| lundi 21 juillet |
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| Things seem to become more and more complicated. Matt seems to be miserable in his Rochester life, defending himself against his parents, wondering if he really does have good judgment. Meanwhile, I'm in California, poor and unemployed and unable to offer him a place to stay. The plan is simple. Find a job that pays well enough to rent an apt, and then find an apt. The latter should be pretty easy considering the vacancy rate for the Bay Area has skyrocketed (are there earthrockets?), but the only reason that's true is because everyone is unemployed and can't afford to live here anymore. It's true, the Bay Area is the most expensive place to live west of Chicago (though it's probably more like NYC). Much moreso than LA, which would be the only other obvious choice. That's because we Northern Californians know how to take care of ourselves. Socal is for shit. But don't mention that to anyone because I'm in the Inland Empire gay.com room to keep my internet connection alive. I figure no one will bother me. Plans for the fall are somewhat dependant on Michael at this point because he keeps saying there are people I should sing for. And I'm looking into getting some early music experience. It seems the best field to break into for my voice, and I know a lot of the instrumentalists already because it's such a small community in this country. And it's music I readlly enjoy. I'm so calm about all of this, which is strange. Normally I would be running around screaming with worry (which is what I did before I got home) but I just know that things are going to work themselves out. And maybe some of it has to do with the lack of urgency that I was talking about before. I am anxious for getting back to a sense of normalcy however. It's so strange how spoiled we were at Oberlin with that huge apartment, beautifully decorated, comfortable (even in the wake of the broken mirror) and everything was OURS. It didn't belong to anyone else but us. And we had everything. All the tools, all the tape and scissors and books and little tiny things we needed in a day. God that was such a great place. And I don't care how bad things got between Matt and I we were together. Patrick said to me "Some people fight, hon. Some people fight a lot. Some people never fight. But relationships are work." And it was good to me to hear that it's ok to have blowouts. Because ... well I don't know why. I guess I was just looking for reassurance that I made the right choice when I told myself that I can't keep breaking up with Matt every time there's a problem. And there are always problems. But there are always these really great things like support and companionship and understanding and the best one: knowing someone. That's what's always been so attractive about marriage is just knowing someone that well. And I love investing that time in Matt because he's fascinating and complicated and beautiful. And it's such a pleasure to be able to say exactly how he'd react to a situation or a quesiton, even in his tone of voice. I should talk about how I'm feeling younger and younger, or at least aware of my age and inexperience or how far I've progressed in the last few years. Is this the part of your life that moves too fast to be recognized? Is this the part you spend the rest of your life wanting back? Is this what I'm going to look like in the afterlife? In my memory of myself, of my self image, for the rest of my life? I believe in God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth. |
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| The first time I heard this CD was at Melanie's house in San Francisco. I'd never met her, but Lindsay was there. The night she spent in San Francisco with me at Osha and the steps of Grace Cathedral looking out at the letoH | Hotel. I rarely listen to it because it's so depressing, but it's also calming and a really great memory for me. Festival Opera is in the news! A number of reviews surfaced this past week (this is almost verbatim the Susannah entry). Among them: The San Francisco Chronicle. San Francisco Classical Voice. The Contra Costa Times review seems to have disppeared from their website, but I'll keep looking for it. It may change, but try this link. In our defense, the opera got much better by the Friday performance when everyone was doing exactly what they should. Tomorrow we take the show to Meadowood in Napa, which should be droll and drunken as always. Who knows how they'll fit the 20 foot high set pieces under that tent. Once again, that's so not my problem. I'm feeling uneasy tonight. Maybe it's the cigarettes I thought I'd passed up months ago, but now who grip me gently with their promise of sedation. No relief however. It's times like these that I should be turning to God, but for some reason I don't. Laziness? Fear? I don't think about it so much. But my quest for knowledge keeps me on the path of Islam. I've been reading like mad. My summer reading list has been fulfilling this year. Animal Farm, What Everyone Should Know About Islam and Muslims, Lord of the Flies, the Bible. No Lolita yet, but there's still time. I'm anxiously awaiting the order of Arabic childrens coloring books I placed last week. Maybe Thursday. =D Children's books are great. I was searching the classics section of the Oakland Public Library on the Teen floor. Lots of books I haven't read in a very long time, and some I'd been meaning to. Animal Farm and Lord of the Flies respectively. These deal with such "adult" issues. The inherent inequality of communism, the downfall of human society through anarchy. And yet I'm fascinated by them and am working through this theme. I suppose it's good to work in trends. If your body tells you it needs to know more about something, you indulge and exhaust. Well, I do. Right now my body is saying "ARABIC!!" and "BRAVE NEW WORLD!!" so I'm gonna go with those. If I can find a copy of Brave New World. It's on the Bay Area summer reading list, so the libraries are all out, no one owns it, so it's on display as soon as you walk into any bookstore. But it's $12 and I'd rather read the free version first. If you have a copy, send it to me. Email link is on the left and I can send you my address. Other books I want to read this summer are 1984, Madame Bovary, Metamorphosis, and whatever anyone suggests as long as it's not Harry Potter. So email might be a good idea, just to say hi and "you gotta read this." Also the little kids classics like the above. I might read Kiss of the Spiderwoman again since it's been a few years and I remember liking it, even though it was slow. I think the books I want to read are the ones that were in the weekly reader brochure you brought home from school. Discount books you ordered as a class and then each month they were delivered to you by hand from your teacher, and everyone compared. It was like a cross between shopping and gifts which was just too much excitement for little kids anyway. Oo maybe Fahrenheit 451. It's been almost a decade. The sunshine girl is sleeping / she falls and dreams alone / and me I am her dagger / to numb and feel her pain // the world is full of noises / I hear it all the time / and me I am your dagger / you know I am your wound // She whispers while I'm sleeping / I love you when you smile / I didn't really lose you / I just lost it for a while |
| vendredi 25 juillet |
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| So i've been meaning to write for a while. A lot of things. but I either never have time or something comes up and I get sidetracked. Story of my life. Anyway, I'm working on a complete revision to this site since I have the free time now, and it's not going very smoothly. After installing Photoshop and Illustrator I realized I had no idea how to use the latter, so I bought a book. Then I realized that Photoshop is a piece of shit compared to Illustrator, and my site has suffered because of lack of Illustrator skills. But then I realized it wasn't Illustrator that was missing, it was css. So now I'm learning as much as I can [read: stealing sheets] and trying to get a working design out of it all. Oh so senseless! And then I didn't know that blogging was such an all-encompassing phenomenon, but most of them aren't like this one. They're more random and seemingly very unfocused. But then, I haven't seen very many yet. They all seem to use Movable Type which is this sort of perl script that makes updating webpages very often a great deal faster. That seems like something that woul dbe useful. When I was on deadjournal I used a little application that I just typed into and it posted automatically. This is a similar idea, but web-based and integrated. I sent a letter to novia to see if movabletype is compatible with their TOS. Anyway, enough of the technical speak. Today we had our final production meeting, and I said my piece about the Orchestral Librarian position. Apparently now it's a line item on the budget, so they plan on actually having one next year, which will make everyone's life much easier. Every time I walk around lately I feel like I'm the sole reason for the turning of the earth. It's only my constant pushing on the pavement that keeps the earth spinning. So I guess we're all fucked right now because I'm laying in bed. I'll keep my faith in inertia, thanks. What should I do about this site? I should ask Roger. |
| samedi 26 juillet |
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| Well I had some very strange dreams last night. My back has been bothering me again, so I took the muscle relaxants I used at Oberlin. I'm convinced they're just really week sominex with half an aspirin attached. Anyway, they're pretty good at putting you to sleep almost exactly two hours after you take them, with an even stiffer back when you wake up. And I had these really strange dreams. Roger was driving. It was sunset and the colors were amazingly beautiful. We were driving down a two-lane street (north for those to whom it matters, like me) in a residential neighborhood something like Lincoln, NE, but still California. I said "We live in the most beautiful place in the world, do you know that?" He agreed. I wasn't driving. The clouds began to thicken and turn into very low (< 100 feet) fluffy clouds. There was lightning at specfic concentrated "nodes" which was constant. Almost like the arc from a Jacob's Ladder, but not moving, and not blue, and not a single arc. Ok, so nothing like the arc. We parked in a parking lot at a middle school that wasn't too far from where we were going (The mall? What was the name of that stupid mall? Actually, I couldn't remember in the dream either. I had to look it up.) And we went to the mall apparently because the next thing I remember is walking back to the car. Roger drove home and I was forced to walk to the grocer for food by myself in the rain. I later called him on his cell and said "You know, it made no sense for you to drive home and make me walk in the rain since you have to come back to my house in a few minutes anyway, and you drive by the grocer to get there." but I'm getting ahead of myself. I was shopping for something. I don't know what. But I saw candy on sale and picked up a king sized Reese's cups, a hershey bar (plain), reese's pieces, and one other one which has already evaporated. I put them all in a produce bag. A man was going through some smaller chocolates and we talked about the difference between Ghirardelli and David's chocolates. I told him the Ghirardelli is better for a gift, but it doesn't taste as good as the David's, so if he's eating it, he should get the David's. He thanked me. Then an autistic man, like the son of the store-owner in Guffman (in fact, it may have been the same guy) was jumping up and down and excited because he put a pair of kiddie shoes on the empty shelf where the candy had been rifled through. He was being chastised and I passed through the pair and decided I should buy real food for dinner instead of candy. I decided upon Jon's quiche that I liked so much. I thought I couldn't remember the recipe, but I could always call him if I needed to. So I started looking for the cheese, but not before I sat on the floor in front of the frozen cheesecakes, drooling. I rifled through the cheese and finally found a pound of Muenster. (Did you know the smoked Muenster costs almost a third less!) The eggs I knew we had at home. So I set off for the produce. They had plenty of squash and cucumber which I almost picked up but then remembered Red Peppers. Unfortunately red peppers weren't in season, but Ferris was there with a bag of what looked like frozen mixed vegetables from Italy. I overheard him saying they were in the Suburban isle. I was starting to get irritated because I'd already been in the store a good 20 minutes and still had nothing in my hands. And I couldn't find a cart! Just a stupid basket. Then I woke up. So I looked up the dream at Dream Moods (which is where I always do my analysis) and found out that shopping for groceries but not finding what you need means that you're trying to find a new idea and nothing's coming. It also said that the rain means I'm embarking on a new adventure. Of course the last thing I was seriously thinking about before bed was this website. I think I've found workable ideas, but then there's the prospect of re-formatting the old entries and that means many many more files. I'm not sure what to do. Novia approved Movable Type so maybe I'll start there. I'm going to Jon's for dinner tonight, so maybe he'll remind me how he made the quiche. I haven't seen him in forever. He has a crewcut now. And yay, I get my presents from Italy! |