belated 锌年快乐

i spent our new year's eve this year in my bedroom.

sickness caught from a friend the week before snuck in to welcome the holiday time...
the decade old trauma kept me half-antisocial half out too much.

living vicarious explosions through my lens documenting bits outside my second storey window


***the videos i took apparently will have to be added later as the add video option is not being kind to me***

from my stationery in the past week or so 1.1

I will never
hardly
lie to you
and maybe
I can
not
lie for you
either.




work for backs of calves: in chinese hanzi-------
monkey/sagittarius




we are quite possibly...
amongst ourselves...

...more rawly giving...
selflessly giving..
...than more other '*people*'...
than we would care to consciously admit.

and
we
tend
to
intermitantly
kick ourselves
for this.
-ouch.

I can cook
garlicky enough
to give
a half-Sicilian
hurtish
HEARTBURN.
period.









even my own thoughts seem
to forget me


never part of any circle. i
am such a broken line
that never learned how to
curve smoothly.


"you make me
better"
could even be said
to my
dearest
frenemies
just
enemies



while I am not altogether
altruistic... I believe myself to
be closer to the known definition
(almost verging on scientific *wink*
) of that word than is the
average female of my
"limited" experience.








*t.shirt/button/etc./apparel

-"you will be photographed"

". . ."
"maybe"


"my friends get me sick
and i love them."










22:52 20 Feb 2008
Hei gen...sandwiched
pleasantly
images of
Alice's catterpiller come
to mind

smoking through
a straw again.

the foreigner in the suit with
carrying
the suitcases

didn't forsee him in time

our eyes managed
to meet
unspoken secret smile

an unknown dear friend's help on
an unexpectedly
beautiful day
perfect weather
bits of previously
unvoiced dreams bubbled
a bit over.

drool?


wo xian xin wo ke yi
i believe that...
get further
get past this

i can
get further beyond









dope n dusted --
electric
guitar

...progression...on a roll...

1. Ever kissed a brown eyed and brown haired person?
yes. more than one...

2. Can you see a phone right now?
my amazing cellphone. guaranteed to be more unique and definitely cooler than yours.

3. What are you listening to?
the 10+ people in my living room speaking mostly hangzhouhua and watching some american movie.
i wasn't even told that this many people were coming over...
and i know most of them...
but i wasn't told...much less invited...

4. Where is it coming from?
my living room...which is right outside the open door to my bedroom where i sit...alone...on my bed...filling out this survey thing...knowing that it is past 11pm, and i know that my roommate knows that i work early.

this is so extremely fucked up.

5. Last thing you ate?
the chicken and broccoli and green bean and snow pea garlicky stuff that i made for my dinner...and lunch and dinner tomorrow.

6. What was the last thing you saw on TV?
some weird game show kind of program that i couldn't understand much of.

7. Who was the last person other than family you saw?
neo when he came to ask me for scissors to chop up some pot to probably be put in the little pipe i lent my roommate...and i haven't even been offered a puff.

8. Are labels/stereotypes good?
they could be the root of much evil

9. What is your least favorite bill to pay?
all of them...this month it would be the insanely high electric bill. and i don't even have heat in my room.

10. Song stuck in your head?
there have been about 12 different ones today. currently there isn't one.

11. Acoustic or Electric guitars?
eenie, meenie, minei, moe...

12. Do you dance while getting ready for whatever?
i am constantly dancing. so, that would be a yes.

13. What are you wearing right now?
hang on, i have to look...

my beloved cahoots hoodie, a grey, lightly ribbed, longsleeved shirt, my maserati (the band, not the car) t-shirt, white long johns, underwear that is too much to explain, grey ribbed leg warmers, one black and grey sock with a newly broken hole on the ball of it, one light and dark grey sock, one too-big pinkish purple hand warmer that i knitted last month, one tight, pink, almost perfect handwarmer that i also knitted last month, the amazing stone necklace that demi gave me, my jie half of the heart i bought to give the other half to demi, and 3 small hair clips.

14. What is the greatest number of people you've been in front of?
thousands. my friend anson made me go on stage with him and the other 13 members of his random rock band for his university's 75th birthday celebration.
i live in china. there were at LEAST several thousand in the audience.

15. Have you ever taken a shower while crying?
oooooooohhhhhhhh yeah.

i do a lot in the shower...

16. Do you like Techno?
good techno.

17. Have you ever made out on a plane?
...i don't THINK so...

18. Do you have leadership skills?
yeah, but i am a total schizo, so while i have leadership skills, i make a terrible leader.

19. Can you play an instrument?
i have been known to go through periods of attempting to play things sometimes. maybe when i retire (hahahahaHA) i will finally REALLY take up the cello.

20. Have you ever sat on a roof and looked at stars?
oh wow, yes. several roofs have been committed to memory.

21. Ever done that while talking on the phone to a boyfriend or girlfriend?
most likely. or if not a boyfriend or girlfriend, then at least while talking to a lover on the phone.

22. Have you recently gotten someone pregnant?
not unless i am a hermaphrodite with a dual personality...and somehow manage to mentally hide the erroneous sex organ from the other half...hmmmmmmmmm

23. Are there any animals around you at the moment?
there is a very large plush pig in traditional mandarin chinese dress inn the little room that has my package taped-together desk and my drying laundry, a white stuffed toy dog from the world carnival hangzhou (which is actually in xiaoshan) that i found in my last apartment and for some weird reason kept, there is a squirrel from u of l wearing the u's shirt, and i think that i hung onto my two wooden kissing pigs (they have a string in between them that holds them together and brings them back when you pull them apart), so they must be around here somewhere...and as always, the insane xiao maomen are lurking around somewhere in the apartment.

24. Ever thought you were going to get married?
yup. and i did. and that was a really bad thing to do with that person, as it turned out. so i put a stop to it.
now i haven't a clue if it will ever happen again...
...and i am actually quite okay with that.

25. Last person who told you they loved you besides family?
a max

26. Favorite time of day?
the good times. how can i possibly have a favorite time of day? all of my days are so very different, and when they are not, they are exactly the same...

27. Favorite food?
ANYTHING FROM THE MENU AT ZEN GARDEN...damn, jeneane----shit, i so cannot spell your name----i had forgotten how amazing the food there is...

lately, i think that ma la tang and hot pot effing rule!

28. Cat person or dog person?
it depends entirely on the individual animal. right now my daily life is living proof of that.

29. Got a job?
good lord, yeah, i do.


30. Biggest regret?
you just really cannot go back and change a thing in the past. so i am learning as partially conditioning myself to let go of any vague regrets.

31. What do you want the most?
to be able to speak and understand mandarin chinese and hangzhouhua.

32. Do you want children?
if it is the right circumstance and situation...i would like maybe one. i refuse to go through a pregnancy alone, but if i really want one alone, i will have one. obviously the circumstances etc. are not in alignment presently.

33. Are you a lover or a fighter?
very much both.

34. Last time you had butterflies?
been having a panic attack off and on for the past 2 hours...i think maybe butterflies are like little panic attacks...

35. How is your mood today?
it has been maybe more all over the place than any other recent time...

36. What do you do all the time in a car?
lately, sleep and knit. the 'car' in am in on a regular basis (i ' ' car because the actual vehicle changes constantly...just when i think i know all of the cars these people have...another one appears)

37. Do you like anyone?
i like a lot of people...but right now i am not feeling very liked at all. i am quite hurt...

38. Have you ever changed your clothes while in a vehicle?
many times. i change my clothes a lot...though there are people that change more. i have also changed my clothes sitting in a booth at a club. layers effing rawk! so many possible combinations and arrangements...

39. Who was the last person to make you cry?
right now, my roommate and my acquaintances in my living room are making me want to cry.

40. When was the last time you cried?
probably going to happen at some point tonight.

41. What is one thing you miss about your past?
being able to drink water straight out of the tap.

42. What is one thing you've learned about life?
STILL LEARNING...yup...every day...so many things, so many different kinds of things.

43. Is anyone jealous of you?
don't know why anyone would be at this moment.

44. Has a friend ever used you?
more than one friend, more than once.

45. Has anyone recently told you that they like you more than as a friend?
yes.

46. Who was the last person you drove with?
xiaozhou, "amy", and "tracy" home from work today. but i haven't driven a car since the first week of december.

47. Why are you filling out this survey?
because i have nothing else to occupy me at the moment.

48. What was the last movie you watched?
nana. and it was fucking awesome.

49. What is something that you want to do within the next week?
drink margaritas tomorrow night and get fucked up and listen to fun music.

50. Who last messaged you?
ding ding sent me a picture of a chipmunk. completely out of the blue. it was awesome.

51. Is there anyone you are excited to see soon?
yup. get to see my friend young and my mei mei demi tomorrow night. at leats that is the plan...and you know what they say about plans...

52. Do you use post-its?
i like to, but there never seems to be any around.

53. Do you like gum?
i like this one kind of wrigly's they have here. it is yummy.

54. Do you have more friends that are girls or boys?
boys. for sure. has been that way since about 6th grade.

55. Has anyone ever talked about you behind your back?
in the days of twice told, my name was put in various writing on the walls of the "girl's" bathroom stalls more than anyone else's.

here, at times i am talked about behind my back in front of my face. i stand out like a very sore thumb and cannot understand much of what is being said, and it is obvious that there is a good chance that i cannot.

56. Favorite boy name?
i have a lot...i have liked the name logan and the name luke for a long time...but i know that there are many others.

57. Favorite girls name?
annika elizabeth mackenzie.

58. What's your biggest fear?
honestly...i am not quite sure about what i fear...nothing truly ever comes to mind when faced with this question.

59. Have you ever cried yourself to sleep?
AGAIN, I AM FEMALE!...hear us roar!

60. Have you ever not been able to get someone out of your head?
yup.

61. Are you a player?
i have my moments. sometimes there is a game to be played...if you play it well...and the other player is good...there can be momentary rewards.

62. Have you ever dated/fooled around with a co-worker?
yup. it is rarely a good thing afterwards...

63. Asked someone out in the past few months?
in a sense.

64. Name 5 of your favorites:
1. my amazing blue fluffly bathrobe
2. getting lovely high and dancing in a good shower
3. making stuff
4. cannot ever live without music. had i not heard any within 24 hours of being born, i would have shriveled up and died. thanks to my saundra taking me to concerts in the womb and surrounding me with beautiful things and my mama and papa being amazing and feeding me music.
5. deep connections...that are mutually sustained

65. Is something bothering you right now?
not any more...conversation with the one that really matters to me was had. there are people that maybe i should explain my extreme shyness to...and i need to get further over it. so i am now a bit bothered by myself...but i will work on that, too.

66. What is it?
that i need to work on reinforcing the outer walls of my insecurities so that they might diminish somewhat...and it is hard...

i need some more people that i can talk to.
or maybe i just need to try to talk more to people?

67. Is there something else you should be doing at the moment?
maybe sleeping...if i was THAT type of person. but i am virtually the only one at work tomorrow. so as long as i get there...it really doesn't matter if i am hungover or exhausted or anything.

68. If you could have one wish, what would it be?
to have my own bar/laundromat/cafe/art venue...
i guess, basically have a venue and be able to sustain myself on the proceeds...and do it in hangzhou.

that, and to wake up in the morning and find that i can magically speak and understand pu tong hua and hang zhou hua.

69. How is your hair right now?
idiotic, rebellious in all the wrong ways...too thin...in a word...just wrong.

to my 'roommate'

i am offended
intrigued
confused
hurt
bizarrely lonely
right now

in my small, almost bare, living room sit from 8-10 people. most of whom i “know.”

i was not invited.
on a week night
i was not even told.

pot smoked from my lent pipe
and i always share
and i am not even offered.

it is one thing if 2 or 3 people suddenly arrive unexpected to me...
...it is quite another thing when it is 7 people...
anything more than 2 or 3 without warning is a rude offront.

i would never do that to you...
...why do you do it to me?
...why do i expect people to treat me as i would them?
wo ‘zhe ge ler’

yes. my chinese is pathetic. did you expect my hangzhouhua to be any better?

“why do you stare at me as if you had never seen a human before?”
apparently i do not appear to be human.
tonight i feel like i am being treated thus.

is everyone here really so thourougly two-faced?

maybe i put it all out there too much.

i wanted to live with this young woman
she said she wanted to live with me.
i told her i wanted to know her
i thought she wanted to befriend me
she had said she wanted to know me.

one night i told her i had a friend coming over that would probably stay the night
she said by the way, i have a friend coming, too.

mine left. hers didn’t.
the little old wife and husband
that are not boyfriend and girlfriend
but lives are at a glance intricately intwined.

my roommate has two roomates.
i live with 2 people, but i don’t have one.
i have friends in my living room...
but i don’t seem to have any friends.

i have never felt less of consequence before in my life as i do right now.

maybe the da ma
and the sprite very heavy with cheap chinese wine can help
and bending and twisting beautifully malleable wire

the knowledge that tomorrow’s time after work will be saturated with frozen margaritas
and some seemingly deeper friends.
my first mei mei.
i split the heart to give to her her rightful designated half.
she even gets the precious box
though i need to start a collection in this hemisphere.

so many strange material things constantly missed
catalogued in my troubled muddled puddley head
hoping that they will all still exist
and want to be found
...and hopefully easily transplantable...
upon my next return.

and so i am okay with it.
with everything...

...but next time...

some prior notice would be greatly appreciated...

i forgive because i appreciate your youth
...your lack of
decidely different
too much in unknown ways
experience

this time.

if it repeats itself in this way...i might cry...
and it might make me forced to make some changes.

spew much? but the spewage can be a good thing.

.2.18.08. 18:45
saved in the form of a phone call. from someone I missed. who actually lives here. at least he does for the moment.

maybe the most ridiculously complicated ‘relationship’ that I have ever been involved in. but at least I know the situation from the in depth beginning of it all.


.2.19.08. 2:40
oh my gosh lucero. slow dancing.

so my apartment room on st. anthony place. starting college again, but no longer as an art student. but still so deep into it.

jeremy and I were all but quits when I moved into that house.

living there sapped and zapped me.

it was also too close to where I had lived with jeremy. within 5 minutes walking distance. it was so cold that winter. that was my 22nd birthday spent at the melody inn with him to see the teen idols. I think maybe the spunks played, too. that may have been the night I got my “Japanese punk sucks” t-shirt that I love…even though the writing has more than disappeared from it due to 5 years of various washings. he gave me that coat that I so adore. it hangs out still in my poor parents’ basement.

i have lived in some strange dwellings.
is anything in my life not a clusterfuck of the bizarrely random.


and then led zepplin comes on.
that was even earlier.
i was not yet twenty.
with my 1978 white “Vovo” station wagon. fucking shit I LOVED that automobile…oddly similar to a hearse.

i would listen to them on cassette. through my headphones speakers that my papa rigged in tin coffee cans on either side of the stick shift.
because the original ones in the door went out.
and to get even replacement speakers and do it ourselves was so expensive.

my hair was the longest it ever was. it was so hot that summer. late into the summer. i was finally in college. and I had one of three to four part time jobs working for “Vector.”
I sold cutco knives.
the most awesomest knives ever.



oh my. ladytron’s ‘seventeen.’ jamie.
aw, fuck, jamie.

the red lounge in its heydey. maybe before I wholly knew what she had gotten herself into.
oh jamie.
where did you go?

that was a nutty couple of years, too.

when was my last down time?

maybe every february for the past ten years…it has just taken me a decade to begin to try to learn how to productively use it. i am trying to be resilient.

it isn’t easy, people, believe me. and maybe give me a break every once in awhile.


but actually, I think some of you do give me a break. and I shall try harder to extend a little pale, slightly crooked, knobby, freezing cold hand to you.


2:53
almost 3am on a Monday. singing softly to me streaming from my laptop speakers and all sorts of hopefully danceable music emanating from the pseudo-living room.

maybe if I can write more of it down, I can let it go more. get it out of me.

i am going to maybe do a lot of word vomiting. prolly in a lot of forms.

maybe at times I will go all turkey vulture on you.

fuck. my ears still hurt too often.


2:56
i think sometimes I get afraid of sleeping. because I dream. and waking up becomes more and more difficult. those kinds of dreams that stick with you so much of the next day or five.

为什么？ 我不领会。

the highschoolness of early twenties BOYS.

i am twenty-seven years old. i find absolutely no amusement in you playing "keep away" with my drink. nor do i want you putting my straw in your mouth and then setting my drink on the floor of the bar...especially in china when you KNOW what is on the floors...

i don't care if you think you are flirting with me...if you deem yourself old enough to go out to a bar and hang with those of us that have moved beyond highschoolness behavior in that department...you should have found a better way to flirt.

i don't care if you are threatened by me and feel like you need to try and assert your pitiful excuse for wannabe alphadogness. i will beat you down, little bitch.

and i have been here longer than you. and i will be here long after you have left. you haven't bothered to find out one actuality about me... you don't know me, what i am capable of, and who around me will back me up if i clock you in your face.

don't make me ask you to stop what you are doing 3 times. i will get loud. i will get pissed, and i know that i will be justified because you couldn't fucking respect the simple request of a person asking you to stop what you are doing with something that is not yours.

when someone stays, "stop. put my drink down," it in no way translates to, "please put my straw in your mouth and then set it on the floor."

what sucks the most...is that i am going to be subjected to sharing airspace with this jack off at a friend's party tomorrow night...which he was only invited to because he is a co-worker of someone's and overheard talk of it.

i am so bored with belligerent assholes... especially the tiny, anty ones that i am dying to just squash or burn with a magnifying glass.

one thing that can suck about supposedly looking so much younger than my age is that these tiny little boys actually think that they can school me when they are blacked-out drunk.

on a brighter note...looks like i get to see my friend anson for an hour or two tonight before he goes to his parents' home in haining for the holiday. i miss him lots. he technically lives in hangzhou...but he is almost always away doing inspections of factories for his company. he always makes me smile. he is actually quite possibly my oldest ongoing friend in china. so there is some happiness to be had...despite my cold which seems to have reappeared just when i thought it was on its way out.

humans and places and things got me going Thursday night...

it was totally rad. radical even.

this is what got written down throughout the evening and night on some of my stationery paper that i tend to carry around with me.

i think that ongoing act even got me laid well at the end of it all 哈哈！i have a particular "buddy" that is always turned on by me randomly writing as i do. kind of bizarre and extremely cool. and what can i say? i get lit in that way watching him climb rock walls in office buildings :-)

anyway. the typed bits have been rearranged a bit---wow...first time in ages that i am actually going to re-read what i wrote---but i am attempting to include photographs of the original point. doing this with my tiny little elph, of course.

i swear...if i cannot get a digital camera with a nice, big, lens (a wide angle one would be heavenly, too) within 6 months...i am not sure that life will quite be worth living any longer.

i do not remember the order that these were written, unfortunately, but i shall do my best.

we make friends of lovers and lovers of friends.*

we are masters of layers.**

we take up so much space and at other times none at all.***

we love rhythms AT LEAST as much as we adore words.

if we drink alcohol, maybe we can probably outdrink you...but most likely, you won't even notice when we do...every single time.****

we are very well-equipped.

we go through phases of truly enjoying very dangly earrings.

if we partake...we KNOW how to use pot.

we are teachers. we don't always want to be--and there are times when you will be refused that outright skill of ours...we are, afterall, only humans like you--but we do not know how not to be teachers.

we know. period.

we love our friends and always seize the opportunity to outwardly display that love whenever it arises. it is not altogether altruistic. we do it because it makes us happy.

you never know what you might find in our pockets...and we have MANY.

we savor the rare moments in which our minds are unoccupied...but in the savoring, the wheels start turning again, of course.



*here, of course, "lover" can mean so many different things. but it did initially come to mind used in the physical sense of the word, "lover." but as i was writing it down, it clicked onto many of the other possible meanings as well.

**layers are the bomb. layer clothing, layer art, layer food, layer drink, fabric, tile, hair, music, paint, metal, our lives...

***this came to mind and was inked because i notice how china is a very crowded place. i do take up a lot of space with all of my stuff that i often carry around with me. but i know how to make myself small. i know how to manage all of my junk...be it putting it on my lap and still being comfortable, folding things, rolling things, etc. i actually quite enjoy it. and some of my acquaintances are probably thankful for that.

****i knew that i had "ke'd" more alcohol than all of the people that i was with that night. i was drinking liquor and they were drinking chinese beer all night. and i knew that i had smoked more than all of them, because i carry my pinch hitter with me and while i can take the whole thing, they always share it with each other. but i was fine.

more than one of the were so faded that they had to be told when to go home and be put in a cab. the next day one of them--he got to the cab by himself, but he did need to have the suggestion of going home to his bed and his dog made--remarked on how drunk/high he was...and kind of just projected his level of intoxication on to me. i was rather crystal most of the night 哈哈！

and i am in no way saying that this particular person is a lightweight, by any means. i guess it is a simple matter of this:
Louisville-raised (meaning a city where the bars are open until 4m every night--and i started going to them at 16, where we get amazing super grass--it isn't all blue and i knew that at 12 years old, and residing in the state where bourbon and falls city were born),
half northern-irish, half sicilian,
moved out of the parents' house at 16,
has held a job of one sort or another since age 14.

pit that against mostly people that never had a drink before 18+, never smoked pot until they were older than that...add that most often i am at least 2 if not 7 years older... then add some other factors... yeah. i can outdrink you.

(note that this equation may only work when in china)