elly.org / journals

February, 2006

February 6, 2006 - 12:08am

notes

i just went down the back stairs to get the laundry. micque and theo had left a fire smouldering in the little metal fire pit, and it filled the backyard with a vertical plume of pungent smoke. at the same time, on the other side of the smoke, timidly blooming honeysuckle vines filled the breezeway with their sweet scent. the moon shone through the redwood tree. i was happy to have clean laundry. it's good to note these gentle experiences.


February 7, 2006 - 1:05am

night time anytime

tonight, on my walk home, i thought of all the secret memories and feelings san francisco holds for me. i get such amazing comfort from walking through the same streets on a warmish night, under the moon. i stop and peer at the sky, i see the same houses, the same plants, the same city holding so many of my experiences in its darkened doorways and streetcorners. i thought about how many times i've been outside on these streets at night, sad, broken up with, lonely, or rowdy and excited and romping about. on my way to a lover's house, on my way from a lover's house. filled with thoughts and concerns, filled with longing, filled with a sense of an end that is on its way, filled with anticipation for what glory may also be on its way.
i was floating deftly down the hill tonight, somewhere near you, but so far away. in my mind i was looking for meaning and not finding much of it. just walking home, trying to get excited about tomorrow and not really suceeding. it seems like there are a few hurdles and landmarks up ahead, and i dread traversing them. they mark time and i look forward to them in my mind and fret about them, as if i'm going on a trip or i have an important appointment. some part of me is always looking on to the future, ready for the present to be gone, though the second it has passed by i long for it desperately, since time just takes me farther from everyone i've loved and the moments i spent with them.

i feel empty. i'm searching for the comforting sadness or the hope or the fantasy and they're not there. i think tonight, and right now, is just time for a break from those things. i really needed it, so i guess it is here. i'm suspicious of the emptiness, but i am thankful that something about this phase allows for sleeping and eating without guilt, allows for getting things done at work, allows for some practical accomplishments. the falling apart of things was starting to get out of hand.


February 8, 2006 - 12:25pm

pigeons

pigeons nest somewhere in the roof of my workplace. i hear them cooing during the day. i find it comforting.


February 10, 2006 - 12:56am

saturn devouring his son

before i left the office for art history class tonight, i was complaining to jason about city college and how boring/rudimentary my classes there are. i should learn to shut up, because art history class ended up being pretty fascinating. we talked about francisco goya.
goya painted saturn devouring his son on the wall in the entry way to his dining room, towards the end of his life. by the time he painted this, he had spent years observing and painting the horrible violence of the french occupation of spain. this painting is terrifying, but i find it strangely comforting. it must have brought goya relief and catharsis to paint it, and i feel that when i look at it. a certain release.


February 10, 2006 - 9:32pm

reasons to hate the internet (or, you know, humanity as a whole)

what follows is an exchange with a total stranger on friendster. i don't know why i bothered responding at all in the first place. i knew i shouldn't. maybe i was just curious what would come of actually interacting with someone who'd message me on friendster. now i know.
His first message to me:

Date: Thu Jan 26 14:37:00 2006
Subject: million dollar question
Message:

Are your armpits shaved or natural?

Admiring and smiling in NYC,
[name deleted]

My response: "Natural, of course."

He responds, much to my disgust:

Date: Mon Jan 30 04:45:00 2006
Subject: cruel monday
Message:

Now I'll spend the wholw work day distracted, wishing I could smell, touch, taste all your wonderfully hairy parts. Cruel, cruel, cruel.

: )

Warm regards,
[name deleted]

At this point, of course, I stop responding. He sends me another message a few days later:


Date: Tue Feb 7 12:51:00 2006
Subject: Re: million dollar question
Message:

lost you already?

My response: "Yeah, you grossed me out."

He reveals himself to be a total sociopath:

Date: Wed Feb 8 23:11:00 2006
Subject: surprised
Message:

I had no idea you'd be so fragile, uptight, and humorless. Now I know! :)

See ya.

!!!

I think the most fucked up thing about the final message is the smiley.

Nothing about this exchange is any different than when some creepy guy says "Hello beautiful!" to me on the street, and if I don't respond, yells after me, "I said HELLO, bitch! You too good to talk me?"

ugh.


February 12, 2006 - 1:10am

delayed reaction

last night was a huge party at tuggy's for a bunch of aquarian birthday people. i didn't get to bed till 3am, and drank most of a bottle of champagne. i had been freaking out mildly beforehand, but i had a great time once i was there. i wore my xtra high converse. my xtra high converse are kind of like mimosas - they indicate that much joy is available.
around 7pm today i started feeling weird and exhausted. after some hours of napping and confused feelings and drinking a lot of water, i described how i was feeling to oliver and he was like "oh, you're hungover." wow! OH YEAH. hungover. that's why i feel so bizarre. my hangovers always take so long to take hold, i had actually totally forgotten it was a possibility. i feel relieved that there's not something more serious wrong with me, for a while i started thinking i was really emotionally broken or something.

for someone who introspects so much and knows herself so well, i sure do miss the boat sometimes. i had some other stupid revelation a couple of days ago about how I'M REALLY STRESSED OUT and IF I DO YOGA I FREAK OUT LESS. life is really too easy for me to handle sometimes.

goals for tomorrow:
must buy records
must do some work
must drink coffee
must be mellow and nice to myself and feel happy sunday things


February 13, 2006 - 1:40am

lost weekend

have been out of it all weekend in some kind of champagne nitrous hangover void. total lack of presence and then total guilt for it. lots was going on that i wanted to be involved with but i was just completely disassociated. could have been stress, could have been actual physical health challenges, lately i can't fucking separate the two.
snippets:
party on oak street, cops out front
polyester shirt smelled bad, good enough reason to go home
much needed macchiato standing up
matt tells me about flirting with nuns
boogaloos
a drive to to twin peaks and looking at the tower, my beautiful beacon
feeling like i was drowing in my own tiredness and fighting so hard to get out of the tunnel vision of exhaustion
karen
logistical chaos
two dml sightings in one weekend, one brief and unexpected in the oak st breezeway
total exhaustion
absent feelings, worry about absent feelings
iron pills and turkey sandwich and vitamin b, all these measures to try to be ok

last night's dream was so wonderful but i've already told it twice, and cannot bring myself to do the mental work to write it down.

having that feeling that life is falling through the cracks. work is overwhelming and there's a million little tasks that i'm just not up for. i've been on top of so much for so long i think it's ok to just let some stuff slide, tasks of my choosing, just let them go. it's like a dare, hey universe, isn't it really going to be ok, even if i'm just a little irresponsible? just a little? won't you still love me, no matter what?


February 15, 2006 - 11:34pm

a girl and her kitten

cuddling with franklin.


February 17, 2006 - 12:12am

positivity

wow. i just went back and read a few recent posts. they all seemed really negative and complainy. that's too bad. i just wanted you to know that yesterday and today have both been wonderful. i am experiencing a lot of equilibrium, confidence, and intensity all at once. i feel capable of handling the world, and safe in my own heart. i've had rough moments but overall i have found satisfaction in my routine and in just working to try to care for myself. it has been rewarding. i am thankful for everything.
i wish that i could tell you everything that really happened to lead to this feeling, but the nature of the internet journal is that i must be vague. i regret that, and sometimes wish i still had the cojones just to say exactly what happened, but balancing exhibitionist internet tendencies with the rest of the world takes a lot of focus, and i'd rather spend that energy elsewhere these days.


February 21, 2006 - 4:45pm

sigh.

up, down.sad, okay.
hopeful, sad.
anxious, calm.
still in love, suddenly angry.
frustrated, accepting.
taking care of myself, dropping the ball.
freaking out, then somehow reassuring myself.

trying to locate the comforting cushion of reality that meant so much to me a few weeks ago. trying to accept the limitations of my life without being defeatist and angry about them. hating saturn, hating venus, hating mercury. dreaming of tattoos, terrified of being broke, laptop is dying. two cats, no savings, nonprofit job in one of the most expensive cities in the US. there is so much i would not change, though. most of everything, really. there is much hope out there despite my deepest fears.

vanity: my hair is not doing so hot. some of it fell out. stress, margaret thinks from surgery, but i don't know. this makes me crazed. my mom's hair fell out a lot, i can't handle that destiny. what do you think i should do? my plan is to brush it a lot, exercise some more, and eat the flesh of animals at times. i would really like to try to not wash it at all for a month or two, which used to be really easy for me but now i can't help myself, i'm like, excitedly rubbing the aveda on there every two days even though i want not to. NO SELF CONTROL ABOUT ANYTHING, REALLY?

ugh.


February 21, 2006 - 11:03pm

cold

it's freezing out. in religions class, the instructor blithely opened all the windows, seemingly not realizing that people were freezing. by the end of the class i had on all my outerwear and needed to stand up because my feet and ass were so cold that it was unbearable to sit still.
tonight we talked about christianity, christian persecution by the romans, justinian, constantine, etc. we read from the gospels. no one wants to read from the bible aloud. the resistance is noticable and interesting to me. the instructor is kind of like a puppy, he keeps saying "does anyone want to read, does anyone want to read?" and tonight he tried to actually tell someone to read and she said, simply, "no." i was resisting, too, but i've started volunteering because the class is already so long and boring that the spells of him asking people to read and the silence afterward take up valuable time we could spend getting through the material. and going home.

there are a few interesting characters in the class, including a woman with such intense eyeliner that makes it hard to look at her. she always has on really hot shoes. i wish i could have documented all of her tuesday night shoe choices thus far. it's really something. there's also a wonderful 80s throwback style girl with crazy frizzy joan jett hair who wears cowboy boots with ripped tights and long long long beaded neckaces with slouchy dresses. i like her best. tonight i overheard her phone conversation: "what? you got WHAT? ... a *duck*? is it going to get along with the cat?"

as i rushed out of class into the continuing cold and up the stairs to cross campus, i realized that it was cold and i was tired and there was no respite from that. i would just have to get on bart and make my way home, and no one knew where i was or conciously cared if i was freezing and tired and needed a hug. it wasn't terrible, i made it through the cold to bart and from bart to a cab and into the warmish house where the cats are. and i have food, and i'll take a bath and sleep, and it's all ok. but i feel the hollowness, the emptiness of the house, the strange feeling of knowing that i'm not the special person that someone is thinking of. it hasn't been this way in over 6 years, and i'm not sure if it's awful or just ok or freeing. maybe all those things, at different times.


February 23, 2006 - 1:49am

yoga

yoga has been so amazing for me in the past few weeks. i've been going a lot, even when i don't feel like it. my anxiety levels were just so out of hand, and everything was really hard, and i realized that no one was gonna make me feel better. i just have to make myself feel better. i kept freaking out, and the inverse relationship between the freaking out and the yoga cannot be denied. i still get upset and anxious but i've been handling it a lot better.
sometimes things are really stressful, and getting really freaked out about a situation is one way for part of you to let the rest of you now that you need to make a change or deal with a certain situation. so, i'm not down on myself for getting all stressy and tweaking out, because i think it can be a useful process, but yeah, it was too much, and i wasn't accomplishing much with it.

in summary:
yoga good

ps. consider this an official shout out to, and endorsement of, the yogic stylings of one kristie home.


February 24, 2006 - 5:04pm

a feeling

i feel as though i am, emotionally, and with you, in a very beautiful desert right now.


February 25, 2006 - 12:45am

heartache

a stonea riverbank.

i am reaching out, but there is nothing left for me to want

...


February 26, 2006 - 6:43pm

dream. last night, today

two nights ago, a peacock appeared to me in a dream. it was fucking rad.
last night, i was at the cracktory. it was also rad. i was very happy to be wearing two pairs of pants and stripey tights. the cracktory is kind of a filthy place. in all the good sf freak scene ways.

i argued with ryan about astrology - he said, disappointed, "i thought you were a woman of reason."

today there was amazing brunch. it is raining and the rain is making the world so lush and green. i love to hear it, i love to watch it melt the trees.

happy.


February 27, 2006 - 7:48pm

two items from today

  1. i was just remembering how, when i was a kid, i used to eat TANG dry, with a spoon, straight from the jar. my mouth would turn orange and hurt. but i loved it so!
  2. the rain continues to melt san francisco into a wet friendly charming pile of mush. today, in the downpour, i passed a skinny rocker (junkie?) with tight pink spandex pants on, and a black silk bathrobe on over them. barely wincing in the rain. wearing black converse and some kind of studded belt. long fluffy faster pussycat hair. very late 80's LA. i was enthralled.

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