the truth

the girl in that room never stopped undressing

If I could be half as brave as I was as a child,
that would be really something.

charades

If I hadn't seen it my self I wouldn't believe it. And if I tried to tell you my words would be lost. They would be empty. They might not even sound. A silent film. As bad as charades. Or my best impression of a mime. The one where he's trapped in a box and can't get out.

There are no shortcuts here. And it's an uphill climb. But maybe the distance is made bearable if you're holding the hand of someone you love. Everyone else just wonders what the fuck is a mountain or are smart enough to have gone around it in the first place.

be a man

Instead of being a woman men want, I'm going to be the man I want.

There is no such thing as equal or fair.

This is something children learn early, painfully, only to forget as adults.

I am tired of living a half-life, afraid. This requires immediate,
drastic action and a little hope.

I've also noticed recently that, regardless of how I envy them,
people who have a lot of friends are often more lonely than I.

two not one

I overheard a barista at Starbucks yesterday. She said it hurt being broken up with, but that she was okay because it hadn't been "real" anyway. Whatever it was, it wasn't real. I don't know. It seems to me that most romantic relationships in general take on a quality of the unreal. They employ fantasy and imagination. They thrive on ideas like the past and the future. They exploit the emotions. Sometimes they're even validated by a certain chemical attraction - if you're lucky. Our individual experiences of the same event can vary so greatly it's questionable whether two individuals are in the same relationship at all. I've experienced this. And jumping from one to another is merely swapping one unreality for a different, momentarily more tantalizing one.

So where does the truth lie? Somewhere between these two perspectives or completely outside of it? And can two people ever live together so harmoniously and in the moment that their experiences coincide? Does it even matter? Does the animal part of me, driven by its own machinery, give a fig? Two are not one. It's much easier for me to grasp some notion of harmony and oneness on a macro level. Here in the dirt, the water and salt of the body, or two bodies, I find it almost impossible to imagine.

Can you lose your virginity twice?

The obvious answer is no. Another answer (as I may or may not have understood it) might be that certain folks have acquired the ability to experience things which are novel as novel - every moment being different from every other. Perhaps for these few there is no such thing as a repeat performance. Every time is their first.

My question now is this: could a person experience something as new not out of some achievement of willful presence and remembrance of self, but because they have forgotten themselves so fully that their repeat performance is experienced as a first? And how to tell the difference?

I'm plagued with a sense of my own inability to decipher whether or not I am improving or simply cycling through the latter of these two scenarios over and over again. And I feel strongly that if I don't work my ass off this will be the only story I ever have to tell. Not the story of my life, but the one of my slow death.

I must remember to remember.

a day in the life

Today I did my sitting, practiced guitar and Chi Kung, worked, updated my website, struggled with my blinds, framed and hung several prints and a few of Paul's drawings. Dave from New Zealand (with the red Moto Guzzi) helped me with my TV and took me out for a bite. I went home, showered and walked out to the pier. A clear night in Venice. The stars are out and the sky is dotted with airplanes on their way to and from LAX.

I like being alone and resist the urge (which I believe is mostly social) to feel as though I'm missing out on something by enjoying my own company instead of someone else's. If it is our desires which veil the truth from us, I'm tired of being shrouded in lust and longing. Tonight I wore a dress in which I can feel everything. There was a breeze off the ocean. It touched me gently. Discipline and curiosity may not be able to do this, but I plan to fill the man-gap with these anyway.

On my way home I was forced to choose between the lesser of two evils: walking down the dark alleyway I live on and where a bum and his shopping-cart full of belongings has taken up residence or take Catamaran and go in the back way. For those of you who don't know I recently vacated a life (and love) on that street. Walking it makes me feel awkward and ghost-like, tonight especially in my white dress.

I shunned the bum, deciding at the same time I need not be ashamed of my incredible ability to move on.

somebody else's trash

I smoked a cigarette by the water today and thought about what I wrote last night. Everybody comes here to visit the beach. They get oiled up, fight over off-street parking and leave trash everywhere. There are lots of little crabs on the bottom of the canal. Our filthy canal. Should I add my cigarette butt to it? These little niceties are a drop in the bucket. 

If you don't give a shit about your self, why should I? Every decision carries an exact weight and has a quality which acts on the soul either to tear it apart or build it slowly. This I know for sure. Me? I threw mine away. You can do whatever you want with yours. 

I left yoga today feeling emotionally unsettled. During my practice I realized I wasn't completely there. Not necessarily because my attention had wandered, but because I was insecure. I had a very similar experience during Kung Fu not long ago, but had the added disadvantage of being distracted by a remote but powerful memory. In any case, I circumvented personal interaction with my teacher and headed for the door, for the safety of anonymity. Which, of course, led me to the local Starbucks where I purchased my comfort beverage of choice and a banana. I went outside to find a seat and was greeted warmly by an elderly gentleman who was sitting alone. I selected a seat at the table closest to his without hesitation.

It wasn't long before I realized this sweet little old man was thumbing through the pages of a XXX-rated sex magazine. This effected me in a way I couldn't have anticipated. Whatever response this man hoped to elicit I wasn't sure, but I did know one thing; he wasn't going to hurt me. This was inexplicably comforting. Whatever he held in his mind didn't matter. It had nothing to do with me and couldn't hurt me in any way. He was so obviously past the age of being capable of sexual violence, perhaps even sexual function.

I didn't leave for a while. Walking away I felt quieted and had the sense that this man represented something to me - perhaps my own unbalanced desires (sex being such an easy one for people to distort). Perhaps one day mine will wither and age. If I stop nurturing them they lose their power. Perhaps one day they will be as scary to me as this old man and his pictures, instead of the monsters they are now.

letters

Azar means scarlet in Farsi. Though I've studied Farsi I didn't know that until I looked it up just now. I had drinks at The Standard with Paul this evening. You can see the capital from there and Azar, which I guess is a liquor store. Z is a seldom-used letter in the English alphabet. I can imagine the proprietor of Azar having trouble purchasing the neon Z required for his sign. Perhaps they don't bother to make Zs. Perhaps Zs are more expensive. In any case, it's clear that the Z in this sign is really a horizontal N. I contemplated that this evening while feeling mildly impressed with myself for having noticed.

old entry which somehow feels relevant today

I prefer the smell of chai to the man sitting in front of me. This is an immediate preference. I'm drinking a chai and the man in front of me reeks of patchouli, hair gel and salty food - food that would give me indigestion were I to eat it. I have indigestion anyway. And my body doesn't fold like it used to. I like the familiarity of buttons. This too is immediate. Right now I prefer the word button to zipper. Tomorrow I might fancy a different word, Salat perhaps, in Farsi or something else I saw while sitting idly and somewhat displaced in a book store. I'm tired now so I don't mind lingering on tastes. My body doesn't fold like it used to. A bend at the hip or waist creates an uncomfortable bubble of flesh-not-muscle. If you were to fold me in half you'd find it impossible to create a single crease. It would instead be a succession of three or four. 

A man in a jeep (on his way to me, wondering if I'm mad at him for being late) doesn't walk like others. He lopes. He'll be loping his way here in a few minutes. Maybe relationships themselves are nothing but this. Not what is said, not what's done and undone by time, stepped in or out of, but the timing of the entrance itself - into my life and then into this book store. Relationships carry their own unique rhythms and pauses, starts and stops.  I am drawn to and repelled constantly by romantic love. How infuriating always winning and losing each other to time and circumstance. One day you might find me searching endlessly for those red, beaded earrings I swore I left atop the dresser (to the right of my grandfather's picture and to the left of my hairbrush, also tangled and floating, strand by strand in time). You might commit yourself to writing your name on boxes, annotating carefully their contents only to later refill them with something different. The permanent marker marks remain, everything else changed.

If I were a pie, divided.

I've gotten soft. My mind is soft, my belly is soft, my writing is soft. Jelly soft, not babyskin soft. Contentment will do that to a person if they're not careful. Contentment and allowing oneself to age too long too comfortably. Because along with this softness, has also come its reverse. Certain beliefs, certain ways of thinking have begun to calcify in my mind. I still enjoy the unknown, but I've never been this afraid of losing myself to it. At the same time, as though the nature of everything is to always be in complete contradiction to itself, it's clear that the impossibility of my getting lost (in Atlanta) has made it almost a certainty.

all women

maybe the last time you saw that friend was on a tuesday.

today is wednesday and I have sparkles on my hands from playing with children. clay too. we made coil bowls. one for the office.

you and you and you. wouldn't play well together. in a room. my head.

but good news. i've met a few brave ones lately. sorry, they were all women.

what's on the menu

First course: toasted bagel with melted Camembert and slices of avocado.

I thought I might be having an anxiety attack when I realized I hadn't had anything to eat all day but coffee and espresso.

Second course: cookie dough. When I bought it I told myself I would have it to bake in the event I had a friend over. At last, the truth comes out (of the can by the spoonful). Motives are slippery little things, even when absolutely nothing is riding on it.

Third course: not yet, but it's cooking. I've practically written an essay on it; how D. is an arrogant, disrespectful, patronizing dick-head who doesn't know how to treat people, least of all me.

Strange thing. I only get upset about it at night before sleep. I lie there blinking, arguing, then finally turning on the light and jotting down a few fresh insults. My latest recipe for trouble.

archeology

He produced a rock from his pocket.
He, his wife and two children each got one -
to show that they're still a family.

I understood at once.

At home, two rings are knotted together
one on top of the other -
to show that we're still a couple.

I ran into an old customer at the Perk today. Pain is unmistakable. We recognized it in each other. Our meeting wasn't comfortable, but it was comforting - not to be scorned for being ourselves, for not pretending. I wanted to hug him. Sometimes when you need a hug the most, it's practically impossible to get. People treat sadness as though it were contagious. They see it in you and run the other way. They're protective, scared, stingy, accusatory. God help you if you show your feelings in public. Well, I don't care. I'm strong and sad. I'm alive. I'm not ashamed.

the thirteenth

I have a token in my pocket worth three mints or three packets of hi-c in the psychiatric ward of Grady Hospital. Five days ago that building was just part of the skyline to me. Atlanta keeps offering up new views. I'll only thank it for the privilege if it keeps my friend off the streets.

I've always believed, stubbornly, that my love could change things - that it's strong enough, pure enough. I must be either extremely naive, egotistical, or weak.

graphite or charcoal

The need to vent my depression is asserting itself.

Don't hate me because I'm avoiding.
Two and half cups of coffee later: a blank page and I need to pee.

I'm frustrated. I want to create something beautiful but it's just not in me. Bills are in me. The past is in me. The question-mark future. I've spent the last few days looking and am dissatisfied. I've tried to become fascinated by the weather, by my lower lip, tendrils of hair, the circles and triangles of the face, but it's no use; I'm tired of looking. What I really want is to be touched. Rendered. Kissed by graphite or charcoal (lightly then heavily). The closest I get are black smears where I unconsciously swept hair away from my face or set my palm down on a self-portrait. I thought drawing would fulfill some tactile need of mine. Surprise! It's created one instead.

relief

I must submit myself to living. I've been struggling against it and nothing could be clearer; I'm losing. I question too much, feel too much. just give me a hammer and a nail. some wood. a sleeve that has neither snot nor blood on it. maybe sweat. you can lose yourself in work or find yourself. either of these would mean relief right now.