New camera! Asahi Pentax Spotomatic

Margaret Preston-Inspiration for Tattoo?

Sized

If you could have spoken, what would you have said? The couch sticks to my skin and peels a layer off of me when I stand. The air doesn’t move out of the way when you walk around, and piles and piles of trash add up. No one ever takes it out. And sometimes there’s a hole between then and now. The holes in the ceiling let nothing in.

There’s a free and fleeting moment that’s bigger than us both. It stands not between or around but above, it’s own living, breathing reasoning.

We took a camera and with it painted our world. It took nothing, instead fed it some exterior perspective. I never figured out what the eyes that tumbled down the bumpy hill, spinning, gave to the animals that followed them around.

I’m awake in the places that one sleeps, and asleep where others are awake. Salty sweat pressed into cotton billows. There’s noises in the walls, the pushpins spear the creatures that never come out til night. It’s irregular, it’s regular, it’s a flat note that can’t get better.

Let's Get Out of this Country, Part II: Finding Abbey Road

It was starting to be that time in London when the rain literally never stops, and it is unwise for anyone to go out of doors without the proper, protective rain gear. Somehow, I survived this entire time period with no boots, no waterproof jacket, no appropriate head gear, none of this, except for an old umbrella that barely managed to open without one of its wires protruding violently close to innocent bystanders’ eyes. For four months I wore an old pair of black vans with matching holes that exposed my big toes and many other parts of my feet. For some reason I was never able to find the right replacement; nothing seemed right. Anyway, on one of these rainy, and of course chilly, afternoons, Lauren and I, finding nothing more productive to do, decided to find Abbey Road. We looked it up online and took the Tube as close to the address as possible, and then figured we could take a bus from there. I had this fishy feeling that something was going to go wrong, because we had never really been to this part of town we were going, and we weren’t even sure if what we had looked up was really THE Abbey Road, or just some other road that happened to also be called Abbey Road. But we went anyway, because Lauren was confident, and while I was not, as usual, I wanted to try to find it anyway.

We took the Tube to this stop that was kind of near this other stop where we had once gone to this football game (at this point I don’t really remember the exact names of any of these places, and you’re just going to have to take my word for it). Although it was only about three in the afternoon, I could already feel the onset of sundown, and the sky delicately changing its hue from a light grey to a darker, more sinister cement-grey. With maps and umbrellas in hand we began the trek, never finding a bus that would take us in the right direction. After what seemed like miles, perhaps two, we began poking our heads in the little businesses that were interspersed between the gentrified, picturesque houses, asking, without much hope, “where we might find Abbey Road, you know, like The Beatles?” Most of these bakery and French launderette owners did not offer us answers in a language we could really understand, and after many of these encounters, one was finally able to assure us that we were walking in the right direction. Literally three hours had passed since we had left our flat, but we continued on, determined to have that picture, the proof that we had been there.

Finally we were on Abbey Road. But where was the cross walk? It turned out that finding the road was not the end of our journey, but just another beginning. The rain soaked up my poor little exposed toes, and although we tried not to admit it aloud, we were both soaked, freezing, and loosing hope. Each time we came to a cross walk one of us would proudly declare that we had found it, that it “totally looks like the picture” only to discover that no, that they all looked the same, that we had no way of knowing. Then, eventually, when nighttime officially fell, it became obvious that we had found it. There was the recording studio, and the graffiti, and love notes to John and Paul and the other guys, all in front of a street where cars whizzed past, not giving a second thought. After several embarrassing tries, we finally got the pictures, after nearly being run over. They are taken at night, of us alone, because there was no one standing around willing to take a picture of both of us together. We got it, but after all that work, the picture kind of makes me wonder why we cared so much. The whole thing was a pretty nerdy endeavor, but then again, most things Lauren and I did were lame, in a really good way.

Let's Get Out of this Country, Part I

{The meager beginnings of an attempt to chronicle my experiences before they are lost in the recesses of my memory forever}

Because it was on the way back from Barcelona, and because we all wanted to go there, I mean, you kind of had to go there, we decided to go to Paris. I had been there before, a few years ago, with my family, but this time, for many circumstantial reasons, was very different. That time the entire traveling experience had been a chore, and horribly boring at times. Well, traveling is always a chore, partly, but that time it really did seem like I was tired all the time, of my family, of museums, of sightseeing. It all just blended together into a long, tired homesickness. One brighter memory I do have is the Panini’s, though. My parents were running low on their Europe budget by the time we got to Paris, so everyday, for the entire week we were there, we had to split between the five of us two Panini’s that cost about three Francs each. Though the portions seemed far too small after we had carried them up to our little hotel room and divided them up equally, they always seemed to fill me up, and more importantly, warm me up. My two brothers always fought over who got the portion that appeared to be two millimeters bigger than the others, then gobbled them up before I had managed to put a dent in mine. The melted cheese and delicately sliced meat seemed to make my stomach bulge until well into the next day. The man who sold it to us was the best part about it though; he must have been making sandwiches day and night for, like, his entire life, and he loved it. Every evening we made our journey back to our hotel from a rigorous day of doing touristy things, our feet aching and our steps heavy, but when we began to pick up the savory smells of those Panini’s, our pace would quicken and our growling, empty stomachs would lead us to the grimy street corner. There was always a crowd positioned close and personal around the guy flipping and grilling, locals and tourists alike, but by about the fifth day we had gone to him, he would smile at us, call us his “friends” and get started on our usual order right away. So happy, so content, just like that.

So, like I said, this time was different. More drinking, more not-by-the-book exploration, more random meetings with interesting people. When you’re with your family consisting of a middle aged couple and three small children you tend to stick together, because there’s no need for anybody else really. This time though, I was still looking for the magic that I had experienced during my first trip, and I didn’t care how stupid that sounded when I thought about it. Hopefully it would be even more memorable this time, and more meaningful. I fervently looked for meaning everywhere, from the writing on bathroom walls to the epic view from the Sacre Ceour. Our first night in the city, my three fellow travelers and myself tried, unsuccessfully, to sneak four people into a room reserved for three. We spent two hours at an Italian restaurant around the corner, in the middle of the night, scheming a plan drawn out on a paper napkin that would allow our fourth member to enter unnoticed. This problem occurred because before, when we had made the reservation online, in the safety of our London flat, we thought it would be no trouble at 2 am to waltz right in with an extra personne; no big deal, everybody did it. Not at this joint, no no…non. This vaguely middle eastern man and his minions had us pined from the start as scammers..we were nailed, identified and humiliated on the spot. But, it all worked out, because our fourth, “illegal” confidante was escorted to a more expensive single room, the “Harry Potter Closet” that, for its modest size and old, grimy furniture, offered us one feature that silenced our momentary fit of panic. In the center of the slanted west facing wall was a window with no shades, and placed perfectly in the middle of this window showed us a clear and vivid view of the Eiffel Tower, blinking with luminescence of a million bulbs. The minute we had walked into our expensive second room happened to be the minute of the new hour, in the middle of the night, and we caught the light show during our first, jet lagged night in Paris. And we shrieked and laughed and took pictures and it was full of magic.

To Whom it May Concern

{An experiment in Flash Fiction}

That morning I sat inside looking out the window. The view drew me outside and I lay on the crisp, chemically enhanced grass, my bare legs itching from the exposure. I licked my lips, my forehead started to sweat, and the evaporation of these liquids tickled as they left my skin. It almost burned. It was still early, and one by one my neighbors drove away to work. The cat had not even woken yet. The little sun that made its way to the ground was warm though, warm enough to dry out my skin. The beads of moisture that formed at the edges of my eyes also drifted away, and I was glad to see them go.

Desiree is my roommate. Or was, I suppose. That morning I went in to the bathroom to feed the cat, like I usually do. I guessed that Desiree had gone to work, because although her hours were never the same every day, not being up and making breakfast meant only one thing, that she had gone to work. But I had not heard her usual overwrought leaving routine, which involved a crescendo of sound, dropping and picking up of keys, whistling of the tea kettle. I had slept undisturbed, at least not by the noises of others.

Specks of cat litter stuck to my bare feet and followed me around the house; the old wooden panels creaked and moaned under my weight. I think I must have spent some time circling through the kitchen and living room and the twists and turns of the hallway doors, not doing anything really. I made coffee and burned my hand on the glass container, so I wrapped a piece of cold towel around the area and continued walking. Desiree’s door stood wide open; a streak of sunlight created a crisp panel of glow on the ground. I stood in the glow. Then I peered inside.

That’s when I found the box full of letters.

They have asked me the time frame of these events, but, see, I’m not so sure. I don’t usually keep track of the time. I couldn’t even remember what time I woke up.

I didn’t realize what they were at first. They were scattered all over the bed, some had fallen on to the floor, some unfolded and laying wide open, some closed and still tucked within their envelopes. Most of them looked like at one point they had been white, but were now faded to a sickly, burnt yellow color.

Although they were open, left as if disregarded, I felt guilty running my eyes over the careful, delicate cursive. I ran my fingers over the pattern on the ornate wooden box that had contained them, which sat wide open and empty, its insides lined with mossy green felt. They did not seem yellow with time, but with wear, as if by reading them over and over, they had been used up and had grown old. In a way, they were beautiful; I wish I could see them again, but I suppose they’re gone now. Someone must have taken them away.

I sat on the bed to examine them more closely, picking up several before I settled on one. The lines ran together in the most seamless manner, as if they had been meticulously edited during the course of a lifetime. I soon realized that they were all the same, or at least, variations on the same theme, contorted in subtle ways to fit the certain moods of the writer. Some expressed the thoughts optimistically, with fervor and hope. Other letters told the same story but with anger and bitter irony. Still others were so empty, abysmal, holding no hope of recovery or an answer. These were the hardest to read. The sun rose as I poured over the letters, up high over the house and then back down the other side.

And when she didn’t come home that night, I undoubtedly knew it had something to do with the box full of unsent letters. The last letter was dated on the day before she disappeared, but it looks old too. I don’t understand; it is unclear whether she has disappeared or been taken away. The intended reader is also nowhere to be found. I now live alone in the house, and to everyone’s surprise, I remain a suspect.

Half-Life

There's a half eaten sandwich lying on the ground
There's half a man walking towards it and picking it up

The length of my street is halfway to another continent
The amount of work to be done is half as much as next year's, and the next

I only listen to half the songs I hear
I only say half the words I think

The great man has given half his speech
I only have half the day to figure it all out

The books on my shelf are all half-read
Everyone I know, I only half-know

September 2008