing moment can hold a special place in our subconscious. Seeing someone for the first time can be such an occasion. And although the view may have lasted only an instant, our mind has a way of filling in what the eye didn’t see, creating an impression that can linger forever..." -James Christensen

______


Peering out of the bus window, I saw a blue streaked bird today. A pang of shock came at the sight, it walking about drinking from a smoky puddle of grease and water. It abided so naturally there at the corner gas station, instead of seeking out the unruly rural areas. It... made me sad.

It is so windy, today. Not only that, the winds have been warm which have a spooky way of leaving a calm in my bones. It does settle the mind for a moment.

Current humanity seems to enact a recipe for self decay by nature. We talked about it while driving down the road. Far from our roots.Thinking of that, I took the stairs instead of the elevator today, *pulled* open the door instead of gliding through the other electric servanting entrance.

It is a bit haunting the thought of it.

So perhaps Diamond should write a second volume of Guns, Germs, and Steel. this time he should focus on the entire populations conquistadores of the twenty first century.
Conquerers of quality, reality of being.

A thought came to me while cashiering, as I stooped to pick up a small penny from a transaction. Echoes of other penny occassions came. I see people drop them without a thought, just a small thing, little worth. Even a nickel or a dime, easily left, the effort not cost effective. I've always been drawn to flavor and detail,that with undemanding notices in the background. Not all pennies are round, but little scraps of being.

I laughed at the trouble I was having with swiping this coin back up. My nails were much to short for any ease with gripping small objects. My register would have noted its absence. I pick up every penny I am able to now, because I feel that pull i n my life, cause what those little things end up meaning to me. Again these minute particulars.

Delta

If you have taken this rubble for my past
raking through it for fragments you could sell
know that I long ago moved on
deeper into the heart of matter

If you think you can grasp me, think again
my story flows in more than one direction
a delta springing in the riverbed
with its five fingers spread



-Adrienne Rich

EXPECT NOTHING

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .


Expect nothing. Live frugally
On surprise.
Become a stranger
To need of pity
Or, if compassion be freely
Given out
Take only enough
Stop short of urge to plead
Then purge away the need.

Wish for nothing larger
Than your own small heart
Or greater than a star;
Tame wild disappointment
With caress unmoved and cold
Make of it a parka
For your soul.

Discover the reason why
So tiny human giant

Exists at all
So scared unwise
But expect nothing. Live frugally
On surprise.

-Alice Walker

two rectangles

I hardly know what to say. I usually don't say much about these kinds of things. It seems that this society breeds departures of this kind. A very well tended to American value is minding one's own buisness.

I... I vowed to myself to look as hard as I can at people to see who they are and who they could become. I would hope that humanity could seek harmony, without living an eye for an eye always, everyman for himself. With the people in my life, I want to extend anything I can to them. Care, you know? Why? Because I know that hardly anyone else will, all of us rarely meet anyone who is able to give a damn anymore. What kind of existence is that?

But because I know this reality, I know to expect nothing, from any one person. People are not suppliers to my needs so I don't need their civility or their kindness. If I do see it, i recieve it with an appreciation.

It's a sad reality.

But that vow. Not always easy especially in moments like this.

She told me to save my time and stop calling. I've never remembered her like that... That we had gone separate ways and I was just a junior high friend, that I had no reason to tell her how to live her life. I didn't expect to be so misunderstood by one that I respected and looked up to so much. I have no idea what kind of image she has of me that made her say the things that she said. I can see why she came to the conclusion she has, when I think on it, sort of.

I've come to the conclusion that I am not accountable for this. I have no need to prove anything more than I already have. And so I expect nothing. However it does add an odd stillness to my day. I can laugh about it sometimes.

i need to read the little prince again

history of us

i went all the way to paris to forget your face
captured in stained glass, young lives long since passed
statues of lovers every place
i went all across the continent to relieve this restless love
i walked through the ruins, icons of glory
smashed by the bombs from above

so we must love while these moments are still called today
take part in the pain of this passion play
stretching our youth as we must, until we are ashes to dust
until time makes history of us

jeu de paume's full of faces knowing peace, knowing strife
leisure and toil, still it's canvas and oil
there's just no medium for life
in the midst of the rubble i felt a sense of rebirth
in a dusty cathedral the living god called
and i prayed for my life here on earth

so we must love while these moments are still called today
take part in the pain of this passion play
stretching our youth as we must, until we are ashes to dust
until time makes history of us

there are mountains in switzerland, brilliant cold as they stand
from my hotel room, watching the half-moon
bleeding its light like a lamb
and the town is illumined, its tiny figures are fast asleep
and it dawns on me the time is upon me
to return to the flock i must keep

so we must love while these moments are still called today
take part in the pain of this passion play
stretching our youth as we must, until we are ashes to dust
until time makes history of us

-Indigo Girls

--------

*sigh*

Now that I turn into a tomato in front of my land lord...

Yeah.

I've been contacting people that I've neglected to keep in touch with the past few months. I hate losing touch. Touch is something that is too easy to lose.
Life just pulls us all out in different directions. No, I would hope that we don't "soon forget the things we cannot see."

A descision is at hand right now... I'm a little unsure. I don't want to kick anyone out. However it is so strange. I feel awkward sometimes around these two, they are practically married now and... That's just it I feel like an occupant in a married couple's place. Not to mention 2/3's of the people I know would pale at the thought of me living with a guy here. I can't describe why or how this gets to me. It does, and I don't like the way it feels. John will tell me to stay out of things before I even say anything. I try to be ignorant and impervious. I can be outwardly at least but. Really I can't be. I don't agree with all the fighting. I try to keep it their buisness but you know when you hear a man screaming out and a girl cussing back at him, it's hard to pretend nothing is going on. Or when he has to sleep on the couch. I want quiet sometimes. I loved how there seemed to be less anger here but that has changed since he has stayed here. Right at home again I guess.

I just...

on the scale of awesome

Today can only be expressed as adventurous.

This is so why I take the bus, to meet other eccentrics like myself.
I made a new nerd friend today. I saw a mac laptop, which this guy carried around. Funny that I saw him going inbound and outbound. The second time I got gumption and asked to finally desaturate my curiousity for these pretty little "mac tops".

How gratifing it is to talk about little nit picky mac functions and of course, "the big switch". Even better to hear that a previous tech support had some of the same issues that I currently have. Of course, this "switch" was well worth it as he was also going into graphic design, (cool!!) no better way to go then a mac in that rodeo. We both decided that Trekkies are quite fun and terribly misunderstood.

It was great to geek out with someone over the more retro game consoles. Holy shioot this guy had a Jaguar, and was also tracking an intellivision! Those are impossible!! It was easy for him though, from what I understood he was a kid when these consoles were released. I've never talked to someone that has bought a packaged atari or sega off the shelves.

Which reminds me!!! I did not buy that gamegear I found at work. *sobbing* I hope its not gone... Perhaps I can finally get that pac man game for the atari. We all love pac man just admit it. Little yellow chomper dude.

I just got my order for the awesomest tee shirt today. Makes me proud.

I caught the bus to work 20 minutes early but still arrived 20 minutes late because of traffic down in Sunset. One of these days you should all take a day off and observe the Whitney as she darts about in a mad flurry of a hurry. Better than pay per view.

There was more traffic in savers of course, being a monday sale. Sheesh. Too bad though. I heard an ever so familiar voice, and yelled out "Susan?" Responding to her name, my anthropology proffessor turned around and peered out of her designer glasses, "Whitney! How have you been?" Oh, I wished we would have had time to talk. She was picking up some home decor for her cabin. Now that was on the scale of awesome.

On top of all this today people were so kind. I found myself asking how many girls it took to shove a desk in a car after a customer had purchased furniture. One of em was pretty tough actually, just took the reigns and started haulin. That was so so so cool, it was more in her tough ass demeanor than anything. To the point, a stranger offered a hand to these girls, who was parked a little bit away from them, kinda watching us with nothing to do. That was... Nice.

The second, a mother and her son came to my register. I subtotalled and this kid started rummagging through his pockets, as his mom went through her purse. He was what like seven and here he was "dont worry I want to pay for ya" with his baby toothed grin. It was so incredibly cute.

Ashley my coworker said sometime she is going to just go out and relocate to England. Random. Just like that. I also talked quite seriously about leaving the country. We were talking about it and I thought to myself what's keeping me from doing this kind of thing? Why can't I? It's doable, easily doable as seen so well in my aunt's wanderlust. She could give me the low down.

So yes, a day of many an adventure.

deteriorations

We live in the age of the short attention span- where vacuousness is a virtue, where time to stop and think is rarely found and where everything goes in one ear and out the other.

-angloplugging.co.uk
*****

Sing

There is this thing that's like touching except you don't touch
Back in the day it just went without saying at all
All the world's history gradually dying of shock
There is thing that's like talking except you don't talk
You sing
You sing

Sing for the bartender sing for the janitor sing
Sing for the cameras sing for the animals sing
Sing for the children shooting the children sing
Sing for the teachers who told you that you couldn't sing
Just sing

There is thing keeping everyone's lungs and lips locked
It is called fear and it's seeing a great renaissance
After the show you can not sing wherever you want
But for now lets just pretend that we're gonna get bombed
So sing

Sing cause its obvious sing for the astronauts sing
Sing for the president sing for the terrorists sing
Sing for the soccer team sing for the janjaweed sing
Sing for the kid with the phone who refuses to sing
Just sing

Life is no cabaret
We don't care what you say
We're inviting you anyway
-Dresden Dolls
**

The loss can be a leak in history or a shrinking in the vitality of everyday life. --Adrienne

*****
A couple of years ago, a tabloid in one of India’s metros called in a consultant to help them make the newspaper more reader-friendly. “Keep stories short,” he advised. Shorter stories, snappy paragraphs, simple sentences; suck the reader in and spit him out before he gets bored. This is the age of the short-attention span, and we see it all around us.

It’s there in the journalism. Tabloids keep their stories brief. Agency copy often consists entirely of one-sentence paragraphs: news for dummies. Magazines have found that the pages that readers turn to most are the snippetty ones, that don’t make demands on the reader’s time – like the last page of India Today, or the second- and third-last of Outlook. One of the reasons that blogs are gaining in popularity along the world, in fact, is that they cater to the short-attention span: the most popular typically have brief, pithy posts that efficiently encapsulate the subject they’re on about.

We see this also in the way we consume music. Soon, all music will be sold in the form of digital downloads, which is convenient because most people prefer to buy songs rather than albums, preferring to listen to a familiar song they like over and over rather than explore an artist’s oeuvre. It’s all a-la-carte now, and concept albums might soon be the dinosaurs of music. Television channels have also recognised this: MTV India found years ago that their maximum-TRP shows were their so-called vignettes, the two-to-three minute snippets that viewers can consume easily, like MTV Bakra and Filmi Fundas. We are hungry for the easily digestible. Ten-course meals? Sorry, no time, could you summarise please?

Television, in fact, is often blamed as a cause and not a symptom of this. Camille Paglia recently wrote: “The jump and jitter of U.S. commercial television have demonstrably reduced attention span in the young. The Web too, with its addictive unfurling of hypertext, encourages restless acceleration.”

-India Uncut

**********
Fuel

they were digging a new foudation in Manhattan
and they discovered a slave cemetary there
may their souls rest easy
now that lynching is frowned upon
and we've moved on to the electric chair
and i wonder who's gonna be president, tweedle dum or tweedle dummer
and who's gonna have the big blockbuster box office this summer
howabout we put up a wall between houses and the highway
and you can go your way , and i can go my may

except all the radios agree with all the tvs
and all the magazines agree with all the radios
and i keep hearing that same damn song everywhere i go
maybe i should put a bucket over my head
and a marshmallow in each ear
and stumble around for
another dumb- dumb waiting for another hit song to appear

people used to make records
as in a record of an event
the event of people playing music in a room
now everything is cross-marketing
its about sunglasses and shoes
or guns and drugs
you choose
we got it rehashed
we got it half-assed
we're digging up all the graves
and we're spitting on the past
and you can choose between the colors
of the lipstick on the whores
cause we know the difference between
the font of 20% more
and the font of teriakiyi
you tell me
how does it...make you feel

you tell me
what's ...real
and they say that alcoholics are always alcoholics
even when they're as dry as my lips for years
even when they're stranded on a small desert island
with no place within 2,000 miles to buy beer
and i wonder
is he different
is he different
has he changed what's he about...
or is he just a liar with nothing to lie about

Am i headed for the same brick wall
is there anything i can do about
anything at all
except go back to that corner in Manhattan
and dig deeper, dig deeper this time
down beneath the impossible pain of our history
beneath unknown bones
beneath the bedrock of the mystery
beneath the sewage systems and the path drain
beneath the cobblestones and the water mains
beneath the traffic of friendships and street deals
beneath the screeching of kamikaze cab wheels
beneath everything i can think of to think about
beneath it all, beneath all get out
beneath the good and the kind and the stupid and the cruel
there's a fire just waiting for fuel
-Ani DiFranco
**
Songless

What is the point
of being artists
if we cannot save our life?
That is the cry
that wakes us
in our sleep.
being happy is not the only
happiness
And how many gadgets
can one person manage
at one time?

Over in the Other World
the women count
their wealth
in empty
calabashes.
How to transport
food
from watering hole
to watering
hole
has ceased to be
a problem
since the animals
died
and seed grain shrunk
to fit the pocket

Now
it is just another matter
of who can create
the finest
decorations
on the empty pots.

They say in Nicaragua
the whole
government
writes,
makes music
and paints,
saving their own
and helping the people save
their own lives.

(I ask you to notice
who, songless,
rules us
here.)

These are not containers
void of food,
These are not decorations
on empty pots.

-Alice Walker
******************

this is a translation of a Chinese poem, it is a little choppy, yes

No Time


I must get far away from this city
with it's soot streaked curbs
and people who pass each other
without a smile or a word
'No time! I have no time!' She answered me,
the girl dressed all in lavender

Still, she did answer me, and yet
I didn't dare ask her,
'What important things have you time for?'
But whispered to myself instead
- the homeless whispering to the homeless -
there are those who love but have no time
for loving.

If this is true, how can birds fly back to
their nests?
How can poetry be written?
If this is true, birds and poems will die.
Yes I must get away from the city
If there is no time, no time here
to speak one word,
to share one moment's laughter...

- Nguyen Sa


_________


What are we all becoming?

the lottery of triage

Everyone says they want to be a fly on the wall. I do. I just got an accidental call from my parents. I don't know how it worked really.

After a long series of my hellos is anyone picking up I about hung up. Until I heard my name mentioned a few times.

I don't know if they meant to call and have me over hear or not. Hard to say

Wasn't anything big either. well... Whatever. Don't always know what to say to these things.

On a lighter note, I woke up this morning with a perfect knowledge of where I am. Usually it takes me a moment to connect with my surroundings here though I know where I am if that makes sense. This time, no my room looked and felt perfectly natural again.
Well enough for me to slip back into sleep instead of forcing my self to take in my surroundings so I can better connect with it. It's hard to explain just how much my psyche attaches to my environment. I only know that it does. However I think I caught something in me from my parents families that skipped my parents, nomadic senses.

It's not always easy here out on my own but god, it is so worth it.

about these kinds of things

*sigh*

I don't know what to think.

How did it happen that I am now living along with my roommate's fiance? Until who knows when?

I wouldn't mind so much but the fighting gets to me. He has the right kind of anger that makes me stony eyed.

He became guardedly upset when he saw I moved some of his drawings from the walls. I had replaced them with decorations I had bought. That I had replaced his stuffed monkey on the ceiling with a hanging pot. That I moved the candles that used to be on the tables. "but we like to have candlelit dinners!" Those candles are just chunky christmas candles I don't see the whole... Of couse they can be put back at dinner time. I just wanted to put in a center piece. It's not like my things haven't been moved around and used without me. I'm not really used to guys holding grudges, honestly.

What the.. All I wanted to do was make the place look more homely to me. I am not used to bare walls. I had understood his pictures being a temporary arrangemnet. Then again I thought this whole thing was a temporary arrangement.


'kay Whit, get to the bottom of this. If ya dont say anything he will stay here until August. I don't find much comfort in living along with a guy. We've not made any arrangements to split rent or bills but even so he does contribute in other ways.

Ugh. Too bad my tact left me tonight eh? I get to be the evil roommate with pointed horns. . .

Transcontinental

I lift a wing, my head filled with the continent invents a floating body. It's not that I am fleeing because I accept what I am with the most complete submission, not to flee but to hover a bit above the stock. In fact, I don't really take off, a foot is always firmly secured in my sand-filled shoe. And I can't really lighten my ballast because I can't forget what I am. I am however able to see a bit further, a daily contact so that I don't rot in place, an instinct in the shape of a safety valve. Using a dream to harbour a different death, a different destination, infinite travel possibilities, It's a way of seeing things.

-Morthem Vlade Art

she drinks coffee at midnight, when the moment is not right

It just bit through me just now... Just a glimpse of the corner was all, the closet slightly agape, files from the cabinet, my chair at an angle. The moudling on the corner. My place for thinking has changed. How simple really so why should a small detail make so much fuss?

It used to be the ceiling, I'd be on my back looking up at my paper snowflakes, maybe upstairs curled on the couch stairing out the window. Where I would let my mind unravel, my thoughts saturate into a new feeling.

I am trying to put familiarity into this corner. I usually can keep a degree of familiarity along with me, wherever I am. Not when I drift off into my own world though. I really daydream alot, just get lost in my own world, spend hours just thinking... But with all that I need, the distance I drift needs an anchor, a thing of familiarity. Especially at that point where I go back to whatever I've needed to do and pull away my gaze from those particular spots. The bending of light through the shades, a faint twirl of my snowflake.

Oh goodness. I need more Chai.

Why is it that we feel we can't say what people truly mean to us, Kailu? Very aimiable goal you have, when you see something about someone that is good, tell them. Why does it need to be so secret? Maybe we can make more slams and lifts on life, on the warm pavement and stare stony eyed into the sky, swapping disarming and curious occurances.

I've been thinking about this ever since you said that... Why do we all take so much time composing ourselves to mask what we appreciate? We just don't see how urgent it is. I believed Vazzi when he said that the people here don't look at each other much, are so quick to get angry, almost arrogant because they kind of ignore... He said it wasn't like that where he was from, where he had been.

We do find everyone in minute particulars, Blake. So when will we all see that and notice how fleeting any small message is? I try to use a person's name at least once when I am with them. Few things are more closer to you than your name, your word. Just address that they are there. Subtle things like that...

You said you got to ask yourself if you feel content with it, happy... You just say things so free of bias and judgement now and then, it's good. The world needs more of that sometimes.

pilgrimage

Found an interesting quote earlier from a seemingly interesting stranger's blog.

“a woman is not a potted plant
her roots bound to the confines
of her house …
a woman is wilderness
unbounded” -alice walker

“the fundamental question about revolution
as lorraine hansberry was not afraid to know
is not simply whether I am willing to give up my life
but if I am prepared to give up my comfort:
clean sheets on my bed
the speed of my dishwasher
and my gas stove …
paintings I have revered stick against my walls
as unconcerned as saints …
yet not one lifeline thrown by the artist
beyond the frame
reaches the boy whose eyes were target
for a soldier’s careless aim. …” -alice walker

I love Walker by the way. Amongst one of my favorite poets.

* * *

I hope I am making the most of my time. I hoped that after school got out I could have a period of introspection, one of reading, cultivation, creation, evaluation, meditation. Sadly, today felt productive going down to Ross, actually living my one of two living spaces. I even bought two books today, one on drawing human anatomy and the other an origami enyclopedia. *laughs* Always with my paper worlds...

Drawing from what I mentioned earlier, an aspiration of mine is to learn the art of meditation. It's purpose intrigues me, stimultaneous removal and connection. You learn to concentrate on releasing independent attributions. What is it but the art of focus? The challenge focus presents is that of applied measurement.

Also I had planned to journey through a myriad of various readings. From the current book I have been eternally reading (I need to finish it) Field Notes on the Compassionate Life, selected writings of Virginia Woolf, Adrianne Rich, Emerson and Thoureau, Joseph Campbell, and Carl Jung... Much more on that list than is listed. I wanted to read up more on Rilke, Alice Walker, Nikki Giovanni, and Mark Strand... Brush up on life's imagery...

I had hoped that this would be a period dedicated to finding my own spirituality. I look at the head way I have not made and I feel my heart - sink. Truly the only journey is one within but from where does one embark?

It's not too late, not even close to over yet. Even so, that sets off no sirens, no dramatics in the background, the soundtrack has long since been cut. This is life in the raw, life itself simply uncut.

It's what we can make of the measure...

amongst a gypsy

There are a few words for me, that aren't quite me but are becoming me. Transient, vagabond one could say... It takes some time to articulate. I travel about with Gypsy feet, never completely in one place.

~I'll be the girl who sings for my supper... ~

Random shreds of songs of current / lasting intrigue continue to flood over my head. I am finding a common thread to the songs I love the most as of late. That of a free spirit. That free spiritedness that is within just calls and continues to call, then simply arrives invited or not. It was one that I had left overtime by accident.

~and so here I stand, with a sword in my hand, you can say it one more time, what you don't like, have a seat while I take to the sky~

I have journeyed through my calm, but as such almost forgotten my wonder..

Parts of myself I saw flicker have newly begun to reappear. Residing here on my own has changed so much. It's about sitting in a quiet place, and asking myself what I hear... What has been heard, and what has not yet been told.

Secure Yourself

In the ink of an eye I saw you bleed;
Through the thunder I could hear you scream,
Solid to the air I breath,
Open-eyed and fast asleep.
Falling softly as the rain;
No footsteps ringing in your ears.
Ragged down worn to the skin,
Warrior raging, have no fear.

Secure yourself to heaven.
Hold on tight, the night has come.
Fasten up your earthly burdens,
You have just begun.

Kneeling down with broken prayers,
Hearts and bones from days of youth.
Restless with an angel's wing,
I dig a grave to bury you.
No feet to fall,
You need no ground.
Allowed to glide right through the sun,
Released from circles guarded tight,
Now we all are chosen ones.

Secure yourself to heaven.
Hold on tight, the night has come.
Fasten up your earthly burdens,
You have just begun.


-Indigo Girls

fasten up your earthly burdens you have just begun

This renegade’s on the chase again, clinging to whatever scraps of light. It’s so different just being out in the open... I had thought religion must always be associated with bureaucracy, with function being above the soul.

Church... um. Haven’t been in a month or so. I get curious about the ward in my new area but... It just stays a curiosity.

My mother is beginning to crack down on me for not recieving my patriarchal blessing yet. She’s been telling me it will be a blueprint to my path in life... I hate to watch her religious flutter, it actually scares me how she can appear to be so spiritual and be so rash and set in her ways.... Why is it that I feel so dangerous saying these things? Why have I always been so pressed to not look anywhere else but in one small corner?

John wrestles with Christianity, but whenever he and Tammie have troubles, he wanders off to the Lutheran church near the apartment. Says it’s peaceful. It is actually. So are the different church houses I’ve been to in my life. At the Buddhist temple you can definitely feel an energy. As far as feeling the ‘spirit’ goes it’s surprising on how I feel it and where. I don’t think I’ve lost it, many would say before my telling them of my church activity that I do have it. I love the quote ‘ the less I seek one source for one definitive, the closer I am to fine’. But it’s not always easy...

My struggle of the soul is not just limited to Mormonism, but to Christianity as a whole. The ideals of Salvation complex me, just the whole urgency of it... The motions of Salvation as well, it is either good or evil right or wrong. Is finding the value and depth of one’s soul such a uniform process? Can it just be found by looking at the stamps on each action and making a collective desicision to see if you’ve flunked out or not? Is it really about earning love and redemption from the father???

An obstacle I have to understanding any black and white process is it is heavily based on direct associations. Whatever happened to due process? Too many factors exist for such uniform establishments, even there are too many factors within factors. It leaves too much room for discrimination and less room for thinking for one’s self. It assumes we all have same goals. Yet there is that ticker in my head again ‘beware of he who is learned’.

It’s like running your bubble test sheet into one of those machines. In less than five seconds you have your score. It does not take into account your putting down (b) when you actually meant (c). It is a machine, it can never read your mind. Divine forces should be able to understand you as you are, an atypical mold. We can’t assume that every member of humanity has the same purpose.

Draining filters. In church they are taught that there is much that our carnal minds cannot begin to comprehend. Once we are in an eternal sphere our comprehension is expanded, not simplified. I believe that after this life our comprehension will be broadened and not condensed. Eternal descisions should not be made by an earthly order. Yet we are taught that it will all fall into good or evil, white or black. Well I’m sorry we’re not dealing with a posterized black and white portrait here. We are not even dealing with a grayscale image. We are dealing with life – an endless colorwheel of beautiful complexities.

It does sound appealing. To completely eliminate the evaluation process and replace it with but one law. But that leaves too much chance to prejudice.

I am not saying it is wrong to have a focus. It is very important to have and embrace basic values, but the essentials should not choke the framework and the framework should not bury the essentials. This can’t be seen in a rigid system fueled by opposing extremes because there is no room for factors of who one is. I do not believe there is evil out there, just imbalances, just confusion as to what to do with the complexities of one’s self. There was an amazing allusion in my book. The soul is like a packaged fixture, all the parts are included but some assembly is required. Sometimes we can make bad combinations. Individuals’ purposes become a mosaic, and if all are in balance with themselves. I see little embrace of diversity of thinking for oneself. Doing that is marked as a danger. However I look around and all dangerous functions try to sever the thought of an individual. Individuals are mediums in themselves, their own songs and palates of color. We are not scaled by some universal toner that plots us out into black and right.

I’ve never been the ideal student. Most of my life teachers have talked about my delayed homework. She needs to focus more on completing assignments. Little did my teachers know how much I took from those classes. I would get so intense in art and music lessons as you can probably imagine. Back then was when the sciences still fascinated me. I would trace the rings of Saturn, and told the substitude teacher maybe the gaseous planets were created by the trails of gases other planets left behind. When we did a section on the black rights movement I imagined myself out there marching, fueled to be speaking out with the crowds. Sometimes I was considered dull because I wouldn’t respond, I wouldn’t turn in homework. Because learning is judged by paperwork, five letters and a range of percentages that I did not earn, they measured my education by what I completed, never by what I learned. The system would not allow it’s own flexibility because setting standards was far more important than communicating the essentials of education.

Sometimes the education system reminds me of my previous religion. I would keep a still, quiet place in my soul hoping to listen. I would see others who would partake in ‘unrighteous’ acts tear up in the lessons when I was waiting patiently for my understanding to unfold. It was like others could pick up on it so quickly when I’d have to strain myself to understand the nature of God and righteousness.

In seminary class, Brother Evenhuis told us a story about a mother trying to illegally cross her country’s borders through a river with her small children, and new born in her arms. The young child could not handle the trauma and began to cry. Worried that she would be exposed and her children shot, she frantically tried to calm the baby. She stroked his cheek and brought the child to her breast to try to feed him, but his crying did not stop. With tears in her eyes she knew she had no choice. She looked at her other children who were clinging to her in fear.

She covered the baby’s mouth, it wasn’t enough. Broken and reluctant, she held her infant in her hands for the last time and held him below the icy waters as he struggled feebly confused by this act in his mothers caring arms. Hysterical tears rolled down her cheeks as her child took his last breaths. She could not even whimper else give her family away. If she had not done this, her other children and herself would have been caught and tortured by the guards. She wanted freedom of religion as a Mormon convert. Even still it was considered a sin- murder. She was granted repentance by the prophet after following a long process of interviews and...

In these kinds of systems actions can only be seen as actions, but there was no room to take into account her love for her children. It was truly a sorrowful situation, how could God not see this woman’s sacrifice? How could that inflexible system take this into account. Murder is murder. What pain this woman must have felt to do the best that she knew and in one desperate situation still be reprimanded for her loving concern and pursuit for her family.

I don’t know if you had watched the Torino Winter Olympics last year. I watched the team skating sessions. Having two left feet I have an appreciation for those with grace and the beauty of delicate movement. They appear to glide over the ice as if friction and gravity do not exist to them. I believe it was one of the Chinese pairs that were out on the ice. There was so much spirit contained in this dance. It appeared that the two were in perfect animated balance. As the man spun her through the air, she positioned her knee in the wrong alliance with her ankle and the balance was broken for a moment. After she fell she curled up on the ice, she had strained a muscle. She would have been in the lead, but that spin was crucial. She was carried to the normal ground, She tried again while in excruciating pain. Upon that difficult spin she landed right with some difficulty but landed all the same. What made her do this? Just ambition or was there something behind this? It was her sheer spirit there that allowed her to dance on a damaged leg, aside from pain. This was not included in the rubric, there was no way to incorporate spirit and a focused determination within the Olympic evaluation process. If you saw this, do you remember how powerful this was? Where was the room for spirit or passion? Doesn’t spirit and passion remove it from being just an act, just a movement?

Such processes ban inward values because they do not appear to be absolute or easily measured. I believe however that these should be taken into account. I can never support a self serving system which functions on blunt and rigid framework. Something as profound as the salvation of a soul cannot be charted out by measurements. I have a hard time seeing the view of any duality, in this cause that of black and white because of it’s bureaucratic funtionings.

I realize that salvation is based on boundaries of the sacred and profane. It leads to many who will fume and preach all mighty speeches of brimstone and fire when they can’t solve problems with the black and white formula.

I do not understand the nature of sin or the nature of a sin’s consequence. I recongnize that there are acts that can be commited that can deform one’s spirit. I recognize that anything that transcends this life will call for one’s ethics. What I do not understand is Christianity’s response to sin. A sin still remains a sin and that’s where the Savior comes in. If we recognize it, then Christ will complete it for us. Sins must be suffered for. Wrong deeds deserve correction, yes. But I cannot agree with the definition of correction. If a man commits an act harmful to his soul’s growth, but later recognizes the measures of this act and does his best to understand the nature of the act and truly takes accountability why should he still be punished? What if it made him stronger?

My shortcomings have built me in ways I cannot begin to describe. The process of which I look at my mistakes and correct the thinking -/ feelings that led to them is so much more valuable. Why should sin still remain a cost after the fact, after one has evaluated a wrong doing, and resolved the issue? Are sins really permanent black marks that cannot be corrected without a call from the big guy? Aren’t sins the nature of the act or ‘crime’ a failing of the heart? Or is it still the fact that a ‘crime’ was put down on a track record? WHY SHOULD IT BE TALLY MARKS ON THE WALL??? This Universal Law that is functioned on does not take this into account, so how is this love if it is so ignorant to this? This system’s basicness is actually frightening to me. It can never be observed deeper than the face value, because that would be robbing justice? My question is why does justice rob so much from mercy?

How is this justice? I believe that all are born good, but along the ways in our lives we are confronted with conflicting parts of ourselves and all sorts of complex situations. Some are lucky enough to be given wise parents who encourage growth, but many are not. Many adults are still trying to grow themselves. In fact some religions try to encourage marriage as early as possible... Children raising children? I could accept a lot more of this system if churches were more established, Be it Mormonism or Christianity. That way all could have an equal chance. This would be great if everyone could be born into what they were able to handle or an environment that would not block their growing. Look around do you see this? Does everyone have an equal chance? No. I do not believe that every one is only given challenges that they are able to handle. This is not justice. This justice continues to rob mercy. (How in the world were these two virtues considered opposites in the first place?) What makes it like this? Does commiting a sin really pollute the universe’s atmosphere? Offset some cosmic balance by virtue of track records???

On a side note I can’t believe as one general authority has said that we are only given trials that we are able to face. Okay... So what about toddlers who are beaten bloody and senselessly by their crack head mom?

I do not directly understand a universe’s requirement for blood and torture. In this respect I do not understand the Crucifixion, or the Atonement. This system of religion seems to communicate someone must pay for this and sacrifice. Why do wrong doings need to be suffered so gruesomely for? As I said earlier why is resolve not enough? I think personal resolve is very spiritual, powerful. Why beat someone who has suffered profusely at knowing they have made a grave mistake and actually worked build themselves better ethics?

If this universal law is higher than God than God is not all powerful. I do not understand it. This says we cannot learn by experience but I believe that experience is the most profound teacher. If you make a mistake, and feel that mistake and assume responsibility, and make a respectable effort to change why does one still need to be slapped around? We should be judged by heart and intent. Not because we spiritually misspell words or use improper grammar. But by the content of the message in our souls.

Excuse me if this appears to be blashemy. I am finally speaking from my heart when it comes to religion now, not fear of a deity. I mean not to harm anyone’s beliefs and think that Christianity is beneficial to some. But I do not feel that it need be pressed as the only path to growth and personal betterment.

I want to learn how to improve, to be able to embrace values larger than I. To have firmness in all that I do. To look deeply into all that I see and try harder to seek what I may have missed. I have nothing but respect for the power of the earth and existence itself. It is a journey, and this renegade has once again packed for more nomadic trails.

nature of the beast...

Between falling off a scooter and banging my head on an unseen bar well it’s been a wondrous two days.

I realized that management has been too flooded with personal emergencies from at least four different employees to actually respond to any mishandling. I still feel twinges of guilt though whenever Jamie (not to be confused with the other chick fighting Jamie) comes in with a medical note, in the chokehold of a neck brace. I could barely even talk to her. She could barely look at me, be it a lack of neck movement or whatever...

When I had taken her shift she told me she could cover a shift if I wanted later in the week. My supervisor had thought Jamie would cover my shift the next day in return and called to make sure. That morning I had not been looking forward to work because I was getting nauseated and other fun things. Jamie had said if I took her shift she would take my Sunday shift if I wanted, but I never responded. I asked Liz if it would be okay if we swapped shifts cause I wasn’t feeling well. She said it wouldn’t be a problem.

Jamie had forgotten it because no set plans were made to take that shift and said she would be in soon enough. But I was recalled in again. Jamie called apologizing saying she had just been in a car crash, a bad one. The shift was mine again I asked to stay off the register afraid I would seriously mess up.

As if my concern for Jamie had not been enough Keelee, one of my coworkers, kept on asking me intruding questions the entire night with that undertone of blame in her voice. “Well if you feel alright then why’d you try to call in? ”she’d ask accusingly. Since when have I ever told anyone who has casually asked me how I was, how I really was?

I recognize that it wasn’t my fault, but even still, had I not had her swap that shift... I don’t think she’s holding anything against me. Still she will always remember that whose shift she would take. Ugh... Retail once again rears it’s ugly head in all it’s do or die complications.

smork work

My mac is being a real beast right now. So if anyone knows a good mac techie please let me know. Internet complications... For now we have the internet on John's computer. Even still it's nice to have ready access that I can use whenever I want or need to. I haven't had ready internet for about four years now. 'Tis rather nice.

It feels so refreshing to be out of school finally. No more hitting books over my head... No more history proffessor with an anarchist ciriculum. No more earliness.
It's all the more bearable when it's not early. Earliness is evilness. I can actually read now without feeling guitly for not reading my textbooks. lol. Freedom! There is so much that I am able to do now with time. If I didn't have bills then I'd have more time but living on my own is rather convenient.

All is going well right now. I'll cap off all the Polliannaish comments, but lets just say this past week has been, well, nice. :)

I finally applied to convergys today. Commies. The recruiter asked if I had been reffered by an employee. Yes. They can't do it by people's names though, you need to provide the employee's ID number. What the heck! Sorry, names are out now, forgot to get the number inscribed on the back of her neck. All apologies, I'm just a little critical of U.S. culture at the moment.

Even still, a desk job is going to be nice. At Savers I am all over the place, running racks, unloading trucks, cashiering... Bleh. Oldness.

damn facists

It literally amazed me. When did the course of needless procedure ever become more important than the worth or suffering of an individual? It's long since been this way I'm aware. I don't know... Every now and again I tire of living in a system where my being present is no proof of my participation. It upsets me that my social security number is worth more than I am, my ID can only prove who I am. Why should I approve of such a impersonal system? Americans seem so consumed by individuality that by the time the divisions are made no one has anything but statistical worth.

This concept made me boil once again on Saturday. What makes this okay? I had been running around mindlessly about work all day, unloading donations, training a new hire, being the only cashier for three hours. At the end of my shift I had had it. I was ready to just go home. While I was counting out, my coworker Jamie asked me if I was leaving, what time I had come in.

She seemed like she was somewhere else. Really shook up. Then she told me she felt horrible for having to ask me, but there was an emergency. She had called in work with a family emergency, at which they told her to find someone to cover else still come to work. Else she would lose her job! Lose her job??? WHAT? Why the hell does her having an emergency make her such a severe inconvenience??? The supervisors were more worried about Greg's staunch demands for clean store orderliness than they were sensitive to Jamie.

Jamie could barely even talk. She told me that her grandfather had just had a stroke. He was in the hospital, with a few hours to live. It would probably be the last time she could see him. She was going with her folks to go say family prayer with him. Some one was dying. DYING! I can hardly come up for a better reason NOT to come to work.

I took her shift. I told her was very upset at the management. That was an understatement. After Jamie left I could barely even talk for a different reason. I was pissed off that she was handled so coldly. I'm not even sure of the LEGALITY of their decision. I stopped caring about how I had worked all day, because all anyone could think about what work, work, work. What the hell!!!

As one of you can testify to, I was completely disturbed by such insensitive carelessness. lol. You were the only one that day that bothered listened to my bantering... thanks.

test tube project?

AHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAH! There is another Whitney Lomax out there, perhaps even two!
Creepiness!!

While surfing online i found all sorts of Whitneyness
Whitney Trails

I think the funniest I found was on a soap opera board called Passions. Whitney and Lomax are characters in a soap opera. A few people go off swoon over how perfect the two are for each other.

lol, anything to keep me alive between finals......