September 3rd, 2009
Someone:
I am sitting in a pale little kitchen, figures flickering on my attention span like a slide projector:
$20
+$5
+$15
-$40
-$13
-gas money
= $-13-gas money a week
How is South America going to happen again? This cold, flat realization cripples me upon impact. I watch all the visions of life and death and happiness like stone melt into a massive puddle at my feet. I contemplate how to reshape this puddle but no tactic comes to mind. Instead, I opt for the least effective method, lying down in it and trying to soak it back into my skin before it leaves me permanently. I lie there in absolute stillness for several minutes with my lungs swelled, my teeth clenched, and my fingers trying to rupture my temples. Nothing miraculous happens to my puddle.
At last the panic recedes and I sit up, look around, and draw a simple conclusion:
It's time to grow up and get a job.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
I Never Thought These Would Hit So Close to Home
she's looking in the mirror
she's fixing her hair
and i touch my head to feel
what isn't there
she's humming a melody
we learned in grade school
she's so happy
and i think
this is not cool
'cause i know the guy
she's been talking about
i have met him before
and i think
what is this beautiful beautiful woman
settling for?
she bends her breath
when she talks to him
i can see her features begin to blur
as she pours herself
into the mold he made for her
and for everything he does
she has a way to rationalize
she says he don't mean what he do
she tells me he called
to apologize
he says he loves her
he says he's changing
and he can keep her warm
and so she sits there like america
suffering through slow reform
but she'll never get back the time
and the years sneak by
one by one
she is still playing the martyr
i am still praying for revolution
and she still doesn't have what she deserves
but she wakes up smiling every day
she never really expected more
that's just not the way we are raised
and i say to her,
you know,
there's plenty of really great men out there
but she doesn't hear me
she's looking in the mirror
she's fixing her hair
she's fixing her hair
and i touch my head to feel
what isn't there
she's humming a melody
we learned in grade school
she's so happy
and i think
this is not cool
'cause i know the guy
she's been talking about
i have met him before
and i think
what is this beautiful beautiful woman
settling for?
she bends her breath
when she talks to him
i can see her features begin to blur
as she pours herself
into the mold he made for her
and for everything he does
she has a way to rationalize
she says he don't mean what he do
she tells me he called
to apologize
he says he loves her
he says he's changing
and he can keep her warm
and so she sits there like america
suffering through slow reform
but she'll never get back the time
and the years sneak by
one by one
she is still playing the martyr
i am still praying for revolution
and she still doesn't have what she deserves
but she wakes up smiling every day
she never really expected more
that's just not the way we are raised
and i say to her,
you know,
there's plenty of really great men out there
but she doesn't hear me
she's looking in the mirror
she's fixing her hair
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
July 14th (I think), 2009
Someone:
I have for you good news, a self-evaluation to balance it, and demanded changes to make me more healthy.
The news: I got my scores back from AP today and it turns out that I got a 5 of my 3D portfolio. I am beyond thrilled, considering I was biting my lip for months in hopes of a 4. As with my acceptance to Quartz Mountain, however, I felt an immediate instinct to curb an inflated ego with some rational thought. For one thing, once I heard, I returned to the idea of myself as an imposter(sp?). I am not living FOR art, I do not even create every day. How am I defined by the word "artist" if I am not defined by the word "art"? It is a huge part of my life, but I have reached and passed the point where it should BE my life.
It concerns me to realize, as I have this summer, that I have some major self-control issues. The summer has gone swooping by in a stream of miraculous colors and possibilities. It is almost as though I am sitting here, dormant in front of a screen, watching it go by, just watching with a dull laziness, never bothering to make it reality.
My parents are having hardwood floors installed in the back rooms of their house, so I spent the day going through all of my JUNK. Watching the Himalaya-sized heaps of all my worthless crap pile up, it is bitterly humorous to think that I consider myself an aspiring minimalist. I had forgotten WHY. I had forgotten the vast impression that silence and space makes on the mind. The objective of minimalism is to grant easier access to our soul. Elise: rid yourself of distractions and dependencies, such as mirrors, hairpieces, decorations, etc. The best way to glimpse yourself is to cut through the crap, strip off all the material junk.
Since all my stuff is already displaced, I have no excuse to waste this opportunity. I will revive my minimalist approach: no rugs, tapestries, fancifuls, general BS that smothers the floor, etc. The room should be a blank canvas so that my thoughts may dance in, surrounding me and guiding me as I pull them into the physical world (I refuse to use the word "realm").
Now that all the seriousness clogging my brain up has been pitched in your direction, I am in a gibberishly gleeful mood. I bid you farewell and may you take on my abysmal attitude with great courage and iron optimism.
Love Elise
I have for you good news, a self-evaluation to balance it, and demanded changes to make me more healthy.
The news: I got my scores back from AP today and it turns out that I got a 5 of my 3D portfolio. I am beyond thrilled, considering I was biting my lip for months in hopes of a 4. As with my acceptance to Quartz Mountain, however, I felt an immediate instinct to curb an inflated ego with some rational thought. For one thing, once I heard, I returned to the idea of myself as an imposter(sp?). I am not living FOR art, I do not even create every day. How am I defined by the word "artist" if I am not defined by the word "art"? It is a huge part of my life, but I have reached and passed the point where it should BE my life.
It concerns me to realize, as I have this summer, that I have some major self-control issues. The summer has gone swooping by in a stream of miraculous colors and possibilities. It is almost as though I am sitting here, dormant in front of a screen, watching it go by, just watching with a dull laziness, never bothering to make it reality.
My parents are having hardwood floors installed in the back rooms of their house, so I spent the day going through all of my JUNK. Watching the Himalaya-sized heaps of all my worthless crap pile up, it is bitterly humorous to think that I consider myself an aspiring minimalist. I had forgotten WHY. I had forgotten the vast impression that silence and space makes on the mind. The objective of minimalism is to grant easier access to our soul. Elise: rid yourself of distractions and dependencies, such as mirrors, hairpieces, decorations, etc. The best way to glimpse yourself is to cut through the crap, strip off all the material junk.
Since all my stuff is already displaced, I have no excuse to waste this opportunity. I will revive my minimalist approach: no rugs, tapestries, fancifuls, general BS that smothers the floor, etc. The room should be a blank canvas so that my thoughts may dance in, surrounding me and guiding me as I pull them into the physical world (I refuse to use the word "realm").
Now that all the seriousness clogging my brain up has been pitched in your direction, I am in a gibberishly gleeful mood. I bid you farewell and may you take on my abysmal attitude with great courage and iron optimism.
Love Elise
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