(August 5,, 2024)
Shut Down
Mood: Split
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I just finished rewatching the film 'Thirteen'. It's a favorite and a film I'd like to continue to watch over and over as I get older. The final scene where the mom kisses the cutting scars on her daughter's wrist made me cry. The intimacy the mom wants to have with her daughter is so frightening, and normally I feel disturbed by parent-child relationships that are too close, maybe because of the incestuous undertones. But this felt different. A parent that's had compassion for herself and her mistakes able to embrace the self-destructiveness of her own daughter. Mirrors, both holding the same pain together.
I'm not sure I've ever had that kind of intimacy with my mom. Growing up it felt like I had to cultivate a sort of anti-intimacy with my parents. I've always been fascinated by the teenagers who felt compelled by their emotions to melt down publically, in front of other people in such a devestatingly honest way. I'm not sure it's even motivated by bravery but this instinctual, deep routed thing, like the doors to the house were never screwed on. They have no choice but to gush with life and rip out the emotions of others in response. I know it's the product of not being able to mediate your emotions, but from the completely other side of that ability where numbness lives it looks amazing.
Don't get me wrong, there are moments where I've been swung by my nature to partake in this honesty, but I learned about it much later when I left for college and it doesn't come naturally. And when I go to visit my family it all has to go back into its box. That's why it's hard to visit family. It requires numbness and walking a tight rope. I fully shut off. Talking about it feels like beating a dead horse. I don't expect it to be different ever, because my parents had their adulthood before I existed, my entire childhood, and my early adulthood, and their present golden years to change things but they haven't. This is their life. They are responsible for who they are completely and I'm not sure how I turned out could have been any different. It does feel like I'm still boxed in by whatever made me the way that I am, and that the pandemic, and the relationship breakdown rebuilt a lot of walls I thought I had been able to deconstruct. I'm anxious because whenever I'm able to challenge one of these innate things about myself, when I visit home these limitations are strengthened and I either fall off the wagon or just have to recharge for a few months to get back to normal.
Obviously my parents did amazing things for me, and I do want to acknowledge the stability, the food, my own room, helping me take out student loans. I will never deny my privileges that are the product of their hard work and love over many years. But my mental health starting very early was not in a good place and nobody ever did anything to help me. It felt like I had to exist privately in my head or else disturb whatever balance was being maintained. And holding the knowledge that your parents are in an unhealthy dynamic weighs on you. Having to stay quiet about your observations about how your dad treats your mom and vice versa is a form of gaslighting. You shouldn't have to always hit an emotional breaking point to be able to be allowed to say something true. It shouldn't feel like something is burning behind your eyes when anyone looks at you, notices you. You shouldn't have to stay smaller than your dad to make him feel like more of a man. Or punished for growing at all. Maybe that's what still gets me, that they provided so much for me, but also turned around and needed to take me down a peg if I was flourishing too much. I became concious of this, learned how to bite back or turn away from them so I could focus on being who I am, and this has reframed our relationship so harshly. It makes sense that they view me as selfish and disrespectful.
But what brought that about? I already had some of these feelings in High School, maybe earlier. A dawning awareness of feeling restrained and very alone. The antagonism and instinctual need to keep me within their dynamic. I know that my parents worked hard not to pass down all of their own trauma to us, shielded us from some of those weirder instincts. I sometimes think that's why they were so distant and uninterested in playing a role in my life during high school, or were antagonistic when I tried to set boundaries or share my feelings. They knew that if they got too close that they might give in to crushing the entity that they were supposed to take care of. Everything would be smooth if I just shut the fuck up and stopped wanting things. If I just stopped trying to be consistant with my morals. Why won't you tie this anchor around your foot? Why won't you pretend to be stupid for me? Why won't you agree that you're ugly, like me? That you have no choice in your life like I feel? Just want the same things I want! Tie yourself to a house, a kid, shitty coworkers ANYTHING PLEASE so I have something to talk to you about because it's too painful to talk about the other things, what I want, my dreams about what the future could look like.
(July 16, 2024)
A HEART LAYING ON THE PAVEMENT
Mood: Tired & Bored
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I've sworn off Tik Tok for awhile, and that means my mind is hungry to ingest information and be entertained. Unfortunately today that lead to listening/ watching the entire season of 'Worst Roommate Ever' on netflix while I worked. This might be a good explanation for why I feel uncomfortable and hollow. When I get like this I do start to think. "Wow, I'm such a pessimistic person".
I wrote a little about creative pessimism for the cover letter for my submission to Anchorage International Film Festival. How I heard that their fest had a lot of heart, and that I wanted to make things even if the world is crumbling around us. My pessimist goes beyond just the creative, and into everything else. For example, I realize that I enter most interactions apologetically, convinced that nobody likes me. That I have to bludgeon and earn respect by being talented and making things that dazzle.
I miss the version of myself that believed so much in myself, who felt like I was sparkling and special. The main character. I know even then I was also insecure, but I marvel at how I always kept trying. Always showed up despite my anxiety. And how I wanted to talk to and meet as many people as possible. I didn't think much about "what if this person gets too attached", or know that someone was weird to women. I just was like "we're all artists and equal, let's party!". Again, hindsight with the rose colored glasses. I also realize I was often motivated by libido. With that part satiated, the constant seeking for love feels unnecessary.
Oddly enought, I wonder if my response to feeling like a selfish waste of space, and others as emotional time bombs that could go off at any point, is actually to be more selfish. Lean back into being the main character of my life. I've felt so burned by others treating me like a side character that I hesitate to be that person. The delusional aspect of it feels necessary though. I want to feel more joy and sureness in my decisions. These feelings that I'm cheating, or worthless, or ugly, or holding what people MAY be thinking about my body in their head. I wonder if this state of fractured brain is due to being online and becoming so obsessive about how the online politics swayed. I didn't know how to act in person so I'd study people online to see how to position myself. But I think that also made me study people I didn't even know. Read the nasty comments people say, not at me, but towards people like me.
I wonder if I need to become even stricter with my social media. Not purposefully read the hateful comments out of curiosity. Not need to know every single position and opinion to the point where I become paralyzed. Set boundaries for the hatred that can leak in. Maybe do just an hour of social media a week so I can at the very least get a taste for what's out there. Maybe an hour a day? By doing so I hope to become so bored that I'm forced to learn how to play cards, and start a random conversation with a stranger.
People interpret my mannerisms as either, being holier than thou, being hyper confident, or dismissive of people. Sometimes they assume I'm smarter than I actually am. Though, that also needs to be reassessed. I am smart, and I shouldn't have to qualify that or hide it. Anyway, it depends on their own insecurities but I do hide behind this shell. I do like my privacy, but often inside myself I'm in pain when around people. Navigating all of their politics, not knowing if I've looked at them enough, or too much. I feel too tired to do small talk, even though I know this is what builds closeness. Or leads to the collaborations that build closeness
Rearrange my wires and reboot me. It's a great fatigue to be so on gaurd all the time. I don't even know why I'm so cagey about my life to others. The agony of being known singes at my edges. If anyone feels the need to humble me though, they're dead to me. Honestly that's what I sense so often. Other people's insecurities. Most of what people are expressing, all of the time, through their gossip, who they befriend, their interests feels as if it stems from insecurity. And I can smell it on people, because again, my insecurities express as expressionlessness. Which triggers other people's insecurities. It's hard to befriend people when it feels like they're completely naked in front of me from the start.
The role that trauma has played in this can't be understated. That's the other part, I never feel comfortable talking about my trauma because I know other's have gone through so much more. But that needs to go out the window. Over the pandemic I was exposed to my loved ones (some) turning on me, who needed me to be smaller than them in order to make them feel ok. Who lied about me to me and let their paranoia grip their hearts. Those who loved me the most felt content to watch me get bullied, even enjoyed seeing me struggle or cry. I watched my mom stand by and watch my dad tell me I was shit, stood by while he proudly let us know what was in his heart, and that he was willing to sacrifice all of us on the alter of his ego. Watched everyone around these toxic men make excuses and become their protectors. Had people swindle their way into my home to just become hateful and take advantage of me. Had people make me feel like I wasn't talented enough because I was making progress without their help. It's been hard to get the taste of disgust for people out of my mouth. It taints everything. But it also tastes like truth.
I'm not sure I can forgive, because it's not about how they hurt me but what they revealed about themselves. What do people do when given the opportunity to dominate or hurt someone else. What do they do when someone is vulnerable. Forgiveness doesn't take away the knowledge that they can't be trusted with my innards. Whenever I meet someone I subconciously wonder what societal string is keeping them in line. If I test them and show them my belly will they in turn show me that they would not be able to resist ripping into my soft flesh? Could they handle when it becomes clear what kind of creature they really are? Most of the time no, and they lash out in shame.
(July 8, 2024)
THE SPACES BETWEEN FAMILY AND FRIENDS
Mood: rested & bored
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Last weekend D and I had two separate and very different experiences of hanging out with friends of ours. The first was Lily and Jason's house warming barbecue in connecticut and the other was dinner with his friends Jani & her husband (terrible I don't remember his name). The first was not my favorite, and I knew that was coming. I've written about this "friend group" before, and know that I should just stop calling them my friends. I was invited, and hope that Lily does consider me a friend but it's most likely distant friends, or the way you would invite that faroff aunt or friend of the family. You don't want to erase that person from your life, but you maybe secretly don't like them.
I guess I'll write about this friend group a little bit. I didn't have a terrible time, but oddly it was the people I knew the least, who knew me through my art who were the warmest and most enthusiastic about talking to me. One of these being another friend Lily, who I totally get actually liking me because Donald and I had an interesting run in with her at first lily's wedding party, where we made sure she got home safe after getting too wasted. (Truly a blind leading the blind situation). However everyone else, I don't know. Certain people always avoid talking to me, but I was kind of taken aback that Jensine seemed to be like super uncomfortable around me. Barely asked me any questions, almost avoided me if I hadn't spoken to them. Now I will give folks the benefit of the doubt that it was hot as balls outside and the moment we moved inside it felt like the vice around my heart relaxed a little.
The opressiveness of the heat already makes me a sour puss, but it wasn't just that. There's this thing that i realized just zaps my energy and makes me fully unsure of how to approach and truthfully annoys me haha where someone will overshare something sexual and deeply personal loudly, in this vain desire to have people think they're so crazy, and sexy and cool, but then also don't invite you into the conversation or make space, so it makes you feel like you're trespassing when they're the one spewing their business way outside the intended circle. It feels embarrassing and for the first time in a long time really made me cringe. This happened again when Jackie talked the entire way home on the train back to the city. Everything from who's she's dated, sex, how cicada's piss always with this feigned "whoa, I'm so crazy and hyper, whoa don't look at me but LOOK AT ME". Which is so puzzling that she needs to be this hyper center of attention because nobody will ever not look at her. She's a total smoke show. So I'm not sure where that need to always be yelling "LOOK AT ME" comes from.
Most people there are for sure aquaintances at best. But the experience and the 12 hours of overstimulation in the sun left me drained and sad, clawing to get away from everyone. Even Maritsa seemed to act strange to me, being way more interested in chatting to Donald than me. Which was ok. I got that sense a few times. Donald it so cute and attractive and honestly if it weren't for me he'd probably get invited to stay longer, to hang out at all the boy nights and a third in all their threesome/ friend orgies. He has this willingness and want to please others that I don't have that. I envy him for that openness and want to try with people. I still don't think that should be enough to elicit this strange need they have to push me to the sidelines.
I did feel, purposefully pushed away by most people there. Not sure which circle to join with Donald. There was a point where we sat kind of near a group under the umbrella and it felt like the adult thing to do was to like, notice us and make space for us too, but this was not something ever extended. And I guess I wasn't willing to debase myself by asking to be invited. That never feels good. I guess I felt pretty sad that Lily never came to talk to me or D the entire time, Jensine low key stayed away until we went back inside again, and like, who else is a friend there? Donald is such a good partner that he'll stay by my side and be my buddy, but I know it probably wasn't fun for him.
So here's the thing, I know that I often place myself off to the side because that's where I feel the safest. I'm deeply nervous, and naturally feel unsafe in most social situations. I can see this with this friend group, my own family and school. I understand where a lot of this comes from. I don't feel comfy at school because I just wasn't able to be around to socialize on campus and on set because I had to work to make my film happen. With family, it's because I can't be myself without upsetting the family patriarch who nobody wants to hold accountable. But with this friend group I still don't get it, why I was pushed away so harshly. They've all maimed one another way more in deeply upsetting ways than I ever have. And to be honest Lily is much more exacting and mean than I am. My only thing is that I don't host things, or haven't in a long time. And I've stuck up with myself.
So lets be real. I will not sound likeable in this paragraph but it should be said. Vreni doesn't like me because I make her insecure because I'm the better artist and I think she senses that her husband prob would find me hot if they weren't together because we're the same body type. There can only be one chubby hottie in the hot girl group and she wants that covered. Jensine excludes me probably because she knows that her boyfriend tried to hook up with me but I rejected him AND in the hiearchy of the group, because she was always the "hot one", she's lost some of her desireabilty currency by gaining weight and not having the hottest boyfriend in the group. We are on the same hotness plain and for someone who has seen themselves as secretly better than others that's humbling. Nobody likes someone who humbles them. Maritsa I have no clue, she just seemed nervous. Vreni's husband and Jensine's boyfriend can't talk to me for the obvious reasons because them having awareness of me is a threat. I've never understood why K doesn't like me, and at this point don't take it personally. Lily only invites and talks tome because she feels guilty for how the apartment handoff went, and actively doesn't invite me to things because she doesn't like it when I don't agree with her. She's particular, and wants/ needs control of things and knows that if I don't like something I just won't go along with stuff. In a way we're similar, and while that should bind us, it actually creates strife. She also has told me to my face that "I'm really weird". We lived together for years where I was too stressed to come out of my room. While she probably holds this against me, I think she's self-aware enough to realize that living with her and Jason as a couple was uncomfortable for me. Jason can't show an interest to chatting with me probably more out of nervousness at being a host and maybe because of the weird boyfriend code.
When I got home I was so burnt up, chub rub all down my legs, overheated. Donald wanted to make love but my heart wasn't in it. When he fell asleep next to me I silently sobbed. Mourned not having friends. I missed Laura, and I missed Dadu & Daniel. I missed when Chandler still wanted to work on things together with me. I don't think I'll be worrying about the Lily Barbecue group of people anymore. Worry about being invited, worry about what they think. There might be some interesting professional connections still there but I'm not going to push it. I can't make it better, or let them block me from the world. If I see them I will say hi, but I have other joys, and want to prioritize folks who make space for me, who have space for me. Donalds friends make so much space for me. I can tell they think I'm weird, but maybe they have some of Donalds want and interest in winning people over. I've been learning a lot from D in terms of his friend making/ keeping spirit. He's always thinking of others which I think is what I lack. Always wanting to bring a snack, flowers, wanting to help tidy up and help the host of the party. I feel a toxic twinge of frustration when I feel this expectation, maybe because of the gendered nature of the expectation. People feel a sly sense of smugness when I do a womanly thing, but Donald will gain a bit more praise and make people feel safe by being one of the "good ones". It's a strange space, I love that about him though. Even if that need to help comes from a place where he feels like he has to earn his love, it's still a beautiful expression of an insecurity that could become ugly in other toxic expressions.
I want to be a good partner to D, and make his socializing funner. We went to dinner with his friends yesterday and I think it went really well. We all chatted fervently about a range of topics, had good food, and the other couple seemed to truly be excited to hang out with us, with me specifically, they already love D. I got the vibe that they realy wanted to hang out with another couple in that double date sort of way, since monogamy between men and women can be a bit isolating. It was a nice reminder that some people do have space for good one on one conversation. That I maybe wasn't a burden all the time.
There are a lot of patterns in my relationships with others that haunt me, but I don't know how to fix it without changing fundamental aspects of myself or dulling my shine. My interests. My instincts. I know I'm not perfect, and can be difficult. But I can't help but shake the feeling that this pattern arises because I make people insecure by taking up space in my own way. I should prioritize the freaks that dare to approach me and are wise enough to stay.
(May.25, 2024)
"I Saw the PP Grow"
Mood: Relaxed But A Little Lonesome
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Just walked back from Nitehawk where I saw 'I Saw The TV Glow' for the second time, this time on my own. The first time I saw it with C, J & D. I think everyone had fun but there was a stiffness about the ordeal. I sensed a strange energy from Jensine. Was she mad at me? Or was she nervous because she hadn't hung out with D much? Is it the weird unsaid things between her and C? Who knows, either way I just felt a little nervous. Had a great time with D next to me. He does this thing where he'll get as hyped as me for films that we get way to excited for the months before its release.
So, I have this weird feeling and I can't tell, but I wonder if J doesn't like not being the central person due to their hotness. She was someone who had a lot of social capital when we graduated college, and one of the reasons I kind of more concioulsy separated myself from that friend group was that I felt like they wanted me to play the otusider, and second fiddle to some silly power structure that was established before I even met them. It's been easier lately to hang with her on her own with C but there's this energy of C wanting to really get in J's good graces and its none of my business but it's hard to watch. When we were all sitting eating burgers I got really self righteous while talking about the thesis show judging experience. For a second I felt bad, again for taking up space and having opinions, but then why even care? That's who I am and if they don't understand that struggle with feeling hurt by that school and how they treat their students, then that doesn't make J a good teacher, or a good friend.
Not sure why I got caught on that, just that It made getting stoked for the film and present experience kind of difficult to take in. I wanted to talk to someone about how the film really hit me hard, in how closely it encapsulated specific feelings of being a kid and dislodged from your own body, gender, whatever. Like when Tara gets flickers of recognition of Isabel in Owen. You can see it in her? Their? His? eyes. The film focusing so hard on Owen makes me wonder about Tara. I know the pink could be feelings of saphic love, and the desintigration of traditional feminine ideantiy crumbling without the gender defining centrality of men in your world. That not moving around men in the same way as other women creates these ripples that people can feel. As a kid you're oblivious about the defiance, because it's not rebellion, it's just you being who you are. And then when you do become aware of it, that people are laughing in concern for you instead of laughing with you, that natural thing you have either crystalizes into a defiance, or you let the pressure sand you down smooth. You give in. Your nature is erased.
My eyes fill with tears each time I've watched Isabel choking in the grave, blubbering out the moon juice. It's so deep, and terrifying because the people who bury you are your loved ones. Your teachers. As a kid I noticed that adults and their cruelty weren't so different from children and their cruelty. They'd get mad, or frustrated and blow their tops like little toddlers at the smallest stepping out of line.
I think it's important that Tara came back for Isabel. If you look at pictures of me as a kid, I looked like a little boy. And I mostly lived like a little boy until puberty hit. People would ask me if I was a little girl or a little boy and then I'd turn it on them, genuinely curious what they thought I was. I think it was 3rd or 4th grade where after our first sex-ed class where they split us into groups to talk about puberty I began pacing the track at the school, thinking. I must have looked absolutely nuts to the other kids. Eventually I think my friend Anupreet would come up. I don't know, I get the sense we were sitting somewhere, maybe on some concrete or dirty, maybe near a fence, I don't know. But I told her how I didn't want to be a girl. That the rules were silly and we could just choose our path. Despite each path looking cursed. I think we may have even both proclaimed, hands clasped that we were going to be boys. Better night ejaculation than everyone constantly thinking you were stupid. The heinous shame when I grew breasts and didn't even notice.
I sometimes wonder if I'm Owen, or if I've figured anything out for sure now. I wore my "them" necklace to the movie, something I've taken to wearing as a small assertion of my transness? nonbinaryness? non-woman-ness while presenting super feminine. I wonder if I'm still Owen, or if I coughed up all my moon juice yet. I think as a kid I experienced a sort of gender dysphoria in both directions. I'd look to the freedom of boys, so in their skin, athletic, gangly limbs and I don't know, this cuteness, this vulnerability you'd see when they slept. The adventurous need to just see the thing with their own eyes or die. And then I'd look at girls, how they were so hooked into one another, expansive psychic gods in the bodies of little girls. I wanted their secret language, but I hated when I'd be at the slumber party and they'd try to include me and touch my hair. The glitter they rolled on my arms burnt my skin (I write this literally while wearing glitter) and I hated seeing myself through their eyes, the measuring, the psychic pain and policing of the body. The way they would rant against the wolves and then obediently get on their knees and put their head in their maul. But it was overwhelming in both ways. To see boys shift how they spoke to you when their friends rounded the corner, or to see a girl's face change when they realized you weren't quite what they thought you were. For some reason that one makes me sadder. "No I swear I am one of you! Look at my dress! I love little trinkets! I even have a womb! I bled all over my bed just last week, I swear! please! Be my friend!" I crawl on all fours at the outskirts of their circles like a stray dog. Better a dog with gods, than a dog with dogs.
I've been thinking of taking the name Raphael. The name of an angel that only takes on the form of a man when in the flesh, but is amorphous when in spirit. It's shared with great artists, it's somewhat shaped like 'Rebekka', has the same amount of letters, starts with "R", and low key feels like a variation on my middle name, 'Rachel'. I thought I'd use it as my official first name and move 'Rebekka' to a middle name. Still part of me, not necessarily incorrect if someone calls me that, but only one part of the puzzle. Also I feel like despite being a "masculine" name, a Raphael can still serve cunt.
The reason I wonder if I'm Owen is that I've been super quiet about wanting to use another name, about wanting top surgery, even to Donald. I know I fear that if I was physically more boyish he would pull away, despite him totally knowing I'm non-binary, sometimes calling me his little guy etc. I've also told him about how I feel disconnected from my breasts and would take them off if I could, maybe only using them as a fun fashion or sex accessory. So I don't feel like I'm hiding anything technically. I did stop taking T. It was making me feel so ugly, and that coupled with other stressed made it all too much. I want to become fitter, and see if that helps. Maybe being active and more muscular, along with some sort of top surgery down the line would be best for me. I want my hair as I age, and I feel more secure in my body's misalignment. I know some trans people feel totally insane thinking about their womb, their periods etc. But I don't really, I've never felt super connected to my period, over identified with it. Plus some binary men do have periods so like, if its a fear I cant be masculine with a cunt that's already been objectively disproved. Plus I guess I'd like to keep it around in case I do want to reproduce with D. I love him so much, and while I don't foresee myself being a mom, the idea of it gives me hives, I'm more open to being a parent, gritting my teeth through the strangeness of pregancy to create someone we could raise and celebrate. Children aren't something I need to be happy, but I don't have anything against the fact that my balls are on the inside instead of the outside. If it weren't packaged with my lack of cock I'd think it was a design improvement.
More and more I feel quietly trans. I think my coughing up the moon juice happened back in 2021 during the last bit of isolated pandemic. Sobbing on the floor, living my strange star trek fanfictions in my head and having hours long conversations with Tuvok about gender, sex and my place in the universe. It's hard to be open with real people. And I'm do genuinely think having to be super loud about who you are just so Cis people get it feels ridiculous. You can't be made when queer and trans people are quiet just living their lives AND be made when they play the clown you want so well. There's no winning so why even waste your time? I might internally philosophize but why give so much to someone who's not brave enough or interested enough to ask about it? I've written this all before
But I might be Owen in that I'm anxious about proclaiming my dreams to my partner about top surgery and a new name. I might be Owen because I'm scared of both Cis & Trans dismay at my specific build-a-bitch approach to gender. Transmedicalism sucks but I truly am working through if I want Top Surgery partly because it would even prove to myself that these feelings are real. I want the feelings to be physical in some way so I don't feel so crazy. I might be Owen because I wish I could be called he/him despite my curvaciousness & affinity for pink. How do I reconcile wanting to be a magical girl, but also wanting to be a teen boy with his hair too long? How do I reconcile wanting to be sooooo pretty and also wanting to feel my cock throbbing and cumming inside my boyfriend's ass? I have trouble trusting myself, that I won't just oscillate and be sad I don't have breats.
Lately I've been writing this little fanfiction in my head about me and D as Teen boys together. Becoming friends but always fighting a romantic chemistry. I think about my fashions, how boy version of me would probobly mourn not being a girl in the way I mourn not being able to be a boy. Would he ever get breast implants though? I see him enjoying wearing dresses, maybe doing some drag when clubbing, enjoying performance, but also being flamboyantly masculine in a playful way. I wonder if he'd be a little happier than me in his own body. Sadder that he can't be a magical girl sometimes, but ultimately being sadder at how men are so villainaised for their femininity, mad that my girl friends can't walk home alone at night without fear in their hearts. I've even written in my parents being divorced in this other world, and how I have to stay and keep my dad safe until I'm in over my head and finally get help. I can't let boyhood version of me not have any baggage. I do think I'm a looker though haha, like Kurt Cobain but with my eyes slightly closer together.
Anyway, I just ordered a skateboard.
NEW COUCH FLU (Feb.4 2024)
Mood: Concerned at the Night's Calm
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Where do I begin? Yesterday after sharing a nice dinner with Donald, after watching Detective Pikachu, after discussing the film 'Zone of Interest', after watching 'Mr. and Mrs. Smith' and after Donald read me the role he'll be auditioning for tomorrow we fell into a strange discomfort and silence. It felt like neither of us knew where the conversation should go next, as if we had run out of things to say. I felt the harshness of the light behind him beaming on me and the feeling that I was trespassing somehow engulfed me. I could tell that I wanted to continue to fill the air with questions to out run this feeling.
Before going to bed while we were getting unclothed he did this strange thing where he goofily grabbed my breasts. It shocked me a bit and I felt really trivialized. I think he was embarrassed by his actions because when he came out of the bathroom he apologized and I responed: "Yeah, I really didn't like that." I've told him about how I don't feel very connected to my breasts and wanted the ability to take them off sometimes. Having them be such a tempting joke and fixation made me feel a little objectified like my body wasn't being taken seriously. We quietly got into bed and he asked if I wanted him to put my glasses on the bedside table. I held his hand in the dark and deposited them onto his palm.
That night I felt a little alien to myself. I don't want to hold embarrassments or missteps over my partner. Weaponize small hurts, but also want to honor my own feelings too that whatever this vibe was didn't leave me feeling very sexual. I felt solemn. We ended up kissing in the dark. I didn't want it to leave this part of the affection. We have a good amount of sex, but I don't think we make out very much. Lately I've been feeling this pressure to push for myself to perform sex out of fear that not doing so means that our relationship is fizzling out. Or that our affections will become split, our relationship being this space of pure comfort and no sex, and the rest of the world a tantilizing temptation of sexual exploits and exciting loves.
Some of these feelings is that I am somewhat aware that it was around this amount of years that in my last relationship that nuked my sense of self, things were quietly going off the rails. That my ex-partner was looking frantically to fall in love with someone else so he had an excuse to jump from the relationship I was still trying to be patient with and grow. Now it's clear that outside of the infidelities and sexual assault that we weren't a good match. That my relationship with Donald is different. When I look back to what was happening in that relationship a little after the 2 year mark and what's the feeling is between Donald and I now it's very different.
In that last relationship having sex was becoming more and more difficult to create. I was feeling stifled and pushed to become hyper emotionally independant like a stone baby and my existing would bring up these little emotes of disgust with my ex. I got the sense that I was too forward about sex, that I was too talkative, that I dressed too weird, that I was too fat, too unfeminine, too queer. Strange little jabs or looks that weren't there before. It became more and more necessary to stand up for myself.
But currently with Donald we definitely are still craving each other's intimacy. We share with one another our days and what we feel. We've maybe become a little more aware of each other's sharp bits but they don't feel present all the time. I apologize for talking too much and he tells me that he likes to listen to me. I don't feel the need to cut him when I get scared, or at least when I do feel sharp I am aware that I don't want to hurt him and create a fear in him of expressing himself to me. I don't feel the need to jump in and correct things and build a better version of him in my mind than what exists in front of me.
But we're not perfect and I wonder if I should somehow share with him what I've been feeling lately. This fear about being together a little over two years. The looming little monster that whispers in my ear that I should enjoy this while it lasts because it's all going to come crashing down. That he'll turn to me and be completely disgusted by my body and realize what a monster I am. What an anti-social liability I am. I've felt this fear for as long as we've been dating, I'm sure most people fear a version on this. It's still hard to tell what you tell someone you love and what you shielf them from so they don't have such a huge weight to hold. In my last relationship my ex felt like he was walking on egg shells and that's not the kind of relating I want to harbor.
This morning when he left I felt a little sad about how he phrased when he'd be available. That we woudn't be available until Wednesday because of work. Despite us having just had sex he seemed distant. I know his mind is on this audition he's really excited for and that he gets very internal when heading out for work. It's not natural to have a physical goodbye for a kiss. I think that's maybe just a difference between us. I like hugs and kisses goodbye. I wonder what he's feeling currently about our relationship, if there's something he needs that I'm not giving him. If there's something he's sad about. I guess I just got the vibe that he didn't want to think about me over the next couple of days, and I want to give him space. But I also don't want that space to make it seem that I don't want to reach out either.
I kind of feel like I have to hold back and I know he wouldn't want to hear that. Am I holding back because I'm fearful of what he'd say to me if he wasn't holding back? Maybe this weirdness is just the feelings of deep winter. I like winter but I also know it's hard on Donald. I've also been feeling content. It may be seasonal but the months leading up to December I felt sick with worry over finances and school and producing my film. But with my current job things feel so much better that I just want to sit in this calm of not being frightened all the time. Take things less intensely and really think through the art I'm creating and really enjoy all the little pleasures that felt so far away just a few months ago. Maybe this feeling of calm is making me hyper vigilant to my relationship.
Like, not to get too arm chair therapist here but as a kid whenever I came across as too relaxed, or too proud of myself or too confident it felt like an adult really needed to put me in my place. My mom would need to tell me I was eating like the food had no calories. If I got an art award when I got home my dad would take the remote control from my hand as say "don't push it" like there was this alotted time he could stand to celebrate me. A boyfriend would ask me if I really thought I was good enough to be a professional illustrator when I shared my ambitions. Another ex would tell me he cheated on me because I was "too smart". I would fuck a guy so well that he'd get embarrassed about how hard his cock was and ghost me, though this is possibly the best humble brag of all time. My mom would say that she didn't know how to talk to me because she was afraid of coming across as stupid to me. Recently I did a talk with Jensine chatting to students and I felt like I overstepped. I shared too much or had way to much to say about the questions they asked me. I felt bad because I couldn't tell if what I was saying was coming across as hogging the mic or if I was just good at articulating things. Was it cringe and stupid or too good and made Jensine feel bad. I don't know! To hold back is to lie about what I can give the world and to deny myself the feeling of stretching and growing.
I felt guilty this evening when I got to come home from hanging out with my wonderful boyfriend and enjoy my little studio apartment all to myself. I just got a new rug, couch and mattress and it feels so extravagant. To have a place all my own, to have this tech job, to be going to grad school, to be starting pencils on my graphic novel. I feel selfish, like I'm here because of my selfishness. I feel selfish when I take the time to take care of my skin in the evening, or when I buy a little toy or can walk into a store and just buy myself hair conditioner and refill my favorite color of lipstick. I feel guilty that I get to do this and I kind of know that my mom is stressed and my dad feels unloved by me and that my sister is struggling with fatigue and some health issues. I feel guilty that I get to draw every day when my dad stopped drawing after high school. I'm guilty that I get to hold hands with Donald while I sleep when my mom basically sleeps alone because my dad sleeps on the couch. I feel guilty that because my sister didn't say Happy Birthday to me I also didn't tell her happy birthday a week later when it was her turn (though I do want to send her something for her birthday still, it's just hard to know what kind of thing she'd actually enjoy and I feel guilty that I don't know what she'd like). I feel guilty that I'm happier when I don't have to navigate how I don't fit in with my family, or navigate how stressed I am when I visit home. I'm guilty that I'm pretty sure it's easier for them when I stay away from them.
I'm guilty that at least at this very moment I'm so thankful for my life. Maybe thinking the sky is going to fall at any moment is a natural part of that.
DEPRESSING TEA (Dec.28, 2023)
Mood:Soft Panic
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Feeling bad, or stressed or very pessimistic. It's silly but I was supposed to go to the Zoo tomorrow but low key have no way to get there without asking my mother to drive like 40 minutes. I'd borrow the car and go myself but I also am not sure my Driver's License is valid (long story). This isn't a huge deal, I've seen them once while here and I think after the wedding this is a good start to reconnect into some sort of distant friendship with this group of High School Friends. It would be a lie if I didn't say not going would be a relief. We had brunch recenlty and while the food was good and I enjoyed myself it felt uncomfortable.
I've noticed this trend that when I visit my hometown, family, high school friends etc. that when people speak to me they speak more at me than with me. It's definitely a baby boomer thing but even my younger cousin did this (my other younger cousin also gushed, but actually made space for me to ask questions which feels way better), like I could not get a word in. It's like I have to hold everyone else's stuff or mold around their lives. I think a large part of it is a latent assumption that because they are family oriented, are stable, focused on their kids that everything they do is more important. Which is pretty unfair.
It makes it difficult to tell people about the things I care about. I don't want to complain too much because it would give a huge amount of insight into what a hard couple of years I've had in terms of stability and I know that it would just result in judgmental gossip later. A host of sighs and mentions of retirement funds, marriage, mortgages and health insurance. If they knew how little I had materially they would probobly have a heart attack. Which is funny because listening to my family or friends talk about their lives my blood pressure begins to rise. My life, which I actually love and want to stabilize becomes reframed through these parameters and suddenly looks inconsequential and in danger.
Despite my life being financially always in flux, I've been feeling expansion in my heart. I can see myself growinging stronger in certain ways, and I felt really touched at how many people showed up to help me film my movie. The next year and half is going to be wild, and full of so much art and that has me feeling great and hopeful. Being here is like whiplash. Going from being with a partner who is so inspiring and loving and who I don't have to slow my mind down for, finishing a huge chunk of my film, landing an in-house illustration gig TO feeling like a teenager who sleeps next to a freezer and can't express any part verbally about how I feel is too much contrast. It's made me think about how much fashion, art & film became so central to my identity early on. You weren't allowed to talke about your rage, or pass judgement on people who hurt you. But you could draw about it and for the most part people were too fucking emotionally stupid to see past the craft of the art. It would be framed as a party trick even if it made them feel a little weird. That's just what art does right? It's just this wacky thing. Those artists and their funny goofy ways.
Meanwhile artists are screaming and thrashing around trying to warn people of what's coming. Of what's already slithered around their necks. And then we're told we're too much, TOO RADICAL. Not worth listening too because of how goofy we are. It's kind of incredible. I can't help but see a direct connection between how artists are being fully devalued, executives frothing at the mouth to replace them via A.I and the speed at which people are joining the American Death Cult. The planet is dying, and children are being blown to bits in their beds by Israeli missiles but god forbid we even mention boycotting starbucks.
After dinner my Mom and Aunts were talking about my Uncle who is slowly wasting away. It's a long story but he's needed care for the last 6 years and because of weird relationship stuff with his wife, and bad decisions, and dynamics that have been in play since his 20s hasn't gotten it. He's quickly destabilizing and the way folks talk about him is wild. They can only talk about his obstinance and the physical ailments but it wasn't until I said that he was basically committing a slow version of suicide that they mentioned that yes, he had actually left in the car and they had gotten a phone call from his wife saying she thought he might be suicidal. Like what the fuck guys, maybe strategize a way to help him want to be alive? I get it's a hard situation and you can't make someone do something they don't want to do, but they know his history, his personality. Like ask him to get the fuck out of that crazy desert house they built, away from his narcissistic wife and I don't know, hire a sex worker to give him something to live for. Anything! Do anything! It shouldn't take your useless artist neice/nephew/ kid to bring up that mental health exists for you to think about this.
Here's the secret, I'm actually a total coward. I'm not a great revolutionary and feel frightened of being dragged into the human mass of resistance and lose my indivduality. Some of this is both my white need for non-confrontation but also my German side that's so aware of how close fascism is. How in moments it's already here. I guess I only have to be a coward for a few weeks in the year, in return I get to see my family. This trade off feels worse and worse, since there's less and less of me I get to show up with.
This leads me to wonder if I'm actually wealthy in a way. Me, in my little studio, with my cat and my Love and my work. I don't have these other things everyone has carefully stockpiled but I don't want them either. Not if it means I have to become ever paranoid of keeping it, and it's the only thing I'm proud of. Not if it means that I view the struggles of others through the pornographic lense of superiority. Not if my taxed wealth goes to bombs or the tearing down of community gardens.
It's obvious I'm not so different from them. I'm working for a financial tech company currently so there you go. But I have no allusions about where I'm dirtied. I'm allowed to eat as well. For all my talk I do want stability. When I get home I'm going to really reconnect with my gratitude, hug my cat, fuck my boyfriend and keep making things. I miss D so much but I don't want to burden him too much with these thoughts while I'm away. I just know that things have been getting better for me, and I'd like to use that as the base and focus on building again. Slowly but surely on nobody else's timeline. In a way it's nice to be insignificant in the eyes of others. It let's you build a secret heaven.
Going Mute (Dec.26, 2023)
Mood: Witholding
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I had a small incident on Christmas Eve. Something kind of like this happens at least once whenever I visit family but this time I wasn't able to hide it because of all the social events planned for that day. I don't know how to explain outside of that I was trapped in my body, and completely unable to handle being around people. I didn't come out to say hello to any of the guests who came for the football game my parents were hosting. I didn't come out when called to help decorate the tree, I was almost completely quiet at church and at the Christmas Eve dinner, despite the spread of food my family had prepared I coudln't look anyone in the eye. My presence was unsettling even to me but I couldn't get out of it no matter how hard I tried. I just wanted to be alone, and repeatedly would retreat to sit on the floor next to the heater.
It was hard to rationalize it, and my family aren't the ones who would ever ask me a question. While at the dinner table it became so distressing that I knew if I looked anyone in the eye I would begin to sob. Truly, I didn't want to be like this. When I finally took myself to bed early I tried to work through what was happening. I just felt so depressed, and heavy. I looked it up and maybe I was experiencing some for of "selective mutism". I do go scary quiet when stressed or sad, even with people who I trust like D. There are a few things that may have contributed to this. Being yanked out of my established routines, the reminder of how distant and uncomfortable I am around my family, father in particular, holding all of my mother's complaints about people I don't know or walking through my hometown and being reminded of what a lonely place this has always been.
I felt SO SELFISH in how I acted. When I'm here it feels as if I am the problem and they would be better off if I didn't visit. It begs the question if witholding so much of myself is what led to the Mutism. First of all everyone misgenders me here (I'm not sure they fully understand how they/them pronouns work) but also I can't bring up my true feelings about anything because everything seems to trigger my dad. It was always sort of like this but as I've gotten older, and we lived through Trump, he's become hyper sensitive to anything critical of men, The USA, status quo, immigrants, gender, Civil Rights, Police, his property, mainstream media, capitalism, A.I (IDK, don't ask) and apparently EZRA MILLER? On Christmas I was talking with my cousin about Ezra Miller's crime spree and how he choked a women in Rekjavik, Iceland and my dad was like "Well you don't know what it's like to be a celebrity". He can't handle a man he knows nothing about being criticized for CHOKING A WOMAN. It's really fucked up.
Despite all of my dad's red flags and control issues it hurts to not be able to talk with him. And I know it hurts him that I can barely look him in the eyes. It also hurts me that he's replaced me with his friend's daughter, that he finds these surrogates that won't question him or make him feel bad about his opinions. He dotes upon them, hangs out with them, fixes their cars, buys them bowling balls. None of this is new but I had sort of forgotten about this dynamic. I used to try and talk to him about stuff but it's been a long time coming and it's something that's been building for a long time. I can trace it back pretty far, I think he was still proud of me while I was going to school, but I can also tell things got super weird when I came back from NY to finish my degree and lived with my parents for a year. He would get suddenly rageful and territorial and I'd yell back.
In comparison this panicked shut down silence feels cowardly. Like a thick slime that covers me and makes me untouchable but safe. When I think about the things he's said to me over the years, the moments where he's needed to strive hard to shut me down this intense withdrawel feels less innapropriate. Even if he hasn't said anything too pointed at me on this visit (because I've been not engaging about anything), it doesn't erase all these past lessons and rules he's taught me about the space he rules over. If I get shut down, or am told I'm not a person because I don't have children, called "you people", has bragged about violence towards his immigrant neighbors, disparaged my Mom's home country, has excused the killing of unarmed Black people at the hands of the police and identifies with men who have physically abused women, these are all things that just add up over the years and signal to my body that he's not a safe person to be open with. It's signaled that if I ever show up authentically that I'm the exact kind of person he loathes. If I wasn't his kid, he'd hate me.
I just don't get how others don't remember these things. Maybe because I have stood my ground in the past or thought I could convince him to care about other people he's had more "mask off" moments with me. There's still a small part of me that fears that I'm the bad person in this situation, that I've over dramatized these moments and that I should be thankful that my parents took care of me, were able to send me to college and provided stability. And they love me, I know they do. I know he does. Others can be around him, why can't I? Why does my body literally stop functioning.
Can my body be trusted?
ZOMBIE INSIGHTS (Dec.7, 2023)
Mood:Clean
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My boyfriend starred in an Indie movie funded by the least Indie folks I've ever met. But exciting stuff, we got to go to the premiere for the film! And it was so cute and so SO weird. It's that strange thing where you're there to support your partner and feel both on the outside of everything but also really proud. The film itself suffered from a lot of craftsmanship issues as well as interpersonal drama but the actors did their absolute best with the very little they were given. I'm a little afraid that I was too negative about it because I want my bf to be really proud of what he accomplished. He was GREAT despite all the weird editing they did around him.
So fun fact, I kind of thought I'd get jealous, since he basically gets married in the film, and I feel like there's been some weirdness between me and the actress who plays his fiance in the film. Nothing crazy, she's very nice, I just find it weird that she always talks introduces herself as his "wife" when talking about the film. Plus she once said something kind of weird that maybe insinuated that they felt strange before their respective partners popped up on set to hang out. As if there was something blossoming between them? I don't know, I don't mind anymore but previously it did make me feel uncomfortable which I told by bf about. But after watching the film, there was definitely some pathos the actress brought to the end that honestly elevated the film beyond what the writing deserved but overall there was like, NO CHEMISTRY. They barely had the two of them touch, which I thought I'd be relieved by but ultiamtely I weirdly wanted those characters to have more to them. As a partner I felt safe, but as an artist I was pissed at how stunted their relationship was because of the writing.
Anyway at the after party I didn't really know where I belonged but I ended up chatting with this woman who was in an all red suit. She was pretty interesting and honestly had a pretty good instincts when it came to what the film kind of needed. I didn't realize but I guess she was a producer and the wife of one of the other producers? She got really excited when she found out I was studying film because I guess her husband and his crew have some big plans for to establish a studio out in the middle of nowhere. It was one of those instances where you're excited about the convo but also know its probobly more lip service than anything else. D (my bf) seemed sort of legitimately concerned they would hire me for something and I'd get dragged into their unprofessional shenanigans. It was kind of flattering that he thought they'd even consider it. I know they had a hard time on that production, but professionally it would be HUGE to go from directing my little 2-5 k budget short films to TWO MILLION DOLLAR productions. Could you imagine?
D and I have been pretty critical of the production, but one thing we agree on is that if these people could get a film made with all the messiness and lack of interest in art so can we. I think we could really make a killer film for 2 million. I mean, I made a better film for $500 last year! The whole experience made me really want to shine up my short films once I'm finished filming my 2nd year film so I have 3 full films ready to rock and roll before my thesis year. If these Producers were really desperate enough to ask me to direct my stuff would be right up their alley and I think I'd have the resources and support to be able to push back on some of their nonsense. Or maybe I'm being overly optimistic about my own abilities. I guess we'll find out, In a week I'll be on set filming my third short film for school and it's going to be the most intense of the bunch.
I'm taking a little break tonight from all that stress since I'm balancing last minute production stuff for my film, my day job, a corproate mural job AND a book cover! I don't know why this season is so crazy but I want to grab on as much as possible. The film really needs to take center stage next week though. We've locked a lot of stuff down and I met with my DP yesterday who seemed pretty confident about my shot list. I want to trust her and think I will and deal with any issues that may arise on set. My nature is that I often want to just get through the parts that are in the air and chaotic so I can get to the part where I have full control and the raw material to work with i.e the footage, sound etc. I'd like to work on being excited and looking forward to being on set. There are so many unknowns and this deep fear that everyone's going to bail or judge me for it not going smoothly. I've produced a lot of it and when I get on set I really just want to keep my focus on the monitor and the actors and not feel the pinpricks of wanting to do everything for everyone else.
There's this thing about film that I can't get over, and maybe because some people are bailing and making things difficult for the production but I wonder, why do people who aren't directors ever want to work on movies at all? So much of the work feels thankless. Directors are also useless without a proper producer. And what do Producers, especially at the student level get out of this process? I'm lucky that a few people like my DP asked to work with me because they liked my film. Is that what you have to do as a Director? Just make great things that people want to be a part of? I'm not good at networking and wish I could have been more present for people. A classmate of mine launched a whole kickstarter campaign for their 2nd year film and it made me feel a little jealous that they had the network and gaul to ask for money. And that they had this entire team. I still don't always feel like I have my people at school. There are people I like, but I get why I don't come across as very useful to others. I get so hyper focused on my own vision to a fault. I mean, I havn't been in class for the last bit of this semseter because I had to take on work to fund my film. I don't see another way to do this. I keep reminding myself that we are all going to work in our own ways and that these displays of confidence from others would actually be a nightmare for me.
Like, how am I supposed to know if the film is going to be important before I've made it? Do I want to build my brand around my personal identity and intersections of oppression? This classmates way of speaking always lands as so self-important. I had similar feelings about the Director of the film D starred in. I really like him, but sometimes he comes across as disengenuous and puffed up. When I feel like I'm playing a schmoozy role it leaves me feeling grossed out at myself. At that movie after party I could feel those old schmoozy opportunistic muscles flex. They're emaciated since I havn't really wanted to fight to be seen since when I was building my illustration career and was fighting for my place as both an artist but also for the hearts of those I kept falling in love with. I could feel that instinct come out at that party when I realized that some of these people were close to something I also wanted. It was a little disturbing how natural that version of myself is after a drink or two. This people self-serving people pleasing reminds me of my dad. It's like his super power, to be charming and get people to like him. An infinite conversational flexibility.
I have it, and I wonder if I should start exercising that part of myself. If it's possible to conjure this smiling hungry little monster should I ask them to help me achieve my goals? What I don't like about the monster is how it requires other parts of myself to be quiet. The parts that don't like lying. I think I need to nail down my own values when it comes to working in this industry. It feels like film requires a lot of money and people, which means you can't avoid working with people who you find morally reprehensible. I used to fear never being able to achieve my goals and visions, but not I'm starting to fear the compromises I'll be asked to make once I'm in the right rooms. I sort of fear getting what I want.
I wish proximity to abundance didn't feel so tainted. It's a challenge to cultivate abundance in your own life under capitalism. Everyone deserves to have a comfortable life and to follow their calling. I do believe that the best way for me to contribute to society is through my art. It seems to delight people and it feeds me. Movies were often what brought color and meaning into my life so it feels natural to want to pass that on to others. So I'll trust at the very least that it's not immoral to make movies or to ask people to help you make them. Now that this is out of the way, what is the morality of allowing your art to outweigh every other aspect of your life?
PRODUCTIVE GNOME HOURS(November 25, 2023)
Mood:Calm
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Day three of Operation Thanksgiving, where I try and calm my stressful soul down in order to feel like human again. It became obvious recently that my nervous system was just so overburdened. I don't think I really was waking up even concious that I'm a person, just that I need to do school work, produce a film, fit in my illustration work, somehow sleep, keep up my relationship with my boyfriend. The only times I did feel calm was when I would be hanging out with my boyfriend, because once we're hanging out it's such a relief. He takes my mind off of everything and makes me want to be fully there. But I don't want to wear that out. When I'd go home or have time to myself everything would begin to shut me down. I couldn't clean, or cook for myself, or even play a game out of guilt that my other responsibilities weren't tended to, like debt. I think it's just been this huge scramble to stay afloat.
I really hope I'm almost out of the woods in terms of feeling like I'm just scraping by. I started a new short term job that's paying me more than I've made in years. It's only for 3 months but even one two week pay check from them is going to LITERALLY change my life. Taking the job meant I'm basically finshing up the semester remotely and that's a bummer but the more I think about it the more I believe it was the right choice. I haven't been able to be fully present at school because of feeling like I'm so burdened.
This semester, and maybe for these first 3 semester's I've been really hard on myself in terms of not socializing well with others, leaving class right when it ends to go home, not being able to help out on people's shoots. Either people think I'm off putting or rejecting them OR they can tell I'm tired. I've been thinking about that a lot, how we guilt ourselves for not doing the things we should do.
Yesterday I worked on that. I figured I needed a little help this weekend not going crazy, so I've been self-medicating a bit. Which is not in my personality really, I feel like I've known a lot of people who use substances either to hype up for work, or chill out and they always come across as disconnected, lackluster, or just a little overwhelming so I never wanted to become that. I had an ex that was so dulled to the world and he maintained this through weed and by the end of the relationship he didn't know who he even was. It was scary.
But this weekend is different. I decided I wanted to treat myself, and calm myself. If it made me dumb and feel bad I'd just stop, but ultimately I deserve to have my own relationship with certain experiences. I'm not like my ex and his issues have nothing to do with me anymore. Case in point I've been puffing away like the little gnome I am and that combined with a fervent search for a To-Do list App that whistles at you when you finish a tast I was able to tackle a huge undertaking yesterday. I went through and organized my entore Large closet that's been stressing me out. It's basically been a dumping ground for clothes, toys, stepladders and even a computer. I thought I'd get more done in my home but once I got into pulling out all the clothes I realized this was WAY more intense that I thought, so it took up most of the evening.
But god so worth it. One thing that's been adding to my stress is how ashamed I am of my home. It's not even that bad! It just gets neglected and uber cluttered because it's so small. Like I can feel that jumble of objects beating like the tell-tale heart. But when I do get it cleaned up I feel like a million bucks and able to be proud of myself for being able to live on my own and have such a cool apartment. Today I'm going to tackle my kitchen and bathroom. The final boss is my mini-fridge which might have to happen tomorrow. I think if I can just get everything clean with no little pockets of hidden shame I'll be golden. I deserve to live and work in a clean place and I'm not a bad person because I get overwhelmed sometimes!
A MERRY SALTBURN THANKSGIVING(November 23, 2023)
Mood: Ecstatic
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I just got back from seeing 'SALTBURN' and from the very first moment when the text burst onto the screen it had me. It had me in so many ways and it left me dancinge inside and pacing the subway platform like a madman. SPOILERS FROM HERE ON OUT. There's so much that I'm obsessed with but I think what struck me the most was how FULL it felt at all times, full of people, full of lust, full of humor, full of humanity, full of longing and hate. It helped that despite the main character, Oliver, being a total sociopath (psychopath?), I still found him so cringefully relateable. This embodiment of upper middle class resentment and the spark of someting else that makes your upper middle class parents fear you a little.
I've been thinking a lot about wanting to have my thesis be this queer horror-fantasy and this film just felt like someone grabbing me by the back of my neck and whispering "Don't waver" into my ear. "You're not alone, just do it." Oliver as the monster who can only experience lust through domination and ownership still feels queer to me even though the reveal at the end of the film (that every interaction has been pre-meditated) suggests otherwise I still don't think it negates the two hours of romantic flashbacks and fucking his targets grave. Yes Oliver was a predator, but can he really lust after Saltburn and the wealth and the status and not lust after Felix? In the end I didn't believe that he didn't love, or was IN love with Felix.
And can we talk about that ending? No, not that ending, the final FINAL ending? Maybe it's because it feels like culture is slipping back into a prudish sludge but why yes, I did enjoy a joyous visage of Oliver's cock swinging triumphantly thorugh the halls of his newfound home. There was something so liberating about it all, how he didn't hesitate to just be full on sensuality. It makes me sad that men don't have acess to this most of the time. Or don't allow themselves to access it. Ultimately when I watched I felt like I had to process his beauty and my subsequent roaring gender envy.
I wish I could move like that, be firm like that. Have leg hair that lights up in the morning sun. And sometimes I don't want that. I'm nonbinary and tragically indecisive when it comes to how to walk through the world as such, but watching Oliver definitely brought up those feelings of "What if". If I could switch with him would I take it? There's that thing they say online where folks will ask nonbinary people about what if they could swap into the opposite sex's body would they? As a sort of challenge and insinuation that their identity is a cowardly act of self-denial of "full" transition. Normally I'm pretty sure that if I had a "male" body I'd still be nonbinary, that I'd want to maybe drag myself over the dictated line at least a bit. But I don't know, I envy boyishness and boyish beauty. I think about the way I could love in a body like that and can't help feeling a little sad.
FIRST (November 22, 2023)
Mood: Chill
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I think it's officially Thanksgiving day but I haven't slept yet so spiritually it's still the 22nd. I don't really have any thanksgiving day plans until Sunday so I'm not sure what I'll do tomorrow. I've been so focused on work and school (I'm really behind) that I kind of thought I'd just keep working but I have the feeling that I need a rest despite being so behind on things. That's actually why I making this site/ blog. To have a place that's not so tied up with presentation and work and self branding and just not tied to the mega beast that is social media and worldy concerns?
I had this realization that I never just "hang out" anymore. I miss getting stoned and just going through my tapes at night, listening to music, watching the star machine cast little pin pricks of light onto my ceiling. It's so healing. Hopefully I can find a little more peace. I recently started this new job that forced me to have to do the rest of the semester remote from home and I think it's been really good for my nervous system and sense of self. To be able to quietly focus has been such a godsend these last two weeks.
The lesson of the week is that I need to be way more compassionate towards myself (and others) about NEEDS, and not get down on myself that I do NEED a lot of alone time to recharge. That I'm actually really talented when I'm in a less disruptive environment and that these things like building websites, looking at pretty images, thinking about fashion and curating little piles of media is a totally valid way to spend my freetime. Like damn dude, you don't have to be a machine! Just be a stupid little moody teen grub every once in awhile. Don't be afraid to make your future self cringe!
It's been the first day in awhile where I was actually proud of myself and didn't feel like a total fuck up. Soooo thankful for that and for the opportunities that have popped up recently that are saving my life and mental health. I want this next year to feel a lot more solid with more space to have a calm mind that's capable of helping others.