Observations from the Window 10.20

I was going to write this earlier but I thought it would be better if I waited till I wasn't quite as irritated as I was. Irritated isn't the right word, I was totally disgusted. At Tuesday night's debate Katherine Fenton, a 24 year old kindergarten teacher, had the gall to ask Willard what he would do about the gender wage gap. In his answer Romney explained how hard it was to find qualified women to serve in his administration in Massachusetts and dropped the now infamous "binders full of women" line. For her efforts, and like Sandra Fluke before her, Fenton has now had her name trashed from coast to coast by the neanderthal press.

Nobody has of yet called her a slut but they have called her a feminazi, a party girl, and a member of some phantom left wing conspiracy to destroy the American dream by making women equal partners in it. They scoured her Facebook page and Twitter account, which has since been deleted, and discovered that, omg, she liked drinking and sex. She wasn't ladylike enough, she likes manly things, and to top it off she wrote about in public when she should have at home cooking dinner. The wingnuts love to talk about terror and well they should because they win more elections on pure fear than anybody has since the Civil War. Isn't something like this just terrorism in a different form? When it's a man it's a "pointed question" but when it's a woman asking it suddenly becomes personal, your'e just a slut.

I've never really thought of myself as a feminist, I don't like having to 'be' anything, but maybe it's time I did. Seriously if the wingnuts and angry old white men are so scared of the term it must be good for something. Just think about it, if women were to trash a man for asking a simple question there would be hell to pay. But they are allowed. Don't dare call fat Limbaugh fat but somehow Candy Crowley's weight can be an important issue for post-debate discussion. They are allowed. Think women are equal in today's America? Like many minorities they may feel equal but under the nice calm surface of equality a woman is one pointed question away from being just another slut.

I was going to leave a link to the article that totally disgusted me but I changed my mind, why give them the traffic, and after my rave review you probably wouldn't read it anyway. Instead I'll leave a link to a Raw Story article on it and finish with a paragraph from the same.

"The article, published anonymously, alleged that Katherine Fenton’s Twitter account “reveals that purple Joose is her choice to get blackout drunk and she has a history of getting wet at happy hour.”
The article also highlights sexually suggestive messages Fenton allegedly sent from her Twitter account. The Twitter account cited in the article no longer exists."

Published anonymously, fucking cowards.

Observations from the Window 9.16

It was still dark when I took my coffee and wandered to the roof early Friday morning. The slimmest of crescent moons hung over the Village in the cool air, simply one of those mornings I lived for in the mountains. Sometimes my mountains seem so far away, like they are from a totally different life. Still, Fall is in the air and if it's not quite the same in the Village there is no missing it on crisp clear mornings like the past few.

I have to say that the past three or four weeks have been rather hectic for me, sometimes excruciatingly so. There was my trip to Paris, the VQs made their return from Boston, and the political conventions didn't give my politically addicted brain much of a rest. On top of those I have been stressing over a personal issue for a couple of months now and I happened turn 30 in August.

So yes I do love this time of year but as with anything involving me it isn't all that clear cut. Fall just seems to be the time of year my brain reboots. I suppose you could call it the start of my mental year probably due to spending too many years at PSU. This year it just seems to be worse than others have been because of all the things I just mentioned. I start to dwell on what I want to do, where I want to be, and how the hell I'm going to get there. Painting, writing, and photography all are competing for limited time. This is also the one time of year I still so miss my mountains and I just don't have the time to get back there as much as I would like. That makes me start to think that maybe I should have just stayed there all along. See what I mean about the mess my brain becomes?

Than again it seems I left myself a clue this year. I did happen to ship all those acrylics back from Paris. There must have been a reason for that.

A brief Fall sports update; the Phillies are making a totally unexpected run at the last playoff spot in the National League (but proceeded to lose 2 out of 3 games to the worst team in baseball), the post-Paterno era of Penn State football is off to a totally expected dismal start (but crushed Navy for their first win), and the Flyers seem to be locked out in an NHL labor dispute (but ... well no buts here, locked out).

Finally a rather fitting quote from Leo Tolstoy that I posted on one of my tumblrs and has been reblogged over a thousand times ....

"If you want to be happy, be"

Observations from the Window 3.31

Sometimes I read my horoscope in the morning, sometimes. I don't often mention it because there people out there that think the habit is just another nail in the coffin of my sanity. The thing is I read it yesterday morning and it said that I was in need of an attitude adjustment. Well actually it said an attitude adjustment could change everything, what everything it could change was not specified.

Google Chrome and I have been at war as I tried to sync my bookmarks on two comps and I thought maybe that's where my attitude needed adjusting because I was totally geek pissed. As the day went on I found I actually was adjusting but not in the way the stars seemed to mean. I fell into one of those death spirals of emo arrogance that Ash so subtly describes as being bitchy. I have no idea what the lesson to be learned is here but I'm sure there is one. Maybe it's just that sometimes the stars are wrong even when they are right.

But anyway I'll just dwell on those little bits of happiness that make the mood go away. Page 280 in the new issue of Vogue. The dress on the back cover of the Express flyer that came in the mail today, a must have even though I don't wear dresses. The buy three and get three free sale at one of my fav stores. Paris Amour, Coconut Lime Breeze, Black Raspberry Vanilla, Midnight Pomegranate, Black Amethyst, and Into The Wild. You can guess the store.

Finally, as I look at my print of "Almond Branches In Bloom" hanging on the wall, I want to wish Vincent a belated Happy Birthday. Wherever he is I'm sure he is creating a masterpiece. The man may have been insane but he was a total genius.

And the rain begins to fall.

Observations

With all the things going on right now this seems a strange post for a Monday morning but I was paging through an old book, saw this, and it made me smile. Too long for twitter and not right for tumblr I'll just post it here and hope it makes somebody else smile too.

“If I knew that today would be the last time I’d see you, I would hug you tight and pray the Lord be the keeper of your soul. If I knew that this would be the last time you pass through this door, I’d embrace you, kiss you, and call you back for one more. If I knew that this would be the last time I would hear your voice, I’d take hold of each word to be able to hear it over and over again. If I knew this is the last time I see you, I’d tell you I love you, and would not just assume foolishly you know it already.”

Gabriel García Márquez, Love in the Time of Cholera

Observations on Art 8.15

Dreams take many forms but is a dream worth everything? In that I mean is it worth giving up all else to make that dream happen? Everything comes at a price, even a dream, one just has to decide if it is a price you are willing to pay. The price of turning that dream into a reality.

"Notre devoir, en tant qu'hommes et femmes, est de procéder comme si les limites de notre capacité n'existait pas. Nous sommes des collaborateurs dans la création."*
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin


Paris de Women are Heroes from La Boite Concept on Vimeo.

Ile St Louis is one of Paris’s oldest and most exclusive districts, a district of cobbled streets and tea-shops. It became the home of an installation by French artist and photographer JR called Women are Heroes. For the Women are Heroes exhibition JR and his volunteer assistants pasted up miles of posters of women’s eyes around Ile St Louis and the Louis Philippe bridge that links the island to Paris’s right bank.

Everybody has a dream. Some are fleeting, some are not.

*"Our duty as men and women, is to proceed as if limits to our ability did not exist. 
We are collaborators in creation."

Observattions from the Window 2.20

Sometimes I get these massive headaches that feel like a vice is squeezing my head together from ear to ear. I have been told they aren't technically migraines but I have never been told what they in fact are. I don’t know what causes them, nobody seems to have any idea what causes them. A couple years ago I went through a whole array of tests just to see the doctor shrug as if to say karma.

I had one of them yesterday, the first I have had in a long time. Actually I think it was the first I had since I moved to the Village. There is nothing like spending 24 hours in bed, clawing at the pillows, chewing on Treximet, and praying it puts you back to sleep so you can forget the pain. Now the funny thing with Treximet is that one of the possible side effects is a rebound headache. I do not lie, a rebound headache, what the hell is the point?

The best explanation I was ever given was that it is totally stress related. Basically my brain isn't wired right to handle stress so it takes it to a point and than it overheats. My theory is that fluid intake should cool it down but I suppose alcohol isn't the right fluid to be taking in. It seems to work to a point and than it doesn't.

Anyway I had this idea to write down what i was thinking, that is if I was thinking anything other than just kill me now. I must admit that was the most prevalent thought I had. I guess my grand experiment was a failure because other than the kill me now thought it was mostly black without the white. A dark deep depression with no light anywhere, no escape, nowhere to hide. Seems almost like what I call the mood but with added pain. What a piece of work I am.

Karma

Five Finger Death Punch - Bad Company

the Loner

"We are the ones who know how to entertain ourselves. How to learn without taking a class. How to contemplate and how to create.

Loners, by virtue of being loners, in celebrating the state of standing alone, have an innate advantage when it comes to being brave—like pioneers, like mountain men, iconoclasts, rebels, and sole survivors.

Loners have an advantage when faced with the unknown, the never-done-before, and the unprecedented. An advantage when it comes to being mindful like the Buddhists, spontaneous like the Taoists, crucibles of concentrated prayer like the desert saints, esoteric like the cabalists.

Loners, by virtue of being loners, have at their fingertips the undiscovered, the unique, the rarified. Innate advantages when it comes to imagination, concentration, inner discipline.

A knack for invention, originality, for finding resources in what others would call vacuums. A knack for visions."

Anneli Rufus, "Party of One, The Loners Manifesto"

Observations from the Window 1.24

By all accounts I seem to have survived another attack of the mood. It was a good idea to run home for a couple days because it did seem to clear my head for now. For two days I did nothing but eat good steak, watch sports, and talk with the family about our roads ahead. We also managed to consume a case or so of my dad’s beer in the process but we aren’t telling.

One fun moment was seeing my brother's Penn State diplomas which had just arrived via the USPS. They left them out on the front porch in the melting snow, after four years and a small fortune spent, they left them sit in the fucking snow. Sorry maybe the mood isn’t totally passed yet. Anyway the kid now has more papers than I do as he got a diploma for each of his minors too. So as of this writing he is ahead three pieces of paper to my two, online Academy of Art here I come.

So why the mood? It's been some time since I fell into one and I'm not totally sure why. Over the years I have tried to figure out their cause but I have never had much success and neither has anyone else. I’ve been told part of the reason is that I'm an emotional person but I keep those emotions bottled up so eventually they need a release. I do partly accept that because I can see that release when I paint, almost as if those emotions flow through my fingers and the brushes onto the canvas. Than again maybe I am just insane and nobody has figured that out yet.

It's at times like this that my mountains always worked their primo magic and it's when I now miss them the most. But I have to wonder if it's just one of those things I look back at longingly knowing I can never completely go back. It seems as if the past can taunt you like that, teasing you with its perfection yet never giving it back. With my brother gone the last links in the chain are broken yet I still find myself drawn to those mountains.

So maybe the answer to the unasked question is that I'm not the mountain painter nor am I the city photographer. Maybe the answer is a combination I have yet to find.

Maybe I have to find it ....

Avril Lavigne - What The Hell

Observations from the Window 1.20

I have been quiet here lately but not for lack of trying. Seems I have slipped into one of my moods and the more I tried to write my way out of it the more depressing the read became. Just one of those moods I get in where I'm not happy with anything at all, I just hate everything equally. I might have a reason or I might not; it doesn't seem to matter at times like this. With know obvious cause for the melancholy feeling everything becomes the cause and the mood becomes a demon that feeds on itself. I just feel mentally and emotionally drained, tortured, dejected, gloomy .... emo.

One time my mom gave me a carton of eggs and told me to throw them in the kitchen sink to blow off steam. I don’t remember if it helped but I do remember it being fun as hell so I gave that a try yesterday. Made one hell of a mess for me to clean is what it did. Next up I might try slinging paint at canvas while trying not to hit the walls, or maybe sling paint at the walls themselves. Either way it could get interesting.

At times like this my girls always seem to know what's best for me. Last night one suggested I soak in the tub with tunes and a drink. I won’t pass on what else she suggested but it all seemed to help me unwind and get to sleep. Than today the VQ told me to just stay home and do something to relax, like I know how to do something like that. But some wandering the Village, doing some photos, and another soak in the tub have done wonders for my attitude. Ash also came up with the idea of making a run home to recharge which I might just do. I'm not about to risk taking Foxy out in this crappy weather again but I just might look bitchy enough to get a pair of seats to myself. I just have to remember to skip the hells this trip.

And so life goes on.

Bob Dylan - Not Dark Yet

Disclaimer - I should admit I lied up above because I don't hate everything equally. Even in my mood I hate that jackass Glenn Beck more.

Thirty Days of Truths, Day 29

Something I hope to change about myself. And why ....

Can I use location on this one? Why? Because Paris seems to be calling me. Damnit I’ll just think of something else. I knew that was too easy an answer.

I don't think it's ever going to be possible but if I could change anything I would tame that slight flaw in my personality that makes me so damn emo sometimes. A friend recently said I have a 'dark, lonerish, superior, arrogant bitch' attitude and I like that. It's a cover I have worked long and hard at over the years and I believe I may have finally perfected it. But still it seems to fail me at times.

The problem is the fact that under that veneer is a soul that can suddenly be torn with emotion. I'll usually mange to keep it safely hidden away and under control only to have it explode out of nowhere. There are times I don’t even know why it happens but still it does. It can last hours or it can last days than it will suddenly fade away as fast as it appeared. My mom once called it 'the mood' and it's a name that has stuck ever since.

Granted I love to paint when I'm in one of those moods. It's as if I can see the colors swirling around my head and can smell even feel the paint as I put on canvas. At moments like that every creative nerve in my body seems so alive I honestly think I could paint what I see with a blindfold on. It has to be the closest thing to an artistic orgasm as I have ever found.

Maybe I won't change that flaw after all. I mean seriously, who am I to turn down an orgasm?

Thirty Days of Truths, Day 26

Have you ever thought about giving up on life?
If so, when and why ....

Well this is an easy, short, and simple one. The answer is yes.

For the second part of it, if you don't know by now just read back and you should be able to figure it out.

HIM - Join Me

Observations from the Window 12.15

I’m just taking a little break from the ‘truths’ here because I’m struggling a bit over these next two. Life, death, and taxes just scare the hell out of me. On top of that I have my horoscope telling me turmoil will swirl around me for the rest of the month. Not that I believe in horoscopes, their just karma’s bad relation, but it seems to be the way it always goes for me this time of year.

The world that is mine just seems a bit turned upside down at the moment. I never got back to my sister’s big Thanksgiving news for the family. She wants to, is going to, join the Navy. Go to photography school there than go to art school when she gets out. While I now think she is as totally insane as her older sister I am still proud of her for thinking it all through on her own. I’ll leave it at that before I end up getting myself in trouble.

Than you have the non artsie member of the triumvirate. My brother graduates from Penn State this weekend ending a long run for us in the mountains. But the little shit has decided he doesn’t want to go to the graduation ceremonies in person. I say little shit in the best possible way because he is six inches taller than me, though I still think I could take him though. I just think he should go to graduation like I did and just sneak a bottle of champagne in under his gown. It isn’t as if the TSA is going to pat him down on the way to the stage.

On top of all this is the normal end of the year Christmas emo mood that I fall into. As always I feel it tug at me, start to pull me down, as Christmas gets nearer and nearer. But I’m going to fight it this year no matter how much alcohol it takes. After all I have a turkey to make and I found a totally kewl recipe for jalapeno cranberry relish that should put some unexpected bite into Christmas dinner. I guess I really should start shopping though, the clock is suddenly ticking faster.

It’s enough to make this tall bish throw up her hands and scream.

But not yet anyway. Not yet ….

Robert Earl Keene - Merry Christmas From The Family

Not that I am going to start posting xMas tunes but that is effing classic. I remember the first time Sean and I saw it, we just had to watch it over and over.

Thirty Days of Truths, Day 1

Something you hate about yourself ….

At first glance this one is so easy it almost makes me laugh and I can answer it in a few short sentences. I can become suddenly emo to an extreme. I might have a reason in my head but I don’t honestly need one. Sometimes darkness just swirls around in my head and it just happens.

See that was totally easy and made all the easier by the fact that I seem to be in one of the moods at the moment. The thing is now that I wrote it I have to sit back and think about what I wrote. And that is going to be the biggest problem doing this whole thing. I'm going to need another doctor until day 30.

Yes I can be emo, I can get into a mood so dark I make Ophelia seem like Cinderella. But I’m also an enigma, even to myself. I don’t want to say I enjoy the mood but sometimes I seem to thrive on it. I did one of my favorite paintings when I was in just such a mood. I hate the way I make people feel when I get this way but I have no control over it at all, the demons just take over. I can be moody, dark, anti-social, and totally withdraw inside myself and at the same moment want attention, need the attention. This means be nice but don't always expect much in return.

So I can be an anti-social attention whore. Just an enigma.

Why the hell did I start this?

Observations from the Window 10.18

I had a thought to write myself out of the beginnings of an emo mood but a big Phillies win last night, a fun morning today, and a day off have done wonders for my mind. The artsie part is buzzing and just looking for something to do, either that or I have left a toy running somewhere. I’m suddenly not as tired as I have been and think I’m going to head out for some photo taking and some shopping but first some odds and ends that are on my mind.

I was watching MSNBC while I ate lunch today and the talk was about teen bullying and suicides. Philadelphia radio personality Michael Smerconish commented that he doesn’t think bullying today is any worse than it ever was but that what we have is heightened media attention causing a "shark attack syndrome." He also commented that there was bullying when he was in school too. I’m sure there was bullying than but there is one big difference today I can see and I was tempted to send off an email. By his look I would say all the bullying in his day was by word of mouth or hand written. Over the weekend I saw the totally awesome movie ‘The Social Network’ and in the movie is a line that stuck in my head and seems to fit here. “The internet's not written in pencil, Mark. It's written in ink." When somebody bullies on Facebook or in blogs or anyplace on the web it is there forever, just a Google search away. It is a little harder to get past something when anybody can see it anytime they want.

In the sports world my Phillies gave me one hell of a scare when they lost game of one the NLCS to San Francisco. I sat watching in the bar with a room full of victorious Yankees fans and didn’t enjoy that too much at all. Than last night I got to return the favor as the Phillies won game two in a rather convincing fashion and the Yankees had lost their game 2 on Saturday. Now I have to talk to Ash, I mean the boss, to get myself out of work tomorrow because FOX moved the game time up to 1 PM Pacific. Rumor has it the move was made so they didn’t have to preempt their show ‘Glee’. I never saw it, have no desire to see, and wonder why the fuck it is so important.

Finally the wind down of my sis’ high school field hockey career continues tonight as they play in Round 2 of the county championships. Already having beaten a perennial power, which had knocked my sis out of the playoffs two years in a row, they take on probably our high school’s most hated rival. I wish I could get down to see her play again but I haven’t been able to and I feel bad about that. Good luck sis!! Keep winning and maybe I’ll still get another chance. I’ll have to update later on the game.

flickr (check), flickr (check), blog (check). Time to shop ….

VersaEmerge - Past Praying For

(awesome vid!)

[hockey update - after taking a 1-0 lead my sis' team lost 2-1, all the scoring taking place in the first half. they did however make the district playoffs so her career lives on for now]

Observations from the Window 9.12

I started writing this on a dreary rainy Sunday afternoon, opening Sunday of the NFL season. I was already full prepared to announce my opinion that my Eagles suck but upon further review, and an almost miraculous comeback, I will hold my opinion for at least another week.

I haven’t been writing nearly as much as I was but there are reasons for that. As I have said before I have had a lot on my mind most of which is off-limits to my blog, off limits for no other reason than I say so and it is after all my blog. Yes some things in my life continue to be personal. What was a very good run ran into a roller coaster and combined to create a bit of an emo end to the week. It got to the point that I thought the gods were indeed angry. That the gods were, for lack of a better term, fucking with me. I also think they found it in their collective hearts to apologize and so dropped that most awesome pic on me that I used in the previous post. Hopefully they have moved on to greener pastures. The three stooges of American politics (Beck, Gingrich, and Palin) would be a good place to start.

To top the emo off on Saturday PSU sports ran into a perfect storm of misfortune. Not only did the football team lose to Alabama 24-3 but the vaunted three consecutive national champion women’s volleyball team also lost. This doesn’t seem like a big deal until I tell you they had won 109 consecutive matches dating back to Sept. 15, 2007 when they lost to the same Stanford team that beat them Saturday. The nationally ranked women’s soccer and field hockey teams both had already fallen Friday. Add to that the Phillies losing to the Mets on Saturday and the Eagles debacle today and you have a sports weekend from hell.

But than Saturday, after watching the Penn State game, I spent a late evening with a good friend of mine. She always finds a way to cheer me up no matter how down I feel. I always appreciate that and probably don’t tell her that nearly enough. I guess that’s what really good friends are truly all about. When you are down they pick you up, dust you off, and send you back into your life a little better prepared for whatever the gods throw your way. When you up they enjoy it with you and never take credit for it even though a lot of credit is there due.

Life goes on

Paper Tongues - Ride To California

Observations from my Bed 9.12

I don’t normally post photos in this blog but I found this one on a tumblr site that just is so totally a look into my mind that I had to share it. From top to bottom I think I have finally found my long lost twin sister. The hair, skin, pants, hands, and yes the ass are all so me, I just wish I had taken the shot. Why the hell didn’t I think of it! Oh and I can’t forget the word, karma ….

Yes karma

Linkin Park - The Catalyst

Observations from the Roof, the Vendor

I had a rather eye opening day today and I seem to be back on the roof where it all started last night. After a night of chatting with the vqs I tried to get to sleep early, well early for me. For various reasons I found myself tossing in bed unable to sleep. Around four in the morning I pulled on a sweatshirt and some cutoffs and decided to go wander the neighborhood. I wandered the dark and empty streets, or what passes for dark and empty streets on a summer night in the Village.

Eventually I stopped to get an early edition Times and ended up drinking coffee and talking to the vendor. I guess he doesn’t get much company at that hour because he proceeded to give me a life update. At one point he was telling me about his daughter who lives out on the left coast and whom he hasn’t seen in years. But than he pulled out his cell phone and told me he talks to her every day.

Something about that hit a loose wire in my brain because, as he talked on, I couldn’t stop thinking about it and I have been thinking about it ever since. Now I always talk about how I ‘burn bridges’ leaving people behind like so many piles of bones alongside the road of my life. Not that it has to be my way all the time, more like I find it hard to deal with life’s problems and I find it so much easier to just walk on and leave it all behind. Its why have so few really old friends and always seem to depend on my family for support.

What makes this all more intense is the fact that at the moment the friends I do have seem to be scattering to the four corners. My sister is deep into field hockey, Ash’s girl friend is off visiting family and attending a theatre seminar and one of my best friends is off in wilderness unknown hunting bears.

After a day of thinking I came to determination of sorts. I just don’t think I am any longer the loner I once was, the loner that all my life I thrived on being. Maybe part of it is living in such a totally and constantly intense environment or maybe its just I’m getting older. Maybe I’m just maturing into a more normal person after twenty eight years. Honestly I have no idea why the vendor’s story did this to me. Karma, always karma.

The only thing of any substance to come out of all this meditation is this. I have a friend I call Pitts, its short for Pittsburgh and the reason is worth a blog post all its own and maybe one day I’ll get to it. She left PSU just before me, moving to LA and a job at UCLA just before I moved to the Village. For a long time we would talk everyday but now we just don’t seem to do it as much. I guess its one of those another place and another time type stories, things would have could have been so different had i met her at another time in my life. But today I realized I don’t want her to become one of those piles of bones along the road, honestly I miss her. There are only so many tall dark arrogant bitches in the world and we have to stick together. So I called her, talked for like two hours, and until we said goodbye it seemed like we were never apart. It felt good.

Well this turned into one of the longer posts i have written but I still have to get back to my newspaper vendor. After finishing my coffee and a last smoke I decided that the nicely caffeinated muah really did need some sleep after all so I said goodbye and headed for home. Hopefully I get to talk to him again but when I finally woke I wasn’t so sure the whole episode wasn’t just a dream. Than I found a paper next to the bed and realized that it really did happen. Strangely I found these words scribbled on the paper in my handwriting. I have no idea if I saw or heard them somewhere before or they came out of my sleepless brain. Ill finish with them because they seem fitting ….

No one knows till they have it
No one cares till they lose it
No one bleeds till they live it
No one wants to admit it
No one can be without it
No one truly lives till they feel it

The journey continues.

Amy Winehouse - You Know I'm No Good

Observations from the Window 8.15

So today is my birthday, twenty eight years old if I remember correctly. Don’t laugh because I thought I was twenty eight last year too. I am sitting here thinking about where I am, really where I have come from too. I’m at a place so different, both mentally and physically, from anyplace I have been before in my life that I honestly think I need to take a hard look and think about where I want to go from here. But that isn’t for today, isn’t for now.

It has been a long crazy journey to this point and I don’t see that changing anytime soon. Karma. I’m just a crazy girl and I totally don’t see that ever changing either.

I started out in a relatively small town in Pennsylvania and now find myself at the center of the universe, I am so going to pay for that comment. Along the way I earned a masters degree from one of the country’s finest schools, seen more awesome works of art that most people see in a lifetime, and created a body of work of my in both painting and photography. If I am honest I have more good friends now than I have had at any other time in my life and two girls I like to call my best friends. I rely on them both in different ways but love them both dearly in just the same. I have a brother I can’t do without, a sister I admire like nobody else, and a father whose feelings for I can’t put into words.

On the dark side I have been lost in drugs, spent time in rehab, and had a long term relationship end brutally. At times I can be the hardest person to be around, be one introverted, moody, and arrogant bitch. The worst part is sometimes I totally like being that way and that arrogant bitch has had me thrown in jail at least one time that I know of.

Looking forward I have no idea where I am going. I just started a little art business project that I hope goes well. Ash and I will either do well or kill each other in the process. It's way to early to tell which of those is the likely ending but I’m thinking positive. Sometimes I like to think that all roads lead to Paris with a good friend. Time will tell on that one too.

So, reading up, that teeter totter of life is at least leaning towards the light side. After all that I better get to my point. Between all my little online endeavors I have more friends and acquaintances than I care to count. You listen to me rant, bitch, and sometimes cry in writing and in pics and, bless you all, you keep coming back for more. I just want to thank for reading, looking, and pretending I am a relatively sane gurl.

The journey continues.

George Harrison - While My Guitar Gently Weeps

the List

My birthday wish list,

A house on the beach in Stone Harbor NJ,
A Ferrari California in black,
A Harley-Davidson Nightster (perfectly named),
An Alexander McQueen Leather Bomber Jacket with the Stretch Pants to match,
An apartment in the 6th Arrondissement of Paris, preferably with a view of the Louvre,
A lifetime membership as a Patron of the Louvre,
A Sony VAIO Signature Collection Z Series laptop with the black carbon finish,
To be alone with Lady Gaga for a whole night and keep her so busy I don't have to listen to her sing even one song,

And finally a cure for cancer and the ability to turn back time, i mean seriously Superman did it why not muah?

Sometimes I loath my birthday. Karma.

Elton John - Candle In The Wind

Observations from the Window 8.9

Looking out the window all indications are the heat is back. I don’t know this for a fact because I haven’t been out yet but the street has that hot shimmering look to it. Than again it is the middle of August. It’s Monday and I’m sitting here with one of those melancholy moods slipping down over me, the kind that calls for plenty of ‘Black Parade’ on the iPod. I realized this morning I have been here in the Village for over seven months now, nothing especially saddening about that as I really am enjoying it. But this means that for the first time in ten years it is the middle of August and I am not getting ready for another year at Penn State. No classes, no work, no office, no smiling JoePa face in every window. And I do believe that is the root of the mood I suddenly find myself in.

I really can’t think of any other reason because it was a great weekend. As I said my sis and her girlfriend came to visit for a couple days. I miss my mini-me, and don’t get to see her nearly as much as I should, but the girl is busy getting ready for her senior year in high school, being captain of the field hockey team, and looking at schools. Personally I think she should go to Penn State and I think my dad and brother would agree with me. But she is rebellious to a fault, I’m so glad I’m not like that, and I see her breaking with the rest of the family just on principal.

She seems to be leaning towards an art school in Philly but I don't see her going there because they don’t have a field hockey team. I really can’t see the girl giving that up like I did because she is so much better than I was and even has scholarship offers from some small schools. I did nonchalantly bring to her attention the fact that Penn State has a fine hockey team, I have checked it out on occasion, and a totally awesome photography program. I might even have a few contacts for her in the art school.

Speaking of photography, between real and second lives I must have taken over a hundred pics this weekend. I just finished looking at them and sadly I don’t really like any. Now this isn’t going to help my mood at all. But I did see some good photos yesterday. A friend of mine just got back from a west coast trip and had some awesome shots from camping. That at least makes me smile, however briefly, because the girl thinks she has no artistic talent at all and she really truly does. By the way she doesn’t take compliments well so I didn’t just mention the pics.

Now I am thinking I have to get Foxy’s oil changed this week because for the first time in a long time I am starting to believe a run to the mountains is called for, after all the 14th ranked Nittany Lions are already a week into practice. Cool crisp clear mountain air, cold beer, and football with 100,000 friends, now that could be the cure for this mood.

Time will tell

Eminem - Love The Way You Lie