petrushka the great

10:19 am: i have realized...
that all i am is a crazy old poet, so, so old, because i no longer want anybody to myself, because i no longer have such delusions... rather, i have deteriorated into the shadows, waiting and wishing for somebody to become obsessed with me... and if they do, i shall simply drift away...

12:24 pm: Sophomore Formal

Left to right: Dan, Me, Lia, Ronnie

06:31 pm: Dali

"Paranoic-critical method"

an active, irrational thought process to "systematize confusion and to thus help discredit completely the world of reality."

often falls into fits of hysterical laughter.

09:02 am: Roses

burningviolas: i bought a rose today
burningviolas: i thought of you
burningviolas: when you said in your religion you eat flowers
sunstarfarmer: yea
burningviolas: then i bought another rose
burningviolas: so there were two roses
burningviolas: the yellow one is Bill Perfect
burningviolas: the white one is Cathy Ice
sunstarfarmer: we eat flowers
sunstarfarmer: and are not afraid
burningviolas: are they dead first or do you kill them?
sunstarfarmer:  i win
burningviolas: the graveyards go to the flowers
sunstarfarmer: the flowers...well...young girls have picked them everyone
burningviolas: and we have all taken husbands
burningviolas: or lovers...
burningviolas: ...except me, of course...
burningviolas: i have gone off to war
sunstarfarmer: with who
burningviolas: myself
sunstarfarmer: tell me
burningviolas: exposing my value systems to the elements
burningviolas: you know what?
sunstarfarmer: what
burningviolas: i ate a rose this past summer
burningviolas: i held it in my mouth for a few minutes, sensing the life still about it... finally, i accidentally swallowed it... i can still feel it growing inside.  perhaps now when i open my mouth it will color my voice deep hues of of love and other mysterious things
sunstarfarmer: they arent good to eat
burningviolas: what kinds of flowers do you like to eat?
sunstarfarmer: all kinds
burningviolas: except roses?
sunstarfarmer: i inhale roses
burningviolas: o
burningviolas: well, breathe me because i still have some rose inside

12:28 pm: Sometimes i wonder if words are really worth the effort.

no thoughts in my head.

just steel wool.

sunstarfarmer: dont drown okay?
burningviolas: i did
burningviolas: the street turned to water
burningviolas: i went under all the trucks
burningviolas: and swam under the ground
burningviolas: till i came to a bunch of coffins
burningviolas: and realized i was under a graveyard
sunstarfarmer: you didnt drown
sunstarfarmer: just went for a dip
burningviolas: when i came up we were all in a white room and told each other how we'd committed suicide. i didn't have anything to say so i just painted all over the walls
sunstarfarmer: it was hot outside
sunstarfarmer: you needed a drink
sunstarfarmer: its okay
sunstarfarmer: dont drown

I need to stop thinking. I need to take the metal in my brain and nuclear melt it until the wheels don't turn. then it will overheat and the summer time will come and i will go swimming. the twisted metal will drag me down and i will enjoy the rippling stream turning into waterslides as i drift seaweed at the bottom. i suppose a crab will come and stir up the silt and i will blow words into bubbles and sing him a song. he will sing back, "the pirates have joined me for a party in the old shipwreck; come enjoy the gold while the pirates laugh at the sorry shape of their skeletons." and it starts to sound fun. but when i go the pirates tear apart my brain for the silver inside. i looked at my skull and indeed it was the sorriest one i'd ever seen. sorry for believing itself, sorry for falling in love.

i guess i'll go pretend i'm a pirate and rip apart my brain myself. maybe i'll find the silver glint that was my memory of him. i'll make it into a necklace and wring him around my neck, kissing me with knives.

03:40 pm: sad happy things...
Talked to Nora last night.

She said I didn't really drown. She said it was a hot day, and I just needed a drink.

I apologized for blindly believing her.

I am currently writing three short stories. One is about a lady whose destructive impulses take over and almost lead her to burn down the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Another is about a woman desperately trying to take care of a mentally ill child, while going crazy herself. The last one (and the happiest) is about the past, the future, and history. I'm trying to base it on reality so I'll see how it works out. I hope it stays happy.

O, and I told Nora about my odd dream. She said it's not so odd, and that lots of people have been dreaming it lately. I guess they all told her about it, hoping for some sort of reciprocation. It must be nice to hold so many people hostage.

08:47 pm: !
evilpigeon777: i just watched this program on the history channel on machu picchu
rufusownsyou0: incan ruins
evilpigeon777: fun stuff!
rufusownsyou0: haha
evilpigeon777: i wasn't being sarcastic
evilpigeon777: for once
rufusownsyou0: i know : )
rufusownsyou0: i spent much of the afternoon reading a smithsonian animal encyclopedia
rufusownsyou0: celacanths (misspelled) are cool
evilpigeon777: o those fishies?
rufusownsyou0: yeah
evilpigeon777: yay!
rufusownsyou0: they have lobed fins instead of rayed
rufusownsyou0: and along with several species of lungfish, they're the only fish left of what is believed to be the first terrestrial animal
evilpigeon777: wow
evilpigeon777: i thought the first terrestrial animals were slugs
evilpigeon777: they like, crawled up out of the ocean one day,
evilpigeon777: and went on the land
rufusownsyou0: no one really knows, but lobed fish are good candidates because their fins are more like our appendages than those of other fish
rufusownsyou0: enabling them to maybe walk or something
evilpigeon777: like lungfish!
evilpigeon777: i get it!
rufusownsyou0: yeah!
rufusownsyou0: haha, sry i'm going all bio-nerd on you
evilpigeon777: i love it
evilpigeon777: bring it on!
rufusownsyou0: haha, ok
evilpigeon777: what are you learning about in cooper's class?
rufusownsyou0: right now, macroevolution, and today we talked about the theory of puncuated equilibrium
rufusownsyou0: it's fun
rufusownsyou0: classical models for evolution hold that macroevolution is just the acculation of microevolution over a loooooooooong periods of time
rufusownsyou0: basically constant, gradual change that adds up to major change
rufusownsyou0: however
rufusownsyou0: the theory of punctuated equilibrium holds that there can be long periods of stasis (no real change), "puncuated" by relatively rapid periods of diversification (rapid being tens of thousands of years)
evilpigeon777: omg
evilpigeon777: i get it
evilpigeon777: like,
evilpigeon777: wow
rufusownsyou0: yeah it's so cool
evilpigeon777: i'm so happy right now!
rufusownsyou0: yeah i love this stuff
rufusownsyou0: you should read stephen jay gould
rufusownsyou0: he's the main proponent of this theory
rufusownsyou0: and the fossil record is showing that he may be right
evilpigeon777: once i watched this video on evolution and it said something like that
evilpigeon777: that's why i get it
evilpigeon777: otherwise i'd be clueless
rufusownsyou0: haha, nah
rufusownsyou0: you're really smart
evilpigeon777: that would be you
rufusownsyou0: most people would be like, duh, what's a species . . .

10:49 am: What do they have in common?
Hans Christian Andersen
Ernest Hemingway
Gustav Holst
Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain)
Modest Mussorgsky
Charles Dickens
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Gustav Mahler
Mary Shelley
Robert Louis Stevenson
Tennessee Williams
Peter Tchaikovsky
Mary Wollstonecraft
Emile Zola

03:21 pm: DAMNIT.
http://www.wlhs.wlwv.k12.or.us/Counseling/college_guide/major.html
evilpigeon777: that means, basically and sarcastically, i won't be going to a good school
rufusownsyou0: well if you don't have enough money you can get a need-based scholarship
evilpigeon777: how about want-based?

evilpigeon777: all the mail crap they've been sending...
rufusownsyou0: it'll just keep coming until about january senior year
evilpigeon777: back when i took the PSAT, i was still all into and thought i was capable of math and science, so i marked genetics as my intended major...
evilpigeon777: so now i'm getting all this, "your science career" stuff, while i really want to major in English or History
rufusownsyou0: the weird thing with me was that i marked something science, and people kept sending me "your career as a doctor" stuff

08:11 pm: english...
evilpigeon777: hi!
Horsewoman89: hey, what's up?
evilpigeon777: ahhhhh! my writer's journal sucks!!!! i hate myself!!!!!!!!!!
evilpigeon777: u?
Horsewoman89: pretty good, i'm writing my novel
evilpigeon777: lucky u
evilpigeon777: i can't concentrate
evilpigeon777: i've been sitting here all morning
evilpigeon777: i wrote a crappy poem
evilpigeon777: and an angry outburst at beede
Horsewoman89: lol, why?
evilpigeon777: because he hates my writing
Horsewoman89: he doesn't hate it, i think
evilpigeon777: he said he did
Horsewoman89: in those words?
evilpigeon777: he said he loves it and hates it
evilpigeon777: but i'm a pessismist
Horsewoman89: well, a love/hate relationship is not a bad thing
evilpigeon777: with the beede?
evilpigeon777: ugh
evilpigeon777: and last night i had a nightmare about him
evilpigeon777: in it he pulled my hair
evilpigeon777: it hurt
Horsewoman89: lol!
Horsewoman89: that's horrible
evilpigeon777: i'm so distressed right now!

03:54 pm: i may not be updating this for awhile because for English class i have to keep a writing journal, and what i would've put here i'm putting there.

01:58 pm: Winterstorm 2005
I need a Kamera to my eye

nice.

11:56 am: i'll die at 32
i'm having a bit of a crisis right now.

The great thing that used to occupy my mind has rotted away into reality. I think i'll retreat to my old rotted stump in the woods, where i used to contemplate things; i'll use my imagination; people are nicer that way.

That's not the crisis, though; that's life.

Or maybe that is the crisis.

Recently i seem to have lost my ability to feel. Just look at that sentence:

"Recently." As in the time of Wilco and gigs and obsessive live-journal reading. As in the time when i realize things are going to keep getting better and better, and seeming worse and worse.

"I." Now i have to indentify myself?

"Seem." What people do a certain way in my mind.

"to." Helping verb. I think.

"have." Some other useless part of speech (and i'm the grammar spaz; this is depressing).

"Lost." "Phone my family, tell them i'm lost on the sidewalk. And no it's not ok."

"my." As in belonging to me, as in nobody.

"Ability." What you should have the potential for.

"to." Um, Teacher, i think you repeated a question!

"Feel." Something about emotions, maybe spiritual, likely physical, maybe it's all in my head. These are just cliches; frankly, i have no idea what i'm talking about.

That's ten wrong on the final exam on life.

Or maybe that was supposed to be the essay.

I'm screwed.
...

09:58 pm: turning me into an existentialist...
i don't know what i used to be. back then i wasn't concerned with "what." I was me. me running through cold fields full of prickly bushes, barefoot in the winter and screaming to harmonize the wind.

Now, i've realized that if there's to be any meaning in my life, i have to create it myself.

If that means cramming yourself to fit in with the traditional school system, so be it. I have to DO SOMETHING with my life.

if what they're teaching us in history class is correct, existentialists recognize that there is no meaning in the world, and searching for it does no good.

in becoming an existentialist, i hereby exchange my tortured soul for a diligent, hard-working, honest, dependable, responsible, blah, blah, blah soul.

i gotta stop trying to label myself.

maybe, i still am running through the fields, but the fields are my mind, the cold is my heart, the prickle bushes are witty people, and the music is the Ish.

09:15 am: She lies and says she’s in love with him

I suppose that last year was all lies.  But at least they were sincere lies.

 

Now, I don’t even bother.

 

And this has nothing to do with Nora.

 

Speaking of her, I went to her going-away party Friday night.  Suddenly realizing I should get her a going-away gift, I took a quick break from my painting of my cousin and made her a small painting, which I called Crucifix:

 

I told her it was a joint-effort; she could finish it while in Vermont, forever uniting us in friendship.

 

I pretty much just sat in the corner and listened to other people.  I did talk to Dave the Senior (mentioned once before in this journal but I’m not bothering to find out when).  I also talked to Weller (same as above in parentheses).  The whole thing was the opposite of my experience Wednesday night- I was anxious, afraid to talk, totally self-conscious with no self-confidence.  But it was good to see Nora one last time.

 

“Distance has no way of making love…” yeah, yeah.  There’s no love here.  Only that of which I used to lie.

 

And that has nothing to do with Nora.

…

11:10 am: sad, random, and manic-depressive
I'm painting my cousin. It's in the style Renoir's Portrait of Mademoiselle Legrand (see entry dated December 21st, 2004). Only mine has more contrast in the colors of the face, and i use mostly reds and blues.

I have nothing to say. I wander around the hall, knowing that something great is occupying my mind but always forgetting what it is. I'm afraid to remember.

Sometimes I don't mind walking as Jesus did
Sometimes I exist just to act
Good works keep my insanity in check
Evil keeps me over the edge

This time, I won't avoid
You're working against me now
Smoke Shadow Silouette
Words in public places

I don't want to hate you or love you like a captive

I want to be an enigma
It's so normal that i try
Cross out the blossom-references
Dying your last prayer merlot
...

06:15 pm: possible Reality article...
it is the dream of every musician in an orchestra to play with a rock band. or so i always thought. maybe it was because i felt that yearning so strongly.

so i took up the electric bass. it couldn't be too different from my native cello. i learned a few songs that were on the radio, looked up afew tabs. i figured the bass came one christmas, the lessons would come the next.

by next christmas, things had changed. i had actually befriended a member of a real rock band, The Ish. they were to play a gig on january 12th. and they wanted me to play with them. on cello.

before the gig, we had three rehearsals which the normal orchestra player would have found grueling. The Ish plays hard. but i had been ignoring my rocking gene for way too long, and by the third practice, that was exactly what we were doing. the next time we'd play those songs, it would be live.

humidity fogged the window on the ride to Hamilton Street Cafe in Bound Brook, New Jersey. i worried about the people to whom i'd handed out flyers; would they get lost in the fog?

my friend Alec warned me not to act scared because it would make our bassist, Conor, extremely nervous. But Conor, Jacob, and John were not nervous. They were ready to rock.

Soon, the audience began pouring into the dimly lit café. I was introduced to whirl of people, many of whom I still remember who they are. Most of them were friends of the band members from Princeton Day School. They hung around talking and laughing, while The Ish stood on stage wondering when should start to play.

At last, they decided to break out in song, one simply called The New Song. "The titles don't matter," Alec had joked. "Neither do the lyrics."

After The New Song, I made my appearance onstage. I was shaking, but at least it helped me with vibrato. I played with them on three songs, including an exquisite cover of Wilco's Jesus, Etc. Girls in the audience swayed back and forth, reminding me to smile.

Afterwards, the band received lots of praise. They also received lots of hugs. Some people had doubted that the cello would sound good with a rock band. I was glad to prove them wrong. The owner of the Café was so happy due to the large audience, he invited the Ish back for another show. I can't wait.

Later that night, I instant-messaged Conor. He said the band was planning on writing some new songs for their EP album. It is the dream of every musician in an orchestra to write songs with a rock band.

...yup, that's 70,000 readers...

...the Ish will be famous...

...please leave any comments, suggestions...

10:10 pm: Every once in a long while, you get one of those days when you feel really wanted...
I read in this week's Time magazine that helping others gives you the most lasting happiness.

Today, a friend of mine was having some trouble with herself. She thought that she wasn't "pretty" enough. Well that's something i've had plenty of experience with. This is what i said:

Pretty? What the heck?!? You're beautiful. As Latinas we have a special beauty that isn't always appreciated. It is important not to let others' ideas influence how you feel about yourself. I know, sometimes you think, if only i had a white face and small features, and if i were tall, things would be better. I know what that's like. But if you're able to love both your inner and outer beauty, you will be a lot happier.

...a lesson for all.

And then, one of the most amazing experience of my life.

The Ish rocked. I mean, maybe we weren't "in the groove" like we'd been in rehearsal. But being on stage is a lot different. Me, i was shaking the whole time. It's hard to play an instrument while shaking, especially one without frets. But it helped with the vibrato. Ok She Left didn't come to that amazing climax we'd hoped for. Red Brown Coat didn't rock hard enough. But this was only a beginning. There're much greater things to come for The Ish.

Playing was amazing. Other things were amazing, too. I was actually able to set aside my social anxiety and talk to some of the band's friends. It turns out, they were all really cool! And nice, too. Maybe i should try talking more often...

...speaking of talking...

i talked to this guy, and i liked it. I usually do not like things i'm not good at. And i fell flat on my face in front of his wit. o well. it was nice meeting him.

Anyway, more amazing stuff: people thought i sounded good with the band. And i think the band appreciated me, too. This is the time when i felt really wanted. The Ish is the nicest group of people i know.

Well, it's not enough to just describe it in words. Not now, anyway. When i'm a better word-artist, i will write about it. Or, i'll just write it for Reality. yeah, i think i'll do that.

11:59 am: So i printed up flyers for The Ish's performance, and handed them out at school yesterday.

It turns out that everyone either has guitar lessons on Wednesday or isn't allowed to go to new jersey... and to think pennsbury kids call themselves "ghetto."

Surprsingly, i had the best responses from the TEACHERS! They all said they would try to make it. Shows ya who my true friends are in that school.

Well, today i asked if i could hang the flyers in the halls. It turns out i'm not even allowed to hand them out. Well, screw it. I'm in one of those do-whatever-the-hell-i-want moods. The Ish will rock.

Well, even if people don't see The Ish at the Hamilton St. Cafe, at least they will see them at my party. The date is set: Jan 22nd, 7 pm-12 am. I'm sure that whomever's reading this is invited.

If you're reading this and i haven't invited you, leave a comment with your screen name and i will get back to you soon.

04:21 pm: Nora, etc.
In orchestra this morning Mr. E took role, as usual. "Woods!" he called
"Here," Nora answered.
"This is Nora's last day with us," Mr. E said. "She's going to Vermont."

The first moment was winter static shock.

Then, the tears carved path in my cheeks. They hit the edges of my lips and creeped to the middle of the cupid's bow, meeting in the center. From here they dripped down onto my cello. I tried to focus on the tears to forget why i was crying.

It didn't work. After i had escaped class for awhile, until orchestra was over, i ran into Mr. E int the empty hall. "Is everything ok?" he asked. I shook my head.
"Nora," i answred, and i couldn't say much more. He knew what i meant.
"sometimes," he said, "We invest a lot of energy in a friend, but it turns out they just didn't do the same for us. You're lucky that you learned early, and you're not like me, 40 something years old and still doing it."
I nodded silently.
"Think of it this way," he said, "She didn't even tell you she was leaving."

After B period, i was talking to Megan in the bathroom. "I need to find Nora," i said quickly.
"I think she's right over there," Megan said, pointing to the sinks. And there she was.

"Nora!" i ran up to her with wide eyes and folded hands. "Goodbye," i choked out.

"What are you talking about?" she asked. "You actually listened to Mr E? He's nuts! I'm not leaving for a few weeks."

"Oh..." was all i could say to her.

"I would tell you when i'm leaving."

Later that day, i was feeling my old mischeivousness coming back for the first time in over a week. When i'm like that, i feel like i can do anything i want. So it was natural deciding to just drop in on Mr. Beede's pre-AP English class with Christa, when i was supposed to be at the library. They were writing poems. I wrote one:

i am the woman that loves you
but i don't know who i am
What is a woman?
Dress-up Dictators
love is panacea
vanity, woes
i can't see romance
but i know who you are

are you a woman who loves me?
you, electric eggshell
What is a woman?
a piece of the puzzle?
love is stumbling
across ocean canyons
i won't see you here
i will see you in the family photos

When i got home from school, i got a phone call from my mother: "We're thinking about changing your medication."

One more thing: i asked mr. E about a cello pickup. He told me to go to Sam Ash and get a fishman cello pickup. "It hooks up to a regular bass amp," he said. Thank goodness i took up electric bass.