D-FENS

I'm not having the best month. It's raining; my skin is a mess; I didn't convert either of my two interviews into job offers; I also lost two freelance gigs this week to more qualified people--one photographer, one writer. I also wrote two serious blog posts, one about being a stay-at-home girlfriend, and the other about racism, and then decided that I would rather not publish any more thoughts on these topics, no matter how eloquently stated mine might be.

I got surprisingly pissed at someone's comments on my blog recently. I think if I were in a better mood, I wouldn't have cared. But despite the fact that I am surrounded by love and opportunity and recently signed a little publishing contract, my self-esteem is suffering--maybe because I'm online too much lately. I don't like being on the defensive, and I realize that is just how I feel lately. There was all this backlash against the whole stay-at-home girlfriend thing, and then all of this hate over racism, and then people telling me I'm just not good enough for whatever it is they want. I don't like defending myself on other people's terms. I don't like trying to prove that I can do a job, that it's okay if I don't have a paycheck for a little while, that it's okay if I'm Asian, that it's okay if I just need to fucken mellow out and bake cookies for a while in my sweatpants. I got all sorts of vitriolic over both hating and defending my way of life, and then I realized I don't have to. And the reason why I feel so defensive is because I spend too much time online reading people's opinions. I mean, some asshole yelled "Chinaman!" at me this week. Yesterday, some guy commanded me to "Smile!" when I passed him in the street. I wanted to react shrilly to both of them, but I let both moments pass me by. It is one thing to give one-sided commentary, and another thing to invite discussion. And I did not want to have discussions with either of these people.

Anyhow, I want to be done feeling defensive and stuck, so I'm just going to be done. I started writing a new novel this week, and I am happy with it. I also know that the reason why I get stressed about money is that it is yet another thing that I try to force myself to care about in order to be "responsible" (like a job!) but that ultimately, I'll have it when I need it, and as long as I don't worry about it, it doesn't really bother me.

Also, I'm glad to be with a guy who I think is getting used to me, so much so that last night when I burst out "Sometimes I don't think you even WANT kids!" he hardly batted an eye. That, and he still wants to quit his plum job to spend six-plus months with me in a van, driving south.

recidivism

I like this word, "recidivism." I looked it up to see what it meant, and it means "a repeat offender," and be used both as a noun and an adjective. I don't know why it popped into my head, but maybe it has something to do with the fact that it is Groundhog Day.

Marido and I have been at each others' throats this week. I blame it on not enough sex and too much time on my hands. This week we have argued about (a) god, (b) astrology, and (c) Shepard Fairey. Neither of us believe in these things--particularly the Shepard Fairey--but we argued until both of us were pissed off.

I said some things to him the other night that felt like a breakup; it was like a reversal of what happened in November, when he said some things to me that felt like a breakup. It is hard to be happy and comfortable in a relationship when you're constantly feeling like the other person is going to break up with you. I hope we can get through this. I don't know what to do about it. I don't like it.

Yesterday I went out with a friend I've known for a long time, and I was asking him for his unbiased opinion on the situation. He doesn't know Marido and I haven't spoken to him in more than a year. He basically repeated back to me what I had said to him, and somehow it made all the difference in the world. I suddenly understood that I was unhappy and uncertain, and was transferring all of my dissatisfaction with the world onto him--just the way I had done with Ex many years ago. It's not so much blame, it's just exerting some semblance of control over what is the most obvious and important to you.

It's not Marido that I'm mad at, it's other things. It's my lack of direction, it's my frustration with this joblessness. It's the feeling that my life is going places and I don't know how or where to fit in, if I should try to steer things in an arbitrary direction or just see where they go? These questions are hard enough with a career, but what about with another person? I suddenly felt like I was carrying his expectations as well as mine. I didn't know if I could do that. I resented his perceived expectations on top of mine. I began to feel contemptuous toward him, and I wanted things to end.

It's never easy to know when you are ending a bad relationship or bailing out of a perfectly good one that has just fallen on rough times. But Karim asked me to think about the good relationships I know and what defines them, and I think it's an ability to grow together, even when things are hard--not only to support someone else when they are feeling down, but to be supported yourself when you are down.

That, for me, is hard. I don't like anyone to see me when I'm down. I'd rather leave and be down by myself than be a burden on someone else.

Karim also said to me last night: nobody ever said relationships were easy.

resolve

Shortly after making my new year's resolutions last year, I had a personal crisis following a night with a friend, two Germans, and a plate full of blow. The fallout, I think, really weakened my resolve, and to pull myself out of that shame spiral, I had to rely on the two bad habits I was trying to break with my resolutions: sugar and sloth.

That was back in a time when I wrote more prolifically in this blog, a time when my life was filled with spectacular failures--universally entertaining because they typically involved some combination of sex, drugs, and idiocy. Things are different now. I am still dealing with failure on a daily basis, but the failures are a lot less interesting and really only deal with some combination of writing, unemployment and monogamy. The lack of dramatic failure is a welcome change, but it also leaves me feeling a little stagnant; I am used to confrontation as a vehicle for change and growth.

Sometimes I can be really hard on myself and then things get pretty dark. I have to force myself out and talk myself up like a kindergarten teacher. I list off all my recent endeavors, and try to frame them as positive, even if they were failures. Failures are the best kinds of learning experiences. If I don't have a lot of endeavors to tick off to myself, well, that's the problem right there: Not Doing Shit. So I resolve to do more shit, whether it's starting some new project, however large or small, or tackling a big, bad habit.

But making the same resolution I've made for the past ten years (gonna finish my novel) has become more depressing than inspiring. I have to finish this and move on just so I can begin making some new resolutions.

Anyhow, I just wanted to tell you Happy New Year and that dammit, this is going to be the best fucking year ever. It's going to be hard to be last year, but it's off to an even better start. Instead of being sort of desperate and alone in Argentina, I'm calm and in love and in San Francisco. And tonight I'm making soup.

untethered

Do you remember tetherball?



Even for a playground sport, tetherball is completely inane. It is a ball. Attached to a pole. By a string. Because of its simplicity, too, I think it lends itself well to so many worldly metaphors. Life is like tetherball: the taller guy always wins, the endless pursuit of balls and poles, a game that just keeps going over and over and over. I don't know.

When we were thirteen, my friend Jennifer and I came up with 100 metaphors for Romeo and Juliet's doomed love affair. I don't remember why, exactly--maybe just to flex our infinite creative sides, or perhaps to prove that Shakespeare wasn't really all that complex and deep.

I guess what I'm trying to say here is that when life gets really overwhelming and/or confusing, it is always nice to try and reduce the clutter down to a simple metaphor or even a lovely cliché. It just seems so much more manageable. I could really use something like that right now. Maybe it is as simple as: the end of the year is always a time for reflection.

It's December!

boiled amphibians

I'm happy that November is over, aren't you? It wasn't the easiest of months for me. But now that it's December again, I can celebrate little anniversaries. Like it's been a year since I left for Argentina. It's (almost) been six months since I met Marido. And it's been two months since I quit smoking--all reasons to celebrate.

Everyone I know seems to be struggling with their relationships. Relationships are always complex and interesting, but lately they seem to be taking more from us than giving, which I suppose is only normal during the jolliest time of year. Things with me and Marido have been no exception. I really thought we were over, but we aren't.

I think this conversation sums it all up:

ME: I think we have communication problems. It's obvious to me that you've been unhappy for more a little while, but you insist nothing is wrong. Then all of a sudden one day you say you don't want to spend the holidays with me, can't live with me, and don't see a future for us. Of course I freaked out and thought you were breaking up with me. It was the most you'd said in a month. Why didn't you say anything before?

(long, thoughtful pause)

MARIDO: Well, it is like boiling a frog.

(Figuring this is some sort of cultural thing, I wait for him to continue. But instead there is an even longer pause during which I stare at him wondering if he is making an ill-timed joke about our communication problems, or if he is just insane.)

ME: Um, boiling a frog? I don't understand. You're going to have to explain that to me.

MARIDO: (genuinely surprised) Really?

I've never heard of this allusion, but it apparently is so widespread that Little Brother understood it immediately (of course) and it has its own Wikipedia entry. If you're too lazy to click the link, the "boiling a frog" reference is an allusion to the myth that if you place a frog in a pot of temperate water and then slowly bring it to a boil, it will not react to the gradual rise in temperature and boil to death; whereas if you place a frog in boiling water, it will jump out and save itself. Whether or not it's true, this idea is a reference to people's abilities to tolerate extreme circumstances when subjected to them gradually.

Classic hilarity!

Anyhow, it's obvious we need to communicate a little better. Last week was pretty fucking dicey, and I packed up all of my stuff and came home, unsure of whether or not I would return. It is a hard thing to have my confidence in a relationship shaken, when I see that as mainly what keeps me attached to someone--my belief that they will love me and protect me and be a new source of awesomeness, not a source of infinite strife, and vice-versa. I want to make Marido happier by amazing him with love and people and new possibilities for adventure. I don't want to make him feel like a boiled frog!

When I left San Francisco, I was unsure of if we were boiling each other or making each others' lives better. Our lives have changed a lot with the addition of each other. We are both intense people and diametrically opposed in a lot of ways. My first step after leaving San Francisco was to consider whether I wanted to ask him to come to Chicago for Thanksgiving (as planned), because it meant a lot to me, or if he should hang back in San Francisco for a breather (as we both knew would be beneficial in other ways). While discussing this with my mother, he texted to tell me he would still come, if I wanted him to. It meant the world to me that he came.

I love Thanksgiving. This year, I am especially thankful for:

1) Delicious food (no boiled frogs!), particularly pie, ice cream, and turkey;
2) the miracle of aviation;
3) my friends, who amaze me with their patience, wisdom, and incredibly diverse range of relevant advice;
4) my family, who sometimes bring out the worst in me but love me anyway;
5) love in general, its resilience, its optimism, how it makes everything and everyone better;
6) Marido, for believing in us, for continuing to make memories with me, for giving me keys to come back to San Francisco, for destroying a dictionary to send me a love letter, for his pasta carbonara, and for his little-boy smile which makes me believe that we will grow old together;
7) the ability to step back and see where improvements can be made in one's life;
8) the ability to make those improvements with the help of all of the above.

I'm excited for my New Year's resolutions this year. Aren't you?

engendering anxiety

The only thing that would make me love this image by Laurence Winram more would be if some (or all) of the figures were women.

What makes it so superb to me is how much I identify with the man in white. I think this image illustrates what it feels like for me to be (slowly) chasing a dream. It is also what it feels like to be falling in love which, for a lot of people, is part of the overall dream.

At the moment, I am feeling probably the most secure I have ever felt in my entire life. This isn't saying much since I have lived most of my life harboring a feeling of impermanence and/or imminent doom. But I am with a man I love and trust, and I spend my days sitting in his/our apartment, reading and writing and thinking. It is just like what I was doing in Buenos Aires, only I am not crushingly alone and isolated by my linguistic incompetence.

It is blissful and liberating, and my frontal lobe feels like this man in white, shining bright and smiling. If I keep my face forward, I stroll through this Irish valley of green grasses, lit by the soft light of the northern hemisphere in the early spring, and all I see are possibilities.

But optimism doesn't come naturally to me. Every third moment of the day, I cast a backward glance and see these tuxedoed specters of every imaginable kind of failure. They're dumb and cowardly and only rarely do they come close enough to me to scratch me, but they are always there, looking all haughty and menacing.

unmarried and single

Turning thirty hasn't been such a big deal since, well, I live in obscurity, a surreal place where few people call my lifestyle into question. But there certainly have been moments where my age and lifestyle don't quite seem to match up. These moments come when I pop onto Facebook and see another photo of a chubby baby blinking back at me, when I'm shopping for a dress to wear to a wedding, or when I'm shivering alone in my twin bed, thinking that I really need to buy a light bulb. Sometimes, everyone seems to be going somewhere else. It is like when you are walking down a crowded sidewalk and you seem to be the only one walking upstream, and you look across the street and everyone seems to be walking the same way. So you run across the street to change sides, and suddenly everything is---fuck, everything is the same.

A couple of weeks ago, when I was in the Far East (as my Mom likes to call it), I was asked the following two questions in many iterations: Why aren't you married? Why don't you have kids?

Really, people? I would like to say that this was friendly family ribbing, but my family is really not that funny. I mean, what kind of answers do you expect here? These were also family members I haven't spoken to in at least five years, if not ten. How would they feel if I told them that my fiancé OD'd on Oxy, or that I was fucking STERILE? Because barring any sort of tragedy or lesser drama---I just broke up with someone, we're trying to have kids--the answer you inevitably get is quite boring. Because I certainly am not allowed to say that I'm trying to fuck at least fifty men before settling down, or that the idea of children is just that--an idea.

There was a Maureen Dowd column that ran yesterday called All the Single Ladies about the media frenzy surrounding Supreme Court nominee/single lady Ellen Kagan. And while it is a bit boring--because really, there's nothing that interesting about a woman being single OR married by itself--one commentor boiled it down quite nicely to say that this is all just the myth of the nuclear family being thrashed about in contemporary society. He or she went on to say that since more people spend more time at work than at home, perhaps it's more important to have a fulfilling job than an agreeable spouse.

One of the most interesting things I learned about Singapore is that they have a national dating service, free, government-sponsored. They, too, believe that strong nuclear families are not only the key to happiness, but a stable society. I mean, the notion of the family unit is how so much of our society is constructed: our taxes, our rights, health insurance, even the architecture of many homes. And in China, they have similar structures in place to secure happy families--after the earthquake left many widowed, they set up a matching system to help people remarry. (Read the Brook Larmer piece from the NY Times Magazine.)

Most of my friends are unmarried and/or single, even as we slip into our dirty thirties. Like I said, I only tend to give fleeting attention to these notions, but it is strange to have passed through two continents where the creation of the nuclear family is so central and unquestionably important, and another in which it is so central yet so singularly denied.

I want to be with someone. I really do. I may want children or I may not. But what I really would like, most of all, is for people to stop asking me why I am unmarried. Because really, the answer to why I am unmarried is that I AM NOT MARRIED. And the reason to why I am single is that YOU ARE AN ASSHOLE.

Eh, maybe I am just feeling sore because of my young bedfellows. I slept with a 24-year-old the other night. We were walking through town, killing a bottle of 17-peso whiskey when he told me about this bingo parlor where the old folks go and I asked him if they gave out cool prizes. He said, "They probably give out Sensodyne toothpaste."

I use Sensodyne toothpaste. What? I have sensitive teeth.

forced friendships and social norms

Last night I had to struggle to go out. I was really tired--been riding the insomnia train again--and I was chilling at home, enjoying some whiskey and a nice joint with my roommate. But I had been invited out by some fellow urban Americans who are all here in Buenos Aires for an extended amount of time.

They're nice kids--and I say 'kids' because they have certain ways of making me feel all of the five years older that I am. It is nice to have a crew to hang out with. But it is obvious to me that we would not be friends back in New York, that they are only hanging out with me out of either A) obligation, or B) boredom with each other--perhaps some fine combination of the two. And I think these are the options because that is what I am doing with them, with the addition of C) masochism/self-improvement. Part of me hates being with them, because I act differently around them--the way you would around people you don't know very well but want to get along with, but also in a way that I find very troubling, where I try to play up the qualities I see in them that I don't admire but understand that they value: their obsession with being in-the-know, their careless spending habits, and their self-confidence, which I find both alluring and repulsive.

Maybe it is what makes me feel old. I feel like I was like that once, in some small way. Anyhow, I feel like they bring out small pieces of me that exist but I don't like to play up so much, and part of being around them is literally not buying into their scene completely, and consciously trying to be me instead of one of them. It always fascinates me when I find myself as the outsider in a group. A balancing act emerges of trying to observe and understand the dynamic, absorb yourself into it and taking part in the rituals, or standing apart completely. This is the story of my life, deciding how much of a participant I want to be. With these kids, I got so caught up in wanting to be accepted that I forgot that I have a choice of not even caring if I am accepted. Because I don't want to be accepted on those terms. Being with them also makes me feel like an insecure teenager. Sheesh.

So last night I declined dinner and thought I would just meet them at the bar, and forego the after-hours club as well. I'm having a cash-flow problem. I thought, "If I can't make it through the night on 34 pesos (about $8), I am hanging out with the wrong people." But I was in good spirits in the end, and accompanied them to the club, but was already out of money by the time we got there. Somehow we avoided the 20-peso entrance fee, but then I was convinced to split a table with bottle service. Ah, yes. Spending money I don't have. Well, the decision was made, and I danced and had fun. Then one of the boys tried to take me home. We had been dancing a little and making out, but I didn't want to sleep with him. I don't know what it is more awkward--hanging out with someone you slept with drunkenly, or hanging out with someone you rejected. I guess it depends on the person. I try to minimize awkwardness.

In the taxi home, I am pretty sure the cab driver used our conversation about the manual transmission as an excuse to touch my legs repeatedly when talking about which feet you use to work which pedal. The touching thing is something I never know how to handle. I'm okay with casual contact, but with men I can't help but feel like they are just being lecherous. When I was out with that old guy last week, he kept putting his hand on my back or on my arms and part of me wanted to freak out and scream "DON'T TOUCH ME!" But I feel like that would be inappropriate; people are just more touch-y here. But it's like the situation with the forced-friend, like the allowance of physical contact is a slippery slope. I am still negotiating all this social terrain. It is good stuff for sleepless nights.

the voices in my head say to chill the fuck out. oh, and i love you.

The 90-degree weather keeps on coming, and I am just cruising with it. Okay, so I allowed myself to suffer a bit, and then decided it was not getting me anywhere.

I thought about Detox Doc the other day, and how he would have coaxed me out of that bitter mood I was in. Sometimes you just resign yourself to a fate, you know? I had resigned myself to being lost and hot and miserable. I don't know why. But another take-away message from my State of New York-sponsored detox program is that guilt/suffering/certainties are gifts from Satan that you do not have to accept. So, no thanks, darling of the darkness: return to sender.

I slid into this world here with some totally random rules for myself that have been making my life unnecessarily difficult. Like I told myself I wouldn't socialize with English-speakers (so I could accelerate my Spanish learning), I wouldn't go out with boys (distractions!), and that I would really live within my means...a steady diet of cheese, salami, and sliced bread. I don't know why I thought I should come to Buenos Aires and live like a fucking nun. I guess that is just how I am. And every time I faltered on these rules, I would feel really bad about it. But then Detox Doc came to me in my insomniatic haze last night and spoke magical things to me, mainly calling me silly for placing these unrealistic--and sort of pointless--expectations on myself.

I sent him a Christmas postcard. But I don't think he got it. Out of the dozen postcards I sent, I have only heard that two made it through. One was to San Francisco and one was to Chicago. I think the NYC post office just dumped them in the East River, which sucks. They were damn good postcards, and rather expensive to send.

Anyhow. I'm relaxing my rules, relaxing myself, and all is so much better when I'm not constantly berating myself for being a failure. Okay, so I'm not exactly a huge success story. Living off your savings in a country with a favorable exchange rate is not go-getter material, particularly if you're not even 30 years old. But the phantom Detox Doc said to me last night, "Who are you comparing yourself with?" And I was like...um...you know, my friend Playboy who is like an international telecommunications consultant and just bought a fucking Ducati. In New York City. And then there's Girlfriend, who is moving in with her girlfriend, and finishing up her fifth year in her secure and satisfying teaching career. Or, Christ, my little brother, who owns his own place in Chicago and regularly makes payments to his 401K. I guess I'm just jealous of people who don't go through life feeling like they're constantly walking on the wrong side of the street.

But I have other heroes too. Like you and you and you. Let me digress for a second.

For a hot minute I was sure I was going to marry this Straightedge Vegan I met in Chicago. And barring the obvious inherent WTF? in that imaginary coupling, there is the feeling that when you make open-and-shut decisions like that in your life, you miss out on a lot of the tortuous angst that makes you the well-rounded, articulate individual who can get along at most dinner parties. What is a cocktail hour if we can't discuss some sort of existential crisis? My whole life seems to be about toeing the lines between creativity and criminality. I think that is why I don't have any friends who are doctors, lawyers, or accountants. I like to start with people from the netherworld of "Okay, people, where the hell are we and where are we going?" If both of these premises are understood, I really don't know where to go from there.

There are people in my life like Playboy and Girlfriend and Little Brother who have more solid ground than I do, but the reason why we can still relate is that they are constantly changing their footing. We are all antsy in our own ways. Some people are accepting--of their jobs, their cities, their friends, their lovers. They are into settling down in some ways. And then there are those of us who don't know the meaning of settling down, no matter how secure they may be. I am in awe of people who can commit to their careers, their partners, and their cities. But I know they have a lot to do with people like me who can't commit to a damn thing. This great American travel writer once said, "You can't shoot a cannon from a raft," or something like that. And it's so true...! But if you did try it, it would certainly be a hell of a ride.

tempting towns

This morning I headed out to explore the barrio Retiro, another neighborhood abutting Microcentro, where I am staying. I passed by (another) protest in front of the University of Buenos Aires, gilded shopping centers, sidewalk cafes, and then went into the Retiro train station to have a look around. I love train stations.

With only a vague idea of which direction I was going, I followed a major road a short way to where it was no longer major. The road was suddenly unpaved, and the buildings now had numbers painted on by hand. There were dogs lying in the doorways, and the types of looks I was getting had changed from mostly indifference to curiosity. Instead of being another buzzing member of the glamorous hive of downtown, I was now walking slowly through a static town-within-a-town.

This part of town had a completely distinct personality. It was protected and segregated by highway overpasses, rusting train containers, abandoned tracks, and swaths of dusty roads. The residences ranged from cardboard lean-tos to brick cubes stacked two high, adorned with narrow, steel, spiral stairs. I wove my way through the lanes of houses. There were tons of people out, cooking, chatting, and of course staring at me. The past two days here, I've felt like I could be anywhere. But this morning I felt like I was somewhere new. I was incredibly happy.

I have been carrying my espresso-machine-sized camera haphazardly in a large canvas tote bag. Although my padded camera bag would be much better for it, I feel like it attracts a lot of attention. You know how in New York you can tell who the tourists are because they're wearing the backpacks on their stomachs and strangling their handbags while walking down Park Avenue? Well, here everyone does that. I've never really been the nervous type about my belongings--mostly since I'm more likely to damage them than anyone else--but here I've already been told to put my camera away twice. I am trying to be good about taking it out quickly to compose photos and then stashing it back. I desperately wanted to shoot photos while in this neighborhood, but instead I wandered blithely through. Although there was an appropriate amount of activity to make it feel safe, there was also an element of stillness that alerts a cautionary sense in me. It's like approaching a dog that is bounding around wagging its tail versus a dog that is just staring at you with its head sort of bent down.

It wasn't until that I emerged on the other end that I took my camera back out. Then I came across the entrance to a more decrepit-looking collection of homes. I couldn't tell how big it was because it was level, unlike the maze of two-story buildings I'd come through. I got even more excited because I am a hugely privileged dork fascinated by poor people and old-school urban development. Cogniscent of the cluster of police cars sitting in a clearing just there, I took out my camera and snapped a quick photo, then stood for a moment assessing the best way into this second village.

Promptly a policeman approached me and told me to leave, telling me it was very dangerous. I wondered whether he would prevent me from entering the encampment. If I were to walk through with my camera concealed, was it a sure thing that I'd be robbed? It was the middle of the day. I've been told I'm quite risk tolerant, and I briefly thought of just ignoring him and plunging in. On the other hand, I didn't want to be stupid. There is a fine line between bravery and stupidity, and if I were to get my camera jacked on my third day here, well, I would definitely see exactly where that line was. I followed his directions to get back to the preapproved areas of town, the whole time plotting a return without any belongings except my keys.

restoring my blogging license

So, if you haven't heard my embarrassing story yet, the moral of the story is to (a) not be a jackalope and (b) not to post the correct names of anything you publish in an anonymous blog, because the interwebs are interconnected! It was enough to make me want to tear down the blog, considering now that several people have attached the blog to me, it feels like just a matter of time before my parents get online and read about the sordid details of my life. 

This is why I could never run for office. Among other things, yes. Shut the fuck up.

Anyhow, I'm tentatively picking up the blog again whenever I get Internet access, mostly just to keep on with the pre-trip planning. I've recently decided to not get on any airplanes, because planes are for people in a hurry, which I am decidedly not. So I was looking up overseas freight travel, where you can get on a cargo ship, only passage to Australia was something like $3,000. And, just like a cruise ship, you can get screwed more as a single person. What does the world have against the ugly? 

Next thing I know, I'm on this crazy site called FindACrew where all these dudes--because the site is predominantly older white men with boats, imagine that--are looking for people to sail somewhere with them. I guess sailing and/or boat ownership is mostly a guy's thing? It's a little creepy because a lot of the men specify that they're only looking for female crew members. Hey dude, how's that plan to create a floating harem working out for you? And there's just something a little scary about getting on a boat--where rules and laws and taxes don't apply--and going out into the middle of nowhere with someone you don't know. Ever since I saw the movie Donkey Punch I haven't really been able to look at boats--or boat people--in the same way. I guess it would be okay if there were a bunch of people on board. Otherwise it just sounds like the setup for a rape and homicide in international waters. 

I really can't tell when I'm just being paranoid. I wish I could just trust everyone. 

thank god for mountain time

I meant to write when I was in San Francisco, to keep on top of things, and now I have to write this bumbling post that will take us through the past into plans for the future. San Francisco was a marvelous time. The weather was amazing, very un-SF. Definitely my favorite part was just doing very low-key things with good friends, tooling around town, gorging on things, and talking about life. I also caught up with past lovers--Ex, Love Affair, My New Best Friend, and even Joe showed up in town unannounced, though I couldn't really say I was surprised. I "celebrated" six months of sobriety in San Francisco. I ate many great meals, went for long walks on the beach, and remembered how and why I love San Francisco so much. Strangely enough, I also do not feel compelled to move back there at all--at least for the moment--I think mostly because it is so loving and familiar. The two weeks lolling about SF only reminded me that I have a tendency to lapse into hedonistic complacency in such circumstances. Right now, though, I am looking for some slightly masochistic adventure.

I think I've mentioned before that I hate my psychiatrist, but when I went to get a refill on my shhh-don't-drink-just-sleep pills before taking off for the west coast, she casually asked about my post-graduation plans. Because I don't take her very seriously, I just-as-casually responded that I had a crazy plan to travel around the world and do whatever the fuck I pleased, but it probably wasn't going to happen and would secretly drive me insane. It's something I've never mentioned to my detox doc/therapist, the one I love, because I do take him seriously, and I don't like to waste our time with my fanciful notions (of which there are many). But the funniest thing happened, which is that she said "Seriously, I'm a psychiatrist--and I don't give advice--but I want to say that your plan doesn't sound crazy." And we talked it through and she convinced me that it was worth pursuing, and that I should talk it through with other doc. After hearing her so unequivocally merit my plan not crazy, I pretty much decided that I was going to do it, though of course I've been secretly thinking of it all along.

I spent a lot of time talking through these new post-graduation plans in San Francisco, which are to spend an indefinite amount of time traveling and writing and shooting photos, and to do so ostensibly under the cover of research. More to come on this later, but every night now I have been falling asleep thinking of this, and it frightens me and excitens me so of course I know I have to do it, and I plan to leave in September. There is so much to plan and to worry about obsessively that it is almost enough to distract me from the overarching question of "is this really going to happen?"

Because it is. I stopped looking for jobs and decided, fuck, I'm going to employ myself this next year to do whatever it is I want to do, and I'm going to do a great fucking job at it. Also, I will hate myself forever if I back out of it now, and so this is why I've told everyone about it, including my family (and weren't they excited about it...).

The first person I called (and saw) when I came back was My Friend, whom I missed while I was away. I actually talked to him several times because we were finishing up a project together, and had to go over some stuff. I'd gotten him a graduation gift in SF and wanted to give it to him right away, so I scooted over to his place and we went for a walk. We talked about shit, plans, jobs, and as I sat there with him I felt both relieved and incredibly anxious. I wasn't sure what the feeling meant, maybe just relieved that I had made a decision of what to do and glad that we would have the whole summer ahead of us to fuck around, but anxious that I hadn't actually made any concrete plans. Then I wondered if the feeling had more to do with him and New York, because I'm not ready to say goodbye to New York just yet, or the people contained in it.

The next day we graduated. I hated graduation, but Mom came in to attend, so I had to go. My Friend and I were the only ones in our department who didn't buy graduation regalia; I appreciated his solidarity. Afterwards, Mom and I had dinner with My Friend, his roommate, and our families. It was cute. When dinner was winding down, My Friend squeezed himself between Mom and me and we chatted and I felt good until that weird feeling returned, the feeling of relief and anxiety, and I attributed it to having just graduated and being around proud parents and declining prosecco with a forced smile, and I tried to relax, but something was weird. Then our friend left, and I realized what was weird did in fact have more to do with my friend than the overall situation. The relief, I realized, was like this calmness I get from being around him, and the anxiety is the feeling I get that he is about to leave. It is like...being in love...why I hate being in love...why I have been quoted as saying "When I think I feel myself falling in love, my first impulse is to get into a car and drive as far away from the source as possible." The love-feeling is weird when it involves a friend, particularly when it comes at a moment when you are with your parents and theirs, and you could be getting married or something. Oof. The thought made me blush deeply. And then, in that moment, everything about our relationship flashed before my eyes and came into scrutiny.

Everyone knows I had a crush on My Friend way back when we'd first met, but then our relationship became completely desexualized because I never felt like the feeling was mutual at all, and I am pretty good at changing course. We are so safely couched in platonic-ville that it really can't go back there. But sometimes I feel so fucking attached to him that I wonder. Even more so than Joe, My Friend has been there for me this year. It's actually quite remarkable that we've not gone..there...because I do love the shit out of him. But rather than wanting to go there, I balk, because it's a desire that's completely asexual and I'm really not used to it. Because now it's just in a weird place of wanting to be a marriage without ever having been a romance.

After dinner, as Mom and I were walking home from the subway, I said, "I think I'm in love with My Friend." She just laughed. And that night, I did the typical girl thing of attributing every weird interaction between us to him being in love with me while simultaneously recalling every conversation in which we had specifically talked about various incompatibilities. I stayed up very late that night. The funny thing is that I actually thought everything through to a logical solution, which is to do nothing different and just to love on him the way I do. I love the way our relationship is now. Raising the stakes when I'm about to leave has always been my modus operandus, but I think that has changed. I really don't want to lose him as a friend, and will continue to get my kicks elsewhere if that's what it means. It's going to definitely be on my mind every fucking time I hang out with him now, which is weird, but I have owned this decision not to act on it.

I am now in the Catskills with Mom and Dad, staying at a hotel owned by the B-52s. It pretty much rules. There is no cell phone service up here, but of course there is wireless Internet. Tomorrow I am coming back to New York and I will have two guests waiting for me, kids I met in Bolivia who have been traveling through South America all this while. I have no idea how long they're staying with me.

I've just been bumbling around for a little while now, and I have work to do. I guess I better get used to all this motion and lack of structure.

...and unhealthy obsessions

Yesterday I spent a significant amount of time ducking people in uniforms, jumping fences, and getting snagged on razor wire for some photos and adrenaline. It started last week and has just escalated where all I look forward to is being places where I shouldn't be, all alone. I don't know how I went from shooting pictures of trees and rocks to shooting abandoned construction sites, but...there it is.

Oh wait, yes, I do know: Roosevelt Island.


















I allowed Joe to come over so I could say goodbye to him (in theory) but instead he spent the night and went with me to Roosevelt Island at 5 a.m. the next day. On the southern end of the island there is an abandoned hospital that takes some...maneuvering...to get to. Let's just say that you have to be somewhat desperate to get there, and I had to return Saturday morning to get the photos I needed without being arrested. This is the view of the south-facing facade. It's like a magical fairy tale, with the Queensboro bridge in the background, and this grassy expanse of uninhabited island, all alone, but sandwiched between the UN and Long Island City. The sensation of that, the serenity and beauty and history and triumph of not dying and being caught...yes, I acknowledge that it's completely juvenile and it's something I did back in San Francisco when I was craving attention from boys and all souped up on drugs and booze, and it's something I am doing now when I am completely by myself and sober. But I told you!!!! I can get addicted to just about anything. Fucken try me.

Yesterday after doing sunrise and sunset shoots, I got a surprise meetup call from My New Best Friend, the guy I was desperately in love with back in San Franny, only he had a girlfriend, so I tried to just be friends with him...right. I haven't seen him or spoken to him since leaving SF, though I have gotten some random texts and emails from him. It was crazy to see him. What was even crazier was how amazingly attracted I still was to him. I think it was because of some comment he made about something dark I had once said to him that he still remembered. That always gets to me, when men think that my dark side is somehow attractive and/or tolerable. I began to overheat immediately so I continued my sneaking around trend and led us to smoke a cigarette in the bowels of the club and I thought I was going to lose my mind so I did the thing where I just talked really fast and hoped that I didn't accidentally have sex with him. It was lovely yet horrible. What was even worse was that as soon as I realized how badly I wanted him, I decided to leave and then he asked me very nicely if I wanted to hang out later this week because he's in town until Sunday, which is, incidentally, the day that Joe leaves for San Diego.

I longed for his cocktail more than anything else.

manning up II

Something strange happened the other night at Joe's and I'm not sure if I can explain it right, but I'm going to try. I showed up around half past midnight and he was playing cards with his neighbor and a guy I'll call Roger, who I've met several times but have never really had a real conversation with. He is a nice enough guy, but he is hard to connect with, and hard to understand because he tends to be a low talker and he is always drunk. He is so drunk all the time that he wears that expression of squinty eyes and stuporous grin and when he talks it's like a wad of gum is falling out of his mouth. But he is very genial and harmless in general, although he seems to have a serious drinking problem and a tendency to want to drive home, even when he is passing out at the same time.

I was trying to talk him out of driving home and a little frustrated with Joe and his neighbor for not being more forthright in just taking Roger's keys from him and putting him on the sofa, particularly given a history of certain episodes, but he was just mumbling something about me needing to go to sleep. Joe and his neighbor vacated the room for a moment, and then Roger suddenly said, "You should wait for Joe." It was an odd thing to say, and I didn't know what he meant, but when I asked him to explain it, he just repeated it, over and over, sometimes adding, "Joe's a good guy. You should wait for him."

This struck me as hard because just last week I got disgusted with the Joe situation and decided, in light of his leaving, that I wasn't going to see him anymore because it was going to make me sad. I informed a friend of this decision and she said something pretty elegant to me that put it all into perspective: Seriously, you're going to be sad anyway. You might as well spend time with him.

Then this past week Joe and I have taken our "relationship" to the next level. This means several things. It means that I am actually engaging with him, talking to him, telling him things. It's pretty amazing how long we've been faux-dating and how much I've managed to not tell him. It's also pretty humbling to see how transparent I am...to see how much he's discerned just by osmosis. It also means that I am allowing myself to actually like him, something I haven't let myself fully do this whole time. It is scary and I am remembering what it is like, just trying to enjoy the moment. Hearing Roger, who is someone who is known to me, but really a stranger, just say to me point-blank that I should wait for him, was quite surreal.

I gave up trying to understand what he meant and tried to refocus the conversation on the merits of not driving drunk, when Roger asked me for a hug. I obliged. I sat back down across from him and watched him drink his water. He continued looking around us in a glazed fashion with that grin on his face, and then he mumbled some kind of question, something like, "What gives?" I didn't know how to respond to this, and told him so, and then he suddenly became very lucid and articulate and told me he was really attracted me.

I've noticed that since entering Soberland, there have been so many instances in which I've been rendered completely speechless. This was one of those times.

Then he returned to the "You should wait for Joe," mumbling, adding, "Joe is more of a man than me."

The mood in the living room, which had been all jolly and sleepy and drunk was suddenly so intense and dark. It was really fucking shocking. He began saying very intense things, punctuated with mumbling more "what gives," which confounded me. He finally said, "I don't know how to talk to you. I'm just attracted to you. How should I talk to you?" I completely ignored his remarks about being attracted to me and said he'd have to ask me a real question that required an answer that was more than "What gives," so he said, "What are you looking for?"

This was a question that really begged for a response, but the whole situation was confusing me. Not five minutes ago, this guy had been passing out upright. And not fifteen minutes ago, the card game had ended because he had lost his hand...literally; he misplaced his cards. And yet right then and there we began to talk to each other in a deeply personal way, leaning over the coffee table. I told him about how I always looked for things that I thought I wanted...only to find out that the things I thought I wanted...weren't really what I wanted. And he started to tell me about how everything he wanted always turned to shit.

He stopped talking the second Joe walked back into the living room. He sat down next to me and said something like, "What's up, guys?"

At that point, Roger leaned back into his chair very easily, and his dark expression disappeared, the drunk mask resumed, and he just shrugged and smiled at Joe and mumbled "Eh?"

I felt like I was fucking insane.

I couldn't tell Joe about it. Would you have? In our previous realm of keeping him at arm's length, this wouldn't have been an issue. But now that we are talking to each other, I feel like I have to tell him things. I tried to let it pass. Then the next day, Roger called Joe and asked him to apologize to me for him. He kind of wanted to know.

I don't know why this is bothering me so much. But really. That exchange made me feel like I was fucking insane.

manning up

Coming back to New York has been taxing. Sharp always refers to it as "re-entry," a terminology which to me accurately portrays how difficult it is to readjust. I find re-entry and readjustment to be very difficult. I guess I am not as good as an adapter as I'd like to believe I am, and this week has been one of "fuck first, ask questions later." Or, more accurately, "fuck first...then go to sleep." When confronted with details that don't seem to fit with my reality, I find it easier to just go ahead and have sex...and then...go to sleep. This happened to me twice this week. The fallout the next morning is harder, only now I can't blame my actions on boozing. Now it's just my inability to deal with reality. The first was with the lawyer when I woke up in the hotel room the next morning: "Wait, did ACLU imply that he's...married?" (Goddammit, Little Brother, why are you always right?) And then with Joe this week, in a more prolonged state of confusion: "Why am I still sleeping with you if you are leaving?"

Yeah, so Joe told me when I got back that he's moving to California probably at the end of next month. This news made me incredibly sad but also somewhat relieved. I was beginning to wonder how long our relationship could continue in this balance. The day after he told me this, we spent most of the day together lounging around in my apartment. In our now 9 months on and off of not-dating, we have never done this. I am not good at chilling with people really, only by myself, and I was only able to do this after getting up at 730 to go to a yoga class. Usually I kick him out of my apartment, but I told him he could stay and that I wanted him to help me chill that day.

I realized, after that day, that I felt closer to Joe, just because I had spent time with him, doing nothing, forcing myself to be still with him and not go anywhere. Maybe the reason why I haven't been able to get serious about anyone is because I haven't been able to sit still with anyone for long enough. But nobody has ever demanded it of me, including Joe. He has never demanded anything of me. He has never demanded more of my time, better treatment, anything. I think he was probably scared of scaring me off. But honestly, I really think, looking back, that had he demanded these things, I would have given him these things. We'll never know, I guess. Maybe I would've just told him to fuck off.

Anyhow, now it just feels even weirder to be around him. I've always kept him at arm's length to avoid giving him the impression that we were getting more serious than we were, but now I feel like I can suck the marrow out of him before he leaves. Is that fucked up? Like I want to be really close to him now and I feel like it's safe because he's going to go. I want the intensity without the commitment, I guess.

home again

I'm back in the Chi, and it is even colder and snowier than the NY. I was stranded at home without snow tires, so I was thwarted from my hotly-anticipated day of hanging out with New Crush, which was a big letdown, but I went took the train downtown to wander around in the slush and see E, which was marvelous.

I was so charged to get out of the house today that I embarked on a three-mile walk to get to the train station. Let me tell you that this is no small order of business in my town, but being at home makes me crazy. The bickering with Mom & Pop has been steadily escalating since sobriety happened, and I'm crazy anxious about the massive amount of time we're going to spending together. We haven't spent this much consecutive time together in about a decade (yep, that's right). It makes me want to gnaw through my wrist bone. Somehow I will get through this, and somehow I am going to do it without (a) drinking (b) smoking and hopefully (c) a murder-suicide. It's a lot harder for me to handle my parents dead sober.

WonderWoman told me that I've lost at least one blog reader because I've gotten too depressing. She also asked me one night if I was bored, because I seemed bored, thus pandering to two of my worst fears about sobriety, that I would become boring and depressing. I know she didn't mean to do this, but hey, there it is. I don't know what to say to that. I hate the idea that my adventures in booze are so much more entertaining than my repetitive battles with reality.

I've been distracting myself by thinking of how I'm going to de-stress following two weeks of vacation with M&P. I've become totally obsessed with the idea of going to Big Bend National Park in southwest Texas. I really want to go to the desert, and have some kind of near-death-by- dehydration experience. I know this is totally specific, but I envision this as being a kind of natural high, and remember that I'm totally fucken sober, and I could really go for some kind of out-of-body experience. I imagine that almost dying of thirst in the desert would get me very close to the kind of high that I need lately. Maybe I would have some kind of epiphany. I am a big fan of epiphanies. I would be like "Oh my god, everything is going to be okay. No wait, everything is okay." That is the kind of epiphany I want. That is what, I think, my adventures in booze gave to me most nights.

M&P do not think it is a good idea for me to spend a week camping by myself in the desert. This is understandable, because I've only been camping a handful of times in my life, and always in the company of some burly dudes. But this lack of faith, of course, makes me hate them. This is why I hate coming home. Instead of having a dick and flying a plane, I am like a eunuch without a driver's license. Everything I've done in the past fifteen years evaporates and all I want to do is run away from home, or smoke cigarettes in the bathroom and read comic books.

But, back to Big Bend. I talked to Ex the other day, as I waited for my flight home, and he was interested in coming camping with me. Camping with Ex is fun. In fact, most of my camping experiences have been with Ex. He's been to Big Bend before. He would be a great sherpa. He would probably make sure that my near-death wish doesn't accidentally go 100 percent.

Or maybe I should come home to the NY. I miss it already. Funny when you realize a place has truly become home. Even when you don't really want it to, because it's so cold. Then you go someplace even colder.

serious cuntliness

In anticipation of more serious sobriety ahead, I kind of went balls-out last night, in a mildly boozey evening bookended by coke and pot and filled with serious cuntliness. I slept through the entire rainy day and got out of bed at 6 p.m.

I finally returned Joe's phone call Thursday night and so he met up with me and Dolly and came with us to the party. I was feeling super amped and decided to call Curly and Red because I haven't seen them in so long and I thought that maybe having them around while Joe was there would put me on better behavior and pave the way for friendship.

Enter B, whom keets warned me away from about two months earlier, which landed me instead with John. I think B is cute, if not a little strange, and around 4 a.m. I ended up pulling him aside and telling him I wanted to make out with him, but I was there with Joe. We ended up making out in the hallway and I gave him my phone number and told him to call me next week.

I didn't go home with Joe. I honestly planned on doing it, but then I didn't feel like it. He got upset. We went outside and he basically told me that he didn't understand what was going on. I told him that we had talked about this before and that I'm not exactly relationship material right now, and that I just wanted things to be exactly the way they have been: casual, sporadic, and completely under my control. He was like, Yeah, I know. I thought I could do that too. But I don't think I can.

Joe and I have been nothing but honest with each other. I know exactly how he feels about me, and he knows that I cannot be as reliable as he needs me to be. He is the sweetest, most understanding guy ever, and I keep jerking him around like a little bitch and he doesn't deserve it. We were hugging our goodbyes on Grand Street when Strong popped her head out the window and took a photo of us.

I really wish I had a transcript of what was said last night.

radical upswing

There is a reason why people seek professional help, and I think it's to avoid posting horribly depressing things like the post I put up yesterday! I don't know what compelled me to do that. Wait, yes I do. I was picturing people's reactions when they'd heard I'd gone completely fucken insane and thinking, "She did what? I didn't know she was feeling like that." I just didn't want there to be any surprises. You've been warned. And thank you for your love anyhow. I love that you love me, even if I'm a finicky little bitch. I'm sorry to worry people. Sometimes I want people to worry about me, and sometimes I don't. But don't worry. If I need you, I will call. Just pick up the damn phone!

I'm feeling a lot better today. I woke up and still couldn't really breathe, but I did sleep, and in my mind I told myself that I would not die, that even though mental instability does not feel good, it will not kill me, at least not directly. I am working through things. I just need tranquilizers in the meanwhile, or to wait until the pendulum swings in the opposite direction and I can think about more serious things, like why the Wall Street bailout makes me so angry and why I can't concentrate on school and why I want to be in a relationship if I can't seem to commit to anything at all. I read a piece of iFluff today about OCD dating. Bwahaha! That's totally me. Anyhow all the little pieces of ecstasy flooding my brain feel good today instead of bad, and this is good news. I have to take advantage of my good moods and try to get things done.

Tonight I am going to try a radical experiment in my NYC dating spree, which is to basically tell John that I have no idea what is going on, but that he can't expect anything of me, really. I don't know what I mean by that because the whole creation of any kind of relationship is managing expectations. Maybe it's saying that I don't want to be in a relationship at all? But I don't want to just continue having casual sex. What if I go celibate for a year? Now I'm just talking crazy. Okay, so I haven't figured out what I'm going to say to him at all. I'm just going to wing it. This is how it's probably going to start, though:

Me: So....
J: So...
Me: I want to say something but I'm not sure what.
J: Okay...
Me: Hm, maybe I should have another drink.
(20 minutes later)
Me: Let's fuck!

Just kidding. Jesus Christ, I'm just kidding. FYI, I haven't had more than six drinks in one night in a week! It's this new thing they call "moderation."

Me: So....
J: So...
Me: I want to say something but I'm not sure what.
J: Okay...
Me: Look, I don't want to dwell on the intense exchange we had last weekend, but it's got me thinking that maybe I've led you to believe certain things that aren't true. I've been accused of leading people on before, and if that's the case, I'm sorry that my actions are misleading. So let's just clear shit up right now. I am not looking to dive headfirst into anything serious right now. I know we had sex within a few hours of meeting each other, which doesn't typically equate to anything serious, so let's just stick with that for now. Maybe in a couple months after seeing each other weekly, I'll ask you what your last name is. If that is going to cause more scenes like the one we had the other night, though, we better have a couple of cocktails and call it a night.

Ya gonna eat that?

As much as I love my muffin top Polly, she doesn't fit in with my plans to not buy any new clothes until I finish grad school. It was bad enough that I had to buy all new jeans just last year, but now I don't fit in those anymore either. This means that my waist has increased by more than three inches in three years. I honestly don't think I would care so much if I just had bigger pants. But I don't, and I feel fat.

I wish I could blame it on a slowing metabolism, or American-sized portions, or the car lifestyle, but the fact is that I live in New York and I walk fucken everywhere. What I can blame it on is the incredible satisfaction I get from eating.

But no, satisfaction isn't quite the right word. When I eat, I'm never really satisfied. Basically, I have two stages: "hunger" and "ohgodifeelsick." I can't remember the last time I was really "hungry," because I eat about every two hours, and overeat about three times a day.

Like any normal girl, I spent most of high school exercising at odd hours of the day, eating reduced-calorie Snackwell's cookies, and fearing any weight gain that did not go directly to my breasts. After I left high school, though, some sort of pride in my appearance or fear of social exclusion due to fatness just completely evaporated.

It's not my fault that I have an intense oral fixation and wish I could be eating/drinking/smoking/makingout every second of the day. It is my fault, however, that I do not try to control this compulsion. It's also my fault that I allow myself to feel bad about it rather than doing something about it...

So yesterday I decided to go on a severe diet. "Severe" for me means eating only three meals a day, and having two of those meals consist of yogurt with crunchy things thrown in and, as Weight Watchers would say, "a sensible dinner." It also means that I am utterly miserable. I am one of those people that thinks about what I'm going to have for lunch as I'm making breakfast, what I'm going to have for a snack with my 11 a.m. coffee, what I'm going to make for dinner, and if there are any cookies around. And the first (and only) thing I want to do at home is eat. My happiest childhood memories are of me and my little brother coming home from horrible days at school and spending the next four hours running back and forth from the television to the microwave during commercial breaks, eating everything we could get our hands on.

I figure that if I want to lose 10 pounds I only have to do this for what, a year? Even if I exercise every day, I think it would take me forever to be able to fit into my pants comfortably. I'm so used to squeezing into tight jeans that I think I think I've rendered my uterus completely uninhabitable by any fetal matter. Maybe this explains why I've never gotten pregnant.

Speaking of feeling bad about myself, I was perusing craigslist yesterday when I came across a very hateful post where this guy was like, "what's with all the fat chicks?" etc etc and then he goes, "Why are there so many Chinese girls who want to go out with only white guys? I'm sorry, but nobody wants to go out with a stubby girl with a face like a pug." Oh god it made me so angry. You'd think that I would be over shit like this, but I guess I'm not. Every time someone says anything about Chinese people, I get pissy. It just reminds me that I'm Chinese, and that no matter what I say or do, some people will see me in whatever fucked up way they want.

Makes me so mad that I just want to bake a whole batch of chocolate cookies and eat them all.

Urm...I don't want to just post something about feeling fat and Chinese, so I will say that I had a lovely weekend, and that I hung out with a boy on Friday night who seemed to like me just the way I am, even though I tried to pick a fight with him. I don't know where all this anger is coming from lately, but I'm glad that I'm surrounded by soft boys who are willing to absorb it all.