Saturday night my computer died.  That was a nice thing to return to at 4 in the morning after a night of 4 different Halloween parties in a still-drunken stupor.  Roommate said that the cat had been lying on it all night (probably) and he heard something that sounded like sirens going off and he smelled smoke.  When he told me that, I freaked out and assumed that the laptop had caught on fire or something.  In actuality, he clarified the next morning and said that smoke actually probably came from somewhere else, but it did look like my poor old lappy really did overheat and burn out the harddrive.  Dang cat!  I should have guessed this was bound to happen any day though; that computer was really on its last legs, what with its missing keys, broken keyboard and CD drive that only spins and dies (due to a certain someone having spilled water on it while I was across the pond,) that measly 1 GB of space left due to my thousands of pictures since 2002, and I can't even remember what else.

Oh, and I had not backed up those thousands of pictures either.  Thousands of memories and art attempts all lost, except where I've uploaded smaller versions to my Xanga, Facebook, or more anciently, the Photobucket.  My brother, the computer guy, says he'll try to rescue some pictures for me but that he makes no guarantees.  I've tried to already assume the worst, and have said my farewell to those pictures.  I deserve it really for not having backed it up, especially on such a shoddy old laptop, when even having a new laptop is reason enough to BACK UP everything.

Add to this fact that I lost my phone (of the i-variety) a couple of weeks ago while drunkenly stumbling around in Dallas with a certain someone from a certain other state, you could say that I've gone back to the early 1990s in my reachability!  People have to wonder where I am at all times, call up my friends and sister to see if they've seen me lately, send me constant messages through Facebook (which I am checking daily at the computer lab,) and all other kinds of crazy things.  In theory I like the idea of not having to rely on these new-fangled technologies, but really it's been becoming a hassle and I am missing out on several events due to nobody being able to find me.  Also, a lot of my coursework requires that I have online access, and though it's fine for me to come to the lab during the day, I really haven't adjusted well to time managing.  So I get stuck up here at the lab for a few hours a day, doing classwork and reading articles the discussing them online... and Facebooking and chatting on AIM with those few souls who still venture online or who have purposely sought me out there.

Whatever.

I'm gonna get a phone on Saturday so I can quit that part of my bellyaching then.  The computerless part--I'm still kind of anxious to see how I can function without my laptop by my side at all times when I am home.  I really was waking up, getting online, eating breakfast, getting online, going to class, coming home, getting online, dinner, and then getting online again.  It's kind of ridiculous how dependent upon it I had become, and when I also had the iPhone, the internet literally never left my fingertips.  Insanity!  I really don't like being that dependent, so I'm hoping this forced separation will teach me in that famous cold turkey method how to how a less internet-involved life.  It's ridiculous, but really not unexpected because I have been on the internet since I was like 8 or 9 years old, and on the computer since I was 5.  DOS and Reader Rabbit and Berenstein Bears, then MSChat and all that.  I'm 23 now, so this was a while ago.

Anyhow, talking about this regular life stuff really bores me.  I have been missing having my computer around most of all for the spontaneous writing I could do.  I have not written anything but e-mails and homework and IMs while at the computer lab in the past week.  And I really do like keeping up with you Xanga folks, reading your poetry and about your lives, and every now and then contributing some things of my own.  Oh, Xanga.  It's been such a long time.  5 years!  It and I have changed so much.   I'm so glad I have this thing to kind of chart how my mind has changed, what I've been thinking, little things that have gone on in my life, how my writing styles have evolved... all that.

But yeah, I can't wait to have my favorite writing utensil back by my side again.  Even if I become utterly addicted and dependent again.  The freedom and ease of expression are really what I would love to have again.

I don't know.  Life's going fine.

I am going to see Rufus Wainwright on November 14th in Fort Worth and I am terribly terribly excited about the prospect.  I have been in love with this man since Hallelujah.  And so has Natalie.  We spent all weekend listening to Release the Stars, and most of the first half of yesterday listening to his earlier stuff.  If he performs Hallelujah I'm sure I'll just die of happiness.

Ah, and I love Release the Stars as well.  It's rare that I love artists' new stuff just as much as their older stuff, but I think I could easily love this one.  I can't believe it's been out since 2007 and I didn't know it.

We were so entranced with Wufus Wainwight and listening to his interviews (one with a man who did say Wufus,) that I didn't notice my cat Lucci had been absent all day.  Natalie thought of him around 4 p.m., immediately went to look for him outside my apartment, and just barely noticed him hiding in the water heater closet on the floor below mine.  He was in shock I think, and barely moved.  She didn't realize he was hurt at first, and just told me that she thought he was groggy.

He limped upstairs, though, and so we figured out the problem.  I live on the 3rd floor so to have been outside my apartment he must have fallen off the balcony (again!)  This is the first time he's really hurt himself though...

He was in so much pain that he wasn't meowing or being anything like himself.  Offered him some soft food, which he normally scarfs down with admirable voracity, but he refused!  Ah, poor cat.  Sat around a bit, worried about what I should do, worried about how much fixing the poor cat was going to cost.  And of course it was Saturday so I would have to take him to an "emergency" clinic.  Found one, took him.  Heard that x-rays and the whole shebang were going to cost almost $500.  Totally couldn't do that... asked for the poor man's option.  Now my cat's all doped up and content to sleep all day between his food and litterbox which I've placed in my room so he can't get out to the balcony again.

His paw better heal itself.  He's doped up now, and eating, so I'm not too worried anymore...

And ah, when I called my mom to inform her of the situation yesterday she said "Oh, well if it costs more than $200 you're just going to have to cry because you can't afford that and you'll just have to put him down."

I didn't seriously think anything could be that bad but the ability she has to think of the very worst scenarios sometimes really shocks me.  I teared up a bit just imagining the prospect.  My mom has a hard time being comforting, god.  It reminded me of the time that I called her to tell her that I was going to the E.R. because I had hit my chin on the pavement while bike riding and the first thing she asked was "Oh my God, are we going to have to get you plastic surgery?"

There I was, already in shock and pain and with a profusely bleeding chin, en route to the hospital, and suddenly having to think if my face were going to be horribly disfigured and in need of expensive reconstruction.

Mom, Mom, Mom -- it's taken some getting used to her form of mothering.  She tends to react very impulsively and emotionally, with an extremely pessimistic edge.  I love her, but man, she can make me cry or upset unlike anyone else.  When she is hurt or upset she makes everyone feel the same, and then she'll regret it later and eventually react more reasonably and tenderly, but oy, I reel from her first reactions every time.



So... this weekend has been pretty interesting and spontaneous in general.  It really disappeared, though in a pleasant way.  Natalie and I got some quality time in, for sure, ha.  And plenty of new inside jokes.  Sexy grocery trips and sexy emergency vet trips and substitute Europeanity with bread and wine and brie and olives, etc...

And...
Oh, I want to write!  I want to push myself beyond what I've ever been!  Rufus said he wanted to make his latest album to encourage everyone else to do everything that they do passionately, whether it's creating or working or smoking or having sex.  Let's do it all passionately and ferociously, k?  Ok, farewell yall.

I am not supposed to be here writing anything (because I am in the midst of analyzing and discussing long articles, and a midterm) but I have been having such a hard time obtaining the necessarily clear-enough mind to achieve all that that I feel I must air myself out--get this persistent feeling out of my chest.

Even what I have been reading about, (in part, the ontology of language within an individual compared to the human species) has contributed to my own personal feelings and my inability to focus on anything else.

Everything I learn makes me feel like I am going to be hopelessly ignorant of the vast majority of things for the rest of my life.  I don't know how I could ever be motivated enough to research all these things that interest me very thoroughly.  Or thoroughly enough to ever be able to produce things like these articles I am reading.  I am just on the verge of being able to understand them, and even that takes up just about all of my mental capacities.

I feel like I am not very smart and that unfortunately I am just smart enough to comprehend my somewhere-around-average, maybe a little bit higher than average intelligence.  I feel like I have more strengths in self-awareness of my emotions, or perhaps it is just that I am more practiced at that.  Perhaps intellectual strengths will come through more academic studies.  I don't know.


Ah I don't even know what's important to me.  I have asked myself "what is important to you?" and I cannot think of a definite answer.  Love?  Communion?  Learning?  Living?  Happiness?

None of these things seem to supersede the others in a significant enough way that I may focus my energies.

That's the thing, I think:  my energies are too scattered and unfocused for me to be productive.  I am meandering in both mind and body, interested in so many things but unfocused.  How do I focus myself?  How do I come to a point?  How do I attain a purpose?

I don't think purposes are bestowed upon us; rather I feel that we carve them out of the mountains around us.  It must of course be a difficult and arduous process, making a shape out of the encompassing and gigantic structure of rock, whose own shape is too large for us to comprehend.  We sometimes wonder the nature of this surrounding matter, but we cannot dwell too long on this question because the more pressing need of digging out our own specific and personal niche persists in pushing us.

Ah, metaphors.

Ah, thinking.

I wish it were just enough to say "I don't know."  I keep coming back to that as my conclusion, but the preceding arguments are infinitely variable and perplexing and maddening.

The frayed ends of my too long blue jeans
drag behind me and scrape over
the dirty sidewalk and wet pavement
as I make my way towards
the other side of things

I wonder what the fibers are picking up
as they slide through the mud and
debris of the road.  What memories
what filth what of that which would
disgust you clings to me behind my
feet as I make my way to wherever
it is I am going?  Would you turn
me away if you knew what was
there?  Spit and grease and
excrement and hate and acid

blacken up my heels, sullies up
my blue jeans, clings to me
like every memory I've damned
and dared to leave behind

The wet from the ground is seeping
up now and I can't ignore
the filth that is crawling up my legs
the flesh of my calves recoil
with the disgust you would have
given me had you given me
the chance.  wet and oozing
and dark I can feel the spit
and grease and excrement
and hate crawling up my legs.



If only
I had
worn

          heels.

I am trying to imagine how different society and people's perceptions would be if we were not constantly inundated with the idea of Love.  Movies, fairy tales, religion, peers, parents, dating websites all speak of love as if it is this "definitely there" thing that we should all seek out, and that without which we must be miserable.  Anyone who is without love must remedy it as soon as possible, except in instances where one is "finding himself" or recovering from a past relationship.  Singleness and living without this love is mainly a temporary state.  The idea seems to be that those who are alone are less stable than they could be were they to have a partner, especially in the long run.

But how true is this really?  What if a society of children were raised without any exposure to the concept of love, in any of its forms?  Paternal-, filial-, fraternal-, romantic-, platonic-, self-love... if we magically struck all these words and concepts of love from our vocabulary and conscious thoughts, what would happen?  Would a word that equals "love" naturally arise?  Would we still be as "loving?"

I imagine parents' love for their children would be evident in much the same way.  That bond is evident across species and cultures and times, but perhaps even the sort of love that developed would be very different.  Perhaps parents would coddle their children much less than they do in the U.S. at least (children seemed a lot more independent and the parents let them roam more freely, I felt, in Germany.)

It's so hard to imagine what effects our language has on any bit of the conceptualization process, and "Love" has such an enormous place in our psyche and society that analyze the effects our words for love have on our mind seems very nearly impossible.  I suppose the next best thing to do would be to research different cultures and see what connotations their words for love evoke for those different peoples.  Especially interesting would be languages that might not have a word for "love."  Ah, I would like to find out if such a language exists right away!  How interesting that would be, and to see if there would be a way to study what effects the different conceptualizations (or lack of a definite term) of love have within those societies.

Unfortunately I am sure that English is so universal now (and within that the inevitable effects of Westernization) that it would be very difficult to analyze discrete societies perfectly.  If this "loveless" language society exists, I hope they are somewhat isolated.  And perhaps I am even overestimating the effects that the spread of English has on other cultures, because though it may change societies to some degree, I imagine that the root and foundation of how different cultures think and view their worlds largely remain intact.  I hope, anyhow.

I don't know what I would want to find out about these effects, exactly.  I guess I just want to know how real "LOVE" really is.  Is it inevitable, is it the ultimate, is it a good and desirable goal for absolutely everyone?

And when I say it I don't even know which love I am speaking of... am I only speaking of romantic love, generalized good will towards others, selflessness, familial love, or what?  I think I am currently most concerned with that idea of romantic love because it holds such a place of high esteem in our society.  You know, "Love is all you need," Moulin Rouge, countless other movies and stories and everyone of every age speak and dream of this romantic love like once it is found your life is automatically complete.  Love is this portal that everyone dreams of passing through, and once you pass through it, life will be like never before.  Birds will sing to you,  skies will be bluer, troubles won't trouble you nearly as much, maybe not at all, and you will finally be on your way to achieving life's purpose of creating a family and making some more of you and your beloved so that they too will one day get a chance at finding love.

Love, or sex.

Maybe it is because we are such social creatures that loneliness is the ultimate demon.  Our socialness is a large part of what put pressure on us to evolve language, and so must also be firmly rooted into our very nature; it must make being alone seem awfully frightening.  Alone we cannot communicate without being crazy, or without writing (which also involves a bit of craziness, I think) and alone we cannot have sex.  Alone, we become lonely, and very alone, we go crazy... falling off "deep ends" into irreparable states of lost humanity.

Ah, I don't know.

What is love without the words of love?  Can it be purely felt?  Can it be studied or measured or proved undeniably existent?  Is it another religion of ours?  Is it another thing that requires great amounts of faith and imagination and hope and dreaming?  Is there such a thing as love that won't go away, or that is truly unconditional?  For religious people I am sure the answers to these perfect Loves are God, but even in that case they must still wonder if they can at least have pieces of this amazing love here on earth, among the rest of us mortals.

I feel like I can say I love and feel strongly for so many things, and yet I cannot wrap my mind around this concept of love in any real manner.  It is so important and ever-present in our society--you think it'd be better understood.  Maybe we don't care to understand, generally.  Maybe we all just want to be carried away, wrapped up in insane and irrational but absolutely amazing feelings that make us have faith in whatever we want to have faith in... people, God, goodness, happiness, purpose.  Maybe just giving into it is the only thing we can do.  Just take the drugs and enjoy the ride; let your body take over for once you thinking-always-thinking creature.  Be impulsive, irrational, poetic, dreaming, hopeful.  Be these things and just love.

It's so easy to say, sometimes so easy to do, but oh does it ever really last?  That's the problem with being impulsive and reckless... you don't know what on earth you're getting into.  Perhaps you can't ever know what you're getting into and so it's better just to have fun all the damn time while you're at it.

I don't know if I set out to answer anything for myself here, but I surely have not.  I've just got more questions, and the questions go deeper.  I don't know anything, once again.

I am constantly trying to settle on a perch of truth.  I am a tiny flitting bird with a terribly short memory and though I feel like I never have chance to land upon the same branch or twig twice, perhaps I have?  Some places at which I arrive feel familiar, in that perhaps-I-just-dreamt-of-this sort of way.

I dreamed last night many things, but I woke up with the ding of a text message and was left with just one image, once again.  And it was a fish once again as well.  Someone told me to go fishing in this little puddle, sort of like water built up along the side of the sidewalk, murky and shallow.  Apparently at one end though it was adequately deep, and a child, a country Mark Twain child comes up to me and points out this one spot as being especially good for catchin' fish.

I go up to this spot, withdraw a magically supplied but tiny little fishing pole, and set it in the water.  I take it out and check the hook for some bait, and I feel like my vision is blurry and poor as I examine the bit of dried up worm that remains...  I decide that it would be adequate enough, and let it drop back in the water.

After a couple of tries, or dropping the hook in the water, I get a bite.  I tug back as I remember I am supposed to, and after a few seconds of struggling I pull up a pathetic little fish.  It is about as big as my hand and I show someone, perhaps that boy, and they are thoroughly unimpressed.

I don't know what to do with the fish, and I just keep holding it and letting it dangle off my pole.  I am confused and I just wait there, doing absolutely nothing.  The next time I look at the fish it is only a head... the rest of the body has been cut off for some reason, and yet it is still alive.  I am confused and I don't remember exactly what I was thinking but I am feeling somewhat guilty and still unable to act.

What is it with these fish dreams?

Looking at the fish head, and ding, I wake up.