november came and brought the north wind with it.
_______________ ____________
OCTOBER 31 2001 06:57 GMT+1
introspecting
tightness in the poot-throat, it's amazing what one night of bad sleep will do to me. and even more do what one can correct. drawn out now, this vacation/work/living experience grows tiresome. monotomy is exciting until it grows monotomous.
i'm watching the leaves painting, competing for the hanging beside the buildings. oranges and yellows that fill up a sense, and the greyness of the sky whose backdropness is lost in colour unless you notice how incredibly grey it is.
i'm snapping, i'm snap snap snapping, but processing films around here is some kind of incredible luxury - right after dry-cleaning, yesterday i paid over 16 dollars for a white blouse and three linen napkins. we may have our luxuries at home, but procesing film ain't one of them. in fact i'm starting to watch them and wonder what is their own balance between what they spend their money on for fun and how many nights they stay home to wait in line for the washing machines in the basement...well that's my few lines of criticism, take it or leave it.in the beginning, i was wont to search for controversy that i couldn't spell out here. the point was to make statements that were original, were mine, that no one could refute. they were there, though veiled, and failed, i think, but i created something else in the process. i return often to those veiled statements, as i read and re-read often this excercise. none of them needs re-making. some are lost, even on me, others are still stupid. that's not a bad thing. and as this space grows on me, somehow my brain knows which stories are worth trying to retell, which have been told enough, and which are still to be made. because the most important point is still unchanged; if you don't have a point to make, however small, then what in fact is the point?
"when i fall in love, it will be forever, or i'll never fall in love
in a restless world like this one, love is ended before its begun
and so many moonlight kisses seem to cool in the warmth of the sun"
Edward Heyman, Victor Young
we're a confidant, a friend, a roomate, a wife, a husband, an entertainment source and a tv-mate. these roles are interchangeable._______________ ____________
OCTOBER 30 2001 06:50 GMT+1
who painted the world halloween orange
the night's calculations were as follows. numerous and stimulating. chicken paprikas, a strong, smiling Irish woman, boundaries retained, and as much honesty as we could cram between the three of us.
they say i'm naive but they like it, gives them hope.
i don't need hope. they see limitations, i see the possibilities. mostly.
more java please!
how much structure do you need? just because my structure is different from yours doesn't make it better, but it does make it different. i'm not going anywhere fast this morning. i'm writing realistic words in a groggy state of mind; a second pot of java notwithstanding. i reach for the rings, i want to swing oxygen into my lungs. i dream of a kitchen far and wide, of a winding wooden staircase, of a heated tile floor in the bathroom, and of a bar tightened across a doorframe to hang from. that's it, that's all, that's more.
i dream of things attainable, enrichable, and those which will allow me to play out the setting of life.argh.
some days, the java is more chocolatey. not a leaf was missed this year. are they colored for the occasion? not a leaf. why can't i pull myself away from it.
______________ ____________
OCTOBER 29 2001 08:41 GMT+1
my very own primal screamit's an orange world that greets me now, how orange can it get. not awake and not moving, i'm still, here. i like it just this way. a superb pot of java is attempting to jar my brain into action.
reaching for new ways, original lines, the point is in the newness; changes. some things stay poised and fixed; the degree of darkness of the java, it's freshness and it's quality, must all be quite precise. and the freedom to think; these are the grounding points. the rest must be unique and in a vacuum. to remember el segundo, to make myself a promise. to float on dreams of unawakeness, in a land where words on the wall are all that matters. where originality is the only prize. perhaps it's a forcing, an encouraging a certain freedom in the ones who can't see it. a weird painting that no one understands, a beckoning for those who do. maybe it's a primal scream.
and friends come, friends go. they've crossed each other's ways - how odd - and we've greeted them in this northern place. we've walked and talked and played and boated, not solved the meaning of life over and over again. whiskey sure doesn't help.
so there's nothing original here yet again, taking a number won't advance you into some line in some room where some one whispers the answers into your brain, nor mine; but if you listen very very carefully, close up to the space in between, you will hear the music - you will taste the neighbours marshmallows - and you will remember telling your friends that hotwheels can't fly.
And once you're done remembering and really feeling all of those things you thought were gone forever, you might begin to see that even though you cannot in fact know the answer, you can hear it, you can taste it, and if you really want to, you can believe it too.
_______________ ____________
OCTOBER 28 2001 08:35 GMT+1formatting, reformatting, why anyone would want coffee that is not serious, i don't know. or most things, for that matter.
the other bodies are moving now... infringing on my space!burning throat overall, flip flopping together as if we're them - and watching the sixties-sculpted ones and their big hair and orange striped shirts. we do the math to see how much more it costs to look like you're from the past. . .
today, we're bob oxley. groundhog day is still here, again and again. oranges are called apelsins!
second pot of java as they fumble about me; hollaring around the rooms. the rooms in this place. jets are taking off now and landing over my head. i'm happy they're enjoying themselves. it's a moment close to christmas.
not more, not less.
______________ ____________
OCTOBER 27 2001 09:07 GMT+1the juxtaposition of things
a thick tarry batch, and i'm thinking of spaces, the places we could occupy; of heated floors and sinks that work; doors that close and a general sense of functionality that is not something we are used to. it's doable, now do we do it?
fitting lesson to learn in sweden.sit up straight, poots, while you can. never you mind the air moving over exposed skin, stop chewing, and write. pleasant dreams, wrapped in a white blanket. later night at the irish pub, we observed with all our might. cohese the thoughts.
so in sum, we're groggy, we're defining a sweden we know and don't, and ourselves at a time; a time that came randomly but accurately, while the world rocks.
the vegetarian one has smaller goals - life goals - and we, bustling slowly with our own. together on different roads, the three (and tonight four) of us gesture gently from our proverbial paths for the other.
it's a touristy day, as things get ordinary for us. we're displaying them, holding the wares out one by one in this northerly place. a similar place, a harmonious place.
since the visitor came thru amsterdam, we await the luggage before the journeys of the day.
i don't know what the vegetarian one will eat for breakfast.
do you?
- - - - - - - - - -
(prison story) where do you draw the line between not having learned how to deal with other people in childhood, and insanity.
______________ ____________
OCTOBER 25 2001 19:58 GMT+1"one day i'll fly away, leave your love to yesterday.
what more can your love do for me,
when will love be through with me..."-Will Jennings
sung by Shirley Bassey
as i lean out overlooking kadett street from the highest floor; i watch people coming, going, in the early winter cold, and i wait. they're moving about their lives; i'm watching them, watching myself. the sight i oversee from that bedroom perch on the fourth floor is more europe than europe itself. i'm singing without my knowledge and a woman stops, looks up and across the street. it's that quiet. the massive buildings that are all the same height house all the city people, in paler shades of yellows and peach, but maintain a majesty, a charisma of old world charm that perhaps i'm the only one looking at today. in my world, i dream of what they are all doing through both the dimly and brightly lit windows. nothing more exciting than watching them, i decide. if it can be possible to feel on top of the world, halfway tween earth and sky, somewhere between the past and tomorrow, this is it. perfectly magic.only the love songs eminating from the box in the corner wrap the moment in glitter, no matter the wait. come, sing with me... i'm waiting.
______________ ____________ "wherever you go, whatever you do, i will be right here waiting for you - whatever it takes or how my heart breaks,
i will be right here waiting for you"
- Richard Marx
OCTOBER 25 2001 13:33 GMT+1shivers now, i've spent too much time leaning out the window watching five meter attendants, puzzling over what to do about a car that already has a ticket. it's probably a rarity in a civilized country.
what have you spent too much time doing, lately. this question falls in the pile of 'what did you make for dinner last night' . . there is a peace that comes with time if it comes at the right time. three hands of cards, irish radio, for the first time in a long time i don't feel as though i missing something. missing the action. that's a terrible feeling to live with after the age of 22. and now i don't feel it. there's no job i miss now, no friday nights in earnst. can it really take fourteen years to get over that? unbelievable.
______________ ____________
OCTOBER 25 2001 10:18 GMT+1documentaries by http://www.ninadavenport.com
she's a creative girl, the kind i'd run across the continent (ok planet) to interview, if i were to take john's listoops and run amok. we all have lists, i guess. i wonder how similar they are, could we chart a graph of lists? would these too, fit into a gaussian distribution? D.L. is one of the most intelligent people i've ever met, and he doesn't see the world that way. i can't imagine that, seeing every characteristic as if they exist in a vacuum; and not making up some persona that fits into a parcel. so he's in the box that doesn't see the boxes, big deal, he still fits into one. doesn't make him any less interesting. coming from one of the best schools in the country and wearing striped socks.human beings are not that complicated. large computers can divy us up and fit us neatly into personality parcels and graph us up. either we'd take a trip around the world or we wouldn't. add a million bucks and the equation gets even simpler. our children's socks either match or they don't.
parcelocation, i've called it in the past. we all have one. which one are you?
______________ ____________
OCTOBER 25 2001 8:57 GMT+1THE guest ranter appears.
______________ ____________
OCTOBER 24 2001 18:48 GMT+1ms. kringen runs around coventry taking pictures of herself in rear view mirrors; she's looking everwhere, for her. she's thinking madonna is extremely self-indulgant yet manages to have a family. there's analagies here, people who have turned me off for smaller things; i'm sorry for that, but i've learned from it. you'll always turn some on, some off; and each won't be of your choosing, but you will be forced to live with the consequences. small moments, minutaie, will make lifelong friends, and large bursts of coming onto the scene to impress others will yet fail, endlessly, over and over again. there is no predicting the two; no discerning between them, but to live with any pleasure that it might bring your way. and to be thankful for the ones who return, face to the ground, asking forgiveness; or accepting yours.
hot face, our guest did not arrive as scheduled. we wait.
we've got music and new words to keep us afloat, he's wondering what is mahir's position on the terrorism.
"mahir: diplomat for nobody, spokesman for all", says he.ok we've had a twinge of 'wanna go home now',
just a twinge. we're still wondering how much more swedish this place can get. ulla britt is the mailperson, not knowing which door to deliver my mail. pretty much just waiting for the guest - an old friend by anyone's standards, another soul who 'came back' - part greek part armenian born in egypt; he understands most thing very very well.
_________________________________________________
OCTOBER 24 2001 8:58 GMT+1
in words, i sing."good morning starshine
the earth says hello"
these mep-lines, a melody.
this is music the best way i know.
it's the past, it's the now.
theories work for me. are they unable to create their own,"such are the dreams of the everyday housewife;
you see everywhere anytime of the day,
the everyday housewife who gave up the good life for me..."
or unstrong enough to believe in them? something must be true. waiting for external validation may be in vain; and when you're wrong - there's no one else to blame. so you blame yourself, get really angry, and then you don't make the same big mistakes twice.______________ ____________
OCTOBER 23 2001 17:45 GMT+1bubblings still, comings togethers - can we create these?
poots arms, outstretched, wraps it all up.
something big is coming. wish i knew what.
lists of fixits for the mep in my inbox. guests arriving, boots fries up some chicken livers (hungarian delicacy),
and old country music twangs from the box in the corner. the air feathers are fluffed;
we're bouncing them around
we're sitting in our corner,
and sticking our thumbs in the pie!
bootsy does the better than the not-so-pathetic country dance. i'll guess we win the prize for the strangest collection of objects on a dining room table in sweden:
broken self-winding phone jack extension cord, red yoyo, thick white candle, calculator, RSA securID encryption card, yellow pack of matches from montreal, a pile of drachmas, 6 ballpoint pens, a GSM prepaid phone card, a cork mat, a pack of kleenex, a loto 649 ticket, a metal @ logo thingy, an airport bus schedule, telephone, glass of australian wine, umbrella cover, tickets to michael mcdonald, pack of swedish gum and a printout of a page off the internet titled "the origin of prozac". (i almost forgot, one really flat laptop)
______________________________________________________
OCTOBER 23 2001 07:03 GMT+1a feeling deep in your soul;
says you were half, now you're whole -
no more hunger or thirst,
but first, be a person who needs people!
people who need people,
are the luckiest people...
i n
t h e
w o r l d ...
-Bob Merrill 1964
i feel these, these lyrics, with my soul. what was groundbreaking about them, anyways? the world was a place to be in 1964. downtown was 'Downtown', not only because the lights were much brighter, but because traffic was romantic, a sign of prosperity. so how do i know all of this, how do i know the feeling in the air? have i merely interpreted all of it, making me some kind of fetal historian, replete with an imprinted view of the years i was born? what is my purpose with this information, to write it here? to enjoy the moulin rouge? to sing in the streets...
or simply to bring it inside of me;
to be with it, to give it, to take it,
where i go. sometimes that's enough,
sometimes it's not.we're gathering now, winter is coming in the nordic places, and the projects are completing, the families connecting.
. but not just yet, so go back. for now, we're in both places, like some kind of different head space, we'll split us up.so was that sanity you heard in me;
and i'm speaking sanely from so, far, away.
yes it's a sense of normalcy, an even keelness,
a historical balancing act; a play with an ending;
it's being played out whether you film it or not,
it's your life if you live it or not,
the choices are few but must be taken
or waged no more.
dream: the inspector was coming, we had to know how to calculate something, the basement was messy and filled with old furniture, so i swept, i folded, i tucked, i hung. there were two other women there, liz and dolly i think, and i explained to them what he was going to ask. i wasn't afraid, i was confident; i had done it before. i was getting great satisfaction out of the tidying. then i heard he arrived upstairs, they disappeared, and i quickly got dressed. every time i turned around, there was another ironing board to be folded, another corner to be swept. then small pieces of paper, with instructions, folded neartly and placed in the drawer, i wanted to tell them which drawer but they were gone. i waited for him to come downstairs but the radio woke me up.
no need to come looking for me. i'm there.
_____________________________________________
OCTOBER 22 2001 07:36 GMT+1the neighbours abide the 'close the door quietly sign' while away from their eyes, poots wakes up anyways. sip, sip, sip, tepid java warms the soul. sip sip lips of gold.
and so for 420SEK (60 bucks) each, michael mcdonald lit up our night; (we lit our day). a thousand or two swaying swedes smiled, singing the choruses. a tall , already bright ceiling peaked over us flashing in the light show, as if to say it were a architectural cathedral. he's a Christian, you can tell. are they?
the smooth white mug is empty now; poots and boots contemplate what we must throw away in order to simplify our lives; a good espresso-shudder; it's quiet here. so very very quiet. silence is golden...
he says:
"i keep forgetting, i'm not in love anymore..."
and:
"minute by minute i keep holdin' on"
and:
"what a fool believes..."she says:
if ever you begin to doubt the unique individuality and beauty of every woman, travel to a foreign country. if that doesn't work, come to sweden._______________ ___________
OCTOBER 21 2001 15:58 GMT+1you never know what people will like. i'm not in any kind of private mode, but here is a secrecy that i can make grand about. there are edges now, buzzlings, meanderings that are bringing things ahead.
i'm thinking of ruth across the street, of our friend still in athens, of art, of movies. i'm wondering how to bring all of these things, these thoughts together. bigger than the mEp, wider than my own world, there's got to be a way. well in fact, i know there is.
and that's all it takes; knowing, really knowing. i can't imagine being blinded without that, being disabled to being yourself. this, the greatest tragedy. but i digress.
so in true bohemian spirit, we dance together, we sing together, we make movies in our minds. but much, much, more importantly; we discuss over, and over again - the true meaning of life. and in doing so, we share it.
The day will come when after harnessing space, the winds, the tides and gravitation, we shall harness the energies of love. And on that day, for the second time in the history of the world, we shall have discovered fire.
--Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
__________________________________________________
OCTOBER 21 2001 12:48 GMT+1it's a clean, lazy day.
a lightness, a positive direction fills me up today.
i can't say why! we buzz around our 74 square meters, dreaming of reproducing the sink and the heated floor,
we watch - and we watch."in wartime you have to paint your enemy in black and white"
-some guy being interviewed on CNNdo you know how my colors are chosen, free-flowing from inside of me, warm when i need warmth; cold when i feel very strong, and others, colours that paint my deepest self without my conscious knowledge. this is a process i recommend for life as you live it. the colours that come from us by merely not thinking, eminate a naturalness that says who we are and that drives us in the directions we are meant to go. i can't explain the balance between this natural ebb and flow, and when to stand up and yell, but with one comes the other, as long as the truth is spoken inside of you. i'm wrong sometimes, but rarely wrong in honesty, rarely wrong in honesty. i guess there's not much else.
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OCTOBER 21 2001 08:58 GMT+1it's possible that there's a natural order. a time to stop drinking coke, a time to move to california, and a time to register a domain name. soon this will be the new home,
but for now, go back.i've got a renewed sense of sense, and it would seem someone has noticed. it might be related to the buses. amongst city construction zones, we walked yesterday under mighty scaffolding. a bus, a reading woman, diesel fumed their way past. in this europe place, we move on buses and trains they take us where we need to go. i'm watching the moving pedestrians and i'm realizing how late in life i have learned these lessons. i think of those who learned them earlier, those who traveled far and wide at the age of 18, on trains and learning how other people moved. my sister was one of them and i wonder if this experience stamps some kind of lifelong practical-understanding stamp in a brain. coming home with a greater understanding, not of acropolis or eiffel towers, but of a prgamatism that you can take throughout your life, just by knowing that people move around by buses and trains, even if everyone back home has at least 2 cars per family.
these are the things i wonder, after sprayed jeans and children who don't know the sixties.
M asterpiece
O verwhelming
U nprecedented
LO V E
I ncomparable
N ebulousR avishing
O utstanding
U nbelievable
G rand
E xactly!
my drinking, my ...., my ..., weaves me the mat on which my sould will sleep for eternity.
____________________________________________________
later....
about taking dr.T for lunch after a long hiatus, and realizing that i am actually becoming part of the woman in her that i admired. i wonder if the reverse is true. i wonder what she realy thought of my screed. she was a mentor of mine, although she is soft and small and appears fragile, inside she is hugely strong and individual. perhaps i saw it in her from the beginning, but i doubt i am the only one because some other wise oens gravitated towards her, although more stayed away. i dont blame them for not understanding.
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OCTOBER 19 2001 08:18 GMT+1bootsy brought the sun back!
argle gargle, achy bones, i'm formatting and reformatting, never awake yet, stronger pot of coffee, bring it on, on, on. physical things are in my mind now, itchy eyes, brain swooshes about, heavier than this wooden chair, legs folded over; tick tick, one more day.
one more sunset, baby i'll be satisfied
and then again, you know what it would do
would leave me wishing still, for one more day with you...
-Bobby Tomberlin and Stephen Dale Jones
the smiling, tanned one struts about. it's even nicer to be home than to finally have them home.
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OCTOBER 18 2001 18:55 GMT+1
tweedle dee tweedle dum! little poots is on the run. in the middle of the city, arching branches reach into mirrored water, dusk and reflections both which frame idyllic urban, yet hard to imagine, settings, just a pootscoot away. where is the digital camera when you need it most. its a beautiful fairy tale view as my brain opens up to absorb it for the first time, really.
____________________________________________
OCTOBER 18 2001 7:20 GMT+1
java number two, did i tell you that the mugs are smaller?
becoming less fanatical, less excessive, landing into a quiet space between the mEp and cNn.the elvis book is a nice time transport - at least in my mind. when three dollars was something, imagine, something, because money when scarce, had meaning, a dollar really was a dollar and it was money. not this blurred concept of money that most of us now know. what's three dollars, it's not even a bank charge. in 1954 it was a pair of shoes; a day's wages for some, it was my mother not yet arrived in montreal, buying bananas for the first time, we're rich! she thought, rich! i've never said this in english before, but i long for those simple days. i dream of when everything meant something. things weren't taken for granted, everything had a value in all it's simplicity and seeming unimportance. your shoes were your shoes, and without them you didn't have a pair of shoes. it wasn't the pair that you don't really wear cause they been under the bed for two months are aren't really in style anymore.
still, elvis bought three cars in a span of 6 months because the first two were bashed up or burned. (not on purpose). lincolns and then a pink cadillac, actually. he was a shy, weird guy, perfectly fitting in the social psychology theory which states who's 'allowed' to be really odd without being incarcerated or diagnosed - and that's the really rich, the itinerant, and the famous, amongst others. i think elvis fit into this perfectly - wearing pink and lime green suits and fussing constantly with his hair. it's funny, it's actually true, his hair was a thing because his hair was a thing.
another gray day in the northern hemisphere;
poots can't find a receipt;
she was supposed to go for a walk and hasnt,
pacman's on tv, sneezes, and tepid java.______________________________________________________
OCTOBER 17 2001 18:10 GMT+1
well ate again, thanks God for that. delicious skinny pasta strings and maybe no wine tonight. ginger ale and a splash of gold rootbeer will result in cheaper telephone bills.
spirit lifting! inside personal brackets, baby steps inject bigger bites of life for me. changes of scenery, advances in our delays, and some free time for next week, all serve to boost pootsmoral. :-)
post fed, i slouch and gurgle.
running thru the city in the early mist leaves a yawning poot. ferry-boating thru the baltic sea to a cable car, and rooms with red cushions and small burning candles.
sluggish, still headachy, i'm learning how really badly i am unable to entertain myself.
http://www.soul-patrol.com/soul/five.htm
this is the band that sang 'oo o child'
oo child, things are gonna get easier...
oo child, it's gonna get brighter
oo child, things are gonna get easier...
oo child, it's gonna get brighter___________________________________________________
OCTOBER 16 2001 18:20 GMT+1
well fed with fleish i fill my flask and turn to you. warm faces, greeting me in inboxes swarmth me with positivity and unnecessary strengths. i speak my mind and people turn to me. i treat them with patience and feel guilty when i think i have slandered them.
closer, closer now, bootsy's return. robot cats, can't decide about that. the japanese have this perverse fascination with childish things. it's weird for a people who appear so mature.
tix in hand - we sang as we walked along the street. it's ok to do certain things here, and the combination of which is simply a new combination, that's all.
bruises appear on my face in the morning, is pugsly so dangerous?
i often wonder if i'm allowed to rearrange the sentence structure given me, can you believe only this week i understand that it's a part of my efficiency program, not to waste words, nor energy to express yourself. i won't say that poot never wastes anyone's time, nor any physical things, but to say or write something is to say it concisely and precisely. i don't know why.
thanks God for wonderful Swedish lammstek! i can't help it, i'm a carnivore. i know i am.
i won't address so many things going on in the world right now, i will pray, i will hope, i will spread peace if i can.
___________________________________________________
OCTOBER 16 2001 7:01 GMT+1well-slept and awoken only with the lamenting oboes, ten hours of dreamland awaited me. i'll follow that near-perfect sleep with a silent room lacking cnn and perhaps extra cream. it's some times when the world is out there and we decide that it's harsh, even if we are alone, and we don't want to see what is really going on, especially when it's changed for the only time in your life at such an old age for many of us and we just can't really believe it yet. are our parents sad for us that it's changed, i won't dare ask them.
as a family we may project high energy, but we inject high peace too. i often compare our family to others that we know, but i can only see the projection; i only pretend to know the collective personality. it's difficult from the inside, but it's something, i know it is. see the peaches, see them project thru todd, a collectiveness that perhaps only he portrays but that they all feel. we're not the portraying type, although two of us have a knack for photography, but we still do portray a strong familyness, in my words:
bonds that are often invisible but impervious; the need to share our joy, pride in our parents, and a love for knowledge, including art and not excluding the mEp.
maybe it's time for the mEp to include the family.
march 99 was a nice place_______________________________________________________
OCTOBER 15 2001 18:23 GMT+1
the peaches are keen :-)
home again, parcels now to keep me warm. cheesy comestibles and a CNN scare, inside the goblet smells like a thousand grapey grapes all squished under feet and stored in oaky barrels but inside the lips it tastes like golden nectar, appley and honeyed, like bursting yellow barley candy, it's such a private joy alone by itself.
rest my shoulders, rest. dull dull.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
OCTOBER 14 2001 20:04 GMT+1
i wonder if all the men behind him are there to jump him in case he says something wrong? how come he can be surrounded by his colleagues but the President must stand alone, sounding rather, err, i'd rather not say. mr G. is a big man i think.
it's a nice book but some parts are over-detailed and quite frankly, making me sleepy. not that that would take much on this, the official LONGEST weekend of my life. today was a teency bit longer than yesterday, i suppose that's how he does it, day in and out, accustomation is a useful thing.
the glossy mags are rifled thru, read, gawked, and flipped.
some of the ads on tv are brilliant, making me cry (GE) and others lamer than lame. even before the Thoraya one appears I can hear his annoying, monotone voice saying everything in the absolute WRONG intones... "Hello, you can hear me can't you? Standing here, I can speak to you on any mobile phone..." aaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh8:10, soon i can go to bed. seems that my headache might be gone now; i'm just waiting for tomorrow, having somewhere to go, somewhere to be, something to get showered and dressed for, someone expecting me to be there even if to sit and read more email.
alt f s in this olivey place; warm, welcoming, mine. private yet not. just how i like it. :-)
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -
OCTOBER 14 2001 13:43 GMT+1
i was twelve when Elvis died. i had it all together then. not one mystery i hadn't figured out. i remember running down the hallway to tell my mother. all i knew about him was that he had big hair and sung love songs to screaming women. so here i sit, twenty four years later, reading about his youth, remembering that kind of conviction, having the whole world waiting for you, when anything is possible, about all the minutiae, the greyness that guides us this way and some that, the subtleties that present certain situations for some and not for others. is it true that there just isn't enough public appetite for more famous people, or is that just what the media would have us believe? then i think about the strength of conviction of some of those who come from poverty, a cross between having nothing to lose, and knowing either way, you'll have to work hard your whole life. i've been thinking alot lately about having something to lose.
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OCTOBER 14 2001 08:23 GMT+1i wonder how much people's individual experiences change their ability to feel a generally accepted modum. perhaps i've made up that word but i think a word needs to be made up for it. such a strangeness having to make up words for things so widely espoused. we're not connected enough - or no, in my post headachal state, i'm going to say you're - and you know who you are - not connected enough to generalities, to those vibes that move us, to the things that bring us together as people. by this, let me clarify, i'm talking about love; i'm talking about accepting your own fragilities; about looking inside yourself truthfully; i'm talking about admitting that you are at all human, and in doing so reflecting that back to others. how can such an important concept be so lightly handled? is it our /dominated world, and i say that in al truthfulness, without prejudice, hoping that someone of you can understand this. it would require the former to hold true, meaning that only the honest can accept truths like that without using them as fuel or hurt. i leave out an adjective above, leaving it as only 'dominated world' choose your dominator i'll call mine 'male' maybe you call it 'animal' ... because it doesn't seem to be dominated by you, and it doesn't mean i have anything against men. /switching back/ here comes more poot style anger, only riled by the ones who aren't themselves, and only because it limits myself. i'm angry that so many put up with so much, leaving me powerless. i doubt that you believe this; you think me trite for blaming others; when in fact the opposite is true. in blaming you i am irrevocably pointing the finger at the most deeply guilty of them all, that's me of course. it's just something that we can't do alone, we can't create it alone and unfortunately we can't get out alone. remind you of anything else? see how important it is to be as one? see how justified my anger is? but please note how i choose to vent it. please note that i still can.
and my original point?
if you are over 30 and you're not moved in some emotional or instinctual way by these lyrics, then i doubt you've read this far.i'm not blaming you, but i am praying for you.
p e o p l e ;- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
p e o p l e w h o n e e d p e o p l e
a r e t h e l u c k i e s t p e o p l e
i n t h e w o r l d . . .-Bob Merrill 1964
_sidebar
addicted to this stuff
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OCTOBER 13 2001 17:41 GMT+1photographic day turned into headache day. carrying heavy objects including the camera slung around my neck and not stopping to eat soon enough combined with sore feet and frantic searching for something to bring home to read along with plastic bags that cut into my hands leave me slightly nautilus with a tension headache immune to tylenol, reading, and rootbeer. last night writhing until sleep with some kind of dull, aching intermittent spasm in the back of my right thigh, and now i'd like to bash my neck with a brick. it's a lovely weekend without my boots. inactivity is dangerous for this poot, rotting sitting in chairs, rotting staring at green screens, rotting thinking the same endless thoughts over and over and over again and rotting with a headache, the source of current rot. i was not meant to be inactive, now i have proof. i'm not a couch potato - watch me rot - i'm not a big reader either - watch me ache - i'm not anything that sits still very well once i'm awake. ahah! you see the real me now, not the one who sits here every morning waking up slowly, gently, with half in and out thoughts still cloudy with fresh sleep melatonins, that is the duality of it all, i'm phasic, and once i'm awake and consider myself interacting with the planet, i'm feisty, energetic, move non-stop, and have very little understanding of anyone who doesn't. there. i said it.
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OCTOBER 13 2001 07:22 GMT+1more mail from bootsy in paradise, complete with two life realizations and the prospect of tears. funny this world.
it is saturday, and there's no rushing, it's not another manic monday. a beautiful rembrandt sky outside the kitchen as the northerly poles tilt away from the rising sun. it's a fitting welcome for a photography day.
now there is time to rest my feet - allow the java to slowly penetrate the lining of my stomach - and allow it to stir brain activity in a natural way. again, why is natural these things, why is peaceable movement natural, it's natural for me that's all. i suppose i can't speak for anyone else, and truthfully, i'm not trying to. i guess even if i were that fairy queen, i still wouldn't change anyone. i'd be a pretty lame fairy queen. good thing i'm not one.
i can't say i'm using this free time well. i'm not thinking too deeply, i'm not praying much. empty time doesn't make good for those things. it's like voided space, with little input, the output is minimal. it might have it's uses later on. i'll wait for that. in the meantime i'll run about town with the camera i suppose and snap snap snap. then i'll try to bring something back here.
yes i stole these. sue me. just kidding. i'll give them back.
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OCTOBER 12 2001 later... later..."let the children's laughter, remind us how we used to be..."
i have to admit, i'm sitting here alone, watching the markets fall and the bells going off from the station as it displays large drops in the major markets. is it just me or do i hear trembling in the voices of the people being questioned.. are they nervous because they are on TV or are they really afraid. i'm alone, watching, watching. i'm a strong person but i am also someone who has a very vivid imagination. they have no proof and i'm quite knowledgeable in the field of science. but. what bothers me is that they are all there, that the whole world is watching. that bells are ringing. that leaders probably aren't getting much sleep. those are the things that bother me most.
i'm just writing to occupy myself and i'll continue to do so.
sdfasdfjk;lasdf;lkjasd;lkfja;lsdkfj just like her i'm fascinated with words, with letters and patterns in nature.
and you Really know there's something weird going on when poots is linking to industrial averages ...
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OCTOBER 12 2001 later...
if i was a writer, i'd have to write. i'd sit in front of this machine, or another, and i'd have to think of words, one by one, and put them, one by one, in some kind of order that most people could understand. these thoughts would have to be clear, concise, and say something that someone would appeal to someone. i could do that. it would help to have subjects, and specifically subjects that require thought, but i could do it. i am capable of making such a list. there are many subjects that i think about, many concepts that i am interested in. so the question remains. why don't i do it?
peace prizes, funny time for such a thing. hmmm.
so now i have TIME . i could analyze the war, proclaim myself a personal war analyst. i will not do so. i could write beautiful poetry, could do so. i could tell you that Mr. Bush looks too confident, too cocky. i think that is a dangerous thing, and i won't say any more about it. perhaps you agree. i'm sticking my nose in a bunch of online forums where it doesn't take long for me to feel like i don't belong. these are the things that happen when you have too much time. you think too much, analyze too much, worry too much, care too much. i do prefer to have danglings in my eyes to bat out of the way in this way and that, pushing things to the left and right, it passes time in a pathetic way but the stimulation isn't constant. is there a way to keep injecting our brains with ideas that keep us on our toes instead of burdens us?
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OCTOBER 12 2001 fr(ee)dagjava on the left, CNN on the right, here i am.
peace prize morning - yes, please! would i know this if i wasn't here? did you know that the peace prize is the only one that's not Swedish? i supposed there's some scandalogical reason. it evades me and the Swedes aren't interested in it.
funny how when airlines converge and merge, we care more than when pharmaceutical companies do so. affects us somehow more personally. branding?
another gray looking day in the north; sister in laws appear lengthily in the inbox. how warming. they are vif people too.
her stories are detailed, and personal. they reveal, and connect.i can't imagine there is much left over there to destroy. i'm starting to think perhaps that's enough, now. i'd like to tell them. where is www.thiswar.com? where is the 'contact us' button?
s
o
m
et
h
i
n
g m u s t c h a n g e . . . . .
is it selfless to continue our lives as they were. the locals feel detached, and i know that usually we are guilty of that. as each day goes by i realize that yes dorothy, things really have changed since september 11.
ok i'm guilty. i bought boots, a denim dress, and wild striped swedish socks. photos of none of which appear in any of these links.
i've all of a sudden absorbed the entire romanticism of what's going on. :-) i knew i would. how did i know? listen to your heart, your gut, whatever you think is talking to you. listen.
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OCTOBER 11 2001 thursdagsipping familiar tastes and food that the other one prepared,
perched as i do on bended legs, i return to face the square ones
for an evening. preoccupied in nothing, i can walk through busy downtown markets in any particular direction while no one notices anything i do or anyone i'm not waiting for. no one knows how much money i don't have in my pocket, no one knows that i'm not waiting for anyone on the corner as i get lost, no one know if i have anywhere to go tonight, and no one knows that i don't really understand the style thing happening around here.unless it's more obvious than i think with all those young people with strange collars and long flared jean skirts that look as though they don't really fit.
it's rare that we see words that someone else writes ring true for us. a truer spirit emerges once we've started writing.
not understanding other people, writing what we really believe we really feel, it's alot more than most. it's an advancement.there are many things i've written already here, perhaps that is why i try not to reiterate, to come up with something clean, something new. many concepts have been hashed and re-hashed, how many times can one person do this.
a time and space alone now it's amazing there is a real difference,
but i still can't get over the nudity freedom bit.- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
c e r t a i n c h u r c h p e o p l e
i can't make up my own opinion.
i show up as an adult of my own free will. i wonder what they think of me. this embarrasses me but inside i'm happy and strong. i've pushed against a will i used to have in order to spin myself around and see things in a way that is useful to me. so if feels good. so it feels right.
so are t h e y embarrassed,
happy and strong,
lying to themselves,
doing things so strongly for other people,
or just so freaking far ahead of m e that they've left m e in green word dust wishing i knew what t h e y are thinking.- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
b e a u t y i s e v e r y w h e r e.
y o u j u s t h a v e t o k n o w w h e r e t o f i n d i t .-chinese proverb?
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psst. you must be delicate. even the president of the united states needs a little bit of humour, these days.
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OCTOBER 10 2001 onsdaga warm white cup, smooth itself and the liquid inside; not quite golden but nearly so. the man in the coffee store ever so carefully with his cargo, folded the top of the sac and tied up the otherwise unseal able bag with cotton string, two-colour, knotting it personally with his hands and handing the kilo to me while taking the crowns i gave him. sometimes it's the strangest combination of people who don't speak much english. these people really must prevent second cup and the like from taking his livelihood away from him forever. i think if it crosses anyone's mind, it's the Swedes, even though it may not be clear what they're preserving... no insult intended. it's just not obvious.
dark outside at 7:34, wakening, but darker, as the shiny red tin roof drips. will keekeeD like the rain?
today we actually have some work to do. we'll meet in the south and sit around a table. i've offered my arbitration services; he noticed that i was volunteering. they'll settle thing in their way, while i wait, we wait, and watch. 3rd quarter losses, who's surprised?
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OCTOBER 9 2001 tuesdaglater...
all hail the fish harvest!
people having opinions, express them here. those of us who also have LOUDLY feeled opinions sometimes hide under blankets of, well, blankets of nothing really. i'm not too sure what's the loud point of making points, have i become too soft for myself? i'm scooting around sweden on my kee-kee-D, not caring what they think, so why am i so silent here? why so silent? what it is i do not believe?
war at large; the world is watching. i'd like to say i'm peace loving but i've grown up some and realized that although violence doesn't solve anything, it is the common language; the only thing both sides truly understand. these are the realities that over the centuries history will prove unchanging, will prove that mankind after all are animals and will continue to solve problems and differences by shoving each other, in the modern vernacular.
i won't shove you, not there, not here. i'll just ask you to come by, see if we can agree, take a look into your eyes and go away quickly if i see that we are so different. cause many of us are. many of us are. and that's why you are welcome here, that's what i have to offer. it's more than the whole world right now. can't anyone see that?
i can't shout too loudly about the war, i'm sideways glancing into an uncertain future with the rest of you. we're watching the plans of our lives, unfolded at the creases; like from the golden cages of retrospection, it's the hardest thing to imagine, children born in a time of war, when especially it's a war that we understand now. something even the young ones might understand. it's what kevin and danielle's child will only know as happening shortly after he was born ; and little erika, shall she be called, who was still in her mommys tummy when the world as we know it changed. this is what we think now, these are the devolutions that a prospective mother can come up with, can tear about, yet the strongest part of her and all of us are that those little ones will maybe never hear a thing , will never hear anything about the world today, because peace will have prevailed since then and no matter, the white blankets are still fresh with the flowery scent of the air as the very first time boots climbed the stairs and folded them just so. as the very first time. these are the only thoughts that really ring true in the world in which i chose to call my own.
and that's where being honest gets me, there aint much point you see - not much point trying to cross the borders of our minds at all.
not this one.cnn through my ears and eyes. finally the java is perfect, i'm barely calculating in my head how much money i waste in the dripping. perhaps now is the time to buy a machine. this would be a change.
gut is gurgling, regurgitating, unhappily and barely digesting.
who knows why. not i.7:53 AM
no words coming; i'm only staring here, staring there.
wondering why i sit here staring, thinking thoughts not fit for writing here, i need to be busy during the day, or the chewing takes away. if they had army reporters then they could tell the story accurately.
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OCTOBER 8 2001 mandagroast pork covered with garlic bakes thru our senses,
our glasses empty of red wine, or anything resembling wine,
we compose letters to our sisters and plan visits to
Magyarorsag. but that was yesterday.today we sip beaujolais for some reason unimportant,
we sip it at all and that is important. the cauliflower bakes
while the scaloppini await the pan. food and the preparation of food are a mainstay of having lots of time, although these are pleasures and luxuries for so many...sites and sounds of a sane place seem so far from so many fearful, so many fearful. i'll be back.
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OCTOBER 7 2001 SUNDAYthe world is round. it's alive, not sleeping. hurting, not ignoring.
the daily life that brings the sunday paper doesn't stop just because you're done with the funnies. constant; constantly struggling, starving, praying.
time zones are just as guilty as distance, i know many intelligent people who still aren't good at them. they protect us without us knowing it. imagine hearing all the news at once?
http://www.portsofstockholm.com/nynashamn/fakta.htm
that's where we went yesterday, just to see the sea.
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OCTOBER 4 2001it's an interesting time to have so much time. we're playing world analysts, taking it all in from all the channels and painting pictures - not so good. we're advisors to each other, for our lives and for lives past and future. the whole thing just seems so connected now, it's a massive game of Kerplunk and i never really liked the loud sound of all the marbles crashing.
from up here, and i will say it really does feel 'up' here, it's like a quiet place, the quiet place that it is , first car horn heard this am, (it's very uneuropean in that sense) it's a very remote place to watch from. we're remote in many different ways but as boots says in rant 4, we can watch from the square devices. so we're watching the down below, listening, watching, re-watching.
i'm never used to caring so much about world events, there, i've said it. it's quite obvious that a certain point has been drilled in, i won't deny that. the world is now officially global for me, and it's only a sadness in me that admits that evil was the one to drive this point. why a bigger face, evil? why?
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OCTOBER 3 2001bitter brown java and burning tongue wake me this morning, it feels much earlier than it is. so i'm physically groggy, but for some reason my brain feels tack sharp; something positive is in the air, i can't say what.
the sun comes up over this place once again, in an unusual display of autumnal light. here, we prepare for the dark, not the snow. dark seems more foreboding, it seems to me.
so we've learned to use the phone and the toilets, learned the difference between socker med pektin and florsocker; we can recognize the names on the Tunnelbana stations and even pronounce one or two. Il faut, de temps en temps, pourtant, nous rapeler que nous parlons deja trois langues...
that's about it, really. there's never anything really exciting i can tell you here; i mean, i could, but I can't. it's just not the mEp way. i guess that truly makes the mEp a peaceful place, but am i really that peaceful? perhaps not my outer core; but i suppose my intentions are. i'll tell you something odd; with time on my hands, i read other's personal lives voraciously, i'll read about their lovers and their houses and their private practices too, ... yet i won't write mine for all to see. i'll tell you in person, walk up to me and i'll tell you pretty much anything if you ask. but here; or there; you won't see it writ by me. i want it, and i'll share it, but not here;
something deep inside of me just says it's not the place. is it a generational gap, perhaps. is it a sense of self preservation, perhaps. is it a sense that those things may change, and then what you've left behind are words, scorched into history, carved into these digital caves, things that perhaps were once you, were once true, now no longer so. but that would be true history, wouldn't it. so that's not it then. that's not it. then what, what? am i really and truly afraid of someone, that's the hardest part to admit.________________________________________
OCTOBER 2 2001and the issue of time comes up again, since our cup floweth over, i can't help but notice how it changes me. can't say how yet. patties and lentils on the table and german style bread; we're eating europe now. because we have time.
images of crumpled metal become commonplace,
my historian mind can only see it from the future. this is the war that mommy and daddy remember, but it suits me too since i'm a post nintendo baby and things need to be quite shocking to phase me, in fact, two large buildings crumpling in front of my eyes might not even seem real to me, as unreal as stories of ocean shores lined with men and bayonnets. let's hope it's still as unreal for us in 20 years and distant, if vivid memories for others.
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OCTOBER 1 2001
white rabbits! and bad posture. getting cranky bones; still no desire to get moving. coffee changes don't suit me so well, and the air is a bit cold in the morning. not enough kleenex in a foreign land, and the runners that i know, the busy people, are busier than ever. i often wonder how i end up so un-busy, so watchful of them. i'm concluding that i'm at least one part laziness. isn't that funny, me lazy? it must be true though, since my aim is usually good. and the more i think of it, the more i think; yes, i do have a strong need to not rush; a strong need to have time; you never know if and when you'll need it. so we're talking some kind of counterbalance here; or let's just say a balance.
so they run run run ; or perhaps it's only i who cannot see them slow, or perhaps it's just timing that's all. this timing thing was always eluding me - yes that's a real fact, evasive from the start.
later - - - really thick black glasses - can you see me thru them
discussions
discussions
what's on TV now.
where are poot's stories, they are fearful of being carved here. how old is too old to move across the ocean?the stories are buried; buried under the thinking, under the watching... restrictions on personal freedoms, where to draw the line, inconveniences or not. what can i write here on this web is becoming leaner and leaner even if no one is reading it.
and part of the thinking is merely wondering what the thinking is, should be, what is interesting any more. watching young people i'm alarmed at how disinterested i am in them, been there done that. too bad. who is still interesting - the ones with really weird glasses and long furry coats. even the spray painted jeans are dull. the people with the dark glasses i suppose they make films or live in a strange environment with interesting things hanging on the walls and not caring to much about the shape of earrings. mine are evolved of a preppy era, still relatively round and conforming to the norms. BORING but there is not much i can do about that in a corporate world. so then is the question, here i am, here, gotten where i was going - and looking no where cause there aint' nothing you can see from here. the shell is not see thru and the only way to make it interesting is to approach the ones with the really weird glasses.
such are the circular arguments running spinning wheels through my wirey mind, bringing me tangled and eventually spun out in a pile on the floor that isn't inspiring or anything at all, really. need more. need more something.
dreams very about people i won't mention here cause i'm scared too.
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september's end 2001
september ending; leaves still green.poots awakens to a silent sunday in stockholm.
more java and which stories shall she tell....
