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June 22nd, Two Thousand Three: So, I'd never seen Titanic. Honestly, I figured I knew the ending, so there really wasn't
much point. Plus, I was concerned I'd break out into the Titanic
camp song (Oh the moral of the story, is plain as you can see / Never trust
a sailor on the high sea / He'll call you honey-darling, and say
that he'll be true / But when the ship goes down he'll say the
hell with you / It was sad...) in the middle of the movie and horrify everyone.
But. People have always kept telling me to see the damn thing,
and I was reminded again during a coffee hangout with J. today
that she did once as well. Lo, when I went to the video store
this afternoon, they were out of nearly everything I wanted and
I stumbled into the behemoth of a film, waved my white hankie
of defeat and rented the bloody thing.
I confess, it was decent. Sappy, sure. But worth watching. Given
my sentimental nature (especially regarding little old ladies),
it would have turned into a total fucking sobfest. Except. When
I went to switch from tape one to tape two? I accidentally dropped
the double box into a bowl of soapy water I was soaking my feet
in. After the initial panic, quick rescue and ritual chanting
of ohshitohshitohshit as performed for my common klutzy debacles, I stopped dead in
my tracks before I got a stomach cramp laughing my ass off...
... in realizing I'd sunk the Titanic. |
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June 20th, Two Thousand Three: Some of the trouble I've had with keeping the journal up lately
is that there just doesn't seem much to document. It isn't even
an issue of there being things which are too private, because
there aren't very many of those, either. It's a matter of feeling
as if I have very little of interest to describe.
For starters, it's summer. Come summer, I scale my work back as
much as I can so I can spend as much time as possible outside.
Sofi has been spoiled senseless with a thousand long walks these days,
and a few afternoons, I -- a lifelong NOT-napper, a fact my mother
will go on about like an oil spill if you let her -- even had
to take a little rest due to a sun-fried brain. I'm not alone
in this. When Becca and I were coming back from a beach last Sunday,
having a hard time turning unto the street because there were
so many people out and about, I mentioned to her that one of my
favorite things about this city is that everyone is so goddamn
cheerful and happy when summer hits. There are hoards of people
out, sure, but they're all in great spirits, smiling and laughing
and it's supremely nice.
The other day, the pug and I were sitting on a grassy knoll at
a park, watching the kids play, and I had to laugh at how I still
unconsciously observe children Margaret Mead-like, even when it's
been so many years since I was teaching Montessori. But I couldn't
help noticing one little girl playing in the sand who was methodically
stooping down to pick up every little piece of tiny debris in
there, continuing still even when there wasn't any more and she
was literally picking up nothing but imaginary debris. I always
find a natural sense of order fascinating (especially since I
don't appear to have one), but in this case, there was just something
so poignant about seeing it: it hearkened to me of how we all
try so hard to keep everything so clear that sometimes, we've
gotten so caught up in trying to clear away the crap and the obstacles
that even when they're all gone, we can't see that they're gone;
we keep protectively and habitually trying to clear our spaces,
to keep our crap out of sight. Made me think about overprocessing,
and about not processing, all at once.
I've gotten some new pieces for Scarlet Letters and Scarleteen
done this week, some coding and updates finished as well. I'll
likely shoot this morning and edit an older set later before heading
out tonight with a girl-posse of Becca and Lise to Dykes Do Drag, which should be great fun, it's such a good show, and I'm hooking
up with the director later to talk about possibly doing an article
and photoessay on it as well.
But I'm finding it hard to stay motivated lately. I like being
alone, but it's been weird for me to be THIS alone, even lonely
at times. Usually, even when I live alone, I have a lover I see
now and then, but that's not the case nowadays, and it's just
so odd. I don't know if it's bad or it's good, I don't think it's
either, it's just unusual. I do know that I intensely dislike
going long stretches of days or weeks without ANY simple physical
contact, even non-sexual. It's bizarre not to be touched, and
leaves me feeling somewhat leper-like, and I wouldn't call it
a good feeling. And being self-employed, my time stretches on
very strangely and slow, like pulling taffy. One of the things
that tends to happen when I'm truly alone is that, for instance,
some days I'll forget I need to sleep until I look up at the clock
from whatever I'm doing and realize it's now 2 or 3 in the morning,
and I woke up at 6 the morning before. That can be an okay thing,
especially if I'm doing something creative, as my particular brand
of ADD kind of requires long, uninterrupted stretches for me to
be productive.
But I haven't used it to be that productive lately -- rather,
what I've been doing just doesn't feel very productive. I've used
it instead to go for long walks, to clean the house, to write
things that just aren't going anywhere, to stare out the window,
to watch movies (Aimee & Jaguar on DVD is amazing, for the record), to play dulcimer and sing
(and end up sobbing over sappy songs while doing so), to masturbate,
to experiment with new techniques for the camera that mostly don't
end up working, to do chemistry experiments, to juggle numbers,
to train, to look back at parts of my life and try and make sense
of them all, knowing I can't.
Yesterday afternoon, I blew a fuse in here and spent most of the
night in near-darkness and total quiet until someone finally showed
up who knew where the fuse box was. Not total: Sofi was a little
wigged by it all, so my total quiet was punctuated with the occasional
protective pug barking. But I've had that sort of feeling lately,
like I'm standing alone in the dark, watching things move outside
me and be far brighter than they are inside.
It's occurred to me that if you don't know when you're going to
kick the bucket, you can never really know when you're having
a mid-life crisis. So, only the fates know if that's what's going
on with me, but I tend to think it's not quite that trite. I'd
like to think it isn't, anyway.
I am enjoying this city, though. Since I moved here four years
ago, it's grown on me very, very slowly, but this year, I'm really
digging it. I like in the summer how many restaurants and cafes
there are where you can sit out on the street or patio in the
afternoon and enjoy the sun and the sir, without fighting over
tables or being pushed to leave for the next waiting party. I
like that I can afford to live in an apartment that's almost nicer
than anywhere I've ever lived (Michael and I had a great place
in Chicago, one he still lives in because he ended up buying it,
this one is about a tie with that one) for about the same rent
of some really icky places I've lived in, and that I can afford
to live in a neighborhood that's safe and beautiful and clean
and green for pretty much the first time ever. It's still revolutionary
to me to be able to go out walking alone at night and not have
to constantly watch my back every two steps like I had to in Chicago.
I do prefer living alone, even if being alone so much of the time
isn't always so great. I like that last night, I could decide
at 12:30 that I wanted to turn on some calypso music, use my climber
for an hour and then practice some boxing moves without worrying
about waking anyone else up who would tell me I was a lunatic.
I like that I can follow my natural clock, however erratic it
may be. I like that I can shoot whenever the mood strikes. I like
that things tend to stay where I put them, and that I can look
at a catalogue of de Lempicka prints and know that when I can
afford them, I can order what I want, and put them up where I'd
like without any negotiation. I could go on for a good, long time
about the joys of living alone, really, but I also know that when
it comes to dating, it gets me cut off at the pass a lot, because
cohabitation is so not a goal for me. In my ideal world, I'd like
to have a lover I could see a few times a week indefinitely, without
anyone moving, without sharing living space, without talking about
whose chair or dishes go where and who gets what closet, the works.
Which reminds me I've got a small beef to air. How is it that
a person can be seen as having too much of the good stuff? I've
fielded some comments recently from potential dates, and heard
other people say as much in relation to their dates, about being
"too smart" or "too pretty" or "too independent" or "too open"
or even "too interesting." Honestly, what the fuck is that? How can you be "too" of the good stuff? And if you can,
where are those people that are those "too much of a good thing"
besides in my personal circle of friends? Are they still single
and do they have my phone number? Because if no one else wants
to date them, I certainly will. Jesus. The allure of mediocrity
never fails to amaze. First I was overqualified for the jobs I
wanted (laugh), and now I appear to be overqualified to date (even
bigger laugh). It's some brand of bullshit, because I've as many,
if not more, failings as the next broad, but hell if I can make
heads or tails of the thing.
Alright, so I did have a few things to say. One of these days
I'll learn to remember that when I just open my mouth up and start
talking, stuff comes out, and I can't predict its value in advance. |
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June 17th, Two Thousand Three: Yeah, yeah, more quickies. The thing is, I just haven't felt
all that much like talking here lately. For starters, it's summer,
finally. So, when I'm not shooting, editing or writing, I want
to be outside or with friends. Heck, lately I'm spending half
my day outside at the coffeehouse down the street in the mornings
writing there so I can get work done AND be outside (where I can
also occasionally peek at the cute butch who works there, too,
I confess). This is one of the major perks of self-employment
with a laptop.
I'm just -- I suppose I'm in a sort of limbo. Some of that is
processing that still feels primarily private, but some of how
I'm spending my time right now is just not very exciting or really
worth jotting down: I've been doing some extra training for my
body, having some good sit-time and some lovely walking meditations
at the lake, a little more writing for myself, being out with
my dog or my friends, tending to the plants, still getting fully
settled into the new pad, watching movies, making ends meet, et
cetera. Super-thrilling single life, yepperdoodles. You can, however,
rock out as hard as you want to to old Journey singles, samba
in your underpants at all hours and belt standards at the top
of your lungs while doing accompanying dance routines on your
rolling chair. And have peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for
dinner if you want, and horseradish mashed potatoes or a plate
full of melon as many nights in a row as you like. For the record.
And I've discovered that the beach is a much nicer place to be
if you do some creative calisthenics and transform, in your mind,
all the straight men leering at you and hetero couples cavorting
into cute, single dykes.
When I have something worthwhile to say or share, I'll be doing
that, but in the interim, I'll just be over here livin' it fairly
quietly.
Can I just say that sometimes it's very nice to be validated?
Years back, when I first started doing networking and some interviews
about Scarlet Letters, some folks thought I was insane for suggesting
that our demographics showed that women, regardless of their orientation,
were enjoying and seeking out visual erotica which included men
and women, or just women. This didn't surprise me very much, but
let me tell you, there were some adamant people out there back
then, insistent, mostly, that all heterosexual women NEEDED to
be looking at men, would only really want to look at men, must
only be looking at women because of being conditioned to via male
pornography, I must be biased because I'm not a straight woman,
blah blah blah, blah blah.
So, this study gave me a self-satisfied smirk of righteousness this morning.
Especially with the study being done in my birth-city. Duh, say
I, but it's a good duh. And "nyah nah nah nyah nah," for the record.
Addendum: One of my cats, Zoe, really fecking sucks sometimes. She will
NOT stop jumping up on my desk and lying right where she knocks
everything over. Minutes ago, in an effort to save a pile of papers,
CDs and the laptop, I reached over to take her off, and she put
up a struggle, causing me and the aforementioned rolling chair
to fall flat unto the wood floor under the aforementioned pile
of CDs and papers and Zoe herself, claws fully extended and rapier-sharp.
Ow. I like the chair a lot better for song and dance numbers,
I gotta say. |
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June 13th, Two Thousand Three: Just serious quickies today, as I'm trying to pack in a shitload
of work into today, while battling some little buggie or another
that's made my head foggy and my bones rusty. The Cliffs Notes
of my Cliffs Notes for you.
• If you're a fellow Minneapolitan, I'll be at Intermedia Arts on Lyndale tomorrow selling prints from 10 AM - 2 PM. Feel free
to stop by, say hello and help pay my rent!
• The Pianist was such a beautiful film, which I finally just managed to rent.
I'm so sorry I didn't see in the theater. Not only is it chock-full
of expertly executed Chopin (my favorite composer to play or listen
to, ever), it was just astoundingly done. I'd like to dislike
Polanski, but the man does some incredible work. I'm also an Adrien
Brody fan pre-Oscar (catch Bread and Roses or Summer of Sam sometime if you want some more Brody work); he's a truly gifted
artist, plus he looks eerily like my Dad. And I would have deep-throated
Halle Berry too, femme as she may be, so there.
• From the Department of Stating the Obvious: new gallery up for
members today. |
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Photography: 06.13 (guest model: Mintpink)
members • sign up
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• I am okay, really. I'm not happy-go-lucky or very gregarious
right now; the last few weeks had some incredible emotional lows
in them for me, but I needed to experience them the way that I
have. Sometimes, that's how it is. There's no need to feel obliged
to try and cheer me up -- I'm where I need to be right here. |
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June 11th, Two Thousand Three: It's so easy to second-guess people. It's less easy to have
a feeling in your gut and know you're right, and second-guess
it, shy away from it, say nothing for fear of being patronizing,
or stumbling, or creating an unwanted outcome. Less easy still
to have that feeling in your gut and accept that it isn't all
that reliable, that you could be dead wrong, seeing what you want
to, rather than what is. And hard as hell to know that sometimes,
no matter what you may think or know about it all, some things
just aren't going to happen, for whatever reason; perhaps for
no reason at all.
It's so easy to enter into fantasy scenarios, scenes where someone
who didn't give you what you wanted just up and hands it over
freely, where a lover who jilted you comes back with flowers and
apologies and pretty ponies and mariachi serenades. Scenes where
you act like a person you aren't, where you play games you're
envious others can play much as you hate them, or you can make
huge dramatic scenes you know may bring you what you want, but
know too well that isn't the way you want it to happen, isn't
something you could live with yourself for doing. Epic myths where
the people in the history of your life who treated you poorly,
who never really loved you back when you loved them with everything
you had or simply were incapable of giving back in part or entire
pay a hefty price for that, feel overwhelming regret, or more
rhapsodic still, go to heroic lengths to make it all up to you.
It's less easy to accept that those things just aren't likely
to happen in reality. The more you read The Odyssey, the more monumental a doormat Naussica clearly is.
It's so easy to script things in your head where you say everything
you want to in just the perfect way, and you're heard and accepted
and understood. It's easy to toss a gauntlet when you don't expect
anyone to catch it. It is far less easy to find out if you can
follow through with what you've set forth, if your aim is as true
as you think it might be, or if it's as clumsy and off as it just
might be.
It's easy to think you can know your own heart just because it's
yours. It's less easy to accept that you can know it all you like,
but when other people are inside it, you have to account for theirs,
and sometimes blindly.
And it's incredibly hard to accept that you may not know -- or
want to look at --what's in your own heart very well at all. |
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| June 9th, Two Thousand Three: I am so in love with this photo right now. |
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Just started editing these today (you can click it to see it bigger);
the series Mintpink and I shot while she was here, working with disillusionment and
disappointment in love affairs. This one just captures the feelings
so perfectly for me, it makes my heart ache and flutter all at
once.
Work can be a good balm, even though like any poultice, it may
sting a bit to use it. |
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June 8th, Two Thousand Three: Sometimes the teachings you need to hear the most are those
you want to hear the least.
"Suffering is a big word in Buddhist thought. It is a key term
and it should be thoroughly understood. The Pali word is dukkha, and it does not just mean the agony of the body. It means that
deep, subtle sense of unsatisfactoriness which is a part of every
mind moment and which results directly from the mental treadmill.
The essence of life is suffering, said the Buddha. At first glance
this seems exceedingly morbid and pessimistic. It even seems untrue.
After all, there are plenty of times when we are happy. Aren't
there? No, there are not. It just seems that way. Take any moment
when you feel really fulfilled and examine it closely. Down under
the joy, you will find that subtle, all-pervasive undercurrent
of tension, that no matter how great this moment is, it is going
to end. No matter how much you just gained, you are either going
to lose some of it or spend the rest of your days guarding what
you have got and scheming how to get more. And in the end, you
are going to die. In the end, you lose everything. It is all transitory."
(Mindfulness in Plain English, Henepola Gunaratana) |
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June 6th, Two Thousand Three: I had a surprisingly good day yesterday, quite by accident.
Started out by going through a bunch of photos from a shoot the
day before for a new series of ads for gay.com (my last ads are
still currently running in Girlfriends and On Our Backs, for the record -- lovely full-page jobbies, it's a cool thing,
being a queer poster child), while doing some laundry and housecleaning
because of my mother's impending visit this afternoon.
It was gorgeous outside, so I soon grabbed Sofi for a long walk,
then to the park down the street to sit and read the paper and
catch some rays. Well, I sat and read the paper; Sofia rolled
around in the grass like a lunatic, as is her wont. We came back
home and I made a small lunch, then watched a few Buffy episodes
on DVD while folding the laundry. Did some more cleanup before
imbibing in a leafy organic substance I enjoy on occasion after
several refreshing glasses of iced chai.
I then got inspired to shoot a bit rather out of nowhere. Now
and then it happens like that, I just get something in my head,
or catch a glimpse of a unique angle in the mirror, and off I
go, boom-boom. Usually, though, off I go with some prep, but I
just didn't feel like prepping yesterday at all. I actually managed
to grab a couple incredible shots. Seemed like a good idea to
multitask while doing that and take care of a a couple toy reviews
I have pending for Good Vibrations, so the shoot also turned into a rather extended masturbation
session in the remaining early evening sunshine on my sunporch.
Which, quite unexpectedly, turned into a rare ejaculation session,
to boot. Not only did I manage to get one shot in (after the main
thrust of it, I confess -- it's a bit difficult to remember to
hit the remote when you've just started ejaculating), but you
know, there's really very little to make you feel a whole lot
better than coming all over the place. That's my feeling on it,
anyway. Made myself a nice supper before reading for a couple
hours (been digging into the massive Kinsey biography lately)
and then passing out under some new sheets I got as a gift for
myself the other night with Becca. Suffice it to say, I slept
well.
I needed that day yesterday pretty direly. Wasn't a day off, exactly,
but it felt like one. The past couple of days, I've been doing
a lot better. While I did take some time off from journaling,
I have been talking to friends, and also sent out an extended
letter about my headspace to closer friends, which gave me some
much-needed perspective.
Monday, the day before Jane left, we had just hopped into her
rental car to spend the day out, when we drove up to a bird on
the street who didn't appear to be getting out of the way. Now,
I am often prone to shouting out "Bird, bird, lookout!" whenever
there is one, and I confess that pretty much every time, they
do move, as my driving companions tend to insist they will. But
this one really didn't (I know feel totally validated in my paranoia
about running birds over), so we pulled over, and I got out of
the car to check it out. After almost getting mowed down by a
fucking SUV, I picked up the thing, and it was clear it'd already
been hit. I don't actually think I've ever held a wild bird in
my hand before -- I don't dislike birds, but I'm just not that
bound to them like I am with other animals, so it's unusual for
me to be dealing with birds at all. I may change my tune on that
now -- it was amazing having this poor little thing in my hands.
We took it to the vet here, who sent us instead to the wildlife
refuge a bit north, where they gladly took the birdie in, informed
us it was a chipping sparrow, which had them all excited. I need
to call up today and see how it went, but the two women there
seemed to think they could rehabilitate it and everything would
be okay.
Jane and I ruminated about why the bird may have been put in our
path, and what lesson it had to offer. I admit, I started out
a little on the cynical side, with "You can fly around free and happy all you want, but some motherfucker
is still going to mow you down and leave you for dead eventually." I was working on getting through the pathetic part of my being
dumped and trying to get to the bitter stage the day before, and
it showed. I improved ever-so-slightly with, "Maybe there's a cute girl at the refuge for me to scope out." Shallow and blithe, I give you, but there actually WAS a cute
girl there. So, I was kind of right on with that one.
We didn't really settle on much, but it's possible that I/we needed
to be reminded that sometimes you have no choice but to accept
help when you're deeply injured. Or, perhaps, the lesson is that
if you have a little faith, someone you may not even know may
well help you when it looks like there isn't any help in sight.
Really, though, I think what we both took from it -- and it ended
up being the first day neither of us had creid over our personal
tragedies in days -- is that we both felt better just knowing
SOMEONE, that little bird, was just going to be okay. And that
we were going to be okay, too. Corny, I know, but hey, it's a
true story. And that little featherpuss was a fighter, man. It
was really quite inspirational.
No more backstory on my baggage for right now. I just don't want
to focus on it at the moment, because for the past two or three
days, I have been pretty darn okay, and I want to stay there.
Last Friday I may have gotten a slight catalyst for some recovery
by having one of the most pathetic singles moments ever.
If you're single, you know that it's not uncommon to put off grocery
shopping until it is absolutely dire. After all, you don't have
to try and make, say, mustard sandwiches or tofu on stale crackers
sound appealing to anyone else but you. And lo, it often happens
that if you have no weekend plans, you end up going to the store
on a weekend night thinking it'll at least not be too busy, and
you can get out of the house rather than moping.
If you've done this, what you also know is that you tend to find
yourself at the market with a pile of single people who all had
the same brilliant idea.
So, there I was, last Friday night, the only person with a basket
full of fresh fruits and vegetables in a hoarde of single others
with carts full of frozen dinners and pet supplies (I did have
the pet supplies in mine as well, otherwise I might have gotten
kicked out of the Sad Singles Club). They're playing some sort
of muzak-ified easy listening, and we're all kind of shuffling
through in a vague collective misery (I'm thinking I had reason
to be more miserable since everyone in there also seemed to be
straight men, and thus, I couldn't even look for a date). Then
they start playing Van Morrison's "Someone Like You." So, now we're all wandering in a collective wistful misery. Joy. I take all of this in, and the patheticness of the
scene makes mint cookies look very appealing. Or Drano.
I might have left feeling worse, rather than better, had not my
experience had an additional bonus. At this market, the baggers
are supposed to walk your bags out to your car. But I don't have
a car, and I live a block away from the store, anyway. So, when
pimply high-school dude with greasy ponytail picks up my bags
and starts walking them out, I say that there's no need because
I haven't a car and just live across the street. He volunteers
to walk them over there for me, and since he shows no signs of
letting go of the bags should I refuse, I just go with the flow
and figure it's nice to have someone carry the bleedin' bags.
We're chatting ever-so-slightly as we walk, and it becomes clear
that he's doing this because he feels sorry for me. On other words,
I'm having a sort of consumerist version of a pity fuck from this
dude. I managed to hold in my laughter -- at myself, more than
anything -- until I got in my door. It's alarming, really, how
easy it is to throw yourself an extended pity party and how anyone
can see what you're doing. I'm not exactly embarassed for being
in that place, recently; I have good reason to be grossly dissapointed
about a lot of things and to feel sad about them. But I do think
I've been wallowing in it to a degree that some of the hurt I've
been feeling is hurt I've been causing all by myself.
And with that, I run off. Must prep for the Momster and her sidekick,
and get some more photos edited to get a new members gallery up.
In the interim, I offer you the following scenes from the getting-much-too-big
photo pile (I still also have Mintpink's set and a set of a couple
from the other day to edit as well):
- • Sofi being excruciatingly cute in the grass
- • One of the possible shots for new gay.com ads
- • And another
- • Another portrait from that session
- • And another
- • Goslings from the lake a week or so ago
- • A cool shot from yesterday's session
- • And (members only, kids, you'll be asked for a password) a rather raw and close-up shot of my twat, ejaculate and all -- bit more personal than I usually show, even in the members
area, but it is a darn cool shot.
(You know you're a pornographer when you post a collection of
photos of what's your daily life, including a pussy shot, and
it seems utterly normal. "Aw, cute baby ducks! Oh, nice wet cunt!" Oy.)
Before I go, I leave you with something to let rattle round in
your head today: I got a google hit the other day for the keyword
combo "strap-on marriage". Amazing, really, with the divorce rate
being what it is, no one has really explored or exploited this
concept yet. Then again, maybe the fact of the matter is that
that's what everyone is doing in the first place. |
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