unexpected

a late happy birthday shout out
to the most important little sister
ever invented

and a very, very early one
to the most impressive
older variety
a brother
could
ever
hope
to have.

Mr. Elizabeth Taylor is asleep on my bed, and I am drunk with the knowledge that I have finished yet another progressive draft of Attican, an old one-act of mine that has been breathing new life this week. I forgot how much I wanted to finish telling the story for the characters. Tonight I rest easy knowing that I have two fewer lost souls bouncing around in my brain. Don't get me wrong, there are a whole lot of lads and lasses with interesting names getting into all sorts of trouble in my head. But tonight, for Demetrius and Alma, sleep comes as last.

Can I get any more effin' dramatic? That's what you get when you write plays. I've been meditating on friendship, which is an interesting situation in Buddhism, because so much of what friends share is based on the past and the future. How much of it is in the actual moment? How much of it is happening right now, as I type this.

so many people have told me
'oh, i've never listened to the grateful dead.'
and i wonder how
that could happen
to someone
who grows up
in
Southern California.
so i've taken it
upon myself
to spread the world
of the apostle
jerry
and his merry
band
of
knap.

goodnight moon.

strange days, these days

on monday, i adopt a cat. his name is elizabeth taylor, but i'm going to call him albee.

tracy chapman, as confusing as she is to adolescent boys, should be sold in the produce aisle. she's as necessary as potatoes and bananas. it's like the goodness of the whole earth has been exhaled as music.

i don't understand key changes. something as complete as a chord, suddenly shifting completely different, but the same. so when i play guitar, i often stay in one key as long as possible. it's like i'm floating piece of the artic shelf that as broken off. and i don't want to jump to the next. i just want to drift in happy blue and white.

missing the people of home. missing people in general. staying busy, but having a hard time actually connecting. med adjustment? fuck that. a little bit of staying up late, pounding on a typewriter while the neighbors fuck each others' brains out- that's how i adjust my meds.

when i was a baby, and when i was a kid, i can't remember those things. my first memory is probably from when i was three or four years old. and they are sporadic after that until i was eight or nine. maybe this is normal. i think it must be. kids exist naturally, and are still part of the environments around them. why do you think they like ball pits so much? time moves differently for them. they almost never think about it. in fact, they probably don't even understand the concept of it. but as you grow up, it's taught to you. the idea of managing your life using time. and once you learn it, it never goes away. once the concept of death is introduced and understood, we begin to measure our lives differently. the past becomes supreme, and the future becomes sublime. we forget about the moment in between, the flash-second that is now, and how that is the only true existence we have. what we have, what we've done, and what we are going to do make absolutely no difference. they are created by us to preserve who we are. histories and futures are about as real as teenage mutant ninja turtles: innately, we understand their absurdity. but that doesn't stop us from making them the centers of our lives. (ok, so i don't know anyone who actually makes tmnt the center of his or her life, but i'm fairly certain that person exists, somewhere). there is a warped understanding of living in the moment that involves jumps out of airplane and canoe trips down the amazon. but all it really means is shedding the past a ceasing of forecasting the future.

jesus h. christ, i wrote too much about that.

going to bed now.

opinions (unabridged and uncensored)

here it goes:

three things happened this week that have stuck with me. the university i went to is letting down its students in a time of terrible need. there have been a series of "escalating events" (why the cliche? why not just call them what they are: racially motivated fuck-ups by kids who are so distanced from reality that they don't realize how much pain they can cause.) what can ucsd do to save itself? they've got to stop erasing the rough edges. that can be expected at a school heavy on medicine, engineering and science. you learn about people by experiencing their history and their art. by hearing their languages and tasting their food. there is a dual failure at ucsd- by the administration for not encouraging true cross-cultural exploration, and by the students for not demanding it. as a transfer student, i was amazed at the lack of diversity on campus. city college, nestled on the edge of downtown san diego, was far more diverse than UCSD could every dream of being. i learned far more for $26 a credit than i did for $200. and it was all because of environment full of rough edges. my solution: art. yeah, i know, im a theatre guy. but storytelling is the most effective way to get somebody's attention. and there is no better way to tell a story than with art. music, theatre, painting, dancing, cooking- all of it rolled into one big ball of culture.

a high school girl disappeared from northern san diego earlier this week. i think that everyone feared the worst, and they found her body a few days later. she had gone jogging in a park near her house. i understand that this sort of thing happens all the time. but it still breaks you a little bit, and it makes you mad. it is an example of an event that has absolutely no positive side to it. it reminds us all that the world is dangerous, and that anything can happen at any time. the taking of someone else's life is the closest thing to evil that exists. the closest thing to good? falling in love.

i'm adopting a kitten. his name is albee elizabeth taylor. i can't really put into words how excited i am about this. maybe it's because animals have a way of explaining how the world is still a good place to be.

i'm tired, and i'm going to bed.

conversation

do you know what you remind me of?
(no.)
winter.
(and?)
being cold.
(uh-huh. and i suppose that's your way of telling me-)
i like being cold.
(nobody likes being cold.)
sure they do. lots of fun things happen in the cold.
(like?)
rosy cheeks. snowball fights.
(runny noses. frostbite.)
you can see your breath.
(black ice.)
sure, but that's expected. it's just a by-product of the cold.
(by-product into the fucking ditch.)
you can expect it. you can prepare for it. you can throw a bag of sand in the trunk.
(you need to prepare for me?)
yeah, of course. not the same way, but metaphorically, yes-
(you know what you remind me of?)
-but you are something that i can prepare for. i like that. if i said you were like black ice in the summertime- what do i remind you of?
(my high school physics teacher.)
oh.
(he had a pony tail. and wore a lot of flannel. and played nirvana before class.)
i remind you of a mid-90's pac-northwest thirty-something-
(i wanted to blow him under his desk.)
jesus christ.
(i told susie kemper. at a sleepover. that i had a dream about sleeping with him. she rolled her eyes. the next day in class, someone had carved "SLUT" into my lab bench with a pocket knife.)
jesus.
(high school was never the same after that.)

a moment

hey.
(hey.)
you know what i like?
(easy girls?)
shoveling snow.
(blow jobs?)
trees without leaves.
(knee-high socks?)
chopping firewood.
(me wearing flannel pajamas.)
yes.
(and thermal underwear?)
promise?
(just one thing, ok? keep me warm.)
you're gonna love the winter.

an unabridged first edition of my opinion

i don't write as much as as i should
and i never give my friends as much time
as i need to/
i think that i can solve
the mysterious things
like how to keep a happy cat
or how to properly disburse
my armies
to defend
my south american stronghold/
but i know that i can never
solve
the truly difficult things
like
math equations that take up more than
one line
or
how to be
in the face of love
like a lion roars
and then licks your face
with it's rough tongue/
i don't always eat right
but i love the taste of ginger
and chocolate
and coffee/
i don't know much about cars
but i want an old one
that smells like decades of suntan lotion
and has a top
that gets stuck
when i put it down/
i learn little things
and i never leave
whiskey
in
my
cup/

and if it is
your birthday
today
then
it's
glen livet
and
i
give
to
you
some
love
and
happ
iness
(and
a song i play
that makes it's way
across
fourteen states-
a radio station
playing
just for you.
happy birthday!)

she had a black eye, and wouldn't tell me why

rain makes me change my mind
like
"that sounds good to eat"
maybe
orange chicken and rice
but
i get home
take off my wet jacket
and eat pretzels and yogurt.
or
i sing the rolling stones
on my bike
but
i get home
shake out my beard
and it's charlie parker
with a hendrix chaser.
and i remember
all the times that it has rained
and all the windows i've opened
to let in
the muddy fingerpaints
of god.
or
the times
that i forget
how old i am
and i close my eyes
and lie down on the earth
inhaling
all the times
at once.

calamity, my daughter's name

the messiest parts of
life and also the
best, the happy
warmth of being
surrounded by
calamity, misunderstanding,
past-due notices
and
shepard's pie
with french bread
eaten on the floor
of an empty
apartment.