i guess it's over

hate it as much as i
love it
ren ren ren
jesus, does it break my ribs
but jesus does it make me
elated
just to see you smile
i hate it
but i love it
and i hate that.

k.

the top three

i had one of the top three craziest nights of boyfriend drama i have ever had in my life on saturday night. now, to be fair to my definition of my "top three", i must explain that more or less, my top three are equal to each other in certain ways, and are filed exclusively to topic headings like, "top three best chick flicks" and "top three favorite salts". i have a plethora on the hard drive in my brain, so even though some might seem similar, they are quite contained to the individual headings.

my "top three craziest nights of boyfriend drama" in the past, however, has usually just been exclusive to MY current boyfriends. saturday night actually didn't have anything to do with my boyfriend, because i don't have one anymore. i have an ex-boyfriend, and he did add to the drama, but only after i could go through two of my girlfriend's boyfriend drama first. so technically, saturday night should be filed under "top three craziest nights of drama from men i don't want to sleep or argue with and from a man who didn't quite try hard enough but still made me feel bad about breaking up with him".

i think i'm going to rename that file "topthree_ex/altboyfriend_drama.exe" in my mental processor. i can save some memory room for things i should actually think about.

it began at work, which puts me in a bad mood immediately because for some odd reason, people still want to drink frozen kiwi margaritas and mojitos, even though it's a windy 42 degrees outside. this is the season for mulled cider and hot toddies, both of which i can make. but what would make less sense in cold weather than to have a hot drink? so i spend seven hours at the service bar cranking out what looks like cocktails for the beach party upstairs and re-stocking everything the waif of a bartender couldn't reach or lift from the morning shift. i clean all of the sticky, margarita stained countertops and steel from the frozen machines until the bleach stings my skin, and count my drawer, near crying at having to put all of the money back into the drop bag.

i could never be a banker. i would be so, so depressed all the time.

anyway, as i'm regretfully zipping the bank bag, i get a phone call from my dear friend erin asking me to guess who just showed up at her doorstep?!? now, i'm not really one for these kind of games, because in actuality, it could be absolutely anyone, from barack obama to a psychotic ex-con who wants to draw you after he does an eight-ball of coke.

guess which one happened to me?

so i guessed her ex-boyfriend, because he's been doing that lately. she had found out he made out with some other chick (actually, she found out from me) and she told him she wanted to take some time away from him. in fact, the night before he had shown up at her doorstep and threw a bag of bacon at her, screaming, "i got you bacon instead of flowers cause i know how much you love bacon but you're a complete and total bitch!!!"

so, i'm no expert on this type of thing, cause i can't even seem to hold down a decent, responsible, and stable relationship. but i'm pretty sure playing faceball with a bag of fried pork is not the way to go when it comes to proving your love and sensitivity.

actually, it was our good friend rachel, who is dating one of erin and my (now) exes best friends. and she's drunk. and pissed off at all three of them. sighing, i hailed a cab and went to erin's apartment. i knew in the back of my mind that nothing good was about to become of this night, and sadly, i was exactly right.

macri park, 12:45 am.
we walk in, get three shots of jack and three buds. go outside to smoke cigarettes and bitch about manginas. a guy tries to sly his way into conversation (which is dumb, buddy, cause if you hear a woman say, "god, men are such PUSSIES!!!" you would think you may want to find another group of girls to hit on), and promptly gets shot down by rachel, who by this time is having a resurgence of her previously waning drunkenness, and the two begin to bicker. we all go back inside and proceed to do another shot of jack and finish our beers, and when i come out of the bathroom afterwards, rachel and the dumbass are in another heated argument. i tell the guy to stop being a dick and let it go, and we all leave, arm in arm.

barcade, 1:27 am.
i realize it is 1:27 am because i look down and remark, "holy shit! it's 1:27 am! it feels like ten o'clock!" three more shots and two more beers later, we are sitting at a table and making fun of a guy who is sitting with us but is so engrossed in his text conversation he doesn't realize we're even there, much less making fun of him. his friend comes over, and they actually are decent guys who can hold a decent conversation. erin tells me to go call her (now ex) boyfriend. i say no, that's probably a bad idea, seeing that he just told her she should date me because we spend so much time together anyway. finally i relent, and it was a bad idea. now her (ex) boyfriend is mad at me and her, and she gets upset and goes to the bathroom to call him. i get another shot of whiskey.

barcade, 2:30 am.
i literally can't believe it's only been an hour since we walked into barcade. erin's in the bathroom crying, rachel is bitching drunkenly about her boyfriend, and my whiskey is gone again. erin hysterically comes back from the bathroom saying that he broke up with her and i call a time out for a cigarette. hail a cab for rachel, tell her to go back to meet jason at their apartment in greenpointe. hold erin's hair back as she pukes on the sidewalk. get a call from rachel's boyfriend screaming at me that i did something to his girlfriend, they got in a fight, and now she's roaming the streets of greenpointe drunk. says i was the last one that rachel saw which is why they got in an argument (which actually, isn't true, because technically he was the last one rachel saw and he provoked her earlier which is why she was pissed in the first place, but, hah, technicalities i guess). says he will break my kneecaps if i don't get my ass to greenpointe and help him look for her. i hang up on him. i get a phone call from my ex saying he's dealing with the same shit with the other two guys. says he would like to see me, if i would want to. i say i will call him if it seems plausible.

lorimer st, 3:50 am.
i finally manage to get erin's face dry, and convince her it's best she not go to huckleberry bar, where the exes are, but instead go home and get some sleep. once she's safely inside her apartment, i call my ex.

huckleberry bar, 4:10 am.
see everyone on the street. tell erin's ex he should reconsider giving up on the relationship, that she truly loves him. he responds in slurs, he is currently shitfaced. tell them i just got threatened with kneecap death, my ex calls rachael's ex, she picks up, says that everything is fine. i take his phone, go inside the closed bar to get the last drink of the night (which turns out, i only had enough time to take a sip of considering what was about to happen), make a u-turn to use the restroom.

the bathroom of huckleberry bar, 4:17 am.
as i'm getting off the ex's phone, i try to exit out of the phone call and instead got into the text inbox, showing conversations mostly from me, but one caught my eye at the bottom. on closer evaluation of what was about to happen, i guess maybe i shouldn't have read his shit, but then again, maybe he should have erased all of it. some people just don't know how to cover their tracks. i end up reading several different text messages from several different girls, which left me with steam coming out of my ears.
not because he hooked up with another chick, and not even for not coming clean about hooking up with another chick when i know for a fact that they did more than just "kiss on the couch". please. this ain't my first rodeo, honey.
i'm angry because about ten days before, he found out that while we were broken up, i had a drunken one-night stand, with someone i don't talk to or care about, because some guy paid attention to me and complimented me and made me feel worth it, which didn't happen all that much while the ex and i were together. so yeah, i had a disposable night of confidence, and washed my hands of it in the morning.
sometimes, the best way to get over someone, is to get under someone else. we've all been there.
but don't you dare berate me for it, and walk around on this golden pedestal, when you've been doing the SAME EXACT THING, even if it's not physical. don't form actual relationships with these girls and get mad at me for one night of carnal flamboyancy. that doesn't set well with me, especially when i apologize for something i don't think i need to apologize about.

the bar at huckleberry bar, 4:20 am.
i take a small sip of my jack daniels, and sit for one second before turning to him and directly asking about some girl's name i saw on the messages. he immediately freezes up, and i shake my head and tell him i'm leaving. pick up my purse and walk down the stairs, only to realize the gate has been locked over the door.

service doorway, apt. building next to huckleberry bar, 4:30 am.
for the last ten minutes i have been trying to get past the ex, and i'm currently screaming at him at the bottom of the stairs to let me go. finally he does, and in a last ditch effort tries to follow me down the street, but i don't turn around.
i was done for the night. i couldn't take any more stupid guy bullshit drama. i just wanted to be home.

my apt, 4:47 am.
get into the doorway and throw my things down. grab a glass of water and take a hit off the bowl. laugh to myself about everything that just happened, and realized why i didn't want to be in a relationship in the first place, because i end up caring too much about the relationship and not enough about my own sanity. it's five o'clock in the morning and i'm so hopped up on adrenaline my brain might actually explode if i tried to go to bed. which means when i finally do go to bed, it will be pointless because i'm not going to end up sleeping well, i will probably sleep in until three, and be completely unproductive and angry at myself. it's a vicious cycle and i hate doing it.

so i didn't. i ended up going to house of yes, where there was a dance party going on with all my friends. i danced it out until 7 and went home exhausted and much, much happier.

so that was my crazy drama night. i'm not wanting to ever add to this list agin, which means i may be single for the rest of my life, but at least i'll be sane. i have no desire to cater to someone's needs like that, while i lose my own. and i may sound bitter, but i'd like to think that actually equates to wisdom in these situations.

it also kind of sound like i'm jaded, too, but i think i'll just stick with calling it wisdom. it sounds much more eloquent and graceful that way.

k.

...and i got the t-shirt to prove it

you know what's not fair?

this last couple months. this last couple months can suck a giant cock, cause i've had to be the bad guy, like, all the time.

"i'm sorry, but i won't be able to pay rent til the middle of the month. AGAIN."

"well, i think we need to take time off from eachother."

"what's that? oh, you're not hiring?"

"mom, i need to borrow some money so i can pay rent. i know, i'm sorry, i know..."

"so what if i slept with someone else? we were on a BREAK!!!"

"sorry, i can't teach class, i have to work the day shift so i can get a metro card."

and so on, and so forth.

when 2010 hit, i told myself, "this is it. this is going to be MY year. i can feel it."

and on day one, on the first fucking day of 2010, buying pastrami in my deli, i was slapped with a clusterfuck of an omen. a tattooed archangel, a beautiful monster, a shiny black diamond, mr tennessee... whatever cliche i want to use, he was standing there on the FIRST FUCKING DAY OF THE YEAR.

are you kidding me? in brooklyn? a month after i could go a day without thinking about his burning paper words and stupid sage green eyes? two weeks after the birthday i spent alone? one the first fucking day of MY year?

pity party, table for 1.

now, it hasn't all been a bust. i've had good days, i've actually had great days, where i feel successful and i book gigs and i teach class and laugh with my best friends. but fuck, man. some of this shit just seems so fucking unfair.

un·fair   
[uhn-fair]
–adjective
1.
not fair; not conforming to approved standards, as of justice, honesty, or ethics: an unfair law; an unfair wage policy.
2.
disproportionate; undue; beyond what is proper or fitting: an unfair share.

hm. beyond what is proper or fitting. not conforming to approved standards. disproportionate. looking at these definitions, it actually seems that my definition of unfair may be too personal to compare to someone else's. if something is so particular to our own standards, then how, really, can it exist?

is it fair that mr tennessee told me he didn't feel about me how he made it out to be? no. but i've been on that side too, and i guess it wasn't very fair of me.

is it fair i lost my job because one of the old staff members came back from chicago? no. but i quit a job four months later after only two weeks with the company because my schedule wasn't working out, and they were the loose end just like me at the other place.

is it fair that my ex enjoys fucking my close friends? no. but it wasn't very fair of me to expect him to grow up at the same rate that i was when we were together, which in turn pushed him to people closer to his age.

fair and unfair only exist to who's being affected. and i guess i've said, "but that's so unfair!!!" more times than i've liked to admit, which is in its own right, unfair. some people will never see eye to eye on their perceptions of fair, and therefore, will never agree on what could be considered "right" or "just".

am i doomed to constantly questioning my morality? to trying to defend my ideas of what i think is right? why can't people just agree with me? we'll form a socialist community of my mind. SCOMM. has a sweet little ring to it.

"We are not special. We are not crap or trash, either. We just are. We just are, and what happens just happens."
~Chuck Palahniuk

i'm not special because of what i think is right or fair or just or bad... everyone has their own ideas of what's unfair, and it's becoming more and more clear that "unfair" seems a lot more like an excuse to pity ourselves rather than evaluate which direction we can go to make what happened better.

life's shit, and then we die. might as well fuck the unfair and rise to the occasion.

k.

death in the front line

our armies advance, they
do not know
the meaning of
"death in the front line", and
even if they did,
they wouldn't care...
me, up on my
high
horse, gun in it's
holster and knife in
my hand, me
with my shiny medallions
and generals' stars, me
with my hardened heart
and weathered, leather
skin; i
yell to the front line
CHARGE
and they do,
and you,
with your small words
and buttonless vest, you
with your blue-eyed
vacancy and penniless
pockets, you
die by the front lines hands,
trampled by the charge
of a general's chance,
killed by a war
of worlds and circumstance;
and i, in my
fancy blues and
sly smile, i
mask my disappointment
behind the glint
of a blood-soaked sword.
i guess your death
prevents you seeing
my award.

k.

2nd star revelations

okay, it's fall.

my one year anniversary has come and gone, my hair has been dyed three different colors, i've failed two relationships swimmingly, and drunk myself into a stupor more than i would like to admit.

i have relished the beautiful nyc days in the sun and jumped in puddles in the soaked-to-the-bone rainstorms; have and been wooed by those more financially stable than i; experienced the loss of friendships and the gain of people promising to be more faithful than the ones fading into the years.

when i went to san francisco, i experienced a turbulence i had never before tasted. dad's cancer, loading and unloading a moving truck filled to the brim with my shit, adultery, and rocky finances. i swore it was going to get better. then, i shook off atlanta and took on boston, which was a lesson on how things could become even more intense, and to the realization that conservative men really like me for some reason (that's what i get for working right next to harvard, i guess). on to new york... new york.

new york has tied together some of the loose ends... not financially, as i'm struggling every day... but ends that i made into other things, ends that i put up on pedestals. the city has forced some of my projections into translucency... and even though that's a really scary thing, at least i know the truth from my fantasy, which can be relatively thick, like a fog in my brain.

never judge a book by it's cover.
things are NEVER what they seem.
value someone's intelligence over anything. for better or for worse, you will learn exactly what they can be capable of.

i need to listen to these little stars behind my ear more often. and after a year here, in a hardened city with a beautiful, sunlit skyline... they have weaved their little lessons into my life with every heartbreak, every job loss, and every let-down that has introduced itself to me.

sure, i still think about the man who cracked my ribs apart with a couple sentences, the friend who gave me up for a pipe-dream romance, and the boss who fired me over the phone.

but i'm still here. i'm still doing something. i'm still landing jobs and dancing and laughing and loving.

fall is here and soon it will be gone, and i'll get to play in the snow and go ice skating in central park with nat. and i'll still be smiling, even if it doesn't seem like there's anything to smile about.

things are NEVER what they seem. :)

k.

to the brim

perfect fit

i could make a dress
a robe fit for a prince
i could clothe a continent
but i can't sew a stitch

i can paint my face
and stand very very still
its not very practical
but it still pays the bills

i can't change my name
but i could be your type
i can dance and win at games
like backgammon and life

i used to be the smart one
sharp as a tack
funny how that skipping years ahead
has held me back

i used to be the bright one
top in my class
funny what they give you when you
just learn how to ask

i can write a song
but i cant sing in key
i can play piano
but i never learned to read

i can't trap a mouse
but i can pet a cat
no i'm really serious!
i'm really very good at that

i can't fix a car
but i can fix a flat
i could fix alot of things
but i'd rather not get into that

i used to be the bright one
smart as a whip
funny how you slip so far when
teachers dont keep track of it

i used to be the tight one
the perfect fit
funny how those compliments can
make you feel so full of it

i can shuffle cut and deal
but i can't draw a hand
i can't draw a lot of things
i hope you understand
i'm not exceptionally shy
but i've never had a man
that i could look straight in the eye
and tell my secret plans

i can take a vow
and i can wear a ring
and i can make you promises but
they won't mean a thing

can't you do it for me, i'll pay you well
fuck i'll pay you anything if you could end this

can't you just fix it for me, it's gone berserk...
fuck i'll give you anything if
you can make the damn thing work

can't you just fix it for me, ill pay you well,
fuck ill pay you anything
if you can end this
hello, i love you will you tell me your name?
hello, i'm good for nothing - will you love me just the same?


white doll cabaret. music and story by the dresden dolls. fall, 2011. <3

the art of defense

when i was freshly twenty-one, living on my own for the first time in atlanta, i made a giant mistake.

i called my father for father's day.

normally, father's day is set in place by the creators of all the holidays in america, hallmark, to be a day that dad's can revel in their dadness. "look at how my sons have grown... big and strong and tough..."; "i may not have had a rulebook, but i sure did raise some good kids..."; etc.

"i hope you have a great father's day dad... how are you playing today? mmhm. yup. what's that? um, well, i'm serving at a restaurant downtown. yes, i'm dancing too. no, it's paid performances, unpaid rehearsals. well... well, no, i hadn't really - but i don't want to get - dad. dad, i don't need to - can we not do this right - ???"

a wish for a happy father's day went downhill fast. effect... me on my couch, in tears, listening to him tell me that my whole love for ballet as a career was a sham, and how i would never make enough money to survive in the real world.

and here i am, surviving, and writing about that memory.

i share a peculiar relationship with my father. we are two ducks in a pond, siskel (rip buddy) and ebert, martha stewart and robert morvillo. if god existed, he would have pulled a rib from my father and made me out of it. he's a writer, and a bullshitter, and an athlete. a damn fine lookin man, as well.

but even though there are so many similarities, we have a grand canyon in between us, one that will forever separate us from ever seeing eye to eye on lots of different topics, however insignificant or controversial they may be.

my father gave up being an artist to do "the right thing", which in the seventies, translated into marrying a beautiful woman, having babies, buying a house, and owning your own business. because if you didn't have any or all of those things, you obviously were not a contribution to society and don't deserve to be a part of it.

growing up, i was expected to basically be a stepford child; things are perfect! life is good! i love my family! sort of phrases. but my alcoholic father, my miserable, jobless mother, my socially retarded older brother and me, the "let's fake a smile even though i haven't eaten for three days" child made a portrait of things to come. dad came home drunk for most of my life and fell asleep on the couch. mom sipped her wine and stayed tight-lipped when he berated us for nothing in particular. brother retreated to his room like a beaten puppy and immersed himself in sci-fi adventure books. and what was i to do but starve myself and hope for the day i could leave the whole trainwreck of a family for a clean slate. all the while, we posed pretty for pictures and said our please and thank-you's like proper, well-adjusted functional families do.

my father's pension for scotch fueled his harbored anger he never knew how to release, and verbally punched our guts for years. i thought i hated him for years, because i didn't understand why he was so angry at us for everything.

maybe he was angry that marty was a scholar and not an athlete.
maybe he was angry that his daughter didn't like golf and country clubs.
maybe he was angry that he gave up on his dreams to provide for a family he wasn't really ready for.

the cocktail just got stronger with all of the alchemy.

when i was kicked out at 24, tattooed, pierced, raven-haired... i told them i wasn't going to do it anymore. the pretty bobble head smiles; the acting; the lies. i didn't want to put my energy into something that just kept on letting me down. my family wasn't familial; it was just a portrait of what we were supposed to be.

and yes, for many years, i blamed him. i took out my frustrations on myself. control what you eat, punish yourself for who you are. ink your body, dye your hair. put steel rods through your skin, drink, fuck, and fight. and the day came when we all had had enough. so they kicked me out, and i didn't see them for half a year.

i'm not innocent in this, so don't misconstrue it as me being a victim. i pushed buttons, i sneaked out, i smoked cigarettes on my balcony and pot in my car. maybe i was trying to get them to see that the idea of who i was to them was not the manifestation of who i really was. i don't know. i do know that as an adult now, i have taken my past and grew a garden. the mistakes i made when i was young, whilst repeated in older years, have guided me through decisions i've made as an adult.

my father is a good man. he worked hard for his family and provided for us even if it was like pulling teeth from a donkey without anesthesia. and i recognize that. the providing part, i mean. had he not, i wouldn't be writing this from a computer i bought with money i earned dancing to prove to him that i could make it as a dancer and an artist.

the whole point is, we butted heads because he saw himself in me, and he was scared i would fuck up my life with my parallel vices. understandable worries. bad way to remedy them, but understandable nonetheless.

i will forever be my father's daughter, and i'm proud of it. he may never realize how much he influenced me, and that's alright. sometimes, i think it's better that way, so we can still have the same broken relationship we've always had.

it makes for good writing, and even better memories.

k.