Wednesday, February 27, 2008

in first gear

we started off slow, and built up speed.
before i knew it, we were in 5th gear, careening down the highway with no particular place to go.

and suddenly, you told me to drop it down to second.
the gears were grinding, the engine screaming and i was afraid it would explode.

we slowed down, approaching grid lock and i dropped down to first.
you looked at me as if i had done something wrong.

because for you, first gear was not enough and third was too much, but i still loved you in fifth.

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

face forward, back to the land

i have seen the face of hatred,
and it's funny because it looks a lot like the face of ignorance.

i have seen the face of fear,
and it looks a lot like the face of love.

i have looked into the eyes of adversity and seen the swelling tide within them.

i have watched the hearts of those around me fall to pieces, crumble and blow away.

but today,
i face the sky.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Yemaya and Oshun: a ceremony

we went to the land about a month or two after Frick died. we had all been through some traumatizing experience, and it was a chance for us to go out in nature and find peace. sarah taught us a ceremony. it was the reunion of the sister orishas Yemaya and Oshun. Yemaya is the goddess of the sea, of salt water. Oshun is the goddess of sweet water, the rivers and lakes. we waited until night time and she gathered us around next to the fire and presented a few objects.

components: fresh water, sea salt, a bowl, cedar branches, rose petals.

Sarah arranges the cedar branches around the fire in a path. she holds out rose petals and explains that we are talking about death. the rose petals represent beauty. at death, beauty is always present. i feel a rush of sadness through me. i can see the words "no regret, no blame, no pain, ONLY BEAUTY" written on the wall in permanent marker. images of dead eyes resound in my mind.
she assigns me the job of holding a large bowl of sweet water at the dark end of the path. i stand by myself, in darkness while people come around the circle, pick up a pinch of salt and then come to my end and place it in the bowl and then proceed out of the circle. i stand alone, isolated, in darkness, tears streaming down my face as my arms weaken under the weight of the bowl. this experience is a metaphor for my life. people come and go, but in the end, i am standing alone, bearing the weight of our experiences.
we walk in a procession down a steep hill that leads to the river. we are singing Amazing Grace. we get to the edge of the water and each person tosses in a handful of rose petals and i reunite the two orishas Yemaya and Oshun as i pour the salt water from the bowl, mixed with my tears into the river. i pour the pain of loss and heartbreak into the river and i watch it get taken by the current and swept down under the surface of the water. i am the messenger of our pain, the group of people that are here with me. we pour our sorrows into the river and feel the water take them. they come out of us and become a part of the universe, no longer a private, internal experience, but a thing that all kind share. we become a part of a world older than our grandfathers, our thoughts, feelings, and spirits are rejoined with that from which we came.

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Love, The Blues, and Adrenaline

Hey all you kids out there in stereoland,

I have spent the last 4 days straight at school from sometime in the early afternoon until at least 3 or 4 in the morning. I believe I am running out of steam. But that is unrelated.

There comes a time in your life when you feel like you are done playing games and you just want to grow up and lead a normal life. I wonder what normal looks like anyway. Normal has always seemed boring to me. Big house, white picket fence, 2.3 children, a husband that works, and....where do I fit into this picture again? I am nobody's wife, I am nobody's woman, I am not a baker, a waitress, a house cleaner, or a homemaker. I don't put my hair in curlers, I don't cook dinner every night, and I don't wear an apron.I know this may seem a little rash, but I kind of don't know what home life is supposed to look like. I see what my family looked like. My dad working hard every day, ruining his back and knees, my mom taking night classes when I was a kid to get her credential. Dinner was on the table (thanks to my grandmother) and for the most part we all sat down and ate together every night. That's not to say that my childhood was perfect. I had my fair share of family feuding. But that's not what I'm talking about.

I have reached a point where childish games and superficial relationships are no longer fulfilling enough. I have realized that the friendships that I have had and the friends that I have lost make me see friendship and relationships differently that a lot of other people. I see friendship as a malleable thing. Friendship to me has always gone deeper than "oh, we hang out". I have had my share of pseudo-non-platonic friendships with people. I'm not talking about sex. I'm not talking about romance. I guess the closest word to it is intimacy. There is this level of friendship that if you can reach it, will change your entire perspective on what a friend is and can be. It is a friendship where you can be physically, emotionally, and spiritually close with someone without all of the things that come along with relationships. It is a complex and tricky thing to have, I won't lie. But it is also beautiful and precious. I don't know many people that can relate to me on this, but if you're out there, you'll know what I mean. Flings and fair weather friends aren't enough anymore. Romantic relationships are borderline impossible at this point. I don't expect people to be willing to give of themselves so much as I have given to a select few people. It can be exhausting, but it can also be the most rewarding thing you will ever experience.
Is this what love looks like? Do we wait around for that exact feeling? And, excuse the pity party but, what if the person we found that feeling in is gone? Do you strive for that same feeling, or take each individual for a new opportunity to learn and grow in a completely unique and challenging way?
The moments in my life seem so much more digestible when I look at them from afar. When seen in a macro lens, they become way too intense for me to handle. One memory acts as a catalyst for another, and out pours my entire life in the car on the freeway to an unsuspecting friend that until now has only heard snippets of these things.
It sends you in a downward spiral, especially when you think about what tomorrow means and it seems impossible to scrape your way back up the walls of this rabbit hole that we are all falling down and suddenly, no one cares but me.

so, love. You hear all the songs, you read all the poetry, you see all the movies, but you have no idea what it means until it completely smacks you in the face. You stumble, you fall, you can't make coherent sentences. It feels like you are actually degenerating. You feel crazy. I asked my mom, "why do I feel so stupid?". she told me, "love'll do that to you honey". Makes me wonder if this love thing is really good for us. It kind of seems like a blinder to hide the ugly truth. But I think that's a little pessimistic, even for me. I guess I'll figure out what it means as I go. For now, I'm just tumbling down, without pause, full force, headed straight for some insane crazy upside down wonderland.

In conclusion to my rant:
--Adrenaline is not infinite.
--The Blues make you...blue
--love makes you stupid

good night,
get some sleep,
dream sweet dreams.

Wednesday, January 9, 2008

winter break

my eyes reach across the dense yet charmingly cozy landscape that is San Francisco. the past year of my life has been spent running circles around my two lives. when i was younger i had my palm read and the person told me that i have two life lines which means that i will always live two lives, always walk down two paths and always struggle to keep them in balance.
So as I stand atop twin peaks, gazing down at this place that is so familiar to me, i am comforted knowing that although progress has taken its toll on our little city, the landscape remains essentially the same. the silhouette of the monstrous tower condominiums looms next to the bay bridge as a sign of progress for the sake of progress. San Francisco cannot expand laterally anymore, so it must go up. I question whether we can fit anymore people here.
While i watch the Los Angeles urban and suburban sprawl spread like cancer over the once serene flat lands and the smog reach its soot-covered hands out to what used to be wetlands and Indian territory, I wonder if San Francisco will ever get that bad and I pray that it won't.
I spent a lot of time this break contemplating myself and where i fit in this world. i live in a metropolitan area that is very different from most metropolitan areas and when i am in LA i live in a working class area with people who look like me and work like my parents work and earn the wages my parents earn.
As i strive to do well in my department at school i wonder what effect my demographics will have on the work world when i enter it. i am entering a field that gives you a one shot chance at either being great or being doomed to be poor and homeless. Since concept art is so competitive, i want to up my game this semester so that i can equal if not surpass my classmates. five drawing classes should do the trick. but i wonder, when this is all said and done, if i get an amazing high paying job, will i still be able to harbor the same values that i do now? or will i be sucked down into the abyss of the workaholic and the strive for a bigger paycheck?
It seems as though in the art world you are either on top or you're a nobody. there are a few freelance and independent artists that are breaking these boundaries lately, but it is rare and you still have to know the right people and the right people still have to know you. networking is a three-headed demon that can either make or break your career. if the right people remember you for the right reasons, you can make it big. if they dont remember you at all, or worse, if they remember you but hate you, you're S.O.L.

Let's get one thing straight. I am not, nor have I ever been or doubtfully will be one of those people that lives in their sketchbook. I try and try to sit myself down and sketch for hours. Often, at most, i get about an hour of work done. Soon thereafter, i start either hating everything i've drawn, or i just go stir crazy and throw the damned thing across the room. the edges of the page seem limiting to me and i long for a bigger canvas. i long for the medium, space, and skill to make the pictures in my head a reality. Much of the time, these representations come out muddled, half-assed, or just plane ugly. i think the best bet for me at this point is a multimedia project where i can just let loose. again, time, space, medium, skill, all factors in the completion of the piece. not to mention that i have no idea what to make it about. as a concept artist i must discipline myself to draw draw draw. no sleep, just draw, no eat, just draw, no life, just draw. but many of you who know me would say, "F* that!"
...and i agree. the pull between my personal life and my art life is strong and unyielding. it is relentless and un-tamable. my art side is an amorphous being that swirls with colors and undefinable shapes that choke me in my sleep. and my personal life is like an angry tree goddess curled in the corner of my mind, ready to strangle me with her long branches at any moment for neglecting her.
i must find a metaphorical rolling pin with which to roll myself out to a medium thickness without bubbles or rips so that i may comfortably fit over the pie that is my life.

Thursday, December 27, 2007

that ole devil called love

Billie Said it Best:

"It's that ole devil called love game
Gets behind me and keeps giving me that shock again
Put a ring in my eyes
Tears in my dreams
And rocks in my heart

It's that sly ole-sun-of-a-gun again
He keeps telling me that I'm the lucky one again
But I still have that ring
Still have those tears
And those rocks in my heart

Suppose I didn't stay and ran away
Wouldn't play
That devil-what a potion he would brew
He'd follow me around
Build me up, tear me down
Till I'd be so bewildered
I wouldn't know what to do

Might as well give up the fight again
I know darn well he'll convince me
That he's right again
When he sings that siren song
I just gotta tag along
With that ole devil called love

He'd follow around
Build me up, tear me down
Till I'd be so bewildered
I wouldn't know what to do"

Sunday, December 9, 2007

reflection, the things we don't want to see

it has recently occured to me that i am not like anyone else. i am completely different in many ways from all of the people around me. but i also know that everyone is different, everyone is weird, even if they don't show it and everyone, at some point in their lives, feels alone and isolated.


sometimes i wonder if it is just me that feels this drastic flaming difference between themselves and the outside world. i have come to a place that i never imagined myself staying in for very long and i have tried to make a home here.


Los angeles is weird. los angeles is bipolar. in some senses it embraces all of these different people and gives them a place to stay. drive six miles from where you live, and you see a whole different demographic and a whole different lifestyle. but for me, that transition is slow. if you drive six miles from where you live in san francisco, chances are, you'll end up in the water. people in SF don't have to go very far to step outside of their demographic. LA is weird like that. in la, you can stay in your own little bubble and you never have to experience life if you don't want to. you go to your local coffee shop, your local grocery store, your laundromat. but that's what irks me about it. people don't step outside of themselves. people stay in their neighborhoods and keep to themselves and never experience anyone different from them. it's frustrating for someone like me who loves to meet new people and find out what their lives are like. i have worked in non-profits for years and i always meet new people and i always find out something new about life. it's hard to be in a place that is so "diverse" on paper, but so segregated in reality.


in san francisco, you only have to walk two blocks before you enter a whole new neighborhood. i live on the edge of two neighborhoods and all kinds of people are always coming through.


i'm never comfortable in just one place. i like scenery. i like to change my atmosphere and shake things up. i am not tame, nor am i boring. this has become painfully obvious in the past few months. school is daunting and perilous and i have been scraping my way uphill for the past two months. home is tugging at me. my father has been in and out of the hospital this week and i am missing my family very much.


but still, i am trying to find the beautiful things in life. i think what keeps me going is those little bits of beauty that we see everyday and take for granted. sunsets, intense formations of clouds, how clear the night sky in LA can be after it rains. i have not seen the stars so brightly since i moved here until the other night. to see the entire orion formation brought up something in me that has been repressed for almost three years. the need to be in nature. the need to know that i am still a part of a living breathing earth. that we are all so small when we look up at the sky. mostly. the comfort of knowing that we all look at the same sky, that we all live on the same planet, and that even though war and hate may separate us, that those things keep us united and have made a bond that goes deeper than that.


as i carve my path in this world, i try to remember that everything i do affects people. every move that i make has an affect on someone. as an artist, i have a responsibility to express humanity. i have a responsibility to show people that they are not alone in the world. that someone else feels like they do and that they are not freaks, that they are not abnormal, and that they are just like me. so when i feel isolated and alone, how am i supposed to make everyone feel included in my little world?


i'm missing my lost ones, my angels. i walk through this world, pretending that i have not experienced the things that i have and that i live a normal life like everyone else. we all have our demons, but how often do those fears and paranoias come through into this world? i call them angels because that is the closest word that i can think of to express what they are to me. i look to them for guidance, i look to them for protection, for comfort in times of dispair and pain. the thing is, the loss of these people has caused much of the pain that i often need comforting for.


i realize that i live two lives. i live the one at home where everyone knows me and my deal and understands that when monica is upset, she's upset for a reason. but i also live the life here in LA where when i'm upset people are like, "whoa, what the hell was that?"
it's hard to balance these two lives. it's hard to feel like a whole person when i feel like so many pieces of me are missing.


i know....emo, right?