Echo

I got tired of small talk. I got tired of not being real. I wanted to feel something, something that would fill this emptiness inside of me. I realized that I’m completely devoid of emotion. The only emotion I have is a sadness, when I acknowledge my emptiness inside. Otherwise, there’s nothing. A big brain, a lot of energy, and then…no heart.

you have to remember how to perceive yourself as a child in order to become very aware of yourself.

and for some reason, dragons are very very important.

white people fear dragons but chinese people revere them as beautiful creatures who give them great power.

going back to asia was like being reminded of where I come from, and the strange, mystic and poetic ways eastern culture experiences the soul.

i decided, i want to embody the dragon.

more and more, it’s starting to feel like i’m not fitting in here. venus and mars aren’t wars of gender, they’re wars of feelings. the safety of being submissive or the courage to expand and become great. of hiding or revealing who you are. today in acting class, i asked them why it was easier as a reader to get into something that’s a man writing 1st person through a female character, versus a woman writing 1st person through a male character. they’re the most willing to explore the deeper elements of these questions so they just agreed that it’s easier to read the former rather than the latter.

dragons are mars. they’re the cold, cold representation of mars, a hot blue flame.

there’s a completely different feel, when you’re living life as art. it’s like suddenly, the world has a soul to it.

remember the first time you realized you could ice skate? That you could keep yourself from getting hurt on the ice?

just flew into singapore from hong kong. i’m here for 2 days and then bali after that. will do a trip recap when i get back.

jet lag’s a bitch!

Three couples go out on dinner dates:

faith rooted in optimism + faith rooted in pessimism

faith rooted in optimism + faith rooted in optimism

faith rooted in pessimism + faith rooted in pessimism

Which couple creates the most energy?

saturn. the father. the stern taskmaster. you make us fear things the way fear felt when we were emerging beings, viewing the world through a pinpoint of consciousness from within a dark cave, when we still had no sense yet of what the hell was going on. you scare a person enough while he’s in this stage, and he’ll perpetually walk through life like he’s lost in a game in which he doesn’t understand the rules. it’s the same reason you don’t shake an egg before it hatches.

tyrant father.

you liked tormenting those weaker than you, didn’t you?

but it never killed the smallness you felt inside the root of you.

because father issues are the mother of all issues.

it’s going to stop.

let up on some of these people, okay? they are good people who are way too hard on themselves, thinking they are incomplete or flawed. you are making them feel sad and angry. small. some who are so much bigger are playing small in hopes that you don’t turn your brutal eye on them, or are playing small in hopes it will please you into offering kindness. some have abandoned their personal power in their need to escape. you need to be a better leader like the sun.

when i told someone in confidence that i needed an army to stand up to you, people started following me. they can feel the same feeling, a readiness for emergence. they can feel there’s some truth in this, and they have hope. what binds us is that we believe that we are better than this, timid caged people terrified of their father. they believe that if they can expand the positive energy inside them, it would be so powerful as to render you a ghost.

is it too idealistic of me to think that we can coexist? this is not a war. this is a peaceful return to balance. we are not weak, but we are not threats. we are going to stand up, very slowly, and you’re going to let us. you will be awed by what you see, our size, our numbers, our gentle power. and then, you’re going to step back, and you’re going to let us walk away, to unlock the cages of others.

In my writing workshop, we did a short impromptu writing exercise where we had to write the beginning of a story that starts with “Once upon a time…”

Once upon a time, a man and his toaster had a dispute.

The man was groggy from a late night of spying on his neighbors across the alley who were of dubious nationality (someplace where the men were swarthy with perpetual forehead sweat and the women their coy properties). He was convinced they were running some kind of third-rate brothel out of their dumpy 1 BD + den. He had already been irritated with the coffeemaker which had released a thick little poot of grounds in its final gurgle of release, thus ruining the entire pot. Now the toaster refused to relinquish his toast.

I’ll shake you, he said, waving a knife at the toaster. The indifferent toaster didn’t even blink, knowing if the man so much as tried to pry that precious meal from his insides, he would give him a shock to remember.

I’ll throw you in the alley like the tea kettle!

The toaster remembered the tea kettle, the shy, red KitchenAid possessing an unassuming allure. He had grown fond of her in the summer months when she sat quietly on the backburner, watching the rest of the kitchen go about its business while she, herself, remained a wallflower.

The man was always a coffee drinker but the one time he attempted to make tea for an obese, inane lady friend with a double chin and a peculiar smell, the teapot’s shrill announcement of the water boiling inside her so discombobulated the man that he burned his pinkie on her red backside and promptly defenestrated her out the window.

The entire kitchen was horrified.

They had staged a passive-aggressive rebellion ever since.

Today I woke up and I didn’t remember who I am. Then I remembered who I am, but it wasn’t the same as when I didn’t remember.

my favorite semi-urban jungle gym.

6:30 pm. i rode the bike for half an hour, and then looked for my coworker who was there for a 7:00 training appt. we go to the same gym.

i’ve been obsessed with who her trainer is, if she’s good, and wanting to trail a session. i don’t know if it’s protectiveness or competiveness that’s the underlying urge. this place is my 2nd home and i’m territorial. my coworker invited me to trail their workout tonight so i could copy the circuit.

i ran into her by the locker room and she got my attention with a shy wave. she said that she had been watching me. i was surprised. i hadn’t seen her at all. she said that she was on the treadmill right behind me. really? i said. huh. got creepy feeling that i filed away for later.

she said that her trainer wasn’t there. i asked her what she meant. she said her trainer just called her and said she couldn’t make it. that’s unprofessional, i said. i know, right? so they said i should see if any other trainers are free who could train me. i walked her over to the desk and she asked them about available trainers in this time slot. the guy tries to give her some chick, but i could tell from the way he said her name, it was kind of a sorry, but that’s all we’ve got tone.

this guy, juan, we’ve acknowledged each other with smiles and nods for years. he knows i’ve been here long enough to call bullshit. i ask him, what about bobby? is bobby available. noooo, he said, like bobby’s out of my coworkers league. listen, i said. i’ve been watching some of your trainers, and they’re not watching people’s form at all. that’s how people get hurt, and then they get sent out back to the chiro’s office. my coworker giggled. juan looked taken aback, then grinned. hey, that’s my manager next to you, you have to tell him what you just said. some of these trainers aren’t paying attention to form, and that’s how people get hurt, i repeat, impatient. the manager shakes his head and says, sorry, some trainers just aren’t as good as others.

sorry, some of our trainers just aren’t as good as others.

that should be the gym’s motto.

so i look at juan like, no bullshit, get someone fucking good for my coworker. so he flips through some pages and says, you know, jack over there, he’s very good. he’s very serious and wants things done a certain way, but he’ll work you. he knows what he’s doing, juan? i ask. yeah, jack is good. he waves jack over and introduces them. my coworker agrees to work out with jack.

i lose interest immediately when i see they’re going to be doing legs. i don’t know if you know, but i have legs like a chick running back. like, why can’t i look that muscular in the area of, say, my abs? so i hate working out legs on the machines because i work them out so much in everything thing else i do. i look over and see the basketball court full, sigh, and resign myself to doing quads next to them. in the middle of my first set on my left leg (i go right for 15 then left for 15 at 35 lbs for 3 sets), her trainer walks over and runs his finger along my surgery scar and asks, what’s this from? i watch his finger trace the scar on my knee and look up to see him looking me in the eyes. i narrow my eyes, hostile. don’t touch me. acl, i say, and i go back to focusing on my leg with complete concentration. in the middle of my second set, my coworker asks me if i have an extra hairband. i do. i go back to the locker room to get it. when i come back, she whispers to me, my trainer says you have really strong legs.

i see they’re heading for more leg machines and my body is revolting in boredom. so i tell her i’m going to go play basketball. i head to the court and there’s the guy who shoots like he’s cocking a handgun. he’s also a domineering son of a bitch, and we play some intense one on one games. i do want to interrupt their three man game of 21 to play 2 on 2 and he tries to get me to join a 4 man game of 21. what the fuck? how does that work? so i say 2’s afterwards, even though i know i totally don’t have the patience today to wait for a game. i go and run on the treadmill, the intensity of running making me fantasize about how shredded this is getting my body. i get off after 2 1/2 minutes. dreams of fourpack ownership float away.

i do some back exercises, some 5 lb weight circuit, some dips and consider doing abs, settling for stretching instead because the mat is crowded. i decide to do the seated row. i realize i approach weight training the same way i approach rides at magic mountain. i just go where there’s the least amount of wait until i get tired and want to go home. the trainer and coworker walk by and she says goodbye. i say, i’ll walk you out. i’m bored so it’s time to go home.

the trainer asks her if she would like to train with him again and she says that she would. as we walk, he sidles up next to me and with this grin, says, what about you? what about me, i say. what do you want, he says, trying to look sly. i don’t need anything, i say. you’ve got really great legs, he says. sigh. i want this conversation to end immediately. yeah, that’s all i’ve got, i say, dismissively…the rest of me is still gunning for that fourpack. that’s not all you have, he says. i mean, you’ve got amazing legs like, really amazing legs. he casually gestures towards the trainers station. we’ve been talking about it, your legs are ridiculous. (who’ve been talking about it? mild feeling of alarm) but you’ve got a personality, and a lot of other great things going for you. you’ve got a great jumpshot. with a devious grin, i ask him, almost accusingly…have you been watching me?, saying it the way tim olyphant as the drug dealer in go asks katie holmes, claire…are you a virgin? he gives me this bizarre look, like a small fuse behind his pupils pops and his mouth forms a perfect 0 . no, he says quickly, then gives me a little tiny smile that doesn’t convince me or him. he gives me a small embarrassed wave and says, seeya, as he hurries away.

today i also saw a group of these cocky big black ballers laughing and joking around in front of the courts. they were being obnoxiously loud like they owned the place. as i walked by them, i gave them a smirk like, yeah, i know all about you. and they all fell silent, like they were waiting to see which one of them i was giving the look to. i walked by without saying a word. that’s my way of saying, shut up.

tyrannically enforced celibacy to fuel creativity maintained over multiple months– healthy or a vicious girl-on-guy sexual assault waiting to happen? discuss amongst yourselves.

Thoughts I Had Today

1. Do we really need headlines for blog entries? Have we become such pussies that we need to first be prepared with an easy-to-swallow summary before we read anything? Swallow your freakin’ pills, kids. Seriously. You need to be learning this stuff.

2. As long as you can understand I am the most unreliable contact in the world, but deep down, in a sincere but abstract way, I really do love you even if you can never find me at any given moment and I have a tendency to drop off the face of the earth for stretches of time, then yes. We can be friends.

3. Why is it that when food is fried, people get so giddy?

4. A handshake really does say a lot about a person. It’s like trying a key in a lock for the first time, and you have no idea if it will open the door.

5. Do I want to be invisible or a mind reader? I haven’t quite decided.

6. In One Corner–Tender Sensitive Therapy Addicts Who Have the Annoying Tendency of Being Comfortable with Oversharing in the Elevator.

In the Other Corner — The Predators Who Go To Therapy Just So They Can Consistently Mindfuck Someone Who Is No Intellectual Match

Watching the people coming in and out of the therapists’ office next door is like human fishtank porn.

7. Men with money in Los Angeles have god complexes, no matter how ridiculous it is for some of these losers to have god complexes.

8. I think I’ve been visiting people in their dreamscapes. I’ve been experimenting with gamma waves.

9. Jesus loves you.

I love this:

Kathy Griffin’s Jesus Profanity Stirs Outrage

Oct. 1, 2007 issue – Some stories are best told straight. On Sept. 8, Kathy Griffin, a bawdy, foulmouthed comedian, accepted an Emmy Award for her reality show, “My Life on the D-List,” and in her acceptance speech she explained that while other actors might thank Jesus for such an honor, she wouldn’t consider it. “Suck it, Jesus,” she exuberantly added, waving her statuette in the air. “This award is my God, now.”

Outrage from Christian groups predictably followed, led (also predictably) by William Donohue of the Catholic League, who went on CNN to complain that “Hollywood laughs when she says ‘Suck it, Jesus,’ but if she’d said ‘Suck it, Jews,’ or ‘Suck it, Muhammad’ … they wouldn’t be laughing, would they?” Then, newspapers reported that E! Television would scrub the speech before airing it the following weekend, which triggered an equal and opposite outcry from liberal groups accusing E! of censorship. Around that same time, a group of college students in Hawaii, sitting around voraciously reading the news, “got a giggle,” as 20-year-old Carlos Uretta puts it, out of the controversy. So they did what any atheist-minded group of 21st-century college students would do: they registered suckitjesus.com as a domain name and, a few days later, put up a petition in support of Kathy Griffin, which now has more than 2,500 signatures. “We got an e-mail from someone in Italy, and we thought—really? People are concerned about this in Italy?”

You might think that when the awards show aired the next weekend, edited but not completely airbrushed, the controversy would die. But you would be wrong. Last week a small Christian theater company based in Pigeon Forge, Tenn., took out two full-page ads in USA Today at $90,000 a pop, decrying Griffin’s remarks and pleading for a new civility. Griffin, meanwhile, went on Larry King, who played the unedited clip and ignited the entire thing all over again. And who stands to benefit from this tempest? Well, Griffin, who’s playing sold-out shows all over the country this fall. And Tennessee’s Miracle Theater, just down the road from Dolly Parton’s theme park and in its second year of staging a Broadway-type play about the life of Christ. “The phones have definitely picked up, and that’s great,” says manager Russ Hollingsworth. Now that they’ve scored the domain name, Uretta and his friends think it might be fun to expand their site, but “not to be too profound or anything,” he says. No worries, Carlos. You’re in good company.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20920371/site/newsweek/?GT1=10357

Last night, after the president of my company gave me my award plaque at our company dinner, he said he wanted to tell us a story about an old Persian king. So this king loved listening to violin music, so he put a call out to the kingdom for the best violin player. They found the guy who was the star of the orchestra, so the king asked for him to come to his palace every day to play for him. So every day, he would play for the king and the king would clap wildly after he was finished, ecstatic with his violin skills. He felt proud because he could bring such joy to the king, so every day, he looked forward to traveling to the castle to play for the king. One day, he returned home and his wife looked distressed. When he asked her what was wrong, she said that he has stopped playing with the orchestra to spend every day playing for the king, and now they had no income coming in and she was worried about money. He told her not to worry, that everything would work out, and he continued to play for the king every day, instead of playing with the orchestra for pay. One day, he came home and his wife was crying. She said that she tried to go to the market and buy food to make dinner, but she had no money and no one would give her anything. He says, don’t worry, give me your list and I’ll go. So he goes to the market, picks out everything on the list, and when they tell him how much it is, he looks the vendor in the eye, and starts clapping enthusiastically. You see, he derived such pleasure for when the king clapped for his violin playing and took this as the king’s payment, he assumed that this vendor would accept clapping as tender as well. Of course he didn’t, but when the story traveled back to the king, the king laughed and sent him enough money to take care of himself and his family.

“So the moral of this story,” the president said in his broken English, “is…the clap…will not pay your bills.”

Indeed, wise president. The clap will definitely not pay your bills.

I have been having a lot of adventures and interesting experiences. I keep starting posts but saving them as drafts. It’s like I want to see what’s at the end of this tunnel first before I write about it publicly.

To the Recurring Guy in My Dreams Whose Face I Can’t See–

Whoever you are, I can’t ever remember your face so sorry if I have no idea who you are. But thanks for always dropping by my dreamscape and hanging out. Do you like how the entire place is white and soft? Yeah, I love it. Anyway, I know I always say that I’m going to remember you when I wake up, but I’ll be honest, I’m not a good waker-upper. I’m so groggy in the morning that by the time I figure out who I am and where I am, I’ve forgotten most of the visuals of my dreams. I’m just happy when I recognize if the seat cover is up or down before I pee. This is all I know:

1. you spend a lot of time alone at home listening to music.
2. your energy feels very mature in that your energy is stable and protective, but there’s something childlike about you.
3. you drive a dark-colored car.
4. your name starts with a D i think. There’s a hard D.
5. you seem significantly bigger than me. your shoulders look nice in a sweater, which surprised me because i usually think men look stupid in sweaters.
6. you’re a warm person who makes me feel comfortable.

Yeah so, stop dancing around me. Run into me, or I’ll run into you. And we’ll go out. It’ll be like a Match.com date. But much much more surreal.

even now in heaven there were angels carrying savage weapons.

(u.n.k.l.e.)

So the new fad sweeping our little office is gall bladder flushing. Eddie brought in this plan from his chiro friend who swears that if you flush yourself of gallstones, it will improve your joints. So after the guys all swore by it, I thought I would give my ailing knees some relief by trying it out.

The plan involves drinking a lot of organic, natural apple juice for five days, with the last two days requiring half a gallon of apple juice drank in 8 oz. servings at 2 hour intervals. Then the last day requires servings of epsom salt and grapefruit juice and extra virgin olive oil and grapefruit juice at specific times.

Your body turns into a war zone, and out come your gallstones.

Well, my body feels okay today, but I’m hoping that near the end of the week, my knees will feel like the trampolines they used to be. And by the weekend, I’ll be dunking again.

I watched Stranger Than Fiction last night. I think this is one of my favorite movies now. Holy cow, it’s so creative and smart. I loved the dialogue, and Will Ferrell gave a great performance…he really reined it in and took his character seriously, which was something I was afraid he wouldn’t do. The situation was so absurd but he played his character so human and real with a believable arc, that it was impossible not to get lost in his journey.

It was funny because I had really wanted to see this movie when it first came out, but then I waited and waited. Sometimes I like to find the right time to watch a movie that I really think I’m going to like. I had rented it on Sunday, and my coworker and I were talking yesterday about how I want to let go of the edge and just dive into my creative well and see what comes out…because I need to get focused and write something good so I can stop working at my job. He said that what I need is a manager, someone who’s on my ass getting me disciplined and being my muse. He asked me if I’ve seen Stranger than Fiction, and I told him I actually had it at home and was planning to watch it, and he said I was gonna get a lot out of it.

Well, first of all, when a writer goes into his or her cave, it’s unpredictable. You don’t know if you’re going to go crazy, but you have to be willing to let it happen. Emma Thompson was super nutty, but I loved the part when she goes into the hospital, sees the old guy standing around, takes a few seconds to look at him intensely, then sums up that there’s nothing wrong with him…he just likes looking at sick people. Sometimes you just look at people and you know. I hope that my process doesn’t lead me to insanity, but I’ll be the first to admit I haven’t gone down to the bottom of the well, yet. I think I’m almost ready to.

Secondly, you can hire muses? Fuck. I didn’t know that. Muses for me, have always been love interests that I feel a powerful chemistry with and attraction to, but for some reason, something inside me keeps me from getting too close or them from getting too close. It’s a pull me/push me nightmare with a lot of passion and sexual frustration. There’s never sex, because I think deep down, I know the sex will take away from the creative, idealized side of the connection. A lot of times they’re unavailable people themselves. But between the chemistry and the inability to have them or consummate an emotional and physical relationship, that torture juice fuels a lot of my creativity. It’s like being around them creates this electric frenzy inside of me where I can see and feel everything. I want to tell them everything, show them everything, but they’re not really listening or don’t know what I’m talking about, so it challenges me to communicate in very truthful or emotional ways that exceed my natural daily ability (or maybe willingness). These people drive me crazy, but they allow me to do my best work, so I’m always terrified when they’re gone gone. It’s like losing your energy source. Sometimes you can internalize a muse, but it’s so much easier with an external muse. The juice is so much more powerful and raw. I don’t know if Queen Latifah could shape me up…I felt like her character didn’t really become as prominent and fleshed out as I thought she would be…but I definitely wouldn’t mind a calm and soothing companion around me when I go into my cave and jump down that well. I always worry about my ability to come back.

I don’t know what’s going to happen in the next months. I’ve made up my mind that I’m diving into the well, but this time I want to reach the bottom. I know I disappear whenever I attempt this, but a lot of it has to do with the fact that when I devote myself fully to my creativity, I have trouble controlling my external manifestations, so my personality gets all over the place, and that’s something that I don’t feel comfortable with people seeing…my distinct personality inconsistencies and splits. But I want everyone in my life to know, that this time, I’m coming from a place of more strength and inner integrity than I’ve ever had in my life, that diving into the well won’t destroy the real me, but it will help me integrate whatever it is that I feel I left behind in those depths. I hope by giving complete power to my creative, abstract side, it will lead me to where I need to go and eventually integrate all my pieces and set me free. And that once I have achieved better integrity and consistency with my outward personality, that I will finally be able to allow people that I want and whose company I enjoy to get close to me. It’s all theoretical, isn’t it? But these are my hopes, and I hope that even if I’m not physically around or if I seem to be a mess, that all those people that I’ve had deep connections with and have helped change in some way, whether friends, family or strangers, will also be there for me in spirit when I dive, and that their good will and positive energy will help me find my way home.

i am going to destroy myself this fall.

but it will be a controlled demolition.

hopefully.

forgive me.

but i’m going to disappear again.

i’ll be here as often as i can.

probably a lot.

i’m excited.