I Wish You'd Have Told Me

Pollen

2011-11-27T20:39:00.000-08:00

Drawings by Nabokov, intended for his family.

Michael Winter

2011-11-25T20:59:00.000-08:00

A superficial plunge passed everything I've worked for.

But no, that's not true.

The balancing act- I think of it so very often.

I've ricocheted from either end of the room,

and wobbling back I am now somewhere in the center.

I feel this to be very true.

That after years screaming to each end of the extreme,

I am soberly staggering in the middle of a void.

It's all something I know, because I have been here all before.

It is all around me, just simply in a different form.

I can remember the smell, and the lighting is exactly how I know it.

The sound is dull, frustration fear and failure all into a stuffed pillow

Muted.

But how can I recognize the difference when all of my memories are desaturated,

and the present I know is the same?

Greys, steels, ochres, woods, salt on white skin.

It all blends into itself,

A chameleon in vain.

This is the truth.

I'm telling myself to try to see the clarity,

but I lack the desire and willingness to do so.

A small portion of me is moving,

Upwards, pushing, flailing on my own feet to resist

my own resistance of discipline.

I am stuck, partaking in the exact fear which has consumed my knees,

I am moving inch by inch as if my calves, thighs, and hips were only able to do no more.

Stepping with as much precaution,

acting with as much sloth and laze

and at the same time the most desire

the most pain and the most distress

to truly act as I have always wanted.

And yet with all the stillness I have acquired,

I am not still, and I am boiling,

with heat and stress overtaking every inch of my consciousness.

Even when I simmer, I fail to completely cool.

And so I continue to search for the fear that is fueling this fucking flame.

Perhaps if I keep moving, the truth will come to me.

54 (disco version)

2011-10-23T19:12:00.000-07:00

Jumping from the platform

into the dusted sand

far below the edge of the concrete cliff,

a crevice of camel colored creases.

I lie here a jumbled mess,

a decomposed abstraction,

seemingly in pieces.

But as my eyes move in moments

slowly towards the water,

the expanse of ocean,

ahead of me,

I feel the weaving of my skin

twisting, tinging, tip-toeing together,

tiny portraits of myself transmogrifying,

alchemized and microscopic.

Who knew a hand or face could be so small.

And as my skin stretches and connects,

the wind soothing the heat of the minuscule contractions,

I grow momentarily into.

Nuckle Blisters

2011-09-22T22:14:00.000-07:00

My life wrapped up in pink tissue

or recycled brown paper.

Tied up with a thin silk bow.

A bouquet of lowers picked out just for me,

no dozen roses.

An ear that hears and recalls,

analogues, records, and reflects

and then responds.

The giving, receiving, sharing.

Would you call that a balancing act?

Or would you just call that care?

I'm used to disappearances.

At some point it always happens.

I've never attempted the trick,

or maybe I have and I just don't know the difference.

Something to hold and something to have.

Gifts are given never to be returned,

never with any Expectation.

But I'm beginning to fear them.

I think myself so coy,

such a charmer...

and then they disappear.

With what I've given them.

People are too predicable this way.

No matter how much you tell them,

share with them, try to offer them,

They will always have selective hearing.

They will always take what they want

and disappear.

And sometimes it feels like they gave nothing in return.

50/50 on the chopping block, on the cutting table, on the countdown. What you say and what you do and what you expect all come back at you. Sometimes with a big punch in the face, and sometimes with a nod to your reflection... simply spouting my feelings, vomiting without control, is my avoidance of focus and concentration. It's so easy to snap pictures out of focus, and to try to resharpen them in the future (technology very easily allows for this) but how valuable do memories become when you have to try to piece them together after they've already passed.

It's a restless sleep, if there is sleep at all.

Irene and Jack Weekend

2011-08-29T22:15:00.000-07:00

I've made a few things lately.

A top for my mom.

And a cowl for her too.

Some baby booties for my future cousin.

A shawl for my grandma.

And some socks for me.

Emma seems to like them too.

Distraction? No.....

Lump Sum

2011-08-14T20:11:00.000-07:00

I've been without a journal for the past week or so. Not being able to write, with my hands, has been a strange experience. Having all these thoughts in my head I'd like to write down, but can't. The only reason being pure laziness...

To describe what it is I feel I'm missing... when you have something for a time, and then it leaves you. The sheer transience of just being alive. The part that is most irksome is that I know I'm missing it, because I know what it's like to have it. Being without it is something like being a machine... always the same responses to everything, the same head nods, the same dull expression, the same cliches, repetition of repetition of repetition, lack of

Poor Emma is trying to scratch her ears but can't because the cone is in the way. Not to be melodramatic, but isn't everything in our lives a reflection of ourselves in some way?

Unscrupled Imaginings

2011-07-29T22:46:00.000-07:00

It leeches itself out of my pores like molasses.

And with every breath of this air it becomes thicker,

moving itself over my skin as if it were my new corpse

but an old one

taking over and suffocating the fresh and living.

I move past each palm tree with ease

because really it's all the same when you see it,

nothing ever changes no matter how much time is in between

but with each passing I falter

and digging myself further into a grave of memories

I loose sight of what was ahead of me.

It's so easy to shut my doors,

lay on the grey carpet as if not a year, hour, second has gone by

and that it's all still here.

The posters are more faded each time I see them,

the cobwebs more pronounced,

and still I always want to stay.

Locked away in this gap of space

a locked two roomed doll house

an abyss of safety only I can understand.

It's as if you stepped into a materialized, still life of yourself,

but that's it

you said it earlier

it's not yourself

it's what you once were

but he's dead

he doesn't love you

they've all moved and grown just as you have

the window doesn't stay open anymore

and everything you've left here you've left for a reason

to leave it.

So let it go.

When you walk into a room, and feeling trickles up your ankles, moving slowly up your legs and torso, and neck and around to your throat, and it begins to grab hold of you so forcefully that it feels as though it were a real person, that's perhaps when you should look back at this feeling and ask "what is it exactly that I'm feeling, and what is the exact opposite of it that perhaps I am lacking?" or maybe this doesn't even make sense, for after all I am a little drunk still.

Fear

2011-07-28T21:08:00.000-07:00

When it all drops

when all the bricks come down

one by one

a game of reverse tetris

when we both let it go

when I let it go

when there is silence

when I'm not sure which step

to take

or which way

to look

when I look but I can't seem to find

when the music stops

when the music plays

when I wake up

when you leave

when I leave

when the plane picks up

and then lands

when I try to be poetic

when I try to be more

than what I am

when we play the game

are we playing a game?

when I wait

when I reach the sand

when I breathe

when I exhale

when I see you next

when the pictures move

off the walls

when the pictures move

onto the walls

when I take the picture

when we move slowly towards

the window

when the rain pours

when we forget it all

exists

when there is nothing else

when I open my eyes and look

into yours

when we laugh and know it's ours

when I recognize the impermanence

when I recognize the permanence

when I call you tomorrow

when we know it's real

even when it isn't

when it all seems so cliche

when it is all so cliche

but for fucks sake, that's why it's cliche

when we realize we don't care if it's cliche

when I look backwards

when we know what had happened

when I see the road behind me

and I know that it's all gone

when I know that it's all gone

and I'm finally able to let it be gone

when I don't care that I'm writing poorly

when I mail you that letter

when we get our consonants all mixed up

and when our vowels slur

It's been a bit of lull

but perhaps when I get back

will be when I recognize there is no real

ending

just the continuation of an

excessively long drawn out

overly repetitive painfully awkward

and terrifically

horrendously beautiful

waltz

maybe then I won't be so scared.

I'm sorry I forgot, but I can do it tomorrow

2011-07-12T21:38:00.000-07:00

12:32

2011-07-12T21:32:00.000-07:00

I could sink myself into the sand a forget how time exists. I would start with the tips of my fingers and toes and press them slowly against the friction of the moveable mass. Then inch by inch I would move the remainders of my extremities, my palms, wrists, and elbows, my heels, ankles, and calves until my thighs, breasts and shoulders were fully submerged under the weight of those tiny particles. My neck and head would rest there, on the surface of the sea earth and lean themselves towards the warmth of the sun. My eyes and throat would soak up the rays the way our pores soak up oxygen- invisible but effective, until my lips were red and tense and my eyelids ached from the heat. I could do this and time would stand still for me.

Scabs

2011-07-04T09:58:00.000-07:00

Home sweet home.

A Circus Rant

2011-06-15T20:42:00.000-07:00

What were we thinking when it stopped?

That it would all stop? That's it? The end? The finale? The closure of the conclusion?

No, we couldn't have thought that.... but I guess we did...

I guess we thought that afterward it would all be different.

We would all be ridiculously successful and life would be oh so grand.

Isn't that what they told us? That's what they told me... didn't they?

Or did I just grow up thinking that's what would happen,

because of what I saw my parents do,

and my friends parents do,

and the famous people on magazine covers,

what they do too.

So it must be true

But perhaps that's not so much the truth

as perhaps it is what it is.

And after so much exhaustion

After so much exasperation,

there's more?

No, that can't be it.

That was the end. Finito. Fin!

It couldn't keep going that way.

The juggling like it's some kind of an unending sideshow for kids.

I never got enough nickels this way,

so why would I keep going?

Your arms hurt after too long, and your eyes start to cross.

But I knew that wasn't the end,

or did I?

It's something confusing

I go back and forth with what it is,

how I felt

how I feel

the longest game of pickle

during the longest juggling act.

But somehow I'm supposed to make decisions,

aren't I.

That's the catch.

When you look at what's been happening

for the past seven years of your life

and you think

"Seven years is an awfully long time"

and then you sink into it

the memories of all of it.

You step through each event as if walking a tight rope,

and some steps are painful, but

you keep moving to keep your balance,

and at the other side, you know what you did wrong,

but each step was made right.

So you look at those seven years,

and you start to get it together,

critical analysis is what it's called, I think,

or that's what they told me,

and you start to pick out the problems, pick out the progressions,

pick out the pain and the pleasure,

and you sit there, with your p's all piled up nice an proper,

and you make decisions.

And that's the kicker,

the clincher really too.

You reach the end, and all it is

is just the end of a circus show

and now it's back to "life"

whatever reality is that doesn't involve a ring leader telling you what to do.

It's all on you now,

to leave the show,

and then know where to go.

Just moving on to something new, I suppose.

Nothing too difficult, I guess.

And maybe what it is that ties it all together

is that thrill,

of possibly letting the ball drop,

or possibly missing your step,

and that's why

no matter who is directing you

it never ends.

It just keeps going.

My Addiction

2011-06-12T17:11:00.001-07:00

Skinny Love

2011-06-08T20:22:00.000-07:00

Some times I feel a little lost about it. I look at the situation and don't see the difference. I look at the possibilities and I get confused. It all looks the same when the outcome is chosen. When it's held out by those hands.

We all want a piece of it, and when we aren't asked if we'd like some, we sometimes just grab it all out of spite. Out of some kind of honor or pride we're trying to fill. But what does it matter, when the other person is greedy, or maybe just too excited to share?

Just because we all want to cut the cake, doesn't mean there are enough knifes for all of us. But I don't mind giving up my knife. If making someone else happier makes the situation easier, I'm fine with that.

Today was hot. It's officially summer when I dream so much about the beach that I put up more pictures of it on my walls. I can stare at those photographs for hours trying to get to that sand. Soon soon soon soon soon.

The show keeps moving. It's like a child that's growing up too fast for me to keep up. I thought infancy lasted longer. But now it's walking and talking without me, making a name for itself, making friends, creating a reputation, developing an identity. It's definitely a boy. Like any 21st century parent, I'm supporting it financially as best I can, but pretty soon it's going to have to learn how to make it's own money. It's getting too old to not be working. I wonder what 1 human year is in SPACCCE years... something like 16 I guess.

Last summer I had Henry Miller's Big Sur to keep me company for a few months. Granted it was off and on, but it was a treat to have around. This summer I've got Emerson with me and his essays on Nature. It's a little religious, but I don't mind. A few old fashioned bible beliefs never hurt anybody...

I neglected to do a lot of chores today- write thank you's, put together the table and chairs that need to be painted, do laundry... Nerm and I took our time together instead. We let it take us. That's what happens when you don't know how to move in heat. It just takes over you like a giant wave, and the best thing you can to is just let it push you around until it pushes you out, back to the surface for air. But the only release in this heat are the nights, and even then you're lucky to get out. Tomorrow is supposed to be worse, I hear, so then it's a good thing I'll be in my air conditioned work... with all the wool.

Nerm's gone for a few days, Cecylia is gone too. When there's no distractions the silence can get pretty loud and itchy. But Nerm left her fan with me, so maybe my dreams will be a release. And on that note, bon nuit <3

I had a vision

2011-05-29T20:53:00.000-07:00

Lost time

2011-05-23T22:32:00.000-07:00

For all the time that I've felt I've lost, I hope that now, since it's all over, since it's all started, I have time to share all I've ever gained.

As much as I say I hate technology, what's a girl to do when that's what the world depends on?

Yet another new beginning to the blog.
More to come, I promise! (again)

Don't Go to

2011-04-15T22:39:00.001-07:00

Please go with me.

Contest

2011-04-09T23:05:00.000-07:00

I'm trying to win this contest.... this is my image...

A Place

2011-03-23T21:19:00.000-07:00

It's something like breathing. The steady motion in and out, slowly but steadily, each breath and exhale leading and determining the next. "I could watch this for hours," she told him. "Why don't you move back?" He asks her. "I don't think I would appreciate this as much if I had it every day." With every second passing the sun sank further and further into the blurred horizon, and with the downward motion came the ignition of fiery warms pinks and oranges and yellows and deep deep purples streaking and waving across the darkening blue of the sky. The wind was slight, and the temperature, which had once been luke warm, was sinking with the time passing. She shivered but refused to get any closer to him. "Moving home now would be like giving up. Giving into my nostalgia, but giving up what I've wanted for years. " He looked at her, and watched her watch the waves. She didn't look much different, but then again neither did he. The grassy hill behind them was emptying, with the families and couples retreating to their cars, the darkness pushing their hearts and heads homewards. They were the few sea gazers left. "Let's go down to the sand," and with that she pulled herself up from the cooling grass and began taking wide steps to where the grass met the sand and the sand met the waves. Without even thinking he stood on his feet and started after her, looking back only to catch a glimpse of the people moving the opposite direction between the omnipotent palm trees. She had already shed her shoes and rolled cuffs of the ends of her jeans. She was ankle deep in water, staring ahead towards the endless pacific. "How's the water?" he called out to her. She turned and smiled and shouted back, "You should come and see for yourself." He laughed, saying, "You're crazy, it's the middle of November, that water must be freezing." She heard what he had said but ignored him, focussing instead on the sun half way passed the edge of the world. Up above the moon was already showing it's face, waiting for it's turn to dominate the sky. She was infect very cold, and although her feet were buried deep in the sand, the icy water was biting at her ankles and the bottoms of her calves, causing chills up and down her arms and spine. "I couldn't have asked for a better sunset," she whispered. To her left were the wooded cliffs cutting at hard angles to the solitary space of sky and ocean, and beyond were the stars of land, the lights of the next town south. To her right was a long stretch of straight beach, going farther and farther into the distance until it seemed it was cut as the edge of paper is cut. Straight ahead the sun had finally sank, and all that was left was the water color clouds of the sky. Suddenly she felt sad, knowing that she was leaving tomorrow. She took a last look at the horizon and turned back towards land, towards her home near the Atlantic. He was sitting on the sand, hands with fingers crossed lazily resting on his knees, watching her walk back to him. She always came back to him, ever since they were 14 and lived here, just around the corner from one another. It didn't matter how far across the country she moved, or how far away she stood from him, at some point she always came back, and he felt security in knowing this. She was walking straight towards him with sand sticking to her feet and wet jeans, and with an expression he suddenly realized he didn't recognize. She stopped just in front of him. "Well, did you get what you came for? That was quite the sunset." He said to her. She bent down and grabbed the laces of her white old shoes, and when she stood up she looked right at him and said," Yeah, I think I can leave now." And she did. She left that evening in a car to her old home, and the next morning she left on a plane to her new apartment. She left for her future, and left the past behind.

Dreams of Mexican Sunrises

2011-02-22T19:49:00.000-08:00

Money is Fiction

2011-02-22T19:36:00.000-08:00

I used to walk on the outsides of my feet

2011-02-17T22:12:00.000-08:00

Walking in these shoes is like walking in my old skin. Putting on a suit that at one time I forced myself stiffly into. A show for something close to approval. Now I put it on and I recognize how poorly it fits and how uncomfortable it all is.

Songs music dance dance foot taps eccentricities and transparencies. Difficult rhythms and motions side to side round and round. It always keeps going this kind of changing sound.

Last night when we were talking I could tell you didn't know. You looked at me as if you saw clarity. It bulged through your wide blue eyes, begging me to believe you. Attempts to try to control an exchange purely incontrollable. Did you not learn the first time that this kind of confrontation doesn't work? When you force something onto the stage it's naked and undone and unprepared, and everything and everyone looks uncomfortably the other way.

We are no better than each other. We beg for something more when there is seemingly nothing more coming. We are terrified of silence, space, stillness. The second we grasp it we tear it into a mess of pieces, and then tossing it like a handful of party confetti, we leave it as a pile on the ground. Garbage unconcerned with us. We do this to gain something, or to die a little.

The pulse the pulse the pulse pounding pounding pounding you are wrong but you say you know the truth, you're seeing all sides. All sides 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 and 9. But how do you know when you are seeing through only two eyes? It could be lies and then where would you be? Would you be out, down, lost? Because you were looking every direction but ahead.

I want to tell you but I don't have the choice. The mistakes you make are your own. The stiff suit has grabbed you and you aren't able to move. I see myself in that side of you, and I want to warn you, scream it to you in your sleep because maybe if I found you in your dreams and we had a nice conversation over two cups of tea you would believe me and you would know how I know and you would feel all the mistakes I had made before that are pleading you to see what is actually about to happen to you and you would stop. You would stop stop stop and see your feet walking towards the edge of that street and the road on the other side that would only rip you in both directions if you tried to cross it. But you are walking walking walking and not stopping, because that stillness is terrifically more frightening than that highway up ahead.

I can fix that hole in you

2011-02-01T20:43:00.000-08:00

And why the horror, when there is nothing in it?

2011-02-01T20:42:00.001-08:00

Let's talk about authenticity. Kim Gordon says that maybe it's gone by the wayside now, and in a way I agree with her. Think about it. The definition of authenticity is "of undisputed origin, genuine," but considering we live in a time in which there is not one agreed upon way of living or set of moral values, how can one argue what is genuine or in-genuine, and therefore even remotely authentic. When every perspective can be claimed valid, because every outlook is situational, not one product or statement or feeling can be regarded as wrong. I can claim that the photo collage on my wall is the most authentic and expressive piece of work that exists in my life, but unless someone else knows the stories behind the images, the reason for their placement, and the feeling I feel from the images, no one will understand my meaning and reasoning of why this piece is so important. So what does it matter?

Let's say that nothing is authentic anymore. Truly. Not a single thing. So that means that nothing is genuine and that something you or I create is just a repeat of something done in the past. That's true isn't it? So then let's start with the big bang... that was authentic wasn't it? The first and only time (that we know of) that the universe bubbled into existence. And every development from that point on was like a brick being laid in it's proper place in a long, enormously tall wall. When I think about life like this, I imagine each moment that wind was blown across the pacific, each crack of earth made by erosion, every drop of rain that hit the desert, and every single millimeter of a second has been a piece in this enormous sandy beach puzzle, and each piece has it's particular place in order to make up the long stretch of the ocean's side. Each grain looks almost identical when examined at a far enough distance, but when observed closely not a single piece is the same as another.

Alan Watts claims, " it is only a somewhat clumsy convenience to say that present events are moved or caused by past events, for we are actually talking about earlier and later stages of the same event." This constant movement of existence is like a running marathon that never seems to end, and with our measly measurements of time it truly seems to take forever. But my existence is the product of another existence is a product of another existence and so on and so on and so on all the way back to that first initial implosion of chemicals. However, although there are patterns, ways in which " the intricate organization both of the plants and of my own nervous system, [are] like symphonies of branching complexity," and forms that repeat themselves as the branching of trees is "reverberated in the design of watercourses in the desert," each reflection has it's extreme difference. Although the human nervous system may be looked at as an exact replica of the formation of waterlines along a vast desert, the chemical make up, purpose, and function of both are supremely different.

So then, the patterns which we naturally part take in, succumb to and clumsily fall into without ever really realizing that we are simply following a footpath already made for us, just looking ahead or around us constantly, are always felt and actualized in time differently for every person. So then the argument become false. There will only be one 32nd second of 8:26pm of February 1, 2011 on Earth (as far as we know) and that moment has it's one and only undisputed origin, and is therefore genuine. And I will never look at my poorly painted bedroom door the same way, because each day I am a different person who has learned or unlearned something new and experienced and felt and dreamed differently than the day before. That door will never look the same, it will always look genuinely different.

Let's say that everything is authentic then. Every single moment. It doesn't matter if we know it or not (but perhaps that might make it more enjoyable) And does it matter if authenticity is not something we can force into a particular category or style? I don't personally think so. The idea that every single piece of garbage, hummingbird, wood floor, and synthetic potato chip out there is authentic makes everything a piece of art, doesn't it? It's all a brand new, genuine piece of creation. I'd say thats all the more reason to see how fucking beautiful it all is, and keep talking about authenticity.

I dreamt I was doing a handstand

2011-01-27T20:02:00.001-08:00

If I were to write like Hemmingway I would start off with something I know to be true. One true sentence about anything. So I guess I could start off writing about where I work. I don't want to call it my job, because it doesn't feel like a job to me. Jobs are places where you go to sell your soul to the system. The monetary system that is. I do not have a job. I work at a store in Soho that sells knitting, sewing, and other craft supplies. It's not an art supply store, and it's not a huge department sized craft store that is named after some superior but friendly sounding person like Michael's or Joanne's. It is a store of adequate size and capacity, that is decorated as if a little girl with OCD went crazy with her knitting needles. The walls wave with the textures of the color coded yarns and fabrics against the beach wood shelves and floors. In the store you could get lost for hours in the seemingly endless patterns of cotton. You could stare at each section of the fabric, and think you've gotten to know the language of each print, only to find that when you've made your choice it opens up to reveal a something unexpected. The fabrics are deceiving that way. They line up side by side, an army of predestined prints, but hiding their true colors. They show only their most flattering side, the lean side of the bolt, as a teaser for your eyes. Because of this it is hard to know which fabrics to choose, and often customers will rip the bolts of fabric out of the walls to suspend their curiosity for a moment, and then, disappointed by face of the fabric, clumsily shove their pick back into the wall. This is not something that irritates me, but it is something that I follow. I love to admire the walls when all the corners are cleanly tucked, and the raw edges of where the freshest cuts have been made are hidden in between one fabric and another. I comb the walls for small signs of wrinkled edges or upside down bolts, and when I find something imperfect I try my best to make it look right.

Perhaps it is because of my love for sewing that causes me to drift to this part of the store. To hang around lazily behind the enormous cutting table, sipping luke warm coffee until someone comes asking for a yard or two or for a fabric to be pulled down from the top row. In between measuring, cutting, and folding I fall into the colors of the wall, swimming through all the possibilities of every one of the fabrics. I try to get to know each one as best I can. To get to know their weight, their use, their possibilities. I try to picture each one in their future form, perhaps as a small piece in a large quilt, or a pleated skirt with matching zipper, or maybe even napkins for the next dinner party.

I let my mind wander very often like this. The result of which is always the same: all I want to do with my time is sew. Not to sew in the sense of how a factory worker sews, or a tailor sews, or even an inexperienced fashion designer sews. I want to sew with no priorities and no expectations. To start with an idea and allow it to evolve naturally into itself. To start with two yards of fabric planned for a skirt, and end up with a dress that originally was meant to wrap with a waist tie, but instead has an aline skirt and a last minute added long zipper up the front with short sleeves sewn at the end and collar that trails off on one side because I didn't like how it looked as a regular collar. That is the kind of sewing I want to do.

So in the end is this something that I know to be true? This little store where I happen to pass and create a substantial amount of my time, energy, and dreaming? I suppose it is to me. This reality of seductive fabrics with an allure into a world of limitless creation is perhaps something of my own romanticism, but that's the point right there, it is mine and my reality only exists of what I believe and want to be true. So then is my work an inevitable invitation towards the preferred direction of my future, rather than the previously chosen major of my college carrier? That's really where this little essay is going. It's high on my mind, and it was bound to come out somehow. It's funny that it came out like this. But doesn't the saying go, the truth always comes out somehow?

Whose Woods These Are I Think I Know: Cecily Upton At Large (REPOST)

2010-07-18T10:43:00.000-07:00

Last week, I drove across Nebraska. Nebraska is a really BIG state. Big and Flat. It's January, so there wasn't much growing as I passed through, but the remnants of our nation's great corn industry fanned out before me in field after field of broken stalks and barren irrigation contraptions. I know most people think this part of the country is boring, and perhaps I did feel a tinge of boredom after 300 miles on I-80 with nary a curve in the road to distract me. But mostly I think Nebraska and her sister states of Iowa, Kansas, and the Dakotas, are beautiful. Beautiful in the way that Jennifer Grey was before she got her nose job…a little plain, but kind of wild and alluring just the same.

So, I'm driving through Nebraska and I start to notice that out among the broken corn stalks in 4 out of 10 fields are herds of stout, black cows foraging freely. Foraging freely? In Nebraska? This is a state firmly in the grips of Our Nation's Food System. Subsidies are handed out here like handshakes at a campaign rally. Aren't all those cows supposed to be penned up, in chains, unable to move, force-fed unnatural diets of grain and animal parts and injected with all sorts of horrible anti-biotics? Isn't that what Fast Food Nation and King Corn tell us? Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to say that doesn't happen, because it does. In fact, most, if not all, of those cows I saw munching away in the great open plains are destined for that very fate. Soon. And I passed those very feedlots the next day, in Colorado, and those animals are inhumanely jammed in there and there are MOUNTAINS of manure and it looks to be a pretty horrible existence. But, BUT, my east-coast, bleeding-heart, liberal, Slow Food sensibilities were kind of rocked when I saw those cows apparently enjoying themselves roaming freely amongst the corn stalks.

Then I got to thinking. And this is what I thought: what I'm seeing here might not be a quaint antithetical anecdote to the Evil Feedlot/Bionic Beef nightmare we know exists, but instead might be, in actuality, THE SADDEST INDICATOR OF HOW F***** UP OUR FOOD SYSTEM REALLY IS. Now, I'm still a little emotional about this, as you can tell. I'm going to try and lay this out clearly, but bear with me if it gets a little tangled. Here goes. These fields, in the spring, were most likely planted with GMO corn destined for one of three fates: feedlot grain, high-fructose corn syrup, or biofuel. Now, I need to make one thing clear: this corn is inedible. People cannot eat it. It can and will only be used for one of the three products I just listed. The farmers who grow this corn are most likely losing money on each acre and are subsidized by Uncle Sam to ensure the United States' bread-basket (note the irony here, given that these crops are not destined for food) remains productive. So, the sun shines, the fields are irrigated, the corn grows. Now in the good old days, some of these fields would be something other than corn and that other stuff would be harvested to feed animals like cows through the winter before a short diet of grain was imposed to fatten them up before slaughter.

I say a short diet of grain because grain is toxic to cows. Their stomachs can only tolerate it for a short period before it becomes infected, they sicken, and they die. Anyway, growing that other stuff became less and less profitable once the government began writing the checks. The government will really only write checks for corn and a few other, mostly non-edible, staples, so it didn't make much sense to be growing acres of crops that you wouldn't get paid for. Besides, science and technology had, in the meantime, invented all of these glorious drugs you could give your cows that prolonged the period that they could tolerate grain. So now you could send cattle to the feedlot at an earlier age, keep them on corn for longer, and they'd fatten up faster. Sounds like a win-win, right? Well, I think everyone reading this blog knows it's not, but I want to get back to the cows I saw munching away in the barren fields.

So, I'm driving along and I won't lie, my black Brooklyn heart warmed a bit when I saw those happy cows in the fields, but it soon iced back over when I realized the sad irony. Here were cows, spending their last short weeks before the feedlot, scavenging in snow-covered fields for the remnants of GMO corn that they would soon be force-fed in too-close quarters while standing in their own waste. These poor animals will never know what it feels like to follow their natural instincts. Over the years, they've had those instincts bred out of them. They're bred to eat, and eat they will, anything they can find. And in these fields, what they were finding would soon kill them. Then that heart got even colder and more ice-covered when I thought about this: what if those fields were used to grow actual food, for actual people. Food that nourished and provided our population with the nutrients and vitamins that many of us so desperately need. And what if, once that food had been harvested, the remnants of that system were left to be slurped up by hungry animals who could turn it not only into further nourishment, but also into natural fertilizer, making those fields even more productive next season. Ahh, what if? I'm no farmer, so I'm sure it's just a crazy idea dreamt up by a silly kid from the city who doesn't know what she's talking about, but I kind of feel like I might be on to something here.

by Cecily Upton

Songs

2010-07-02T21:02:00.000-07:00

that speak to me in tongues:

Broken Social Scene - Romance to the Grave

When I'm right I'm always wrong beneath the wise
Rolling through the way

(Further my luck tries to be the same )

When I'm wrong I'm almost right to breathe the miles
Coming through the haze

(Still like I thought)

I don't speak the tongues of finds within a life
Dying for a save

(Stop on gets on my)

I got buried with my try from the start
Romance to the grave

(Star)

And in your house you built to fail through all the eyes
Wanting what to say

(Followed by, keep on)

This might be the last of lied inside your lock
Only you can break

(For all these times, never mind )

Cause when your right you're never wrong to reach the high Low for you to wait

(Fall on days)

I don't lived for all that died
I just want to feel it again

The Plague

2010-06-23T20:44:00.000-07:00

I recently finished the fantastic work by Albert Camus entitled The Plague, and I thought I would share some quotes that I took down. Some are depressing (given the subject of the book), some are difficult to understand when taken out of context, however I feel they are all relevant in some way; either to my life, or your life, or to the understanding of life in general. It was an incredible book with a difficult subject and an extremely powerful, profound message on the purpose of existence and humanity. Camus has a way with his words that enlightens the mind while entertaining it, and I would highly recommend any and all of his works.

Part I -

"But what are a hundred million deaths? When one has served in a war, one hardly knows what a dead man is, after a while. And since a dead man has no substance unless one has actually seen him dead, a hundred million corpses broadcast through history are no more than a puff of smoke in the imagination."

"The thing was to do your job as it should be done."

Part II -

"...they had speedily to abandon the idea - anyhow, as soon as could be - once they felt the wounds that the imagination inflicts on those who yield themselves to it."

"One grows out of pity when it's useless."

"... since the great longing of an unquiet heart is to possess constantly and consciously the loved one, or, failing that, to be able to plunge the loved one, when a time of absence intervenes, into a dreamless sleep timed to last unbroken until the day they meet again."

"'And I, too, I'm no different. But what matter? Death means nothing to men like me. It's the event that proves them right.'"

"The evil that is in the world always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding. On the whole, men are more good than bad; that however, isn't the real point. But they are more or less ignorant, and it is this that we call vice or virtue; the most incorrigible vice being that of an ignorance that fancies it knows everything and therefore claims for itself the right to kill. The soul of the murderer is blind; and there can be no true goodness not true love without the utmost clear-sightedness."

"There was nothing admirable about this attitude; it was merely logical."

"'But since then I've done a bit of thinking.' / 'About what?' / 'Courage. I know now that man is capable of great deeds. But if he isn't capable of a great emotion, well, he leaves me cold.'"

"'Well, personally, I've seen enough of people who die for an idea. I don't believe in heroism; I know it's easy and I've learned it can be murderous. What interests me is living and dying for what one loves.'"

Part III -

"...since love asks something of the future."

Part IV -

"But when a man has had only four hours' sleep, he isn't sentimental. He sees things as they are; that is to say, he sees them in the garish light of justice - hideous, witless justice."

"In short, they were gambling on their luck, and luck is not to be coerced."

"... no matter how much work he had put in, he was always a ready listener and as agreeable companion."

"'Have you noticed' he asked me, ' that no one ever runs two diseases at once? Let's suppose you have an incurable disease like cancer of a galloping consumption - well, you'll never get plague or typhus; it's a physical impossibility. In fact, one might go farther; have you ever heard of a man with cancer being killed in an auto smash?'"

"'Do you know what I think? They're fretting simply because they won't let themselves go. And I know what I'm talking about.'"

"But I suspect that, just because he has been though it before them, he can't wholly share with them the agony of this feeling of uncertainty that never leaves them."

"'There's so much wickedness in the world,' she said. 'So what can you expect?'"

"'For nothing in the world is worth turning one's back on what one loves.'"

"'I know. I'm sorry. But weariness is a kind of madness.'"

"'But perhaps we should love what we cannot understand.'"

"True, the agony of a child wad humiliating to the heart and to the mid. But that was why we had to come to terms with it."

"... we must go straight to the heart of which is unacceptable, precisely because it is thus that we are constrained to make our choice."

"'One would like to do something to help him. But how can you help a judge?'"

"'... as you may see - that each of us has the plague within him; no one, no one on earth is free from it. And I know, too, that we must keep endless watch on ourselves lest in a careless moment we breathe in somebody's face and fasten the infection on him. What's natural is the microbe. All the rest - health, integrity, purity (if you like) - is a product of the human will, of a vigilance that must never falter. The good man, the man who infects hardly anyone, is the man who has the fewest lapses of attention. And it needs tremendous will-power, a never ending tension of the mind, to avoid such lapses.'"

"... that a loveless world is a dead world, and always there comes n hour when one is weary of prisons, of one's work, and of devotion to duty, and all one craves for is a loved face, the warmth and wonder of a loving heart."

Part V -

"... destruction is an easier, speedier process than reconstruction."

"There can be no peace without hope."

"... he was thinking it has no importance whether such things have or have not a meaning; all we need consider is the answer given to men's hope."

"They knew now that if there is one thing one can always yearn for and sometimes attain is human love."

"... and to state quite simply what we learn in time of pestilence: that there are more things to admire in men than to despise."

"... that the plague bacillus never dies or disappears for good; that it can lie dormant for years and years in furniture and linen-chests; that it bides its time in bedrooms, cellars, trunks, and bookshelves; and that perhaps the day would come when, for the bane and the enlightening of men, it would rouse up its rats again and send them forth to die in a happy city."

Sometimes I Feel

2010-06-17T20:24:00.000-07:00

As if I could not love life anymore than I do at this precise moment.

Today I had the pleasure of visiting and meeting the owner of Publicide, a very small letterpress business based out of the west village. I got to tour their small studio space and learn a thing or two about their beautiful heidelberg machines, which pushed me only into knowing that I have to own one later on in my life... The owner, Dusty, was extremely kind and willing to share his knowledge with me, and it was a truly wonderful visit.

The walk from their studio space uptown could not have been more wonderful. The weather today was perfectly warm and breezy, allowing the inhabitants of this crazy city an environment that could make them forget they were in an urban metropolis. Life seems to be ten million times easier when the weather is on your side.

Later on, I was sitting outside a cafe in the east village, attempting to finish The Plague, when I met Margaret Chesney. She had received a letter in the mail that she was having a hard time understanding, and she asked if I could interpret it for her. I guessed she was about eighty. Her rosy lipstick was smudged slightly around the edges of her mouth, and her eyebrows were thickly filled in as if she had taken an auburn crayon to them. She was very kind, and she explained to me the letter was about food stamps, and all she needed from these people was the application to reapply for her food stamps. After trying to help her sort out this ordeal, and after a few failed phone calls (apparently the representatives in the food stamp administration leave after 5, and it was 5:15) I walked Margaret up to the McDonalds on 6th st. She said she likes places where she can just sit and have a coffee and talk to people. I thought it was funny that she chose McDonalds for this, but alas to each his own. She had two poor legs that had been injured in a fall she had taken last year. She could walk alright- the right leg was much better than the left- but it was still pretty painful and we went very slowly. On the way up she told me she had been born and raised on 13th st and Ave A, and she was in fact 83. She joked with me, asking me to guess her age, but I told her I was poor at guessing such things. She asked if I'm Irish, and I told her I am, but I'm also German, French - she interrupted me and said, "Ah! I am German as well!" She was also Czech and Hungarian. "Spreken zie deutsch?" she asked. I laughed as replied, "Non, je parle francais, un peu." She found this pretty entertaining. She then told me she had just turned 83 on June 10th. Her few remaining siblings had called her to wish her a happy birthday- she had been one of eleven, but only 6 (I think she said 6) were left. Her son, who lives out in Long Island with his son, also called her. She described their phone conversation with a small smile on her face, and a sincere fondness in her words. She obviously loves her son deeply. When we got to the McDonalds, she waved to a man inside who was sitting eating a burger of some kind. "That's Bill." she said. I felt comfort knowing that there was someone she knew inside to keep her company. I had only spent about twenty minutes with this woman, but she was such a sweet person that I couldn't help but wish to keep her safe as much as I could. We parted with her telling me that I could find her at this McDonalds almost every night between 8 and 9. I think I'll go see her tomorrow and make sure she's called about her food stamps.

Yoga was fantastic. I've been having trouble with my left knee, to the point where I've been experiencing a lot of pain in the side of and it's beginning to swell. Trisha, the owner, told me yesterday it probably had something to do with my putting all my weight on the outsides of my legs. Since then I've been focussing on rebalancing into the center of my feet when I walk and when I practice, and today I realized that my right leg is extremely weak on it's inside and the knee is hardly strong at all but my right hip is very flexible, while my left knee and leg is in fact very strong but my left hip is very compressed. Then when standing I noted that I can stand with my left foot and leg in perfect alignment, while my right foot is pointed slightly outward and my leg bevels outward also. This may not seem like much, but it explains the whole reason why my left knee is in so much pain! I had this horrible fear that I was going to have to go to the doctor and possibly get some kind of terrible surgery on my knee at the young age of 20, and I was going to be miserable. But no! I just have to continue to focus my balance on the center of my soles, and make right knee stronger through the inside, and voila! I should be back to normal! Then I can resume my walking over the bridge and boycotting the subway as much as possible...

So, in conclusion I had a fantastically simple wonderful productive interesting day. A few other things took place, but really I don't need to document everrryyyything. Just a few things. Lastly I just want to write that I was looking through my "etc." folder which contains my entire image inspiration collection, and some pictures made my heart well-up with love. It's amazing how simple memories, colors, combinations can make one feel completely whole with the love life is always generously handing out and secretly passing around. Truly amazing.

And now.... to the logos!

Alpha Bet

2010-06-16T20:55:00.001-07:00

Today after yoga I went to EarthMatters to write and read a little. When I ran out of paper I pulled out a small blank canvas that Gregg had given me and contemplated drawing on it. Instead I ended up writing some more. Here's what I scribbled out:

Let's draw something. All I know is letters. I could fill this whole canvas with letters and only letters and call it my drawing. The construction of letters and the purity of their meaning has always astounded me. How each letter has it's own history and way in which it has come into existence. It's fascinating. How, when combined, a simple T and O can equal a meaning that people around the world understand as "TO" the preposition, an indication of approach and arrival. Letters letters letters. I have been interested in letters for ages it seems. The structures, the subtle characteristics... what makes an R an R? The stem exaggerated on the left? The loop around the top half of the stem? The arching leg, seductively pushing outward? The R asks for a rrrrrroll of the tongue, the roundness of a rhombus, the running start of a roller coaster marathon. The R is rugged, rouged, rowdy, riddled, and rude. It is wrong, it is right, it is righteous. The R holds a world inside itself, as do all of the other letters of the alphabet, and it is these worlds that we toy with and explore every day. We expand their universe with every use of their characteristics, but stil they can only go so far, can't they? One must remember there are languages with characters, and then there are languages without spoken word or the combinations of characters. [The combination of characters - words].

But we must consider the animals. Our main reason for the creation of characters was to establish common communication. But animals have the seemingly un-human ability to know by either a language communicated through the body or through the mind. Little spoken sounds are made. This is something achievable by man- most definitely- but we have over the centuries become so depended on spoken language and it's ability to disguise what we physically or mentally are feeling that we turned off those "vocal chords" almost completely. Our bodies speak. Our emotions speak. But we have become mind-centric and in turn we have begun to misinterpret our bodies and emotions. They are clouded by our thoughts. But as pure animals as we once were, we found communication with our fellow human beings as well as with the earth around us. Our desire to communicate and record the history lead to documentation through hieroglyphics and slowly the beginnings of a written language. The first characters being primitive interpretations of the animals and earth around us, slowly evolving into the simplistic symbols as we now know them. Astonishing how time can confuse the evolution of creatures. We consider ourselves to be in progression with our machines and ways of simplifying life for ourselves and out future generations, but the simplicities we are creating are allowing new dependencies and new eases- new shortcuts that pull us further and further from our true existences. Our true beings. We are becoming less and less human.

Now what does that mean? Unless something globally catastrophic occurs, this mechanically technological progression into the external material goods we are more and more identifying ourselves with will not end. So will we just accept the "evolution" into becoming half human half machine? Is that destined to be our future? Or do we want something different? Can we find a way to re-involve our senses with the purity of the earth around us as well as utilize our technological advancements to further our race? Or is that an idealistic impossible idea? Or is our society a phase in history? We each choose I guess...

A little vague I guess, but it was just a train of thought, really.

To the memory of birds and sculptors

2010-06-02T08:37:00.000-07:00

The Alaotra Grebe, a bird native to the largest lake in Madagascar was declared extinct last week. Apparently it hadn't been seen since September 1985.

Louise Bourgeois, an incredible contributor to the art and sculpting community also died last week. She was 98.

Such is life.

30 things

2010-06-02T08:24:00.000-07:00

One of my TA's from last year has been trying to start his own class at one of the art college's here in New York. He's a fantastic designer and wonderful human being by the name of Shawn Hasto, and he's recruited my type class from last year as his guinea pigs for this proposal. The first assignment he's given us is a documentation exercise where we must honestly record the last thirty purchases we have made. I decided to use my crude drawing skills and a little photoshoping to complete the assignment- it was pretty fun.

Only Music pt. II

2010-06-01T20:32:00.000-07:00

This one too... except this one makes my teeth tremble

Only music

2010-06-01T19:51:00.000-07:00

This song tugs so hard on my heart strings (don't watch, just listen) ♥

I miss you

2010-05-25T20:02:00.000-07:00

Something I miss about California

Something I don't miss so much about Califonia.

But overall, California, I miss you

2010-05-20T17:55:00.000-07:00

I could have sworn there were more pictures attached to this set, but unfortunately I only have these few I guess. After some time had passed since the opening of Alice and Wonderland, Laura and Erica and I decided to get together and have a Alice and Wonderland Day. We first met at Alice's Tea Cup for a bite and some tea and many many laughs. Then we got the bright idea to go to the Disney store and see what kind of Alice and Wonderland things they had for us to look at, but instead of going to fifth avenue where the store actually was, we went to times square where we thought it was... instead of being sadly mistaken we chose to pop into the enormous Toys R Us store over there. We road the ferris wheel (which was amazing!) and then toured the floor for a good time. We found the lego structures, the Barbie house (total let down), and best of all we found the Twilight gift shop!

legos!
Barbie!

Laura's Barbie doppelganger

Erica's Barbie (?) doppelganger
My Barbie doppelganger
WHICH ONE?!?!?!

OH YEAH

We had decided to go up to Astoria, where Laura and Erica live, to see the movie, and on the walk over we found this ^ a night club called Amnesia. Amazing.

Hurry, we're going to be late

2010-05-20T17:43:00.000-07:00

Even I haven't been posting- that doesn't mean I haven't been using my camera phone! I've got quite the collection of pictures that I've accumulated in that little piece of plastic I'm so attached to, so I best start posting them.

My first set is from my friend Erin's birthday... about two months ago, hah! We threw her a surprise birthday party at a karaoke bar and I was able to capture a few good ones with my measly phone.

Consumer waste is mostly created out of hygienic fear

2010-05-18T21:35:00.000-07:00

Today was an especially glum day. The sky was drizzling for the better half of it, and the chill is back in the air. You would think summer would finally be here to stay considering it's mid-May, but alas it is not. Hopefully soon though. So after a few hours of work today, I headed home to watch my new netflix movie No Impact Man. In case you don't know the story, it's about a man and his family and their decision to not impact the environment for a whole year. They do this in steps and stages, but after six months they've already gotten to no toilet paper, no electricity, no food grown outside of 250 miles, no environmentally damaging transportation such as cars, planes, elevators, etc, and many other limitations. The movie, although it seemed very difficult, did not seem very out of reach. The family was extremely inspiring, and the wife, who started out pretty damn resistant, gave in mid way through the movie. It was a movie that couldn't help but make you reconsider your daily decisions: the coffee in the morning in that paper cup, the sandwich wrapper, the TOILET PAPER, the car, and just overall all the garbage. It's astounding when you really think about it. There are so many things that I purchase without considering the consequences, but as human beings (not even being human beings in this day and age) it doesn't make sense for us to not be thinking about the before and after of our purchases. I guess this is me really thinking about making more adult decisions here.

But the most astounding thing about the movie was afterward I was thinking about the couple and visualizing this one particular scene where they're riding through times square on their bikes, and I was thinking they were just being human. And they were- all of the choices they were making forced them entirely away from any pre-developed system, any system that is considered "standard" really in our society. And they were living and making their choices out of entirely natural and pre-societal ideals. They were acting as pure humans- devoid of not all but most man made distractions and "necessities" as we now see them. That was the most inspiring part. They were able to live in this concrete metropolis of a city and be completely harmless and conscious and thoughtful and it was incredible.

I would be stupid to not try and change things in my life after seeing that movie, so here are a few things I'm thinking of doing:

1. not buying any new clothing, for a least a year (bc I definitely don't need any)

2. making the majority of, if not all, of my household cleaning products and body products (such as laundry detergent, body lotion, etc)

3. only eating out if it's at a place that uses recyclable dishware (I'm talking metal utensils and ceramic plates, not "recyclable" paper plates and plastic utensils that I take home and reuse for a couple days)

4. buying as much as I can from the farmers market

5. trying to convince my roommate to let us have a compost bin :) - we can keep it on the fire escape, yeah?

So wish me luck!

No Excuses

2010-05-17T22:59:00.000-07:00

This is just a post to say- although it has been just over two months- I have not died.

But I do have a whole list of things that have been going on in my life that have pulled me away from posting anything up here.

However... these things, although I am listing them for you as some kind of way to ask forgiveness, are no excuse for not posting... at all ... in two months.

Anyway, here's the list (in no particular order):

1. school

2. portfolio

3. work (rugby)

4. internship

5. moving

6. finals

7. lack of internet after moving

8. end of the year parties

9. more walks over the willyburg bridge

10. bikram yoga

11. organizing the insane collection of stuff that I have accumulated

12. reading

13. friends

14. talks with cecylia (really.. they last for HOURS)

15. and an overall attempt to not touch my computer as much (not smart considering I do graphic design....?)

So there you have it... there's definitely a lot of other things distracting me from posting on my little blog, but they're probably not as big of obstacles as the above have been.

But as a side note- now that it's summertime and I'm trying ever so hard to get a set schedule of work and play organized- I do plan on posting a whole lot more.

Ugh. Wish me luck

A Summary of more than a statistic

2010-03-13T21:37:00.001-08:00

Alfredo Jaar's Rwanda Projects

David Strauss

My Summary

David Strauss' article begins with when Alfredo Jaar first arrived in Africa in 1994. He started out in Paris, then flew to Kampala, then to Uganda, and finally Kigali, Rwanda with his assistant Carlos Vasquez. Kigali had been destroyed to a point where the dead outnumbered the living. They began to meet people and accumulate stories, and one day Jaar stumbled upon a post office where he bought the last of the Rwandan postcards. He began to write the names of the people he met on the backs of these post cards, with the phrase "is still alive!" below them, and sent them to friends and colleagues back home. On one side of the card there would be an image of a beautiful Rwandan scene and on the other a simple statement of hope. This action became called Signs of Life and was Jaar's first Rwanda project. It contained a direct message, with layers of art-historical reference and reversed meaning, and created a kind of "engaged conceptualism."

Jaar and Vasquez teamed up with a Swiss journalist and Japanese reporter to document further findings around Rwanda, most of which were at refugee camps around the city. On August 29, 1994 they visited a church about 40 kilometers south of Kigali where four hundred men, women, and children had been murdered four months earlier. Strauss then talks of how Jaar had taken photographs at practically every moment, and in some cases the camera was the bridge between himself and the indirect beyond the lense, but other times it reminded him only of "the futility of a gaze that arrives too late." He later stated that his opinion of a "good photograph" became one that came, " as close as possible to reality. But the camera never manages to record what your eyes see, or what you feel at the moment. The camera always creates a new reality."

Jaar could not look at his images for two years. He was given the opportunity to show his images in Sweden in the November of 1994, and he found he couldn't do it. He instead filled the light-boxes in which the images would be shown with the name "Rwanda" over and over and over, calling to the people of Sweden to see, to acknowledge, and remember. It wasn't until his show at the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago in January of 1995 did Jaar first display his photographs of the genocide. In sixty, very carefully selected images he showed "the massacres, the refugee camps, the destruction of cities." Each image became contained in a black linen box with a silk-screen white written description of the image on top. The boxes were then arranged into stacks and into monuments. Jaar has described the images as being "buried" in the black boxes, and the show as a "cemetery of images." Strauss also argues the show feels like an archive, and that when stored in a such a way the images "accumulate a charge, so that the monuments begin to operate like batteries: image batteries." He then compares Jaar's work to that of Maya Lin's Vietnam War memorial in that it holds the same simple aesthetic, and with it comes the power and force of the message.

Then in June of 1995 Jaar created an installation entitled Let there be Light, which was of ten light-boxes each displaying a different name of a different place in which a total of one million people had been killed in three months' time. Each name was made of light, and when a person stood before them, the name of the place reflected on their face. The second part of the installation was a light-box holding a mechanism that allowed four images to appear in rotation. The four images were of two boys, on holding onto the other, and by the fourth image they are both resting their heads on one another, with their arms around the other back. This "quadvision" light-box was used again at Jaar's next show entitled The Eyes of Gutete Emerita. Two of these boxes were placed side by side- in one a ten line description of the woman Jaar and Vasqeuz has met outside the Church south of Kigali whose family has been massacred with machetes in front of her. The text then fades into a five lines of description about this woman, Gutete Emerita's, eyes and how much tragedy they hold. Then there are two lines of text: " I remember her eyes. The eyes of Gutete Emerita" and then two images of her eyes extremely close up flash before the viewer. Strauss describes how he became very sick after this experience, and he still feels sick when remembering back to it. He states that the experience is one that attempts to "recover the power of the image" and Jaar has gotten to "the point where an image can make sense again."

The Eyes of Gutete Emerita appear again in February of 1996. This time the text is written very small on a black wall, and it leads you down to the end of that wall. Once you reach the end you turn a corner, and around the corner is a pile of one million 35mm slides of Gutete Emerita's eyes. When one picks up the slide, they come face to face, or rather eye to eye, with Jaar's intention, that you can not turn away from the massacre when you have grabbed it and brought it directly into your sight. This installation appeared two more times, and in the third time Jaar presented a new story about the children of Rwanda. The wall tells of the orphans and the children who had lost either the will to live from pain, or their trust in the world around them. One child is called out in the story who could not speak for four weeks. Nduwayezu, 5, had looked directly at Jaar's camera and Jaar couldn't forget him. This installation came to be titled The Silence of Nduwayezu, and with it came three images, one of the tea fields along the road to the church, one of the road on the way to the church, and one of the church with wisps of clouds above it and sign next to it reading, "bodies, 500?"

Strauss then argues that Jaar's Rwanda works attempt to enlighten the world of it's silence and inaction during the genocide, and to bring it as far as it can into reality and remembrance. He compares it to a few famous paintings of war, asking if art should be or can be doing these things. He then discusses how the proliferation of the image has made the representation of life mediocre, and that due to our bombardment of visuals on a moment to moment basis we are becoming numb to the effects and meanings held within these images. He argues this by quoting Stalin who said, " A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic." Statistics are a way to passively learn about a huge amount of information, where as tragedies are difficult individual experiences. However, the statistic of one million people dying is, in actuality, the same experience of the tragedy, but a million times over. This is our days issue- to attempt to acknowledge this information and reprocess it to it's full meaning. One must focus on the individual, and the connection and possibility of that one individual, in order to feel the full effect of a statistic.

Strauss ends by saying the "terrible truth" about photographs is that they can never show was it currently happening. They are of the past, and they hold what happened in the past- therefore being about something that is gone. This was Jaar's frustration: "the futility of a gaze that arrives too late." But he finds himself, after two years of avoiding the images, and he finds himself in Guete Emerita, "through the most basic human encounter, eye to eye."

Tortilla Bike Wheels

2010-03-08T20:50:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I met up with Cecylia for a late lunch/ coffee walk/ talk sesh. She took me to this wonderful place called The Ace Hotel which is hands down one of the coolest, jazziest, most beautifully typographically decorated hotel I've seen in a very long time. We went to the cafe they had on the ground floor called Stumptown, which not only had fantastic coffee, but lovely baristas and a beautiful bar space where one could look out on the street and enjoy the view of the passers by. But we sat in the lobby area which is so attractive that I plan on going back just to sit and work sometime.

Before we left, Cecylia and I stopped by the bathrooms downstairs, and on our way up we found this lovely and clever gem of the hotel (well... one of the many gems)

The funny thing about this picture is that it was the 323rd picture I took on my phone. What a cowinky dink :)

After we left we headed down to SoHo for some vegan pizza at Grandaisy Bakery, which actually used to supply my old work (the recently closed down Dean & Deluca on University Place) with pizza. It was nice to revisit the old flavors of these delicious slices. I had the zuchini and the potato.

It's always so wonderful talking with Cecylia. I feel so lucky to have made such a great friend in this city which is still so foreign to me.

The last picture of our day is of a bike from one of Cecylia's favorite shoe stores. I feel it's appropriate because not only is it a beautiful structure and piece of art, but bikes were a kind of theme of the day.

Any time you like

2010-03-07T22:44:00.000-08:00

There were a few wonderful walks that I had recently. The first was on my way back from another photography viewing in Chelsea. It was a cold day, a little dark because I think it was about to rain. I had just bought a few sunflowers for a presentation I was giving, and it was just about 4:30. Walking through the residential area of Chelsea is always pleasant. The brownstones are all beautiful to stare at while walking past. On this walk I also happened to find this funny car, and so I thought I would take a picture.Another wonderful walk was a morning that just recently passed. I had stayed at a friends house the night before, and on the walk back I decided to walk to a coffee shop a little further away, on Bedford and S. 2nd, just for fun. While I was sitting outside, trying to soak up as much of the suns warmth as possible, a man came up with his three legged dog. The dog sat with me the whole time it's owner was inside and nuzzled my knees. Although I didn't get a picture of the dog, I did get a picture of the view from where I was sitting. Nerm and I are hoping to move to this side of williamsburg when we move in April, and maybe I'll be seeing this view more frequently then.

The last wonderful walk was the one I took with Nerm across the Williamsburg Bridge the other day. It was the first true day of Spring, and the weather was absolutely perfect outside. Nerm has never walked across the bridge before, so she decided to join me on my journey into the city. It's always so great walking over the bridge with someone who has never done it before. She got so excited! We talked about how wonderful it is to live in this amazing city, and how often we don't realize where we are. Once we got into the city we were walking down Houston, and I saw this weird gorilla thing being sold, and I had to ask Nerm to take a picture of me under it.

I love walking ♥

The Blushing Ivy

2010-03-07T22:33:00.000-08:00

In between the time I last posted in February and now I've have a few great nights in and a few great nights out with friends. They've often included great food, but the best part of the evenings in the great company.

One night I went out with Dorian and his roommates, and while they ate their real wings I drank my "vegan wings" aka water.

This was my attempted picture of the three muskateers, but it obviously didn't come out too great.

Another night we went out for Katie's birthday at Taco Chulo- and now I'm going to be hooked on their vegan burritos which is terribly dangerous since it's just right around the corner. Arg!

This was Chelsey's five dollar chicken taco- it was grilled chicken on cheese and a tiny tortilla.

This was another night, kind of a quite evening, but Nerm couldn't get her boot off so Keenan had to help her.

No one get's worried

2010-03-07T22:26:00.000-08:00

The last snow storm was a few weeks ago, but I took some beautiful pictures of the foot or so of snow. It was an incredible storm, and I'm so glad we got one last round of white before spring hit. Now the weather is getting warmer, and there won't be any more snow for many months. Every year I say I'm going to go to Central Park and take pictures, and I never end up doing it. Maybe next year...

A few weeks ago

2010-03-07T22:21:00.000-08:00

When we were developing our ideas for this poster assignment, that I just posted about below, one of the girls in my class, Justina, came in with her dinosaur type. Justina is one of the girls whose work I am always excited to see. It's always very creative, very fun, and very much her. I loved her dinosaur lettering so much, I asked her if I could take a picture of it, so that I might always see it.

So It's been a while

2010-03-07T21:57:00.000-08:00

I've been terrible with my posting lately. But school has just been taking over my life. Thankfully, spring break is here and I can catch up on all the pictures I've been meaning to post. I have so many, and I'm so excited to finally be putting them up. But first, here is the final poster design that I did for my "Unresolved Pictures" story. The black side is the front, with all of my little hand written details, and the image is the back- jupiter's purple clouds.

Astonish Us

2010-02-24T19:32:00.000-08:00

So there are always reoccurring themes within our life, yes? Things, subjects, objects, ideas, people, that pop up repeatedly, always... not necessarily haunting us... but stalking us. One of those things for me is Kate Spade. Now, I know this is sounding a little silly, because everyone knows who Kate Spade is. She is practically a household name, and her brand is almost ubiquitous due to it's loveliness and pleasantness. However, Kate Spade has also been thoroughly involved in my life since I was very young. I have very fond memories of going up to Los Angeles with my mother and shopping for things like Kate Spade and Michael Star and always taking a trip to Anthropologie. She had always had a sweet spot in my heart because of those memories, and for some reason I never thought that the brand was big enough for many other people to hold it the way I do. But actually many people know and love Kate Spade the way I do, and over time I've had to accept this.

So when I left California I didn't think I would run into another situation where the Spade name came up would come up with as much sincerity as my memories hold, and there I was very wrong. My professor John Fullbrook has brought up the Spades many a time as a perfect example of a perfect brand. He's discussed their methods and values and patterns over and over, and every time I realize more and more that it's those points that he's discussing that make me love the brand and have such a connection to it in addition to the memories with my mother.

So when Kate Spade came up again at the beginning of this semester I wasn't very surprised. I was surprised however when I opened up my New York Magazine Spring Fashion issue to find a whole 4 pager about the Spades. The article seemed to capture their personalities completely. The honesty, the friendliness, and the casual but dignified presence they must radiate wherever they go. They are so utterly charming, that I did want the article about them to end. I wanted to absorb as much of their loveliness as I possibly could and carry it with me in my back pocket at all times!

The Optical Unconcsious

2010-02-23T18:52:00.000-08:00

So today I was supposed to present my LOCAL project, but we got to listen to a talk by Brian Collins instead. He was so thoroughly inspiring, and the speech reminded me of everything I desire to become as a graphic designer. I don't necessarily want to be a "graphic designer" but I want to be a design thinker. The way that he discussed our history, our present, and our responsibility as designers to assist in the design of our future was from a level that was engulfed in the idea of hope. His favorite statement is, "Design is Hope made visible," and after hearing him discuss the way that he's approached some of these projects I know that design has the capacity to effect the way we think and if we change the way we think we change the way we act, and it can all lead to a better, more fulfilling, for purposeful life and future. He touched slightly on the fate of the planet with regards to global warming and our global depression (not just financially, but emotionally) and our negative outlook on the future, but it was more about seeing how he has accomplished the projects that aid in the positive reconstruction of the future that were most inspiring and seemingly graspable. As he spoke all I kept thinking was how much I have to be like this man, and if I ever doubted a purpose behind my passion for design, he is the example of the purpose personified. Needless to say it was a great speech.

And I have my designs basically ready for next week.. I have a few things I'm going to touch up, and a few addition pieces to print out to push my product, but here is where I am as of now:

Don't tell them!

2010-02-21T20:04:00.000-08:00

In other random news, here are a few random pictures that I enjoyed taking but sadly have neglected until now:

Today this little girl was screaming, " Take a card! Take a card! Take a card!" across the street for about 30 minutes.

Then there was a fire down the street! {the red in the picture isn't the flames, but it's the sirens from the police cars}

Then I tried to take a picture of the sirens in the apartment, but this is all I got.

These are top secret pictures from my professor's office!!! shhh!!!

and this last one is my favorite of last week. Man and Nature as one in the snow

Did you by any chance tell him we're underage?

2010-02-21T19:38:00.000-08:00

Last week we went to a few more gallery shows for out next photo crit paper on intention (which I should be writing right now... actually) and we got to see some pretty cool artists and read what they have to say about themselves. First we saw Aaron Siskind, who for a very formalist photographer was fascinating. Each of his pieces was very close, but very felt, and you could see almost a new world and a new figure and a whole array of emotion in a one image. They were very delicate, but with some grime on the coating, and they were great.

Then we travelled on down the road to see Wolfgang Tillmans work at the Andrea Rosen Gallery. Right of the bat I hated his stuff. Nothing seemed interesting about it, and the more I got to know about the guy the more I realized that's his schtick. He is constantly changing his style to have no style and to never appease anyone. I can respect that, but I didn't see anything appealing to my aesthetic at all. Then I kept looking and I realized he's actually really fucking amazing. Not only are his images extremely easy to get into, but, avoiding all traditional design or formalism in any sense, they are completely alive, which make the lack of formalism ok. You can look at each picture and really truly feel the life of each one. It was strange, because you would think that most images can do that, but in actuality they don't. His pictures have breath and a beating heart. However my terrible phone photos aren't going to do them any justice, so check out his website instead

oh, and they also have humor. Plus!

Lastly we went to see the Alex Prager show at the Yancey Richardson Gallery. Apparently Alex is an entirely self taught photographer from California who believes that woman are always acting.

This show was also interestingly paired with a few selections from Garry Winogrand's "Women are Beautiful" series, in which he states "Whenever I have seen an attractive woman, I've done my best to photographer her. I don't know if all the women in the photographs are beautiful, but I know that the women are beautiful in the photographs." And all the world's a stage.

Did you remember to send me that email?

2010-02-21T19:24:00.000-08:00

Part of the reason why I've been so unable to reach this blog is because I've also been devoting 50% of my thinking to this package design project we've been working on in one of my classes. I posted some logo options before, but it's evolved way past that now. In doing some research for the packaging I took a few pictures. Here's the first half:

mmmmuji

I heart anthropologie!!

Then after some examining, I did some gathering and purchasing:

the people in the container store thought I was crazy- I cleaned off the display on this shelf to examine my own.

Then after some purchasing I did a little designing, and this was my first go at:

Then I just finished the mock up for my second go at, and tomorrow final go at: {a not so great picture}

I'll be sure to upload better images later... and further information about my LOCAL company!

Do you ever want to get married again?

2010-02-21T19:17:00.000-08:00

This year I had the privilege of spending my Valentine's eve with 7 lovely young ladies, taking tons of pictures with them, going out to a delicious italian dinner with them, and then going dancing for HOURS with them. And then on Valentine's Day morning (very early in the morning) I stopped by my favorite bar, just to be walked home by my favorite bartender (don't worry mom and day, he just walked me to my door) which was a beautiful way to start off the day of romance. Then around 3pm my roommates + Chelsey and I got brunch and laughed about too many silly little things to count. It was hands down a great weekend.

Here are a few pictures from the Pre-V-Day warm up:

we took so many pictures!!!

They're getting a piano

2010-02-21T18:45:00.000-08:00

So, I haven't been keeping my promise about posting every day.... or even every other day for that matter... but that isn't to say I haven't been taking pictures! Last week was a rough we for a lot of people. It seemed like everyone I talked to was having literally the worst day or days they've ever had, and it was awful. But despite all of the pain we went through we all made it out alright.

I had my day on Thursday. I cried for four hours, and I just couldn't stop. It was like all of the frustration and stress and anger and fear and everything just all came out, and at my internship no less. I haven't felt that weak in a very long time. But the more I cried the better I felt, and by the end of the day I was feeling stronger. Then that night I had one of my reoccurring dreams, but this time it was from a scene I hadn't dreampt before. Over the years I've had a dream about a world war that I'm running away from but trying to solve at the same time. Everything is destroyed and it's all with nuclear weapons. But when I deampt the dream the time it was at the very beginning, just as the war was starting.

I was in an apartment with my 7 or so siblings. I was almost the oldest, and the others were a mix of boys and girls. We didn't like our mother, see was much older and couldn't relate to us at all, but our father was a lot of fun but always at work. In this scene we were all on the second story of our two story apartment, which was part of a larger apartment building. It was night and the city was glowing outside. We were about to put in a movie, but when I put it on, I realized it was full of war and scary scenes that I didn't think would be appropriate for my younger siblings. But the movie kept playing and all of a sudden we were in the movie. The movie was the war that was starting up all around us, but since I had seen the movie before (and this is when I realized in the dream that the movie had been one of my previous dreams) and I knew how it ended, I stayed calm.

All of a sudden our mother is coming up the stairs and outside there are electrical currents coming up from the ground and grouping together around tops of lightpolls that are 20 stories high. We're watching this all from our balcony, and I realize we have to go get our father because he knows how to save us and he knows the answer to the war. I run downstairs and start to grab my things, my keys, my cell phone and I put them all in my pockets, not bringing anything I can't put in my pockets. Two of my little sisters decide they're coming with me, one very young, about 10, and the other probable 15. Because I know what will happen, and I know they will be alright, I tell them its okay.

All around us water is beginning to pour through the corners of ceilings, and outside everything is either disintegrating or crumbling to pieces. I run upstairs to say goodbye to the rest of my family and reassure them that everything will be okay. When I get close to the top I see them turning to stone, and I remember that's a good thing- they will be turned to stone and after the war they will be able to return back to themselves. They will be safe this way. They look so scared, but I keep telling them it will be okay. The war will be long, and we will fight hard, but in the end everything will be okay.

When I woke up I told Nerm this and she said that must be how must be feeling right now, after having such a difficult day the day before. Probably. But it's definitely a huge reassurance to myself.

On another, kind of related note, this is a picture my intern boss took of me hard at work. This is what I get to look at 3 days out of the week :)

Meow York

2010-02-14T13:50:00.000-08:00

http://cuteanimals.todaysbigthing.com/2009/11/30
check it!

You could be in my space

2010-02-10T12:29:00.000-08:00

In honor of all of the free time the snow day has given me, and also in avoidance of making my pop up book, I decided to do a little documenting of my room. All of the little things I love about my space.

Equilateral, Equidistant, Equilibrium

2010-02-10T12:23:00.000-08:00

One of the cooler things I've made

I'm Enamored

2010-02-10T11:51:00.000-08:00

Video phone!

I keep dreaming about California

2010-02-10T10:35:00.000-08:00

My first snow day! Yesterday all of the New York public schools and most of the private universities sent out mass emails saying that SCHOOL IS CLOSED! Wooohoo! I've never had a snow day before, and I really want to go make a snowman and make snow angels and just go play in it all in the park. But it's still snowing like crazy outside and the winds are pretty intense so it might have to wait until later. What would be super cool is if it didn't stop snowing like this until tomorrow night... that way we could have TWO SNOW DAYS!! Just like the movie. The pictures above are from this morning when the snow was kind of tapering off. I took them outside my local coffee shop. But the pictures below are of what going on now. These were taken from out my window.

We were on the cusp of the storm

2010-02-10T10:27:00.000-08:00

Every morning I pass by the City Reliquary museum on my way to the subway. I've never actually been inside, but the window displays always catch my eye. They usually have something to do with the history of Brooklyn in some way. This week there's a display of unicorn collectors items, the relevancy of which I'm not too sure of. But I thought it was cute regardless.

Towards the end of the evening Jason and I went to chat at Irving Farm coffee shop where I purchased this beautiful soy latte. I love when people take the time to make the little things beautiful. I had to take a picture of how pretty my little evening latte looked.

Obsequious: obedient or attentive to an excessive or servile degree

2010-02-09T20:37:00.001-08:00

My ideas and small exploration for my LOCAL company which is a line of health and beauty products made entirely from California. I'm very excited to see where this is going to go!

Time To Breathe

2010-02-08T22:06:00.000-08:00

Last week I also had the opportunity to travel down to The Bowery Presents' office in the Lower East Side. I've been there before, but this time I was going as an errand for my new internship, which made it interesting since BP is my old internship. However, that's really not the important part. The important part was that the walk down there was so wonderfully refreshing, and the weather was absolutely perfect. We were right on the cusp of the storm (the storm that never actually reached us) and they air smelt and tasted of snow waiting to arrive.

On the way down I saw these giant rolls of wire, and I thought, "No where else in the world would you just be walking down the street and see enormous bundles of wire beside New York."

Then this was just a little sign in the BP building that I thought needed to be in my scrapbook.

What question did you ask?

2010-02-08T21:48:00.000-08:00

Last week we held out Photo Criticism class in Chelsea. I got out of my internship early to make sure I would make it to the other side of town on time, but I still got there early. So I took a few pictures of the environment.

Then I decided to walk towards the river. I miss the water.

The look-back

Then I went back to meet with my class to view the Patti Smith exhibit. It was a bit chaotic, but interesting. Her exhibit was a lot like this blog, just a collection of stuff.

Then we went to a few other galleries. This photographer, whose name I don't remember, takes these environmental stills and then manipulates them in photoshop. Although they are not completely organic photographs, they are still beautiful and interesting at such large scales.

We also went to the Diane Arbus/ William Eggleston exhibit. I didn't take much from Eggleston, he's very very flat, but Arbus' work at this show was a little more archaically formalist and held an eery sense of nostalgia. I liked them a lot more.

Treats

2010-02-03T19:10:00.000-08:00

I've been meaning to upload these random pictures for a while. They're each from different days of last month, but I never got around to posting them. But it's never too late!

Vegan deliciousness at the General Store! Sometimes it's really hard resisting these fresh bake goodies in the morning time with my coffee.... so sometimes I'll get a cookie.

This is not the snow from yesterday, but from just about a week ago. I'm still enamored by the snow.

This is a terrible picture of this, but it's awesome! VEGAN DOGS!!!

This one was also just the other day. I was walking to work and just a half a block up University Place was a giant cake being attacked by a gaggle of pigeons! I think the cake had once said Happy Birthday too.

Unresolved Pictures

2010-02-03T18:40:00.001-08:00

For my Typography class we were given a fun new assignment for this week. Our TA Shawn would send us an image and we had to write a 300+ word story, essay, poem, etc. on the imagery. Well... not necessarily on the imagery, but somehow related or... something. This is the image and story I came up with:

Unresolved Pictures
A Short Story
by Hollis Maloney

We didn't know what to expect when we went to Jupiter. Like any other human who hadn't been outside the atmosphere, the idea of traveling into space was very expansive. All of my friends had tons of pictures from their travels throughout our galaxy- pictures of them jumping into the moons craters, pictures of them having sand fights on Mars, but I on the other hand had not been able to space-trot as most had. When I told people I had never been outside Earth they looked at me as if I had said I had never seen an alien (which of course I have), and then proceeded to tell me how much I'd been missing.

We boarded the spaceplane with about 32 or so other people. This was a smaller plane because we weren't traveling too far past our planet, and it would be a relatively quick ride there- just under 2 days. Even though there was snow on the ground, seeing as it was mid February, everyone was dressed for the warm sunny weather we would meet once we arrived. Some obvious tourists were wearing the cliche tourist outfit- their latex short suits with socks and sandals. You would think after hundreds of years after the end of individual fashion people would learn that socks and sandals looked ridiculous and made no real sense. But people will be people I guess.

We found our seats were at the very back of the plane, which I didn't mind. I had the seat next to the window which was all I cared about. I wanted to see everything on our way up there- the change in atmospheric colors, all of the stars we would be passing, and, once we got closer to Jupiter, all of the purple clouds that would be floating over the planet's surface. Purple clouds, in my opinion, were going to be the coolest thing about Jupiter.

I began to think about what it was going to look like once we got there. At this time of year the mid-low eastern domain of Jupiter in it's 5th section, where we were going, had the most beautiful weather. Sun all day and night, but always no more then 27 degrees celsius, and always a perfect light breeze. I couldn't wait to get out of the cold and into that picturesque warmth. I imagined myself sunbathing on the sand with nothing but the shapes of those purple clouds above me to think about.

The spaceplane attendant made the announcement that we would be, "taking off in 10... 9... 8..." A rush of excitement flew through me. "This is it!" I thought. "I'll finally be able to see what everyone else I know has seen! The Universe and I will finally meet!" I turned towards the window, anticipating the quick jolt of the lift off. "4... 3... 2..." I plugged in my head phones, turned on Daft Punk, and we were off!

Technical Snap Snaps

2010-01-31T08:28:00.000-08:00

I finally got some film developed.

You're in My Heart

2010-01-30T22:47:00.000-08:00

Get a real job

2010-01-27T17:40:00.001-08:00

This was so much fun! Pentagram has a little game for us Type nerds out there called "What Type are You?" and apparently I'm Umbra!

It'll Haunt You

2010-01-27T17:26:00.000-08:00

I've finally started back up on my "Don't Go To.." series. These aren't the best of sketches, but it's a start. I've missed doing these things. I better start doing more of them too... I have so many places to not go to!

ps.

These were also done in my Anatomy of Hell class... go figure.

More Adventurous

2010-01-27T17:06:00.000-08:00

Last week in my Anatomy of Hell class I suddenly got the idea to try writing with my left hand. First I jumped straight into scrawling my notes down, but then I thought I should practice the alphabet a few times before I jump to far ahead of myself. It was a really fun practice. Although I felt a little frustrated, I also felt really excited. I tried so hard to connected the muscle memory from my right hand to my left so I could make the characters the way I usually do. I also felt like I was poking a piece of my brain that hadn't been poked for a while... if ever. My goal is to become entirely ambidextrous... so that when I have to hide my identity I have another tool in my box...

I've got nothing to give you, you see? Except everything

2010-01-27T16:59:00.001-08:00

These are a few images from "The Best Day of My Life" book. It's about love if you can't tell :) and daisies. I've still got a-ways to go, but I'm pretty proud of where I'm going.

"Four quarters for a dollah"

2010-01-27T16:19:00.000-08:00

Just a quick update on the last few days of this week:

Monday was ridiculously windy and rainy during the first half of the day. The umbrellas here in the subway can attest to that.

Monday night I had to finish my cut outs for my "Best Day of My Life" book. These are some of the scraps of water color paper left over. I'll upload pictures from that soon.

In the building where I have my "Anatomy of Hell" class there is a long stairway I walk down. Today I realized for the first time that it's a great place to take one of those cliche pictures of stairwells. So I took a few of those, one up one down.

Today I learned that looking into the eyes of a dog can increase the level of oxytocin in your body, which means doing so has the same effect as looking into the eyes of a baby or small child. Crazy!

Keep the Wind at Your Back and The Sun on Your Face

2010-01-24T16:40:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was pretty perfect. It started with an experiment in flow yoga, with my new Shiva Ray dvd (thanks Cecylia), which although was only 30 minutes was very fulfilling. Then after a quick shower I decided to walk to work, and document my trip there. The pictures below are of this experience:

the bridge!
an apartment building I always love to see

I was hoping you would be able to make out more of this graffiti...
this too...

once, a long time ago, I took a picture just like this

I've thought about climbing these

The other side! Downtown Brooklyn!

If you can see it.. it's the old Domino Sugar factory

New York!
The middle!
More of the middle!

The Williamsburg Bridge sign

Welcome to Manhattan!

I know the guy that did that graffiti in there

I love 7th st

Bunny love bomb. Lovemaking bomb bunny?

Holistic Petcare!

I found this just hanging out a block away from my work

Although it looked interesting, I left it in it's place to be discovered by someone who would want it more than me.

I was an hour early so I went to Washington Square Park to eat my scone and drink my coffee.

Then I saw this great three dimensional type/ hotel sign on my way back. Cool!

I continued to stay in a good mood though my work hours and well into the evening. I stopped by the Charleston to say hi to Bull and Dorian, and then went home to make dinner and watch Hannah and Her Sisters. It was all so perfect. Nothing went badly.

And today... I decided to look for a new job. Wish me luck!

Mon Oncle

2010-01-22T20:33:00.000-08:00

A few screen shots from the classic <3