Dedicated

Since I was very small my favorite way to write has been with my head laying on the table, my ear smooshed against it so that I can hear the sound of my pencil making words. I still only write with pencil. But I am not afforded the precious, grandmother-scrubbed table top I used to have for my homework.

I don't feel safe losing myself to any one activity, anymore.

My habit of writing in a vacuum hasn't changed much, though. Now it is just me and the clicking keys. Usually I type everything out in a fury. Don't bother to fact check. Don't look up the words I'm unsure of until I'm completely done.

Rhythm comes first. After that is meaning. After that comes rhythm, again.

I am always at least a little shocked when I look up to find what my classmates are up to.

When I bother to check.

When I stop navel gazing.

I'm humbled.

What I am learning more and more every time: You can't do this thing, the writing or the living of life, all half-assed. You're only fucking yourself out of something truly transcendental when you play it safe.

Revealing the pieces of us that are the most terrified and shell-shocked is one of the kindest things we could ever do for the whole wide world.

The bravest, as well.

The most savage.



I want three hundred and sixty degrees, an old school Cutlass, and more heart than the law allows.

Building Blocks

Last night I dreamed I was shopping for Legos.

I worked until 1:30 at this club on 19th, it was slooooooooooooooow and I passed time playing video games and playing with my jewelry. I met this woman wearing Libra earrings, I told her my besty's a Libra and she told me her besty's a Capricorn. Then she goes


Do you mind if I ask you a kind of personal question?

No.

Are you holding any grudges against anyone?


I started wondering feverishly if it was THAT obvious. Am I really that transparent? That would be devastating, but really liberating at the same time.

Those thoughts only interfered for a second with my nodding very seriously without breaking eye contact.

How do you know?

It's a Capricorn thing. Just let it go, it only hurts you. It doesn't even affect the other person. It only. hurts. you.

Those are the random moments I honor by working in nightclubs as often as I can. I want as many moments like that one as I can get. If I could string those together and make them into my whole life, then I'd really be an artist.

So it doesn't matter that it was slow, or that I was dog tired, or that I spent most of the night thinking about day job stuff that's totally stressing me out and then spent like a third of my night's wages getting home cause I had to hire a car cause there were no taxis.

I ordered my last Bellini of the night and silently toasted that woman. And whatever else happened is inconsequential.

When I got home I made myself a snack and slept like a baby and dreamed of building blocks.

I like comic books because women are either rescuing heroes by being quintessentially feminine or kicking everyone's ass. Or even better: both. I like extremes and a lot of adventure.



And I like heroes and jazzy outfits, too.

Tip Top, Baby

A coworker of mine from a long time ago makes these gourmet meals at his house, serves them with excellent wines and calls them his Bailout Plans.

I'm inspired. Everyone should have their own version of that.

I've decided my Bailout Plan is cupcakes, situps and enough time spent in the ocean that we forget we are land creatures

Plus Colette.

*********

Reading Colette changed my life. There was this sense of finding a kindred spirit. Also, she illustrated a path of joy for me, and the dark circles under my eyes all of the time became romantic instead of making me feel like an outsider.

She was not intimidated by the things about her that made her different from other people. She embellished them. With words and jewelry and everything else.

Life is our most important art.



*********

I've been thinking this for a while and not bothering to share. But this morning on the way to work it struck me how dirty and sexy and danceable this song is, and I got a fresh new tingle about it. So here:

Cold Fresh Air

This kid I work with that I respect immensely told me one time not to lower my standards, but to adjust my expectations. Over the last year or so I think I've learned the art of that. It takes a lot of balancing not to lose faith.

But then there are a few ways to go about getting what you want.

You can be all.

I want a bike I want a bike I want a bike I want a bike

Infinity. You can be like that all day, every day and it is surprisingly effective at getting you a bike.

You can also be all.

I want a bike. A fast bike. With turquoise candy paint. White patent leather seat. Purple streamers coming off the handlebars.

Infinity. You can keep refining what you're asking for and getting a clearer picture of it every time.

Both ways though. They are just meditation.

I worked all weekend, both days. I set up camp in the kitchen with my laptop, watching cable and making my silly ass documents and answering a few questions once in a while. On Sunday I literally wore my pajamas with a pair of boots. It really wasn't a bad way to spend the weekend.

Just tiresome. I could nap for three days straight, I think.

Happy Monday.

Double Vision

It's hot in Frisco today. There was an earthquake last night.

I dreamed I had 2 sisters and we all slept in a bed by the ocean. I was mostly concerned with whether or not I'd ever get my down comforter clean again, once we headed back inside. Meanwhile there was a bear stalking us, and this dude ever trying to whisk me away to safety but I kept thinking maybe the bear wasn't so bad after all.

There were horses, too. I needed sugar cubes for them but all I had was loose sugar.

The greatest gift anyone could make me would be some program where I could input shit like this and over the course of time, map out my soul. It would be like a video game when the whole thing was completed, telling my future based on some complex system of probabilities assembled by sifting through every little detail and making a Big Picture.

Surely there is someone working on this already. Surely he or she is my soulmate.

I'm working tonight, and the party goes til 6 AM. Today is spent preparing a bullet-proof outfit that I'm willing to be chipper and charming in for 9 hours straight. Plus smoking little rizla joints and getting my act together. Heh.

The good news is that I've spent my whole existence preparing for this kind of life, so I'm in good shape.

Happy Saturday. Keep your bearings.

Brava

Con su permiso.

I think it's the sort of thing that needs to be shared. It's those little stories that make us immortal.

Standing in front of a club talking to the incredibly cute and incredibly broke and sexy boys I'd been working with all night. They were questioning my policies about who I date, what my priorities and dreams are. One of them asked me, after a night in a twenty-five thousand dollar suite, what I would have that was of any value.

"A golden, shining memory." Smile.

Isn't that all we ever have? Of anything?

When you lose someone or something, and you feel that loss dearly, you can choose to tend those places inside of you that still hold them. If that's your style, it can be a beautiful project. A garden in their honor with no boundaries, as you're sending little tendrils of it out into the world with your word and picture stories.

Sometimes they will come alive again with a flash of your eyes, you'll do something that so directly comes from that place that it will seem to possess you. That is a huge gift.

I'm working on my garden for my grandparents. Thank you for reminding me how important that is. I have to put it right up there with all of my other golden, shining memories.

I'm praying for NOLALouisianaall of us right now, I hope all of you are as well.

Volcaniclastic

I did not have time to buy sneakers. I sat in an hour long meeting about a budget or a deadline or creativity or some combination of those three things. I did that and by the time I walked out of the office I had like 30 minutes to get ready for the show.

Luckily I had a semi-fresh pair that kinda matched my t-shirt and when I met up with Stef she was looking cute as ever and her little sneakers were inspired, too.

The rest is history, I guess. What a fucking show. I had a lot of fun, I realized that I need to go see live music more often. It takes me past the point where time spent standing in one place doesn't even matter, you know? I'd have stood for 3 hours if he would have just kept on with the classics and the new shit all mixed together. WC was there, and they did some westside Connection stuff and also some very corny song set-ups but I was really just very happy that I went.

I'm pretty sure I will always love Ice Cube. He's like. My 20 year crush. And counting.

So hungover though, off the Goose and cranberry cocktails I was sipping all night. I left leaning and grabbed a cab home like 20 seconds after I got onto the sidewalk. I wrote the dumbest wish list ever here and fell asleep marveling at the uber-softness of these new sheets I got. I slept like a drunken baby. That's deep sleep.

This morning I woke up paying for it and had to rush out of the house to make it to work on time for this departmental powwow thing, except that it was canceled at the last minute. So those extra 30 minutes of sleep were all, "how ya like me now?"

I would have liked them very much. Another argument for a time machine. I'm keeping track of them.

I got normal again at around 1. I don't think I've stopped working since.

Until now. Cause I just missed you so much, boo.

Good night.

Brotha's Got This Complex Occupation

Per Liz's instructions, I only want to have pure thoughts about our future president. But it's so hard! Steph has turned me on to the fact that he is indeed quite dreamy. Lookit him. I could cry.

That whole cover kind of gives me a tingle. Black Cool, indeed. I wonder if Amurkah counts that as one of its largest export economies?



I want to greet you all in a kimono with my hair undid. I want a quiet spot in the hot sunshine. I want a yacht painted turquoise blue from end to end with a mural of my face on the side of it.

Good day.

Set It Off

Talking to my fam a lot tonight, and coming to understand how destined I am to be me. Who I am right now, with all of my promises and limitations.

I adore my dad, who is incidentally like the dudes I've dated for most of my life even though I haven't known him except for the last year or so. But I know he did date my mom, who incidentally adored him beyond reason, had his child even. And while braiding my hair before school every morning, she probably passed on to me the ideals I hold sacred for men.

Honor and Gangsterism and Pride. And Impenetrability. If that's even a word.

Also though. I hate my dad's girlfriends. Because they are crazy, usually. Exactly like me and my moms. Too similar to even fathom, these women. Like I need more of their kind in my life.

I was born surrounded by them, thanks. No need to adopt more.

But then again it makes sense that my dad who was sprung on my crazy moms who birthed crazy me would now love women who remind me of myself. Who remind me of my moms.

My point being: how could I have ever been anyone else? All the seeds for me were so thoroughly sprinkled about.

Born to these two, as awesome and delirious as they may have been. May still be. I couldn't have been anyone but who I am. I can see them both so clearly in the final product.

These things work for and against me. All of the time.


*********

My moms says: "The only way to deal with bad press is to outlive it."

And what a savage motto to go by. This basic assumption that there will even BE press, in the first place.

But for some women there always is. And that's not necessarily a curse.

*********

Culture break. Ha.



Another way to deal with bad press is to make a catchy, kind-hearted and fierce little diss song with your very best homegirls. Word.

I gotta big day tomorrow. So goodnight.

Subversion

I'm torn between wanting to marry this guy (girl?) and thinking he needs professional help.