Oct 29, 2005

bees + people

I like green. The color green makes me happy.

The color yellow, which (and no one was more surprised by this than I was) has been steadily turning up in my mind, as something pleasant, not revolting, makes me happy.

I like red.

Being wrong makes me happy. And, as I'm usually wrong, I guess you might say that I am usually happy, but it doesn't work that way.

And, just to be clear, only as it occurs in nature. Yellow, I mean. Like yellow flowers. Or autumn leaves. So, even though I officially hate yellow, I don't hate yellow.

It's a dilemma.

Plus, there are so many strange, nearly mystical facts pertaining to yellow. For instance, did you know that butter is yellow?

And, the other day I realized that almost always, without fail, when confronted by bees, I yield. And both yield signs and bees are yellow.

And consider (given that):

bees + people = yield

(and) bees + yield signs (as well, butter) = yellow

(it must be that) butter + yield signs = people

It's science. And (!) it's yellow school busses. Not green school busses. And the fact that the shade of yellow used on school busses (and, for that matter, pencils, as well those dashed and solid lines that are painted on streets that, though, I don't altogether understand their purpose, I know that they serve a purpose) matches the shade of a particular leaf on a particular tree from a particular part of Wisconsin, has not particularly escaped my attention.

Pencils. Bees. Lines on streets. Parts of Wisconsin: these things, they are not blue.

I like knee socks.

I both like and dislike mysterious people. I'm on the fence. To be sure, they present one with something to think about. And when you're bored and you hate the book that you're reading, and there's nothing on channel 23, a truly mysterious person can be quite a fun puzzle to unravel.

Is it a Pandora's box style riddle with no end in sight, like a hedge maze, or something more like a crossword puzzle? That's the thing. And, bottom line, are they feigning their own mysteriousness? Because, although it's frowned upon, it's still ok. Because it's so funny. Anyone working in the magic industry would be suspect for feigned mystery. And, by default, I find that I treat all mysterious people as fakes. It's a defense mechanism. It's, ..please, your ploy to get my attention has failed.. don't try to mystify me, I'm tired..

But, sometimes, someone from the other side of town sees something in the mysterious person, beyond their mystery. Sometimes that person is always doing things, like raising an eyebrow and bringing our antihero, the mysterious person, pieces of chocolate, french fries or cupcakes as gifts. It doesn't matter which. And then, the whole town is up in arms. What the hell happened? We were all minding our business, rotely and cruely ignoring this mysterious person (an interloper to be sure) just as we always do. Because it's what we do. In this town. And, here, someone has gone and brought the mysterious person cupcakes. Probably chocolate cupcakes. What the hell.

Believe me, I know. It happened in my town. In Chicago. And everyone is still talking about it.

He or she, with his or her (unprecedented) cupcakes, has wholly rejected our unspoken yet well established policy of shunning mysterious creatures. And, really, how dare he or she?

And I like cupcakes. Just individual cakes unto themselves. All the same size. So fair. So just.

I like a lot of things. I like names like Agnes, Marie, and Mud.

I like changing my kitten's name. I did it today. It was easy. No paper work.

I just suddenly realized (right in the middle of doing something at work that required all of my attention) that Scout's name is not Scout.

It's Mona Lisa.

This realization came to me less like an epiphany, and more like drawing an ace from a deck of tarot cards. As they (with their sudden and shocking floating hand without an arm or body) bring one opportunity, ideas, or inspiration. And sometimes money (just useless coins from Renaissance-era Middle Europe, but still, it's nice, getting money).

It all happend so fast. I thought, Mona Lisa, dropped everything and went directly home.

And, from the moment I got in the door, I yelled (in a voice that is slightly higher in pitch, embued with enthusiasm, and used exclusively for communicating with cats)

..Mona Lisa..!

All the way up all four flights of stairs and down the very long (currently very dark, lightbulb free) hallway, until I was finally inside my apartment.

I said,

..Mona Lisa..! Come out..! Little Mona Lisa..! Where are you..?

This became louder and quite a bit more insistent over the hours. S
he never did respond. I don't think that Mona Lisa gets it.

I do believe every person in my building gets it, though.

It's ok. I'm moving soon. In the meantime, it's all about throwing one's heavy combat boot across the room (and sometimes up at the ceiling) when ones gets home. Because it's fun. And loud.

Them. They do that. Not me.

Oct 13, 2005

life is but a dream

About death. Or the constant avoidance of the idea of death. But death? Maybe death is but a dream, too. About the avoidance of life.

Row, Row, Row Your Boat is not macabre. Not really.
Ring Around The Rosie, however, is quite macabre. This is a song about the plague. It has been sung by children ever since the plague.

And, If I die before I wake.. I remember this. I remember praying those words with my mom before bed. She would then tuck me in (putting my teddy bear and various lambies and other stuffed animals all around me) and kiss me good night. And, I have to say, as nice as all of that was, all I could think of as she plumped my pillow and turned on my night light was the potential dying before waking portion of the program. It left me a little ill at ease.

Last night I had a dream about my own death. It was so real.

Though any dream of any kind is welcome these days. I don't dream like I used to. Or I don't recall my dreams as I once did. I guess people go through phases, but I just haven't had dreams the way a person should for a couple of years.

I know this is true without doing any formal research or anything.

The only parts of any journals that I've kept are those entries that were about dreams that I had. It's honest. An honest account. No editing necessary there. Nothing to feel self concious about. And, as I am not accountable for what happens in my dreams, I felt no betrayal (of myself) was being committed in writing them down. So, I have this pile of paper that, among other things, suggests that I'm a real slob, as writing down dreams is a furious if not delicate operation. One wrong move and poof. It's gone. It just slips away.

So handwriting goes right out the window. These three or four (hundred) pieces of paper that I've kept, written either frantically or sleepily, like scratchings of a true slob, reveals the way two or three key things about a dream might be jotted down, and then might branch out like a sort of tree of words (it's quite like outsider art) into wide ellipses of what I'll call "outer" papargraphs (that sort of swirl around whatever the first few key points of the remembered dream originally were). With further points and notes made in an abbreviated language all my own. Meant to remembered by me (later) and are now (years later) a complete mystery to me. With even the main points being scrawled desperately onto the page. Like those messages you're always hearing about, the ones writen out in blood by the victim,

I was pushed..!

Really ridiculous, the sheer urgency of this particular record keeping of mine.

It's embarrassing. Especially as this all that I've kept of my journals. And the pages themselves are suspect. Often it's onto pages of text books, phone bills or other envelopes. And many, many cocktail napkins. Not that I woke up from dreaming in bars, so much as I often (suddenly) recalled my dreams while being in bars. And if I was bored, and I was often bored in bars (as I often waitressed in bars, which was very, very boring) I would, of course, when having the experience of suddenly remembering a dream, stop everything that I was doing (all just waitressing nonsense) and try frantically to get it onto paper.

I'd just sit down, pull up my sleeves, and start to piece it together. My dream. Whatever it was. And if it took all night, so be it. The customers were already drunk. They could wait.

Bottom line, if I ever post my dreams, I will scan them into my blog in their original state, as the dream itself is not necessarily as amusing as the style in which said dreams were scrawled.

So, last night, I dreamed of my death.

My death dream was not unlike any other party at my mom's house. We all knew that I was dying, and so a get together was arranged. In my dream this was de rigur. It was like Thanksgiving. Just a lot of people that I know roaming around drinking and talking and eating and, for the most part, not addressing the issue of my death.

Even in my dream I understood that this was alright. It's an touchy situation. And I don't like addressing tons of people anyway. Not so concetratedly. As in a party for my death. And, as is so often the case in real life, no one knew what to say. So, it probably goes without saying that quite a few people avoided me at this particular party.

Except for a few people. Those people whom one would expect to know just what to do or say (and we all know such people). Those very people did in fact do and say all the right things to me in my dream. Things like, goodbye. Others didn't. A few were even a little bit rude, like it was just easier to be, and it seemed that they hated this, my death party.

I didn't get too caught up in any of that, though, as I had other things on my mind. I wasn't upset or frightened about my death coming. I had accepted what was going on well before the story line of the dream had began. I walked around barefoot, wearing a long black dress. There came a point where some pressure was building up in my head. It was then that I was (casually) instructed (by someone who knew such things) to poke some holes into my eyes to relieve the pressure, which I did. Surprisingly, it didn't hurt. At first I was afraid that I had blinded myself, but once I realized that I hadn't, I continued visiting and drinking.

The next thing I remember is that my vision dimmed. I was becoming blind (again not by any previous poking of holes in my eyes, but more simply by death itself). By this time everyone had either left, or was sleeping. I sat down on the couch and looked out the window knowing that it would be the last thing that I would see. My death was deffinitely starting. I felt my chest cramp up. Like my lungs were consticting. It was involuntary. I bared down hard and exhaled and knew that it was my last breath. And I was kind of glad that it was finally happening, as all the talk, talk, talking of my impending death all night long had started to make me a little anxious.

Very briefly, I became concerned with whether it would be painful. Or lonely. Or just nothing. I didn't entertain any thoughts of the afterlife. I briefly considered it as a subject to address, then decided that I would deal with the afterlife if and when it happened (as I now had more pressing matters to contend with). Finally, I noted that no longer breathing was as unremarkable as breathing itself. Death was nothing more than a bodiIy function. I decided not to worry, but rather allow myself to be entertained by the fact that the mystery of death was finally being revealed to me. I thought, ok, I'm ready.

And then there was something like an odometer that had characters on it. It was running rapidly. Numbers and dates and times spinning and flipping by. Then, slowly, it stopped. When it stopped, the last part of it said, September 5.

Then I woke up and looked at my clock. It was 12:30 AM. So I went back to sleep.

Next thing I knew, I woke up having over slept an hour and a half, and I had the most horrible fifteen minutes trying to throw myself together for work. And my whole day was crap as a result. And I wanted to cry. I just kept running to the bathroom to cry as well as stop myself from crying. Like I was trying to cry in a reasonable fashion, a little bit here and there. Throughout the day.

I was super emotional.

I just roamed around the studio continually thinking that it was Friday for some reason (and then, over and over again, being rudely reminded that it was, in fact, Thursday), styling things for various photographers, and, all the while (that is, while puffing up santa hats or whatever they were, or putting away candles, or eating my turkey sandwich with too much garlic in the pesto mayo) I was aware that I was having the worst day.

And, if it's possible, it was both hot and cold outside today.

This day. It was bad. But the dream (though it sounds bad) was good.

This is me writing it down.

Oct 7, 2005

today on frankenmonsterblog: frankenmonsterblog is revealed to be a liar

On October 1, 2005 I wrote:

"..Fact: About ten years ago I lived inside a jewelry box.."

Now, I remember writing this. The use of the word fact is in and of itself such an audacious abuse of the very word (fact) that I can't fathom my own audacity. I went on to say:

"..It was a small apartment. There wasn't a sink in the bathroom. There was just no room for any extras, like bathroom sinks in that apartment.."

It's like I'm trying to wriggle out of my original statement. It continues:

"..My apartment, with sixteen foot high ceilings and four by four foot floor space. And its deep, turn of the century windows with all sorts of scrollies, rosettes, trim and moulding and real 100% solid wooden doors all heavily painted upon and replete with cornices and gargoyles, each betraying in architectural language many, many secrets.."

My God. What kind of asshole writes that?

"..and my little bath tub, it had feet! I named it The Holly Golightly.."

I won't bother with whether or not the above is true, only reiterate that an asshole is definitely in our midst. She blathers on:

"..I brushed my teeth over the tub. In case you were wondering. Because people always wondered. If not panicked.

Not true. Nobody panicked.

"..And they always asked, Where can I wash my hands..? I said, over the tub. I said it so many times. Over the tub.. over the tub.."

No one ever asked where they could wash thier hands. Draw your own conclusions.

"..It was fun. The sheer dismay over my apartment. Lots of laughs. It was good for at least a few minutes of nervous laughter. Then we almost always left. To go drink. And forget about the size and ratio of things pertaining to my apartment, and rather dance and drink and get into trouble. Of all kinds.."

Here things are taken to almost fantastic levels of insanity, as with this particular statement:

"..Obviously, a hundred years ago it had been the back quarters of a very spacious four story apartment house. It had six rooms. One probably for fruit storage. One for tools and chickens. One for the wash tub and squeezing out of water apparatus (with drain). My apartment was certainly the place where they kept the mops and brooms and boxes of Borax. And moth balls. And coal. It's where the cat slept. With a few chickens. But only in the wintertime.."

Really? Huh. And I wasn't even alive in 1905. Interesting.

"..I loved that apartment. I don't know why. The thing is, I've remained with the same landlord for years and years. I could so easily get that apartment back. I think I'm going to bring it up with my landlord, Carl (his real name) first thing in the morning.."

Actually, Carl is his real name. I wind up the story by presenting some not so disturbing ideas that are luke warm (at best). This is meant to frighten the reader just in time for Halloween. It reads:

"..I can just see it. I put all of this getting my old apartment back into motion. And it's a go. The apartment is available again. So I return from Carl's office with the happy feeling that turns quickly into a weird shaky feeling that I've just done the unthinkable. And there's no getting out of it. So, I start packing (and panicking) knowing that I've just made the weirdest moving mistake I've ever made.."

Suggesting that I've made millions of moving mistakes.

"..And it's the worst. I get there (there's no stopping after I've made such crazy plea to get that apartment back, what with all of the papers signed). And so, a few weeks later, I unpack. I'm back. Right where I started. Oh, the horror. The private horror. And it's like the apartment is haunted by a ghost. And I can't put my finger on it. This ghost, who is she..? She seems familiar. She reminds me of someone I know.."

Wrong again. I would totally know that the ghost was me.