France

October 22nd, 2012

Paris is a magical city, which has more to do with the people and all the parts that make up a land. It’s less the buildings than what houses them, what happens in them, what is said, what is done, what is eaten, what is seen and worn. I’d live here if I could, and perhaps that day will come sooner than later. The France of my dreams isn’t Versailles, but the one from Bunuel films, or the Red/White/Blue series. My fantasia of myself as an expatriate has me looking like Catherine Deneuve or Juliet Binoche, but without the prostitution and the grief.



A man walked up to me and said, “you are very beautiful…” not really wanting anything but to tell me this was true. It was as if he was informing me that something had fallen from my bag, or that I had a post it on my back. My beauty was simply a fact that was to be relayed, not a bargaining chip, not a thread to be pulled that would come undone and fray all my life. He was merely pointing it out, before he marched up the boulevard, swinging his long, black umbrella in the night mist.



Shut Up!

October 15th, 2012

I cannot deal with it when people cannot stop talking. I am shy beyond reason, and almost can never muster up even a word unless I absolutely have to. Doing comedy doesn’t really count as conversation. I’ve already thought it through – I know what I am going to say. I try to go for the absolute minimum amount of words to relay the maximum amount of information. I don’t want to waste anyone’s time and I don’t want to talk more than is necessary.



I met a man who seemed interesting – until he opened his mouth. He wouldn’t shut up. And he kept going. Time slowed down. The seconds dragged. It was boring and monotonous but also incredibly inappropriate – telling me things I didn’t want to hear, and moreover shouldn’t have heard. Family secrets and sexual indiscretion is my trademark, yet I am uncomfortable with others revealing too much. I know it’s not fair, but I can’t help how I feel. I am prudish in ways I don’t care to admit, and I keep to myself in a way I wish would be reciprocated.



This guy wasn’t into that. He wasn’t into give and take. He took the floor and then wouldn’t wouldn’t wouldn’t stop. He went on and on and didn’t seem to notice that I was tuning him out, fading away, diminishing and depleting. I felt as if I was steadily losing air, like an inner tube with a pinhole puncture. My heartbeat started to slow down and dark circles appeared under my eyes. It was beyond boredom. It was like a creeping death, surrounding me and suffocating me. His words and his voice were like weapons, bludgeoning me into oblivion. He went on and on and I felt like I was doomed.



He was vaguely aware of it, and kept saying “you can just tell me to shut up….hee… hee….” and I would have if he hadn’t utterly depleted my strength. The more he talked the less I could respond. Every time he told me to tell him to shut up, the more he talked. He spoke of all his ruined relationships, bad boyfriends and relatives – the unspeakable (yet spoken over and over) cruelty of those who were supposed to love him, but my heart went out to the villains in his endless stories – I could see how he abused others with his small talk. His incessant need for chatter was nothing short of a nightmare.



When he finally left me alone I heard his voice in my head, shattering my peace with musings about shows and films and bands and books and foods and fashions and fads and fabrics and festivals and countries and all things he felt didn’t live up to the hype and albums that he listened to from beginning to end, never song by song, never skipping, hearing them not piecemeal but whole, as the artist had intended him to hear. I was surprised he ever heard anything beyond his own voice. I can still hear him and it is driving me crazy.



Happy

October 4th, 2012

Do you ever really think about the times when you are happy? I don’t. Happiness to me is just an unnoticed state of mind, something we drive through to get to lonely and miserable, or ecstatic. Happy is just kind of normal for me, and so I don’t even greet it with a smile. It’s something I take for granted like the sunrise. It’s light out, I am happy – these things don’t register.



I am guessing this is bad because whenever I am unhappy, then I search my mind and heart for memories and evidence of past happiness, and I cannot find it. I didn’t save anything because I didn’t care.



Well today, I am happy. And I did laundry, so everyone around me is happy.



Tour

October 1st, 2012

These tour days are so short. We drive to the city we are playing, our little band of sisters, be in Portsmouth, NH/Ridgefield, CT/Concord, NH/Portland, ME/Burlington, VT – this week is New England’s turn to be wherever, we get to the hotel for a 2 hour bout of fighting with the snooze buttons on our phones, we load into the venue, we eat a meal of varying quality and satisfaction and we do a show, sometimes 2, but this week, it’s just 1, which is enough really, I think.



There’s wine after, and then a very brief ideation of going out, having another drink somewhere, but almost 200% of the time this fizzles, and we are back in our cheapie motel beds within minutes.



For me there’s some futile moments online and on text, trying to retie some strings that have come undone on my long journey. Everyone’s got their ritual. Mine involves a too hot then too long bath and simultaneous painful construction of messages in my head that get sent and regretted right away. I think Selene watches tv. Sometimes I can hear pawn stars through the thin walls. I watch it in my mind also, with my bionic hearing.



I marvel that my iphone can be both a person I love and a person I hate. Suddenly, the blank face of it changes and the name of whoever spreads across it and this little piece of glass and intel metamorphoses into flesh and blood and voice. Call me sometime, if you think of me. It gets lonely out here without you.





Feet Treat

September 26th, 2012

I can no longer deny that I have dry feet and now I am taking matters into my own hands (feet) and I broke down and ordered a Ped Egg and some foot moisturizer in a weird push up stick. It’s kind of like a yogurt push up or a deodorant, neither of which I have experience with. I have never eaten yogurt that is pushed rather than spooned and I have never put anything under my arms (even though everyone wishes I would).



My new foot regime came in the mail all together and I had a hard time opening the ped egg at first. I thought I might crack it and separate it like a real egg, but finally it yielded to my relentless grip and opened up. I grated my dry foot and was disgusted/amazed to find that the chamber held the dry skin flakes just like parmesan cheese and this device would probably do really well in my kitchen, although it’s probably wise to purchase another for that use.



I then took a stridex pad, already in my beauty arsenal, and wet down my dry, scale-less feet with the acidic solution. On top of the stridex I rolled on a layer of the foot moisturizer, on the handy stick. The stick is important because l gave myself a pedicure not long ago, and the continuous bending gave me a terrible neck ache that I had to get a chiropractic adjustment for. It was going down those 2-3 inches to reach my feet that made the biggest difference. If I had the foot moisturizer on a stick, then I wouldn’t have had to have my ribs cracked.



I have put a sock (dirty, but of course) on top of the whole thing and now my feet are kind of stingy, kind of menthol, really wet feeling. I don’t know if this will work. I hope so.



Petting 2

September 20th, 2012

Bronnie sometimes acts like she doesn’t want to get petted. She sits by herself in a pretty satin pillow outside, blonde fur glinting red and gold in the sun, a warm smell of corn chips around her, as dog paws are fritos-like when heat is applied to them. She’s standoffish, a little bit cold, a little bit old, incapable of becoming the puppy battering ram of need that the Chihuahua is when being deprived of slavish attention.



If you want to pet bronnie, you have to seek her out. She doesn’t beg for it with a whine or with her eyes. She stays in her corner, but inside, I know, she waits.



Because as soon as you pet her, she practically falls apart. Her eyes roll back in deep gratitude, and she takes in a huge breath like she’s breathing you in, and you feel the two cool jets of air coming out of her snout, little streaming thank yous. Her dog heart is beating fast and wanting the moment to never end, and she will gently hold your hands in between her strong front legs, with worn and dusty paws. She will lean on you will all her body weight and crush her soft head into yours and show you how happy she is and glad she is and it is the best of her and she wants you to never forget.





Good Dogs

September 18th, 2012

There’s percolating sounds that a good dog makes when she is happy and healthy and sitting next to her mom and/or dad. It’s like these little wet noises of pleasure, that coincide with brief petting, getting those doggie endorphins going, hands between long limbs and touching the warmth within, like you are stoking a dog fire.



I often can’t believe the simple yet overwhelming joy I get from holding/ witnessing/caring for my animals. Life is too much at times, and people don’t give you the quiet assurance you need. If you put your hand unexpectedly in between someone’s arm and body, it’s likely you will get a punch.



A dog, a nice one that is – will give you a look of gratitude, close her eyes in reverie, breathe long and hard and deep to show you she is taking all that good feeling inside, storing it up for later, dog dreams still yet to be dreamt, magnificent fields full of balls and you and her alone but for the squirrels in the trees.



Photo by Pixie Vision Productions