of my life will almost certainly have to feature this scene, so I hope I can do it justice.
Cast of characters:
Grigorio, ~43: composer, pianist, Arts Circle director. Spindly, stoop-shouldered, ingenuous, intense; mop of untidy curls in prescribed composer style; slightly over-dressed for any occasion.
Crank, ~47: hippie/mystic of indeterminate profession; suspected of still living with his parents. Carries chess board at all times. Bad teeth, smoker, not necessarily an alcoholic but certainly plenty drunk on this occasion. Stained clothing, too many bags. Closely resembles any given homeless person, in fact.
J.R., ~65: entrepreneur, CEO, mystic, populist. Plotting 25-billion-dollar deal to transform Governor's Island into a World Paradise of Art and Culture. Could be a lunatic and a bounder for all we know.
Serena, 37: painter, healer, blonde. Wearing, on this occasion, poufy yellow skirt, black athletic shoes, and black cut-off T-shirt reading "Brooklyn: Where the Weak Are Killed and Eaten."
Scene 1: Friday evening, 8 PM, The American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan. It is Free Night and jazz music wafts through the giant glass globe of the north atrium.
Security guard: Nice shirt.
S: Thanks. (encountering G. on stairs) Sorry I'm late.
G: Sorry, what for? Guess what--Crank is DRUNK. I don't know how much we'll be able to accomplish.
S: Ah, well. (We enter jazz atrium via cloakroom and roped-off area containing private party, full of wealthy donors eating cánapés and drinking martinis.)
G: Crank asked me to guard his bags and chess board while he went out for a smoke. Can you imagine? I refused. I'm not a chess board babysitter.
S: How do you do? I'm Serena.
G: You two haven't met?
Crank (to Me): You've almost got it. You're only lacking the littlest bit.
S: Can I get a drink around here?
G: They're overpriced. Crank brought beer in his bag.
S: I'll wait.
C: Do you play chess?
S: Not really.
C: I have a system worked out where I teach kids to play chess, only I'm teaching them the Truth, because they and I are equal to the other kid and them, and the universe, and it's all one and we are brothers. You know.
S: Yes, I do know.
G: I like to go through strange magazines, here, for ideas; look at this, and this, and this...
C: J.R. has a penthouse up the street from here. (Gets out cell phone and dials.)
C: We can go over to J.R.'s, like, now.
S: Are you SURE?
G: We only stay half an hour, tops.
C: Half an hour, it's cool, man. I'm gonna pee. (Exit.)
G: Can you BELIEVE he asked me to babysit all this stuff? Look at all this. I'm gonna stand here while he smokes, right.
(We look at magazines and listen to jazz.)
C: (returns after long interval, bearing fake long-stemmed rose.)
S: For me? Did you meet a Mexican in the bathroom?
C: No, a black lady. (Looks around at empty hall, beerily confused) Is it over?
Us: YES. We need to go now.
C: Sure they're not just taking a break?
Us: NO. It's over. We're getting kicked out. (We depart, bearing rose, bags, magazines, chess board.)
C: Do you believe in telepathy?
S: Of course.
C: We could look into each other's eyes and know that I am you and you are me, and all is one.
S: Or not.
C: You're my sister, and I'm your brother, and maybe, maybe not. Sure you don't play chess?
S: Not really.
C: (to G) Serena is the sexual chi of this project, but she's not quite there yet.
S: I channel through all SEVEN chakras, thank you very much.
G: How far is it? Should we take a bus, or a cab?
C: This is a very important evening. You, me, Serena, and J.R. are the four core elements of this project. We have everything we need. Big things are happening.
G: What about Lolita, and Archimedes, and Horatio...
Me: What is "this project," anyway?
C: We could split a cab. Seriously, my life is brighter knowing that you exist.
(Cut to front of J.R.'s building.)
G: Who paid for the cab?
S: I did. You guys can buy me a beer.
Us: We're here to see J.R.
Security guard: Penthouse. Go right on up.
S: This J.R. is obviously a friendly guy.
Scene 2: J.R.'s penthouse. Rambling set of rooms crammed to the gills with books, good art, bad art, collections of glass and marble eggs, seashells, VHS tapes, china, dead plants, live plants, Persian rugs, antique furniture, fire irons, grand piano. Wrapped on three sides by a terrace overlooking Manhattan, now covered in scaffolding. Smells like great-grandparent's library.
S: Thank you for inviting us. What a lovely place.
J. R. I share with a 91-year-old man who has lived here for 65 years. Rent-controlled. I came for dinner 10 years ago and never left. He's in Fire Island for five months. Sorry about the scaffolding.
C: (grabbing Serena by the neck) Trust me.
S: (tense, standing mid-room) I'm a massage therapist. Find the bad spot, I'm testing you. No, you missed it.
G: The piano is calling to me and I must play Beethoven. But here I have a list of four important issues, which I must preface with an overview, because I'm the sort of person who likes to summarize first. Bullets, one, two, three.
J.R. Yes.
C: (interrupting) This is a very important evening; here we have the four core elements of this project. We can put together a radio program, the four of us in this room, we can revitalize WGBI, I have contacts. This is a vision.
J.R. What?
C: You've heard of WGBI?
G: The four of us? What about Lolita, Archimides, Horatio...
C: And I'm working on getting a website, AC dot IC dot org. Intentional Community dot org, they're not exactly but I know...
G: There's the question of standards, quality versus quantity, perhaps we have levels of membership...
J.R. Excuse me, one thing at a time.
C: I'm going to go smoke.
G: (continues at great length regarding logistics)
J.R. I was drawn to your project; it's what we're trying to accomplish. I take orders from the Man Above. You (pointing at S.'s "Brooklyn" T-shirt) are crucial to us.
Crank: (returning) Serena is the sexual chi of this project.
S: I SAID, all SEVEN chakras, thank you.
Crank: (maundering) Out of all projects, Serena chose this one. She chose us. And...
G: Excuse me, I'm almost finished. (goes on at great length)
S: What we need is a software engineer and a librarian.
J.R. And who is Serena L.?
S: I am the voice of efficiency and serenity. It's time to go.
G: But first I must play Beethoven. (Fade on G. playing schmaltz, J.R. tired, C. drunk, S. impatient and embarrassed.)
Scene 3: Interior of Mexican dive restaurant on Amsterdam Avenue. Very hot, no A.C. or fan. We are the only English-speaking patrons.
G: Is there a waitress?
S: Let me explain about Mexican waiters.
C: (handing S. a beer) You have to promise me a game of chess.
S: I used to play Socratic chess.
C.: (interrupting) You see, it's more than just chess, it's the chink in the mind that needs completing.
(S. takes a sip of beer. C. takes it back and drinks. S. orders own beer.)
G: Do you understand what he's talking about?
S: I've got his number.
C: I like to think I'm unique.
S: I've known a lot of Cranks. The last one was named Clarissa; she visited me last Christmas. Blonde, gorgeous, hairdresser, insane. We're not speaking.
C: I'm sorry you've been hurt.
S: It's not like that.
G: Excuse me is there some sort of budding romance going on here?
S: No, Crank is just being obstreperous.
C: Hey, I want to look into your eyes and know that I am you and you are me and all is one. It doesn't HAVE to be sexual.
S: Back off. I am Not Available.
G: Oho!
C: (cut to the quick) Hey, I know TEN guys like J.R. I could finance your project in a heartbeat.
Scene 4: train station. C. in state of devastated melodrama. G. and S. discussing metaphysics with great energy.
S: You see, none of this exists. It's a projection of the Mind.
G: What do you mean? Of course this exists. Here, (touches arm) this proves it.
S: No, this is merely a perception. Perceived reality is a hologram.
G: This is scientific terminology. Explain.
S: Are you familiar with the new quantum physics? A particle is only a particle when it is observed; when you look away, it's a wave.
G: (insists on detailed explanation)
S: Okay, let's say you have a bowling ball and some sand. You roll the ball in the sand, and it leaves a track like this. Only then you look away for a second, and when you look back, there is the ball, but the sand is going like this (makes wave pattern with hand).
G: I don't understand.
S: Okay, you have a bowling ball...
(Train arrives. Conversation on metaphysics continues while C. stalks off to rear car and sets up chess board.)
G: What is up with Crank?
S: He's not my type; he stinks, he's got bad teeth, he's drunk and insane. Maybe he's reading my aura, maybe he's telepathic, but he's still RUDE.
(S.'s cell phone rings)
C: My life is brighter knowing that you exist.
CURTAIN
Wednesday, August 10, 2005
Tuesday, August 02, 2005
Reality & dreams
It was only after I fully woke up that I could begin to classify it as a nightmare. During the dream and for several hours afterward, it seemed logical, normal and inevitable that I should have been sentenced to death for an obscure misdemeanor, execution to be carried out next week, with no possibility of appeal. I had one more trip planned, and my aunt volunteered to take me to the airport. Only she was driving from the back seat; I urged her to get into the front, because 'there are no brake pedals back there,' then made a lunge for the driver's seat myself. Unfortunately my aunt was too quick for me, and steered the car directly into a pile of upside-down bicycles in the middle of the street. I yelled, "what are you THINKING?", my aunt burst into hysterical tears, and I hijacked one of the bicycles and headed off for the airport. Soon, however, I realized that among other problems, my watch had stopped, and it was already too late to make the flight. I considered the possibility of getting onto another flight, then thought, 'wait, I only have one day to live. Maybe I should spend it with my family.' My family were looking for me, but none of them seemed too distressed about my impending execution, and nobody had thought of a lawyer.
This is pretty directly connected to my current financial situation. Upon waking consideration I realized that 'impending execution' is EXACTLY how it feels. I'm almost out of money and I have not found a stable source of income in the three years I've been here. Jobs from hell are impossible to come by, and it makes me physically sick to think of doing one. Not enough art is selling and not enough clients are calling. I am at my fucking wit's end, and deep in the back of my mind, for the last year and half or so, I have been considering suicide as a more or less practical option.
If anybody tells me I am lazy I will pound them into the asphalt. I've written the cover letters and revised the résumés, I've put my heart and soul and most of my capital into starting my own business, which was slowly sabotaged, undercut and finally shattered by a scumball of a poorly-chosen boyfriend. I have bravely coped with both the subsequent depression and the psychological re-structuring necessary to ensure that I don't make such an idiotic mistake again. Simultaneously I have run and marketed a healing practice, hampered by the fact that I have to do it illegally, written another business plan and worked diligently to get it sufficiently financed; simultaneously I have run an art career, including applying for grants, residencies, exhibitions and fellowships, maintaining a website, publicizing hard-won exhibitions entirely by myself and, oh, I forgot, PRODUCING THE GODDAMN ART. That's THREE fucking full-time jobs. Three. And I am still spending roughly two thousand dollars a month more than I am earning.
I am angry and frustrated and miserable and I need some help. My aunt, as evidenced by her salient presence in my dream, is doing her best to help; in her ongoing, never-say-die quest for a rich husband, she has been corresponding with a 72-year-old Harvard lawyer in Long Island, whose son-in-law runs the type of art gallery that actually sells art for the kinds of prices you need to survive in New York City. Only her friend cannot manage to type in the URL to my website so that it actually appears on the screen. It's an easy URL and the last twenty-five times I checked it, it was working fine. But Oh Well. My aunt's heart is in the right place, and her common sense in these matters far outstrips my dad's, who last month was telling me I should check out Taos, New Mexico; evidently, they have galleries in Taos. Imagine that. I told him, okay, do you have a friend who buys expensive art, and who will recommend me to a dealer who sells expensive art, and is willing to pay to ship my art to Taos and promote it to a list of promising collectors? Because if not, I'm not interested. This Is Not A Game.
I hate to harp on the subject, but nobody is asking my brother-in-law the architect, who is currently working 80+ hours a week on a startup real estate development project and not drawing a paycheck, to get a temp job to pay the bills. Nobody is asking my brother the mechanical engineer, who also works 80+ hours at a startup which is not turning a profit after five (?) years in business, to work evenings as a bartender until someone buys a truckload of nano-silver. No, people are actually INVESTING in my brother and brother-in-law, and if I had any capital left, I would too. Only since I'm the only one who believes in me, I am my only venture capitalist. I wish I could sue myself.
I wasn't intending to make this post into a bitch session. I was hoping to qualify my last post, also a bitch session, by pointing out that it is actually a blessing that my former acquaintances are rude sons of bitches and not worth the effort. It makes it clear that I need a new set of friends; interesting friends, intelligent friends, stable and spiritual and loving and supportive. Grown-up friends. I have a few of those and I value them highly. Maybe I'm meeting more; I've recently joined an "Arts Circle" as a core and founding member, and the energy seems promising. All the members are grown-ups, with actual careers in the arts. They all have money issues too, but at least they take me, as well as themselves, seriously.
And I am practicing gratitude, and last week I did one of those housecleanings that involves delving in corners with funky vacuum cleaner attachments. I eradicated several black holes full of un-filed documents, gardening supplies and untidy stacks; I organized my bookshelves by subject AND color. I increased my usage of lavender oil and hacked at ancient repositories of cat pee. I pared down and harmonized the artwork. My home is a calmer, more nurturing place. I wish I didn't keep having visions of having to sell all my books, plants, cats, art and furniture in a sidewalk sale and move into my brother-in-law's parents' spare closet in Maine. They're nice people but even they would get sick of me after a month or two.
This is pretty directly connected to my current financial situation. Upon waking consideration I realized that 'impending execution' is EXACTLY how it feels. I'm almost out of money and I have not found a stable source of income in the three years I've been here. Jobs from hell are impossible to come by, and it makes me physically sick to think of doing one. Not enough art is selling and not enough clients are calling. I am at my fucking wit's end, and deep in the back of my mind, for the last year and half or so, I have been considering suicide as a more or less practical option.
If anybody tells me I am lazy I will pound them into the asphalt. I've written the cover letters and revised the résumés, I've put my heart and soul and most of my capital into starting my own business, which was slowly sabotaged, undercut and finally shattered by a scumball of a poorly-chosen boyfriend. I have bravely coped with both the subsequent depression and the psychological re-structuring necessary to ensure that I don't make such an idiotic mistake again. Simultaneously I have run and marketed a healing practice, hampered by the fact that I have to do it illegally, written another business plan and worked diligently to get it sufficiently financed; simultaneously I have run an art career, including applying for grants, residencies, exhibitions and fellowships, maintaining a website, publicizing hard-won exhibitions entirely by myself and, oh, I forgot, PRODUCING THE GODDAMN ART. That's THREE fucking full-time jobs. Three. And I am still spending roughly two thousand dollars a month more than I am earning.
I am angry and frustrated and miserable and I need some help. My aunt, as evidenced by her salient presence in my dream, is doing her best to help; in her ongoing, never-say-die quest for a rich husband, she has been corresponding with a 72-year-old Harvard lawyer in Long Island, whose son-in-law runs the type of art gallery that actually sells art for the kinds of prices you need to survive in New York City. Only her friend cannot manage to type in the URL to my website so that it actually appears on the screen. It's an easy URL and the last twenty-five times I checked it, it was working fine. But Oh Well. My aunt's heart is in the right place, and her common sense in these matters far outstrips my dad's, who last month was telling me I should check out Taos, New Mexico; evidently, they have galleries in Taos. Imagine that. I told him, okay, do you have a friend who buys expensive art, and who will recommend me to a dealer who sells expensive art, and is willing to pay to ship my art to Taos and promote it to a list of promising collectors? Because if not, I'm not interested. This Is Not A Game.
I hate to harp on the subject, but nobody is asking my brother-in-law the architect, who is currently working 80+ hours a week on a startup real estate development project and not drawing a paycheck, to get a temp job to pay the bills. Nobody is asking my brother the mechanical engineer, who also works 80+ hours at a startup which is not turning a profit after five (?) years in business, to work evenings as a bartender until someone buys a truckload of nano-silver. No, people are actually INVESTING in my brother and brother-in-law, and if I had any capital left, I would too. Only since I'm the only one who believes in me, I am my only venture capitalist. I wish I could sue myself.
I wasn't intending to make this post into a bitch session. I was hoping to qualify my last post, also a bitch session, by pointing out that it is actually a blessing that my former acquaintances are rude sons of bitches and not worth the effort. It makes it clear that I need a new set of friends; interesting friends, intelligent friends, stable and spiritual and loving and supportive. Grown-up friends. I have a few of those and I value them highly. Maybe I'm meeting more; I've recently joined an "Arts Circle" as a core and founding member, and the energy seems promising. All the members are grown-ups, with actual careers in the arts. They all have money issues too, but at least they take me, as well as themselves, seriously.
And I am practicing gratitude, and last week I did one of those housecleanings that involves delving in corners with funky vacuum cleaner attachments. I eradicated several black holes full of un-filed documents, gardening supplies and untidy stacks; I organized my bookshelves by subject AND color. I increased my usage of lavender oil and hacked at ancient repositories of cat pee. I pared down and harmonized the artwork. My home is a calmer, more nurturing place. I wish I didn't keep having visions of having to sell all my books, plants, cats, art and furniture in a sidewalk sale and move into my brother-in-law's parents' spare closet in Maine. They're nice people but even they would get sick of me after a month or two.
Saturday, July 30, 2005
Terror, obligation and boredom
Well, THAT occasion was a dud. Thank God.
All week, ever since I got the invitation to the premiere of M.'s documentary, about an obscure 19th-century Irish female, I have been feeling nauseated. I knew, by all the rules of karma, acquaintanceship and social credibility, that I had to attend. M. has been nice to me; she has called me up and invited me out, several times, to events and venues at which I have had an excrutiatingly horrible time. She has borrowed the use of my computer and repaid me handsomely in alcohol and African music CDs. She has invited me into her home. She has attended my openings. I needed to go.
At the same time, I knew that if there was one event in New York City where I was most likely to run into the ex, it would be this one. The ex kills time by attempting to fix M.'s obsolete, moribund computer. He gives her my ex-bicycles. They get drunk together, if they happen to find themselves in the same bar at the same time. The ex thinks of this sort of thing as friendship. In New York City, if your friend has a premiere, you have to go.
It's not exactly M.'s fault that I have a terrible time whenever we hang out together. She just doesn't understand that everybody doesn't like the same things she does. She really gets going around the time I collapse--between 11:30 PM and 6 AM. She likes hanging out with, and screwing, big, oppressed, angry African males. She likes loud music and cigarette smoke and long, blasé conversations about how everything's fucked and there's nothing you can do. When I hang out with her they close the bar around us and she refuses to leave, and big black men hit on me and refuse to take 'huh? no, thanks' for an answer. When I try to hang out with her I feel like I'm being tortured. But she's great, really she is.
So since I got the invitation I have been hemming and hawing and thinking of other, pressing engagements that could possibly occupy my Friday evening instead, which, since I am lame and in transition and coming out of a long depression, I don't really have. I have been thinking of what sort of support system I could bring with me. I have been planning my wardrobe.
Finally I decided to bite it and do the hero. I went bravely, solo, in a dress that H. donated for exactly such occasions: five-dollar, thrift-store bin, floor-length petroleum 'fuck me now' clingy thing with a thong and no bra. Amber beads and hoop earrings, eye makeup, lipstick, shiny blonde hair brushing my nipples. I've been doing a lot of yoga and you know what? I look O.K. Better than the folks who spend their time drinking heavily and bitching about how everything's fucked and there's nothing you can do.
You know what else? Those people are LAME. At least five of the folks standing on the sidewalk as I walked up have been invited into my home, and fed, and entertained. They have attended my openings. I have been privy to some of their darkest secrets. We belong to the same Circle of Friends. And none of them frickin' asked how I was. The time has passed when I blame myself for such rudeness; after I have smiled, said hello, offered congratulations or a compliment or asked for a career update, I feel my task is finished. If no follow-up is forthcoming, well, I'm free.
The featured films represented five years of M.'s hard work, a career-to-date retrospective lasting an hour and a quarter, and I consulted my watch. M. is a filmmaker at heart; she likes pointing a camera at things, faces, happenings. She sympathizes with the obscure and the oppressed. And that's all. Man, was I bored. No, that's harsh. I was miffed at having been snubbed on the sidewalk; I was in a highly critical state of mind. I tried to get into the aesthetics of super-8 and black-and-white, of grainy closeups and disaffected soundtracks, of nameless faces and artistic anomie, of lack of plot, and purpose, and point. I didn't try hard enough and I failed.
I had mixed feelings about skipping the reception; I really, really wanted a free shot of Jameson's. But I also had to drive, and also would have had to socially exist during the time it took to drink it. I forewent the Jameson's, congratulated M., showered a couple of ex-acquaintances with random good energy and bolted.
But THANK FUCKING GOD my ex wasn't there. For all his blocks, negativity, manipulation and horribility, at least he has something approaching a goddamned mind. I might have been tempted to talk to him.
All week, ever since I got the invitation to the premiere of M.'s documentary, about an obscure 19th-century Irish female, I have been feeling nauseated. I knew, by all the rules of karma, acquaintanceship and social credibility, that I had to attend. M. has been nice to me; she has called me up and invited me out, several times, to events and venues at which I have had an excrutiatingly horrible time. She has borrowed the use of my computer and repaid me handsomely in alcohol and African music CDs. She has invited me into her home. She has attended my openings. I needed to go.
At the same time, I knew that if there was one event in New York City where I was most likely to run into the ex, it would be this one. The ex kills time by attempting to fix M.'s obsolete, moribund computer. He gives her my ex-bicycles. They get drunk together, if they happen to find themselves in the same bar at the same time. The ex thinks of this sort of thing as friendship. In New York City, if your friend has a premiere, you have to go.
It's not exactly M.'s fault that I have a terrible time whenever we hang out together. She just doesn't understand that everybody doesn't like the same things she does. She really gets going around the time I collapse--between 11:30 PM and 6 AM. She likes hanging out with, and screwing, big, oppressed, angry African males. She likes loud music and cigarette smoke and long, blasé conversations about how everything's fucked and there's nothing you can do. When I hang out with her they close the bar around us and she refuses to leave, and big black men hit on me and refuse to take 'huh? no, thanks' for an answer. When I try to hang out with her I feel like I'm being tortured. But she's great, really she is.
So since I got the invitation I have been hemming and hawing and thinking of other, pressing engagements that could possibly occupy my Friday evening instead, which, since I am lame and in transition and coming out of a long depression, I don't really have. I have been thinking of what sort of support system I could bring with me. I have been planning my wardrobe.
Finally I decided to bite it and do the hero. I went bravely, solo, in a dress that H. donated for exactly such occasions: five-dollar, thrift-store bin, floor-length petroleum 'fuck me now' clingy thing with a thong and no bra. Amber beads and hoop earrings, eye makeup, lipstick, shiny blonde hair brushing my nipples. I've been doing a lot of yoga and you know what? I look O.K. Better than the folks who spend their time drinking heavily and bitching about how everything's fucked and there's nothing you can do.
You know what else? Those people are LAME. At least five of the folks standing on the sidewalk as I walked up have been invited into my home, and fed, and entertained. They have attended my openings. I have been privy to some of their darkest secrets. We belong to the same Circle of Friends. And none of them frickin' asked how I was. The time has passed when I blame myself for such rudeness; after I have smiled, said hello, offered congratulations or a compliment or asked for a career update, I feel my task is finished. If no follow-up is forthcoming, well, I'm free.
The featured films represented five years of M.'s hard work, a career-to-date retrospective lasting an hour and a quarter, and I consulted my watch. M. is a filmmaker at heart; she likes pointing a camera at things, faces, happenings. She sympathizes with the obscure and the oppressed. And that's all. Man, was I bored. No, that's harsh. I was miffed at having been snubbed on the sidewalk; I was in a highly critical state of mind. I tried to get into the aesthetics of super-8 and black-and-white, of grainy closeups and disaffected soundtracks, of nameless faces and artistic anomie, of lack of plot, and purpose, and point. I didn't try hard enough and I failed.
I had mixed feelings about skipping the reception; I really, really wanted a free shot of Jameson's. But I also had to drive, and also would have had to socially exist during the time it took to drink it. I forewent the Jameson's, congratulated M., showered a couple of ex-acquaintances with random good energy and bolted.
But THANK FUCKING GOD my ex wasn't there. For all his blocks, negativity, manipulation and horribility, at least he has something approaching a goddamned mind. I might have been tempted to talk to him.
Wednesday, July 13, 2005
Heartbreak
It's GONE. My beautiful bicycle, my lovely green Jamis Tangier, my freedom. From outside the yoga studio. Wire-cutters. My heart is broken, broken, broken.
I managed to resist my 3 AM impulse to take this out on my ex-boyfriend, at least directly. His astral body received innumerable kicks in the kneecaps during the course of a long, sleepless night, but I doubt he would have noticed--his astral body is under constant attack from his own mind anyway.
Renter's insurance----pffft. Useless. They wouldn't cover the bicycle if I was actually USING it at the time, and the deductible is $500 anyway. I've been trolling Craigslist all morning, but I'm probably too raw to get another one right this instant, sort of like adopting a kitten the day after your 14-year-old Little Kitty dies in a tragic accident. The bonding process could be irrevocably disrupted.
I LOVED that bicycle. Just the other evening I rode it to the East Village to hear a member of my artist's circle perform; I was wearing my deep blue sundress and the actress chick told me I looked glamorous in my helmet. After a couple of gin-and-tonics and some fierce disembowelling of the performance at Lucien's, I took it home the long way, through Chinatown and over the Brooklyn Bridge, singing moody Glass Eye songs that welled up out of my art-department days, when it was just us and Kathy McCarty till 3 AM, crashing bass chords and the high unearthly purity of Kathy's voice.
Time has stolen you from me, Christine
Has made each prospect fade with the evening
Like a ghost, you have withdrawn
Like two children you and time are gone.
I thought, crossing the canal at Union street and turning up 5th Avenue, how Brooklyn feels like my own private fairyland at night; the trucks and the crowds have mostly disappeared, uncovering the mystery of industry asleep, and the fact that I sort of know my way around the city now is somehow remarkable, not just a battle for survival. I felt that I was healing; I felt that I was becoming free. I am so sick of this shit.
I wasn't even going to call the police, but could not quite remember whether my insurance would cover this or not, so I decided to get a report just in case. In practice this meant standing on a street corner for nearly an hour, in damp yoga clothing, fighting back tears, to obtain a completely useless piece of paper. The two blank-faced beat cops who eventually arrived were nonplussed and impassive at first, but after ten minutes, during which the black one fumbled and wrote the report with dyslexic recalcitrance, the Puerto Rican one decided I was okay, told me to sit down in the back seat and they'd drive me home. We had a cheerful chat on the way about stress, yoga, and cultural backgrounds, and he called half an hour later to say they'd found a guy on a Jamis, what color was it? Green, not silver, I told him. But thanks for keeping an eye out, I appreciate it. I really did. It pays to be friendly to cops, something my ex-boyfriend never understood.
To numb out my mind for the rest of the evening I re-read "The Man in the Brown Suit," my favorite Agatha Christie novel ever. With every passing year I am more acutely aware that Agatha Christie is cliche'd, redundant, mannered pulp, but when you fall in love with an author at the age of 8, the magic never really goes away. Also, re-reading prose that was the pinnacle of my romantic ideals at 14 gives me some insight into the deeper nature of subsequent expectations and bitter disappointments. Listen to this:
"You look like a witch, Anne," he said at last, and there was something in his voice that had never been there before.
He reached out his hand and touched my hair. I shivered. Suddenly he sprang up with an oath.
"You must leave here to-morrow, do you hear?" he cried. "I--I can't bear any more. I'm only a man after all. You must go, Anne. You must. You're not a fool. You know yourself that this can't go on."
"I suppose not," I said slowly. "But--it's been happy, hasn't it?"
"Happy? It's been hell!"
"As bad as that!"
"What do you torment me for? Why are you mocking at me? Why do you say that--laughing into your hair?"
"I wasn't laughing. And I'm not mocking. If you want me to go, I'll go. But if you want me to stay--I'll stay."
"Not that!" he cried vehemently. "Not that. Don't tempt me, Anne. Do you realize what I am? A criminal twice over. A man hunted down...you're so young, Anne, and so beautiful--with the kind of beauty that sends men mad. All the world's before you--love, life, everything. Mine's behind me--scorched, spoiled, with a taste of bitter ashes."
"If you don't want me---"
"You know I want you. You know that I'd give my soul to pick you up in my arms and keep you here, hidden away from the world, for ever and ever..."
Well, I mean, really. By the end of the novel young Anne Beddingfeld, orphaned, penniless, unchaperoned and feckless, has received four proposals of marriage, one on-the-fly job as a newspaper correspondent, and not a single indecent proposition. To be fair, she has also narrowly escaped two or three murder attempts. But when she turns down proposal #2, from the strong, silent, Secret Service agent millionaire, he sets his iron jaw, nails the murderer, and then declares,
"Anne, do you remember that I told you I knew what I had to do?"
"Of course, I remember."
"I think I may fairly say that I have done it. The man you love is cleared of suspicion."
"Was that what you meant?"
"Of course."
I hung my head, ashamed of the baseless suspicion I had entertained.
"The Man in the Brown Suit" was published in 1924. Okay, so women had only been voting for four years, and "suitable jobs" for them were limited to parlourmaid, governess, secretary and wife. And for God's sake, it's Agatha Christie. But what I sorely miss about this chauvinistic era, what my heart still yearns for at 3 AM, is not necessarily a steely-eyed, darkly troubled man to fling me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and carry me off to Rhodesia (though this wouldn't necessarily come amiss); it's the baseline tension created by a shared cultural concept of honor. People don't necessarily live up to the code, ever; but at least they know it's there.
At thirty-seven, I don't get as angry as I got at seventeen. I no longer slap strange men, the way I did Carl Kutack, when he sat down behind me at a party, poked my ass with his big toe, leaned over and murmured, "you wanna go for a walk?" It's one of life's common ironies that once you have the experience to handle illicit propositions, you get fewer of them. Yesterday afternoon, though, a fat black man in a silver sports car pulled up next to me at a stoplight and called out, "You sure is beautiful. You wanna give me a ride?" I smiled brightly and said, "Thank you very much, sir, but no."
"Why?" he asked.
"I'm just not interested. But thanks," I replied, rolling up my windows. It took me years and years to learn how to do this; years and years to curb my impulse to be polite, to tell the guy I was married or gay, to give him a lecture on manners and decency, to stop taking it as a personal insult. Now, I take it as a compliment, but that still doesn't mean I have any inclination to accept the offer.
Why?
You're not a steely-eyed, darkly troubled man with whom I have fallen passionately in love at first sight, of course.
Why?
I hate to break this to you, men, but most of you are not very good in bed. The best of you need several weeks' worth of patient re-education before you can reliably compete with a vibrator. One-night stands do not provide the scope for such training, and are thus, on even the most basic level, not worth it.
Why?
Do I need to spell this out? AIDS, pregnancy, chlamydia, gonorrhea, syphilis, genital warts, cervical cancer, painful and expensive abortions, painful and expensive children, death. Offensive body odor, kissing like a giant goldfish, bad teeth, bad breath, farting, bizarre noises, slobbering, juvenile remarks. Knifelike pelvic bones that slam into thighs, leaving greenish-yellow bruises. Excessive body hair in unattractive places. Sleep deprivation. Boredom. Betrayal, abandonment, broken-hearted nervous breakdowns.
Duh.
If you kiss me, Mister, you must think I'm pretty
If you think so, Mister, you must want to fuck me
If you fuck me, Mister, it must mean you love me
If you love me, Mister, you would never leave me
It's as sim-ple as - can - be...(ching)
--Dresden Dolls
For the record, the reason I slapped Carl Kutack was not that I found him an unattractive lout. The reason I slapped him is that I'd had a crush on his heart-rending, crinkly-eyed smile for the last nine months, and he didn't even remember meeting me until that evening, when his girlfriend had dumped him and he was drunk and horny. I slapped him because he had eyes for my behind but was blind to my value.
This afternoon I took the N train to Union Square, and not only were the brakes unoiled, screaming violently at every curve and stop, but something in either the air conditioning, the PA system or the fluorescent lighting was emitting a high-pitched, piercing whine which I found nearly unendurable. I spent the entire journey with my fingers in my ears, and nobody else on the train seemed to notice it AT ALL. Two-thirds of them appeared to be asleep, and the rest were reading or staring blandly into space. When I got off the train I could still hear the whine until I was halfway up the stairs. The rest of the world is deaf.
I usually don't talk about being 'sensitive,' for fear that people will think that I'm a whiny wuss. I didn't even realize I was 'sensitive' for the longest time--I thought I WAS a wuss, and that other people found loud, dissonant noises, fluorescent lighting, horrible smells, emotional tension and superfluous whining every bit as misery-inducing as I did, but were putting a brave, stoic, courteous face on it. Then I read a piece of pop psychology on my lunch break, called "the Highly Sensitive Person," took the test, and whoa, nelly. Finally I felt justified in asking for the music to be turned down, the door to be shut, for my lover to take a goddamned shower and quit being so !@*(&# rough. I'm not frigid, I'm hyper-responsive. I'm also brave, stoic, and courteous. Please don't hurt me any more.
I managed to resist my 3 AM impulse to take this out on my ex-boyfriend, at least directly. His astral body received innumerable kicks in the kneecaps during the course of a long, sleepless night, but I doubt he would have noticed--his astral body is under constant attack from his own mind anyway.
Renter's insurance----pffft. Useless. They wouldn't cover the bicycle if I was actually USING it at the time, and the deductible is $500 anyway. I've been trolling Craigslist all morning, but I'm probably too raw to get another one right this instant, sort of like adopting a kitten the day after your 14-year-old Little Kitty dies in a tragic accident. The bonding process could be irrevocably disrupted.
I LOVED that bicycle. Just the other evening I rode it to the East Village to hear a member of my artist's circle perform; I was wearing my deep blue sundress and the actress chick told me I looked glamorous in my helmet. After a couple of gin-and-tonics and some fierce disembowelling of the performance at Lucien's, I took it home the long way, through Chinatown and over the Brooklyn Bridge, singing moody Glass Eye songs that welled up out of my art-department days, when it was just us and Kathy McCarty till 3 AM, crashing bass chords and the high unearthly purity of Kathy's voice.
Time has stolen you from me, Christine
Has made each prospect fade with the evening
Like a ghost, you have withdrawn
Like two children you and time are gone.
I thought, crossing the canal at Union street and turning up 5th Avenue, how Brooklyn feels like my own private fairyland at night; the trucks and the crowds have mostly disappeared, uncovering the mystery of industry asleep, and the fact that I sort of know my way around the city now is somehow remarkable, not just a battle for survival. I felt that I was healing; I felt that I was becoming free. I am so sick of this shit.
I wasn't even going to call the police, but could not quite remember whether my insurance would cover this or not, so I decided to get a report just in case. In practice this meant standing on a street corner for nearly an hour, in damp yoga clothing, fighting back tears, to obtain a completely useless piece of paper. The two blank-faced beat cops who eventually arrived were nonplussed and impassive at first, but after ten minutes, during which the black one fumbled and wrote the report with dyslexic recalcitrance, the Puerto Rican one decided I was okay, told me to sit down in the back seat and they'd drive me home. We had a cheerful chat on the way about stress, yoga, and cultural backgrounds, and he called half an hour later to say they'd found a guy on a Jamis, what color was it? Green, not silver, I told him. But thanks for keeping an eye out, I appreciate it. I really did. It pays to be friendly to cops, something my ex-boyfriend never understood.
To numb out my mind for the rest of the evening I re-read "The Man in the Brown Suit," my favorite Agatha Christie novel ever. With every passing year I am more acutely aware that Agatha Christie is cliche'd, redundant, mannered pulp, but when you fall in love with an author at the age of 8, the magic never really goes away. Also, re-reading prose that was the pinnacle of my romantic ideals at 14 gives me some insight into the deeper nature of subsequent expectations and bitter disappointments. Listen to this:
"You look like a witch, Anne," he said at last, and there was something in his voice that had never been there before.
He reached out his hand and touched my hair. I shivered. Suddenly he sprang up with an oath.
"You must leave here to-morrow, do you hear?" he cried. "I--I can't bear any more. I'm only a man after all. You must go, Anne. You must. You're not a fool. You know yourself that this can't go on."
"I suppose not," I said slowly. "But--it's been happy, hasn't it?"
"Happy? It's been hell!"
"As bad as that!"
"What do you torment me for? Why are you mocking at me? Why do you say that--laughing into your hair?"
"I wasn't laughing. And I'm not mocking. If you want me to go, I'll go. But if you want me to stay--I'll stay."
"Not that!" he cried vehemently. "Not that. Don't tempt me, Anne. Do you realize what I am? A criminal twice over. A man hunted down...you're so young, Anne, and so beautiful--with the kind of beauty that sends men mad. All the world's before you--love, life, everything. Mine's behind me--scorched, spoiled, with a taste of bitter ashes."
"If you don't want me---"
"You know I want you. You know that I'd give my soul to pick you up in my arms and keep you here, hidden away from the world, for ever and ever..."
Well, I mean, really. By the end of the novel young Anne Beddingfeld, orphaned, penniless, unchaperoned and feckless, has received four proposals of marriage, one on-the-fly job as a newspaper correspondent, and not a single indecent proposition. To be fair, she has also narrowly escaped two or three murder attempts. But when she turns down proposal #2, from the strong, silent, Secret Service agent millionaire, he sets his iron jaw, nails the murderer, and then declares,
"Anne, do you remember that I told you I knew what I had to do?"
"Of course, I remember."
"I think I may fairly say that I have done it. The man you love is cleared of suspicion."
"Was that what you meant?"
"Of course."
I hung my head, ashamed of the baseless suspicion I had entertained.
"The Man in the Brown Suit" was published in 1924. Okay, so women had only been voting for four years, and "suitable jobs" for them were limited to parlourmaid, governess, secretary and wife. And for God's sake, it's Agatha Christie. But what I sorely miss about this chauvinistic era, what my heart still yearns for at 3 AM, is not necessarily a steely-eyed, darkly troubled man to fling me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and carry me off to Rhodesia (though this wouldn't necessarily come amiss); it's the baseline tension created by a shared cultural concept of honor. People don't necessarily live up to the code, ever; but at least they know it's there.
At thirty-seven, I don't get as angry as I got at seventeen. I no longer slap strange men, the way I did Carl Kutack, when he sat down behind me at a party, poked my ass with his big toe, leaned over and murmured, "you wanna go for a walk?" It's one of life's common ironies that once you have the experience to handle illicit propositions, you get fewer of them. Yesterday afternoon, though, a fat black man in a silver sports car pulled up next to me at a stoplight and called out, "You sure is beautiful. You wanna give me a ride?" I smiled brightly and said, "Thank you very much, sir, but no."
"Why?" he asked.
"I'm just not interested. But thanks," I replied, rolling up my windows. It took me years and years to learn how to do this; years and years to curb my impulse to be polite, to tell the guy I was married or gay, to give him a lecture on manners and decency, to stop taking it as a personal insult. Now, I take it as a compliment, but that still doesn't mean I have any inclination to accept the offer.
Why?
You're not a steely-eyed, darkly troubled man with whom I have fallen passionately in love at first sight, of course.
Why?
I hate to break this to you, men, but most of you are not very good in bed. The best of you need several weeks' worth of patient re-education before you can reliably compete with a vibrator. One-night stands do not provide the scope for such training, and are thus, on even the most basic level, not worth it.
Why?
Do I need to spell this out? AIDS, pregnancy, chlamydia, gonorrhea, syphilis, genital warts, cervical cancer, painful and expensive abortions, painful and expensive children, death. Offensive body odor, kissing like a giant goldfish, bad teeth, bad breath, farting, bizarre noises, slobbering, juvenile remarks. Knifelike pelvic bones that slam into thighs, leaving greenish-yellow bruises. Excessive body hair in unattractive places. Sleep deprivation. Boredom. Betrayal, abandonment, broken-hearted nervous breakdowns.
Duh.
If you kiss me, Mister, you must think I'm pretty
If you think so, Mister, you must want to fuck me
If you fuck me, Mister, it must mean you love me
If you love me, Mister, you would never leave me
It's as sim-ple as - can - be...(ching)
--Dresden Dolls
For the record, the reason I slapped Carl Kutack was not that I found him an unattractive lout. The reason I slapped him is that I'd had a crush on his heart-rending, crinkly-eyed smile for the last nine months, and he didn't even remember meeting me until that evening, when his girlfriend had dumped him and he was drunk and horny. I slapped him because he had eyes for my behind but was blind to my value.
This afternoon I took the N train to Union Square, and not only were the brakes unoiled, screaming violently at every curve and stop, but something in either the air conditioning, the PA system or the fluorescent lighting was emitting a high-pitched, piercing whine which I found nearly unendurable. I spent the entire journey with my fingers in my ears, and nobody else on the train seemed to notice it AT ALL. Two-thirds of them appeared to be asleep, and the rest were reading or staring blandly into space. When I got off the train I could still hear the whine until I was halfway up the stairs. The rest of the world is deaf.
I usually don't talk about being 'sensitive,' for fear that people will think that I'm a whiny wuss. I didn't even realize I was 'sensitive' for the longest time--I thought I WAS a wuss, and that other people found loud, dissonant noises, fluorescent lighting, horrible smells, emotional tension and superfluous whining every bit as misery-inducing as I did, but were putting a brave, stoic, courteous face on it. Then I read a piece of pop psychology on my lunch break, called "the Highly Sensitive Person," took the test, and whoa, nelly. Finally I felt justified in asking for the music to be turned down, the door to be shut, for my lover to take a goddamned shower and quit being so !@*(&# rough. I'm not frigid, I'm hyper-responsive. I'm also brave, stoic, and courteous. Please don't hurt me any more.
Monday, July 11, 2005
This is my life
Today's schedule: 9 AM, get up, feed cats, shower, make tea, read New Yorker, email, journal, blogs, painting analysis, lunch. 2 PM, massage client. Change into painting clothes, work on large caty-wampus painting, because supplies from Jerry's have not yet arrived. 6:30 PM, yoga class. After class, go to bank to deposit massage $$, to co-op to pick up basic supplies and submission form for ad in "Linewaiter's Gazette," in the hopes that I can get more clients. Dinner. 9 PM; bike to East Village to hear member of artist's circle perform in piano bar. Midnight; meditation, Course in Miracles, bed.
A large part of my feelings of artistic and social paralysis, guilt, isolation and fear have to do with the fact that a deep inner part of me is sure, sure, sure that something terrible will happen to me for living like this. I mean, what? I'm not WORKING. I am not getting up at an agonizingly miserable hour, getting on the subway, sitting in an ugly place doing tedious, boring things for 9 hours, taking the subway home again and spending my evenings trying to summon the energy to make Great Art while physically, emotionally, morally and spiritually exhausted.
Well, something terrible WILL happen to me, if I don't get more clients and nothing sells out of my show--eventually, that enormous check to Phil the Neanderthal I have to write every month will bounce, and me, my plants, cats and paintings will be homeless.
But every time I look into getting a miserable, boring job, I look at the numbers, and realize again that one massage client=one ENTIRE DAY at miserable, boring job. And so I spend one more week in guilty limbo, and one more, and one more. Pray for me, pray for my lazy, unrealistic soul.
Yesterday I went again to Sund4y at Sunny's, and again nobody would talk to me, despite the fact that I was smiling and approachable, but I've come to expect this and really, really just continue to go for the readings and the free coffee. Beforehand I stopped off at BWAC to check on my painting, and I was glad I did--they had moved it, and hadn't printed any labels saying who painted it or how much it cost. Also, all my postcards and their dispenser had disappeared, along with the pen for my comments book, which vanished even before the last show opened. So fuck it, I stole another dispenser, borrowed a hammer, nailed it up, filled it with postcards, returned the hammer with thanks, and hassled John and Anna about the labels. I don't know if they will actually get printed, but my postcards are there. It is my goal to place every single postcard in a good home before my show comes down in September. I used to think that self-promotion was vulgar, but in New York it is a necessity of survival.
A woman in a sunhat and bleached-blonde hairdo about 20 years too young for her was berating Anna for saying that her work was 'not as strong' as another artist's. She was ranting loudly about how "you don't have to LIKE my work, I'm self-taught, I've been working for 20 years..." as if this made her look less like a total jackass for pitching this particular kind of fit. Note to outsider artists: never do this. There are right and wrong kinds of fits to pitch. When someone drops your painting on a nail and punctures it, it is permissible to report this fact tearfully to every important person within earshot, provided you take it home and fix it in a way that proves you know your shit. You can make people re-print your labels if your name is misspelled, but you may not whine that so-and-so's painting was hung in the best spot because she's the borough president's campaign manager. Basically, the goal of fit-pitching in the art world is to demonstrate absolute, internal self-confidence, so that next year you get the spot next to the campaign manager.
I learned the art of effective fit-pitching in art school, during the course of several successive and obviously rigged 'competitions'. There was one student who exemplified, to my mind, everything vile about institutional politics; being a mind-bogglingly bad artist, her path to career success lay through blackmail. "I'm being discriminated against for being a mixed-race black/Native American lesbian," she would cry, when she wasn't on the list for the scholarship, honor studio, or gallery jurying--and they would actually give her the award. I would have shot off my big toe to avoid association with her.
But after losing the scholarship, two successive gallery juryings and one honor-studio competition, I felt that I could not safely rely upon talent, discipline and quiet integrity to ensure my career advancement. When the results of the final, staggeringly skewed honor-studio competition were posted, absent my name, I marched up to the list in broad daylight and wrote on it, clearly, in ink. Then I dropped the matter entirely, being charming and polite to all faculty members whom I knew had dissed me.
They got the sign down fairly quickly, but not before several student body ringleaders had passed by and read, aloud, "'Go to hell. Go directly to hell; do not pass Go, do not collect $200. (signed) Serena T. LaBella.' BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!"
This would not have worked, of course, if my talent, discipline and relatively quiet integrity hadn't earned me some name recognition among the student body; I think the faculty were afraid of me. The day before the semester ended, I got a call from the head of the painting department. "We found you an honor studio. Another student failed to re-qualify." They gave me the best one. The student who failed to re-qualify was the black Native American lesbian, oddly enough.
Saturday my big adventure was biking to Pearl Paint for 200 ml tubes of titanium white. I was in a horrible mood, having decided to torture myself by digging up and re-reading the last letter sent to me by the ex-lover who, up until the beginning of May, was calling regularly and begging me to visit him because he was horny. In May I abruptly stopped hearing from him until two days before my show hung; then I received a cheery little note describing the rains and the flowers and the amiga who is visiting him through August. At the time I allowed myself thirty seconds to be startled and upset before I decided simply to never contact him again, and pushed it out of my mind. But Saturday morning I realized, "wow, that's really MEAN," and burst into tears.
Biking into Manhattan on a sunny Saturday didn't help my mood, unfortunately. The Brooklyn Bridge is fun to bike across, except for the tourists who stand planted in the middle of the bike lane with their cameras pointing at lousy shots, and the toddlers on tricycles who stray determinedly into your path, and the packs of bored teen-agers who look right at you and don't get out of your way, and the couples holding hands who don't look at you at all and don't get out of your way, and the other cyclists coming the other direction who seem determined to run you off the bridge, or into the tourists. Then once you get to Canal Street it is gridlock in every direction; pedestrians stepping off the sidewalk directly into your path and staying there, trucks unloading in the middle of intersections, traffic cops who defend the rights of no-one.
Then in the paint department at Pearl, a salesperson asked what I needed. "Your best deal on white oil tubes," I said. "Professional or student grade?" "Professional, definitely." "You're in the wrong aisle. Professional grade is over here, at $18 a tube. Goodbye," she said.
Well, I go through about a tube and a half of white a week, when I'm in form; 'professional' or not, $18 a tube for Gamblin is too high. I skulked back to the 'student grade' aisle, hid three $8 tubes of Georgian under my bike helmet, treated myself to a couple of new palette knives to ease the pain of humiliation, charged the lot on my 'emergency' credit card and left. Not wanting to feel like a friendless loser, working alone all weekend, I decided to stroll around Soho before returning to Brooklyn.
Soho sucked, too. All the outdoor patios were full of people having fun in merrily chattering couples or groups; all the sidewalks were full of crappy art and jewelry, all the stores were full of size-4 princess clothing that was ludicrously out of my price range. I bought an ice-cream cone and felt fat, lonely, poor and guilty. After checking out the 'sale' at French Connection and discovering that they still wanted $40 for a size-4, almost-out-of-style-and-season tank top, I decided to head for home.
Just as I hit the Brooklyn Bridge, the thunderstorm broke, seemingly out of a clear blue sky. Huzzah! Suddenly all the happy people were screaming and getting out of my way. By the time I hit the peak of the bridge, I was drenched. By the time I coasted down the other side, I was trilling "'Till there was you," joyfully unto the Lord, and the one other wet cyclist who heard me and laughed. I sang most of the way home. Water on the skin is the best mood-rejuvenator I know. The glow lasted till the next day.
Sunday my rear wheel fell off when I was halfway across Hamilton Avenue, by the freeway exit and the Battery Tunnel entrance. I removed the wheel to change the inner tube on Thursday; I don't know how or why I was able to ride on it for two days if it wasn't properly re-attached. Some guy stopped and made ineffectual suggestions while I got it back on, largely unassisted. He reminded me of, and very well could have been, my last Nerve date nearly three years ago, who caused me to swear off online dating forever. I seem to recall that the 'clueless, desperate elf-guy', as I think of him, had, as one of his main conversational foci, the number of miles he'd clocked while losing 75 pounds (but not the pot belly.) Not the adventures he'd had, not the things he'd seen or thought about, just the mileage.
Fortunately he didn't seem to recognize me. Up until that historic date, I had assumed that men who asked me out through Nerve were, at least, reading my profile, and contacting me because they divined a spark of commonality between us. Oh, naive idealist, I. I never actually PAID for online dating, because up until quite recently, men outnumbered women 3 to 1 online. Also, it bothers me, chasing men; I want to be courted. But not courted by men whose standards are: female; has pulse; will listen to me whine about the hundreds of other females who, quite properly, blew me off. My final Nerve date caused me to break ranks with the ironclad politesse of a lifetime. After what was probably only twenty minutes of conversation which included, on his part, casual racism, embittered whining, weight loss/mileage ratios, and an offer to jump into my lap, I said, 'This isn't working out for me," grabbed my bag, hat and coat in one fell scrabble and bolted, shaking off the bad energy like a horde of rabid mosquitoes. I kept looking back in desperate terror that he might be following me.
So, well, meeting men by losing my bike wheel on Hamilton Avenue isn't working; neither is going to literary readings or weekend parties upstate. My friend H. asked me, "so, what do you want? Just some casual fun?"
No, no, no, no, no. I have spent my life slapping the faces of men who just want casual fun, then pretending that what I wanted was casual fun, then stopping that pretence and going properly apeshit on people who toy with my soul. Goddammit, I want a Real Relationship. One where, if there's a problem, the two of you discuss it and work it out in some way. Is this delusional and unrealistic? Other people around me seem to be having weddings and babies and buying houses and going to couples counseling.
Not that I'm whining, really. Really I believe in karma, and divine guidance, and resonance with particular people, and in making a life-plan to learn certain lessons before we're even born. I notice that in the past, I've simply run into the people I've needed to meet and recognized them, without having to make any particular effort. I'm just wondering when the next one is going to come along. Hello? You out there? I'm ready now. Not perfect, not even flat-tummied, but sufficiently de-traumatized from the last one that I can handle more punishment. At least I think so.
A large part of my feelings of artistic and social paralysis, guilt, isolation and fear have to do with the fact that a deep inner part of me is sure, sure, sure that something terrible will happen to me for living like this. I mean, what? I'm not WORKING. I am not getting up at an agonizingly miserable hour, getting on the subway, sitting in an ugly place doing tedious, boring things for 9 hours, taking the subway home again and spending my evenings trying to summon the energy to make Great Art while physically, emotionally, morally and spiritually exhausted.
Well, something terrible WILL happen to me, if I don't get more clients and nothing sells out of my show--eventually, that enormous check to Phil the Neanderthal I have to write every month will bounce, and me, my plants, cats and paintings will be homeless.
But every time I look into getting a miserable, boring job, I look at the numbers, and realize again that one massage client=one ENTIRE DAY at miserable, boring job. And so I spend one more week in guilty limbo, and one more, and one more. Pray for me, pray for my lazy, unrealistic soul.
Yesterday I went again to Sund4y at Sunny's, and again nobody would talk to me, despite the fact that I was smiling and approachable, but I've come to expect this and really, really just continue to go for the readings and the free coffee. Beforehand I stopped off at BWAC to check on my painting, and I was glad I did--they had moved it, and hadn't printed any labels saying who painted it or how much it cost. Also, all my postcards and their dispenser had disappeared, along with the pen for my comments book, which vanished even before the last show opened. So fuck it, I stole another dispenser, borrowed a hammer, nailed it up, filled it with postcards, returned the hammer with thanks, and hassled John and Anna about the labels. I don't know if they will actually get printed, but my postcards are there. It is my goal to place every single postcard in a good home before my show comes down in September. I used to think that self-promotion was vulgar, but in New York it is a necessity of survival.
A woman in a sunhat and bleached-blonde hairdo about 20 years too young for her was berating Anna for saying that her work was 'not as strong' as another artist's. She was ranting loudly about how "you don't have to LIKE my work, I'm self-taught, I've been working for 20 years..." as if this made her look less like a total jackass for pitching this particular kind of fit. Note to outsider artists: never do this. There are right and wrong kinds of fits to pitch. When someone drops your painting on a nail and punctures it, it is permissible to report this fact tearfully to every important person within earshot, provided you take it home and fix it in a way that proves you know your shit. You can make people re-print your labels if your name is misspelled, but you may not whine that so-and-so's painting was hung in the best spot because she's the borough president's campaign manager. Basically, the goal of fit-pitching in the art world is to demonstrate absolute, internal self-confidence, so that next year you get the spot next to the campaign manager.
I learned the art of effective fit-pitching in art school, during the course of several successive and obviously rigged 'competitions'. There was one student who exemplified, to my mind, everything vile about institutional politics; being a mind-bogglingly bad artist, her path to career success lay through blackmail. "I'm being discriminated against for being a mixed-race black/Native American lesbian," she would cry, when she wasn't on the list for the scholarship, honor studio, or gallery jurying--and they would actually give her the award. I would have shot off my big toe to avoid association with her.
But after losing the scholarship, two successive gallery juryings and one honor-studio competition, I felt that I could not safely rely upon talent, discipline and quiet integrity to ensure my career advancement. When the results of the final, staggeringly skewed honor-studio competition were posted, absent my name, I marched up to the list in broad daylight and wrote on it, clearly, in ink. Then I dropped the matter entirely, being charming and polite to all faculty members whom I knew had dissed me.
They got the sign down fairly quickly, but not before several student body ringleaders had passed by and read, aloud, "'Go to hell. Go directly to hell; do not pass Go, do not collect $200. (signed) Serena T. LaBella.' BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!"
This would not have worked, of course, if my talent, discipline and relatively quiet integrity hadn't earned me some name recognition among the student body; I think the faculty were afraid of me. The day before the semester ended, I got a call from the head of the painting department. "We found you an honor studio. Another student failed to re-qualify." They gave me the best one. The student who failed to re-qualify was the black Native American lesbian, oddly enough.
Saturday my big adventure was biking to Pearl Paint for 200 ml tubes of titanium white. I was in a horrible mood, having decided to torture myself by digging up and re-reading the last letter sent to me by the ex-lover who, up until the beginning of May, was calling regularly and begging me to visit him because he was horny. In May I abruptly stopped hearing from him until two days before my show hung; then I received a cheery little note describing the rains and the flowers and the amiga who is visiting him through August. At the time I allowed myself thirty seconds to be startled and upset before I decided simply to never contact him again, and pushed it out of my mind. But Saturday morning I realized, "wow, that's really MEAN," and burst into tears.
Biking into Manhattan on a sunny Saturday didn't help my mood, unfortunately. The Brooklyn Bridge is fun to bike across, except for the tourists who stand planted in the middle of the bike lane with their cameras pointing at lousy shots, and the toddlers on tricycles who stray determinedly into your path, and the packs of bored teen-agers who look right at you and don't get out of your way, and the couples holding hands who don't look at you at all and don't get out of your way, and the other cyclists coming the other direction who seem determined to run you off the bridge, or into the tourists. Then once you get to Canal Street it is gridlock in every direction; pedestrians stepping off the sidewalk directly into your path and staying there, trucks unloading in the middle of intersections, traffic cops who defend the rights of no-one.
Then in the paint department at Pearl, a salesperson asked what I needed. "Your best deal on white oil tubes," I said. "Professional or student grade?" "Professional, definitely." "You're in the wrong aisle. Professional grade is over here, at $18 a tube. Goodbye," she said.
Well, I go through about a tube and a half of white a week, when I'm in form; 'professional' or not, $18 a tube for Gamblin is too high. I skulked back to the 'student grade' aisle, hid three $8 tubes of Georgian under my bike helmet, treated myself to a couple of new palette knives to ease the pain of humiliation, charged the lot on my 'emergency' credit card and left. Not wanting to feel like a friendless loser, working alone all weekend, I decided to stroll around Soho before returning to Brooklyn.
Soho sucked, too. All the outdoor patios were full of people having fun in merrily chattering couples or groups; all the sidewalks were full of crappy art and jewelry, all the stores were full of size-4 princess clothing that was ludicrously out of my price range. I bought an ice-cream cone and felt fat, lonely, poor and guilty. After checking out the 'sale' at French Connection and discovering that they still wanted $40 for a size-4, almost-out-of-style-and-season tank top, I decided to head for home.
Just as I hit the Brooklyn Bridge, the thunderstorm broke, seemingly out of a clear blue sky. Huzzah! Suddenly all the happy people were screaming and getting out of my way. By the time I hit the peak of the bridge, I was drenched. By the time I coasted down the other side, I was trilling "'Till there was you," joyfully unto the Lord, and the one other wet cyclist who heard me and laughed. I sang most of the way home. Water on the skin is the best mood-rejuvenator I know. The glow lasted till the next day.
Sunday my rear wheel fell off when I was halfway across Hamilton Avenue, by the freeway exit and the Battery Tunnel entrance. I removed the wheel to change the inner tube on Thursday; I don't know how or why I was able to ride on it for two days if it wasn't properly re-attached. Some guy stopped and made ineffectual suggestions while I got it back on, largely unassisted. He reminded me of, and very well could have been, my last Nerve date nearly three years ago, who caused me to swear off online dating forever. I seem to recall that the 'clueless, desperate elf-guy', as I think of him, had, as one of his main conversational foci, the number of miles he'd clocked while losing 75 pounds (but not the pot belly.) Not the adventures he'd had, not the things he'd seen or thought about, just the mileage.
Fortunately he didn't seem to recognize me. Up until that historic date, I had assumed that men who asked me out through Nerve were, at least, reading my profile, and contacting me because they divined a spark of commonality between us. Oh, naive idealist, I. I never actually PAID for online dating, because up until quite recently, men outnumbered women 3 to 1 online. Also, it bothers me, chasing men; I want to be courted. But not courted by men whose standards are: female; has pulse; will listen to me whine about the hundreds of other females who, quite properly, blew me off. My final Nerve date caused me to break ranks with the ironclad politesse of a lifetime. After what was probably only twenty minutes of conversation which included, on his part, casual racism, embittered whining, weight loss/mileage ratios, and an offer to jump into my lap, I said, 'This isn't working out for me," grabbed my bag, hat and coat in one fell scrabble and bolted, shaking off the bad energy like a horde of rabid mosquitoes. I kept looking back in desperate terror that he might be following me.
So, well, meeting men by losing my bike wheel on Hamilton Avenue isn't working; neither is going to literary readings or weekend parties upstate. My friend H. asked me, "so, what do you want? Just some casual fun?"
No, no, no, no, no. I have spent my life slapping the faces of men who just want casual fun, then pretending that what I wanted was casual fun, then stopping that pretence and going properly apeshit on people who toy with my soul. Goddammit, I want a Real Relationship. One where, if there's a problem, the two of you discuss it and work it out in some way. Is this delusional and unrealistic? Other people around me seem to be having weddings and babies and buying houses and going to couples counseling.
Not that I'm whining, really. Really I believe in karma, and divine guidance, and resonance with particular people, and in making a life-plan to learn certain lessons before we're even born. I notice that in the past, I've simply run into the people I've needed to meet and recognized them, without having to make any particular effort. I'm just wondering when the next one is going to come along. Hello? You out there? I'm ready now. Not perfect, not even flat-tummied, but sufficiently de-traumatized from the last one that I can handle more punishment. At least I think so.
Wednesday, July 06, 2005
More yoga
I mean it about the yoga, that's ALL I want to be doing. I feel like I'm pulling my psychospiritual programming fibers out by the roots and re-planting them where they should have been all along, where, I can barely remember, they USED to be.
To waste time, which I have too much of, I have just been reading political blogs. This will upset most, probably all, of my friends, but such things don't make me angry any more. Why don't they make me angry? Well--
1) I'm just too tired. Anger is painful, destabilizing, makes you feel powerful in the short run but in the long run it makes you helpless, knawing yourself up from the inside.
2) it becomes increasingly clear to me, the more I live on this planet, that everybody involved in any conflict is responding, not just to the situation at hand, but to acres and acres of their own personal baggage. Lesson 7, A Course in Miracles: "I see only the past." Shit, yeah.
3) Getting angry over someone's dumb comments in a blog give that person, with all of her blindness, weakness, confusion and misplaced anger, power over you. Getting angry over something strengthens that thing; it acknowledges and reinforces notions of power and helplessness. There's no such thing as bad publicity.
I don't get involved (much) in politics because I no longer believe the problem is Out There. What's Out There is a projection of my own mind. It makes no sense to fuss with it, lash out at it, manipulate, plot and construct it. It's Not There. Manipulating external events is like trying to change the plot of a movie by swatting at the space in front of the screen while it's playing. The source of the movie, the projector, is the MIND. Change your mind, change the movie. Or even leave the theatre.
One of the younger yoga teachers at the studio has been going on and on about karma, and planting seeds of good thoughts, and helping others. She thinks we're being 'resistant' to the notion; my suspicion is that we're being polite. I, at least, refrained from telling her, "Thanks, I've thought about this already, like, more or less continuously for the last 20 years or so, since you were in elementary school." She's a sweetie really, and her class kicks my butt, enough so that I will tolerate being patronized.
Just at the moment I don't want to get into a discussion with her about what it MEANS to 'help others.' Just at the moment it seems clear to me that I will never help others properly or effectively until I radically help myself. Just at the moment I need to let go of both past and future, and this is easier to do while trying to align my hips while bent double in a lunge and twisting to one side, sweating profusely.
To waste time, which I have too much of, I have just been reading political blogs. This will upset most, probably all, of my friends, but such things don't make me angry any more. Why don't they make me angry? Well--
1) I'm just too tired. Anger is painful, destabilizing, makes you feel powerful in the short run but in the long run it makes you helpless, knawing yourself up from the inside.
2) it becomes increasingly clear to me, the more I live on this planet, that everybody involved in any conflict is responding, not just to the situation at hand, but to acres and acres of their own personal baggage. Lesson 7, A Course in Miracles: "I see only the past." Shit, yeah.
3) Getting angry over someone's dumb comments in a blog give that person, with all of her blindness, weakness, confusion and misplaced anger, power over you. Getting angry over something strengthens that thing; it acknowledges and reinforces notions of power and helplessness. There's no such thing as bad publicity.
I don't get involved (much) in politics because I no longer believe the problem is Out There. What's Out There is a projection of my own mind. It makes no sense to fuss with it, lash out at it, manipulate, plot and construct it. It's Not There. Manipulating external events is like trying to change the plot of a movie by swatting at the space in front of the screen while it's playing. The source of the movie, the projector, is the MIND. Change your mind, change the movie. Or even leave the theatre.
One of the younger yoga teachers at the studio has been going on and on about karma, and planting seeds of good thoughts, and helping others. She thinks we're being 'resistant' to the notion; my suspicion is that we're being polite. I, at least, refrained from telling her, "Thanks, I've thought about this already, like, more or less continuously for the last 20 years or so, since you were in elementary school." She's a sweetie really, and her class kicks my butt, enough so that I will tolerate being patronized.
Just at the moment I don't want to get into a discussion with her about what it MEANS to 'help others.' Just at the moment it seems clear to me that I will never help others properly or effectively until I radically help myself. Just at the moment I need to let go of both past and future, and this is easier to do while trying to align my hips while bent double in a lunge and twisting to one side, sweating profusely.
Tuesday, July 05, 2005
Media creature
Here's my volunteer auctioneer gig, and evidence that I've gained weight since the last time I was on stage. Well, okay, so it's Not About Me. Check out the inside of the eerie old boat.
I spent the Fourth alone and in the city, just like I did three years ago, when I'd just moved here and my best friend went completely insane and decided I was Satan. I suppose I could have called Neneng-girl and pestered her to invite me upstate, or to whatever whirlwind of fun she's caught up in this week, or I could have volunteered to cook a barbeque in the back yard of H.'s new beach house, or even caught a last-minute flight to Texas. But something in me rejected these solutions, whether it was pride or a need to sort things out.
Basically, the only things I really want to be doing these days are fussing over my potted plants and going to yoga class. I wish I had an actual garden to fuss over--the potted plants don't need much attention. I got a cutting from Baby, the Lady of the Evening plant stolen from Peru six years ago by a friend of J. H.'s, and in only six weeks it has put down roots, sent up a new shaft, and popped out several new leaves, which are all swelling fleshily. The miniature rose on the fire escape is flourishing, as are the ficii, the habanera helix, the Christmas cactus, the rubber plant and the African violets. The orchid and the bromeliad, however, refuse to flower. A guy in a shop in the East Village suggested they might not be getting enough light, there on my bathroom shelf. He may have a point; I moved them both to sunnier windows and will keep you posted.
A good friend recently said, "Therapy is scary. When you confront your issues, it feels like you are dissolving, like you don't exist." He said this, I think, to make me feel better about the fact that my ex-boyfriend dumped me rather than try it. I still thought of it as just another stupid rationalization. But just at the moment I'm questioning every single habitual method I have of relating to people. I still feel like I exist, but I only really feel safe in yoga class and in my apartment, preferably under one or both cats.
I went up on the roof to watch the fireworks, and met my next-door neighbor. This guy has been here since two months after me, and I would swear to never having seen him before. Our roof turned out to be an excellent vantage point--they had synchronized displays on Staten Island, over the East River around midtown, and what looked to be either Harlem or Queens. It was cool, and so was my neighbor, an architect/city planner from India. He turned out to be another valuable source of information regarding buildings in Brooklyn; just as I start thinking 'this project is hopeless, nothing will ever happen,' another clue falls from the sky.
My baby cat is nearly recovered! Just as I thought he surely had AIDS, and would waste away by slow degrees, he meowed when I opened a can of tuna, and snarfed the whole thing down. It was like Tigger and the extract of malt. Six cans of tuna later, he's bopping things again. It's a miracle.
I spent the Fourth alone and in the city, just like I did three years ago, when I'd just moved here and my best friend went completely insane and decided I was Satan. I suppose I could have called Neneng-girl and pestered her to invite me upstate, or to whatever whirlwind of fun she's caught up in this week, or I could have volunteered to cook a barbeque in the back yard of H.'s new beach house, or even caught a last-minute flight to Texas. But something in me rejected these solutions, whether it was pride or a need to sort things out.
Basically, the only things I really want to be doing these days are fussing over my potted plants and going to yoga class. I wish I had an actual garden to fuss over--the potted plants don't need much attention. I got a cutting from Baby, the Lady of the Evening plant stolen from Peru six years ago by a friend of J. H.'s, and in only six weeks it has put down roots, sent up a new shaft, and popped out several new leaves, which are all swelling fleshily. The miniature rose on the fire escape is flourishing, as are the ficii, the habanera helix, the Christmas cactus, the rubber plant and the African violets. The orchid and the bromeliad, however, refuse to flower. A guy in a shop in the East Village suggested they might not be getting enough light, there on my bathroom shelf. He may have a point; I moved them both to sunnier windows and will keep you posted.
A good friend recently said, "Therapy is scary. When you confront your issues, it feels like you are dissolving, like you don't exist." He said this, I think, to make me feel better about the fact that my ex-boyfriend dumped me rather than try it. I still thought of it as just another stupid rationalization. But just at the moment I'm questioning every single habitual method I have of relating to people. I still feel like I exist, but I only really feel safe in yoga class and in my apartment, preferably under one or both cats.
I went up on the roof to watch the fireworks, and met my next-door neighbor. This guy has been here since two months after me, and I would swear to never having seen him before. Our roof turned out to be an excellent vantage point--they had synchronized displays on Staten Island, over the East River around midtown, and what looked to be either Harlem or Queens. It was cool, and so was my neighbor, an architect/city planner from India. He turned out to be another valuable source of information regarding buildings in Brooklyn; just as I start thinking 'this project is hopeless, nothing will ever happen,' another clue falls from the sky.
My baby cat is nearly recovered! Just as I thought he surely had AIDS, and would waste away by slow degrees, he meowed when I opened a can of tuna, and snarfed the whole thing down. It was like Tigger and the extract of malt. Six cans of tuna later, he's bopping things again. It's a miracle.
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