I have been away for so long because first I was frantically looking for apartments and despairing and then everything was changing and I moved!! I have a super sweet pad now with a big kitchen made for people coming over and me feeding them, because it’s what I love to do. So come over and get fed!!

Moving is a bitch. I’m all, why do I have all this shit? I never use it but I keep it because when I get famous it will be worth a fortune. Like every single thing I made in college. All my fave books that I’ve already read and will never read again. There are things I’ve hauled all over this damn country that I’m now like “TOSS!!”.

And no, that picture above is not some new band I have formed. I have this special wine box full of letters and things that was pretty out of cont. I went through it yesterday and found an early love note from my first ever BF. That’s the side without the letter. Oh yeah, we were bad ass punks. Note the awkward 13-year-old whatdoisay theme, and subtle undertones of sweet adoration:

Hi.
I’m on the phone with you now. We’re not saying anything, but I don’t care. I thought I should write something with this, but! I don’t have anything to say. So in this package is:
- a “Book!”
- a “CD!”
- this “Note!”

I hate writing with a pen(cil). Prolly because I can’t do it. I’m almost tempted 2 rite like this bcuz it is ez but I am resisting. I am not looking forward to writing next year. I’m taking my time writing this so imagine my note-taking.

Aaah! I’m flipping TV channels, and on some shitty gameshow, the female contestant was named “Ketchup.” How sick is that? Adam’s middle name is Hilton. I wonder if that’s where he was conceived. I think he should have his whole family’s middle names after the hotels that they were conceived in. But then like, they’d run out of respectable-sounding hotels and it’d be like “Steve Holiday Inn Shaw” or “Alan 7 Buck Motel Shaw.” Yah.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Overbooking of Flights
Airline flights may be overbooked and there is a slight chance that a seat will not be available on a flight or confirmed reservation. If the flight is overbooked, no one will be denied a seat until the personnell ask for colunteers willing to give up their reservation. If there are not enough volunteers, the airline will deny boarding to other persons in accordance with the airline policy. Persons denied boarding involuntarily are generally entitled to compensation. The complete rules of compensation are abailable at all airport ticket counters.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I am out of space.
I love you.
M

Like, for serious, I couldn’t make this shit up. This letter is exactly how this guy was, too. Awkward, random, but really sweet and well-meaning underneath it all. The mixtape that came with that package was the best one I ever got. I wish I knew where it was. I got it when I was 13 or 14 and 11-12 years later one of the songs on it is still my favorite. I still try to replay it in my head, the whole mixtape. It had good transitions and soundbites and everything.

Reading through these old letters makes me appreciate how many wonderful, sweet, loving people I’ve had in my life so far. I’ve been so lucky.

On that note… my social life has been on hiatus for too long. Call me up, stop by, and I’ll make you pie.

When I was in school, I was always excited for what I would do when I got out. Free from all the restrictions and requirements of education, I would be finally free to do what I wanted, and become the person I was meant to be. Then I got out and figured out that I have to pay rent and feed myself, which can be a little dream-crushy at times. Sometimes it’s hard to get back aspirations when you still have to get the everyday stuff handled. For a little while now, I’ve been trying to remember what or who I was striving for all those years I dreamed of graduation.

When I was really little, I wanted to be a talent agent. My mom was a producer and media trainer, and my sister was an actress, so it felt like a good fit. Little but fierce, I’d be able to haggle the most money and the best jobs with my quick wit, charm, and manipulative tactics. I’d take care of people who couldn’t do it by themselves.

Then there was the torch singer idea. I wanted to lie around on pianos and be treated like a princess and admired by all for my sweet, smokey, sultry voice. I’d hypnotize everyone with my satin dresses draping over the piano. My world would be slick, rainy cityscapes lit by streetlights, walking home on the arm of a tall man in a big coat. I’d drink manhattans and smoke with a long cigarette holder and basically live in the 1930s. I’d break hearts.

I thought it would be fun to be a diplomat’s wife. I wouldn’t have to deal with the boring aspects of being a real diplomat. I’d just get to travel a lot and wear fancy clothes and speak tons of languages and be super classy. I’d throw the best dinner parties and bring the best out of everyone and have an amazing place for entertaining. Everyone would adore me and I’d be like a slightly lower level, less famous, but more interesting and artsy Jackie O.

When I got to high school, I did this awesome after school arts program where I met a bunch of practicing artists. I’d visit their studios and go to their shows and that was when I first realize that there were people who actually made art for a living. I remember this moment, because I always loved to make art. It was my favorite thing to do, but I thought it was too fun to be something you could make a career out of. After that, I was hooked. My mantra was “Do what you love, and things will happen.” It led me to major in art in college, where I learned not only about making art, but I also learned how cut-throat and shmoozy the art world supposedly was. It was a big turn-off, one that I haven’t worked through fully yet. Plus, I became more interested in making events and parties than static sculptures or paintings.

When I really think about what I want to do, and who I want to be, I keep coming back to the same thing: anyone/anything I want all the time. I used to think that I could just do whatever I thought was really cool, but lately I’ve been a little blocked on the coolness front. My vision is a little blurred. But the fact remains that I just want to be amazing. I want to be that person whose presence changes a room when I enter. I want to be confident without being cocky, effortlessly beautiful, truly authentic, trusting, and candid. I want to make everyone I meet feel comfortable, like they are already my friend, and like they don’t have to pose or posture at all. I want to have so many good ideas that I give most of them away and inspire art and culture and projects and good deeds. I want to make magic happen, and glide through life, crushing obstacles and worry and troubles underneath me, as though they were nothing. I want to make art, make events, make dinner, make lemonade stands, and get people to stop and think about how lovely and beautiful thing moment is right here. I want to turn reality into a place that people think must be a a dream from which they never want to wake.

Yes, I want to be a faith healer. An artist. An organizer, a planner, a carouser. I want to sing in the street and give everything I am to everyone around me and get it right back. I want to dream and break the rules. I want to do everything, because I can. And I want to give people this perspective, that they can do anything too. And then maybe together, we will.

I’ve been watching a lot of trash TV this week. We are house sitting at a place in a super residential district with no internet, a big flat sceen, and Direct TV. I never watch broadcast TV, but every so often it’s nice to experience. I like to think of it as a sociological study about American Society and Pop Culture. Mostly, my conclusion is that it’s really fucked up. There are some quality shows, but I would say 99% of television tells you how to be, who to be, how to fix all that is wrong with you, and be as beautiful as the skinny bitches strolling happily along Caribbean beaches in bikinis with hot guys. THIS IS LASTING FULFILLMENT.

So last night I flipped on the Boob Tube and my boo, T, and I started watching Phat Girlz on Oxygen. Intrigued, and yet, also slightly put off by the movie’s title, I thought it would be a hot minute before I turned the channel, but something stopped me. I got sucked in.

For all of you in the dark, Phat Girlz is about three ladies who go on vacation, two of whom are lovely thick women, and one of whom is a tight assed aerobic instructor. They are all surprised when a group of Nigerian doctors at the hotel for a conference introduce them to a different point of view. In Nigeria, they say, the thicker the woman, the richer and more attractive she is thought to be. The aerobic instructor, thong and all, starts getting treated like the ugly chick while the other two are swept off their feet, at which point one of them can’t believe that this hot guy actually likes her and freaks out, sure that his affections are dishonest, and bails.

I related to this movie in two ways:

1. I once had a Nigerian boyfriend too!

And when I told him that usually thick girls are treated like lepers, he didn’t know what I was talking about. He could hardly conceptualize the idea that people would prefer skin and bones to hips and boobs and butts. He thought I was hecka sexy and it felt really good.

2. I still ask my boo, T, if he thinks I’m attractive.

I think he’s super hot, and I often wonder how I get to be with such a beautiful guy. I have never, in my whole life, been skinny. Add to that bad skin when I was a teenager, a few stupid boys treating me awful,  many years being single, jerky comments from jerky jerks every so often, and you know, 24 hour media messages telling me that I am ugly, unhealthy, unattractive, not sexy, and not rich enough, dirty, slobby, unfashionable and pathetic, and you have my crippled self-image. For the longest time I thought I’d never have a date, that no one would ever in a million years want to sleep with me, and I would just be alone and live with my best friend and his lover and whoever else and we’d be like Full House only queer and without any widows. And I was okay with that.

The point I’m dancing around is this. ISN’T THIS FUCKED UP?

It’s fucked that I have spent so many years feeling all these inadequate feelings about myself because this society is so obsessed with LIES! Just looking at the other channels, most of them are dedicated to making yourself feel shitty about yourself, and then trying to sell you something that will make you better. Or trying to make you jealous of a lifestyle you will never have. Or making you buy crap you don’t need because it will lead you to a more fulfilled and happy life.

Lies!

We are all insecure humans, and lots of business feeds off our insecurities. From now on, I’m going to make a dedicated effort to not give a shit how ugly I might seem to some people. I’m going to look in the mirror, say “Hot.” and call it good. I’m also going to tell everyone beautiful I see that they are beautiful, and why. I mean, doesn’t it feel good when someone gives you props? Sometimes it can change my whole mood for a whole day or longer. Why don’t we do this all the time? Why do we have to be jealous and compete and try to bring each other down when we can drive around the city yelling “Hot Stuff!” to people on the street? I think the latter would definitely be more fun. And it would be time spent having fun, instead of just sitting around thinking about all the things that are so wrong about you.

*Not actual tilt-a-whirls, but like, brain spinning media messages and stuff. And it rhymes.

My boo and I went out last night. We drove through dark residential neighborhoods, looking into the lit windows of people’s houses. We drank tall boys on the sidewalk, listening to hipsters name drop and out-cool each other. We drank coffee at our favorite cafe, listening to a lady sing and a man strum his guitar. We listened to Journey in the car and when we got home we watched a movie about an epidemic wiping out 90% of the population of Earth.

I love my boo and I love the apocalypse.

A few months before I met him I was writing a column for  Sustainable Style. I had been watching all these documentaries about peak oil and energy and 2012 Mayan Calendar end of times junk. Sometimes I like to fantasize about the apocalypse. Usually I skip the bad stuff and end up somewhere safe with everyone I love. We build shanties and cabins and grow gardens and live this amazing communal-hippie anarchist-back-to-the-land existence where it’s always spring and everything is wonderful. When I think about all this I look forward to is as a time where I will be released from the confines of having to actually work for money and instead I can just build and grow things and do that whole mutual aid thing, which I’m totally into.

Then I met my boo, T. When he asked me out I invited him to this potluck series I was doing. Every month I would find 6 strangers and invite them to a potluck at my house. I’d sit in the kitchen, serve their courses one by one, and record the conversation they had. So our first date was really me listening to him relate to 5 other complete strangers about life, existence, humanity, philosophy, and experience. At this point, T was a stranger to me. He worked across the street from my shop, and whenever I saw him I got totally drunk by his charisma. Not that he really did anything special, but to me being in his presence was like being next to a pop star I was really into. Like Billy Corgan when I was 13.

In the kitchen, I heard him talk about jumping out of planes, traveling the world, talking to shamans. He whistled the sound of a hawk. He spoke of seeing visions while sick with ameobic dysentary. He talked about the philosophy of the Tao and traded lessons he’s learned about society and human nature with those around the table. It wasn’t just him, everyone at the table had their own piece to add to this night. At the end of the evening a pipe was brought out, all the wine was drunk, and people sat on the stoop smoking and literally singing with each other. It was the best potluck of the summer.

He stood out. We moved in together after a month. It was magic. He would bring me wild flowers and we would sit on the porch for hours looking at the stars and talking about the dragon that appeared every night in the bush across the street, under the streetlamp. He told me about all the different lives he has had, all the things he’s learned and seen and suffered. He even helped me build a shanty in the backyard one Sunday, and we spent the summer living in the backyard, watching movies, eating, sleeping, listening to music. When we didn’t have a barbecue, he made one using a pitchfork, a few bricks, and the rack from the oven. When we got locked into a park all night, he built a big fire and we spent the night talking and watching the trains go by. And when it came time to move, he spent the day cleaning the gutters, washing all the windows, and loaded the truck down the windy staircase all by himself.

And in the back of my mind, I knew. He was the person I wanted with me when the shit hit the fan.

Right now, we live in the city, struggling to keep a roof over our heads and food in our mouths. We spend days in front of our computers, learning, stressing, dealing with clients, and reading. But I dream of the day when the population is wiped out and we are stuck on our own, surviving on what we can do with our two hands.We will be the ones to build a safe haven for those we love. We’ll be really buff from chopping wood and gathering wildflowers and swimming in creeks. We will have an amazing hand built house, delicious hand-grown and gathered food, and all our friends will finally be in bucolic harmony.

But even if that day never comes when the apocalypse strikes, there is still the catastrophe of everyday to manage. And it’s so nice to know that no matter how little or big it is, he is always there, making it a little easier.

Life is definitely more exciting in movies.

There are plots. A developing story. Obstacles that are overcome. Interesting characters. Magical items.

Sometimes my life comes close. There are many times in my life, days where I look at whoever I’m with and say, “Did that really just happen?”

And then there are times in my life when my dreams are far more interesting.

Sometimes there are places I want to be and things I want to do that are just out of my reach. Last October, for my best friend’s birthday, I couldn’t go celebrate with him because he lives in Tokyo and the taxi fare would have been just a little too much. But I was there in spirit. And in my imagination, we went out and had an amazing night.

In Tokyo there is no crime. You can walk around at any time of night and feel completely safe. No one locks their bikes. It’s amazing.

On the night of Justin’s birthday, we woke up and the sun was shining. He lives in this amazing apartment with a sportswear designer roommate, big picture windows, and a tiny back garden with a mini fire pit and a fountain. I sabered open a bottle of champagne and made chocolate chip pancakes and we sat around the garden drinking mimosas and discussing our plan of attack for the day. I promised I would help him spruce up his pad right, so after breakfast we got our goggles and suited up in our white painter jumpsuits before gathering all the paint in the house and starting in.

There’s this great side room in his apartment that opens onto the garden. It’s southfacing, so it gets amazing light all day and we wanted to trap it in and magnify it so got some metallic gold paint and went to work. Before long we got all the ceiling and the walls completely covered in it and it started to look like some crazy egyptian tomb and we had to put on out sunglasses to finish it.

I had made this big drawing of mountains and the sea cascading into this giant pile of brightly colored shapes that were supposed to climb up the walls. We set up the projector and Justin made shadow puppets and danced around to some great funk records while I outlined everything. He started on a ladder at the sky and I started on the floor to paint the ocean and before long we had met on the mountain and climbed up to the crazy shapes. By then it was late and we were exhausted, but we had a ton of stuff to do, so we drank some crazy ass Japanese energy drinks that I swear should have been illegal and I clicked my heels three times and we were on our bikes, flying kites off the back of them through the streets with Justin’s mini ghetto blaster blasting from his basket.

This kind of thing, plus not being Japanese tends to get some attention in Tokyo, and we stopped at lights and struck poses while people on the sidewalk took surreptitious photos on their smartphones.

We went to a friend’s house and she made us some cold noodles and we slurped and slurped while she got ready to go out. This girl is amazing. She has a closet full of wigs and ended up wearing a giant blond beehive with seriously fake lashes and a blue metallic bodysock with platforms built in. She took us to this crazy club that was built to look like a treehouse. You could climb and climb into these little platform rooms and every room had a different drink special. At the top of the fake treehouse was this room that mimicked dawn every 45 minutes and had this infinity pool with, I kid you not, japanese mermaids swimming in it. If you dove in and held your breath, you could go to this totally awesome secret room with one glass wall where you could watch the mermaids swimming, and a deck with a sauna  and a ton of plants that looked out across the city. It was unreal, some weird gateway between jungle and metropolis that totally looked like one of those portals in sci-fi movies to a different universe.

We got lost in the treehouse, and by then we were a little less than coherent, but somehow I remember finding a tiny little door, like in Alice in Wonderland, that set you out into the street. By then we had somehow collected more people and we stopped at a karaoke bar, but after the treehouse club it seemed kind of lame, so we came home instead and put on an impromtu shadow puppet opera with our new friends and a bunch of random japanese opera records we had found mixed with Sun Ra samples before watching the sunrise in the golden room, which was totally bad ass and actually felt like a womb it was so warm from the light.

It was a totally bad ass birthday, even without a birthday cake. It was okay though, because when we finally woke up there was a giant mountain of strawberry cupcakes being carefully constructed in the kitchen. It was almost too beautiful to eat, but then we ate it and omg it was even better.

Birthdays like this are definitely too awesome to not come true sometime soon. I swear. My life is like a movie.

Delicious fare rustled up by volunteer cook-geniuses

I would say that for at least 90% of my life, I have been too busy. I’ve gotten by on too little sleep by slamming redbull before french class. I’ve forgotten to show up for that over there because I was too busy doing this and that and this over here. I’ve been hounded by deadlines and up all night and rushing here and there with millions of to do lists falling out of my bag. People to see, projects to execute, i’s to dot and t’s to cross. Happy, because I was doing so many things that I enjoyed, but also stressed out, sleep deprived, running on empty, and leaving little things undone.

Recently, however, I’ve been bored. Bored and broke and with few friends. Living in the suburbs, it was hard to get out. Transportation is expensive, so is toll, food, drinks, movies, and most everything else you could do for fun times. It led to many a night eating beans and rice and watching movies on the internet, feeling unmotivated and depressed because there is no pulse to life when you’re unemployed and have no regular schedule. There are no constant places to be, things to do, people to see, stories to tell, parties to plan, entertaining to be done.

I do better when I’m not bored. When there are things to do, communities to be a part of, projects to work on, goals to aspire to. Since the move to the city, I’m still broke. There’s not a ton to do when the world is a big puddle outside, but I can feel the boredom seeping away, slowly. Even surfing online is more active. There’s the searching and planning for things to do. Cheap yoga classes to find, cheap shows, happy hours, discount movies, art openings, and bus tours.

This weekend, after we had recovered from moving in the worst storm of the year and the subsequent illness it bestowed on us, we finally got out. On Saturday we volunteered at All Access Cafe, an all volunteer-run donation based community brunch. I bussed tables and T washed dishes while mountains of delicious vegan food poured out of the kitchen. Bands played, people danced and did flips on the dance floor, tea and mimosas were served and there were big grins all around. This is what I’m talking about! I always wanted to start a secret cafe, ever since I read about one in Doris zine . It would be a place only known by word of mouth. There would be good food and good company for cheap. Sometimes live music, sometimes art workshops, sometimes dance or yoga classes on the floor. Board games, space helmet parades, good tea and bread and cookies.Everyone would feel welcome there, and everyone would be welcome. There would be no hip-hierarchy. You wouldn’t have to spend money to come and hang out. It would be like a clubhouse for whoever wanted to come. A community for people who wanted a real community, instead of feeling the isolation of living in a society that’s entirely based on money, having it and getting it.

After brunch, Tim and I walked home, the cafe still buzzing in our over-stimulated heads. We walked home to our new place, watching all the people filling the streets. We smelled all the smells, looked in shop windows. Later we went to a free event at Grace Cathedral, where hipsters were dancing to DJs in the huge gothic building. We walked through the night lights. There were people everywhere, and it made me think that this was what I was missing. All kinds of people all around me.

The cafe was a great taste of something I really need to find for myself. I can’t wait to gather up friends, projects, community, food, and music until I’m busy again, running around without a moment to catch my breath. It’s seeping in slowly, but surely, like rain that gives the park grass that satisfying squish. I can’t wait.

I’ve been reading The Gift: How the Creative Spirit Transforms the World by Lewis Hyde (Download it free by joining Canongate Publishing’s website). It has got me thinking about gift giving a lot, especially with the Holidays and everything. I’m super broke and was brainstorming gift options for my peeps. There is so much pressure to go and buy shit for all the people you love. It doesn’t matter if they have everything they could ever want, somehow the gift seems to become a symbol for how much you care about or love a person. The more expensive and thoughtful, the more you love them. But even if people spend all the money they can and think really hard about it, how many gifts in your life do you actually treasure and keep forever? How many become the sentimental tokens that sincerely emanate the givers love to you for all eternity? Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate all the gifts I have received over the years, but how many of them have grown to symbolize the love my family and friends have for me, the love we have for each other?

I think we’re going about this all wrong. It’s like we have Christmas because we need something to bribe us into spending time with our families. But what if instead of stressing out about the right gift or giftcard, we did something that was meant to bring us closer together?

I’m not sure what this could be. Maybe it’s making up traditions, like playing charades after dinner, or going for a walk (if the weather’s not to bad). Maybe it’s singing karaoke, or something corny like sharing a memory of holidays past. Maybe everyone can plant a seed together, take their charge home and watch it grow all year.

Whatever it is, I’m craving some continuity in these holiday gatherings. I want to be connected to all those people who have drifted in or out of this celebration over the years. I want to know what my ancestors did for Christmas Eve. I want to look forward to the one thing or activity that will make us all realize, together, that we are awesome and lovely as a unit.

I think we need to beat on some drums and call our ancestors to the table. I think we need to make some myths, break out the headdresses, find some traditional colors to wear. Let’s make some hand signs, lets make a family crest and all get tattoos of it. Let’s give each other all one necklace and pass it around every month. I want singing and dancing and giving back to this great earth mother. I want to wail for the sadness and dance for the happiness of last year and tomorrow. I want to tell the tale of how our people came to be here and now. I want to be thankful for us. For the tribe we have formed. For the masses we have gathered together. For those we have lost and those we have found.

Because it’s this togetherness, this place, this time, these people, this love that is the best gift. And if we’re all staring at our iPods or shaking the boxes under the tree, I’m afraid we’ll miss it.