liminality

in between. anticipating.
i float through this present moment.
too mundane to be a rite of passage, i sleep-in everyday.
because i can.

redefining the meaning of work and love.
beyond jobs and relationships.
was it the chai
that prevented me from falling asleep last night?
or was it the urgency of these ideas?
curled up alone on saturday night, i read.
my room is messy but the moon is getting bigger,
so it will be clean soon.
this is the new puberty.

your heart is a muscle the size of your fist!

last valentine's day i attended a "dress-like-a-goth" party in boston. sat on the couch alone for hours watching goth-friendly movies, such as edward scissorhands and the crow on mute as bauhaus or some other such nonsense blared in the distance. i (ironically, okay!) wore black eyeliner and white face stuff, spiking my hair with gel. this year i'm looking for jobs, going to the post office and seeing freddy faggot play at the glass nickel tonight. oh yeah.

yesterday was:

*"porn in the morn" at madison's own bennet's smut & eggs with the chicago folks from saturday night's "rock and read" event where they read from their zines. it was my first time there and it lived up to all of my worst expectations. the aging waitresses were surprisingly (grand)motherly in a very comforting way. this, of course, was juxtaposed with cum-on-her-face money shots in slow-mo surrounding us above. and professional bowling on espn. so weird.

*interviewing anne elizabeth moore for my project at the electric earth cafe. she's awesome. got her own book published last year on radical media literacy for kids and she's also an editor at punk planet where she also runs their new publishing company. not mention all the other zines and articles she writes when she's not teaching media studies at columbia college and bringing down the american girl store. pheewwww! she is changing the world.

*having so much fun at a pre-valentine's day rock show with local legends charlemagne and my favorite madison band ric-rac-attack. it made me happy to be back. there were delicious cupcakes and i smashed one of the heart-shaped pinata's. yup, i'm a heart breaker.

frozen lakes & pajama violence

do you think that i could pay my rent with freelance writing and nude modeling? is that legal?

yesterday i walked on a lake. this may not seem strange to mid-westerners, but for me it was an exciting and slightly scary experience. i walked very carefully and slowly across lake mendota, beyond the shadows of the university of wisconsin. i reached the sun that was beading down on the solid ice and thin layer of snow. i stood there and marveled at this other planet and caught a nice glimpse of the capitol. then i walked back.

so, the pajama (dance) party last night at kristy dactyl's new apartment didn't go so well, despite delicious sushi rolls and cake. at around 1:00 am, a bunch of frat-bro's (apparently lured in by the olsen twin look-a-likes milling about outside) marched in to dactyl's apartment. they were not greeted very warmly since it was a small, private affair and so the fratties started throwing punches and breaking bottles. luckily i was in the other room watching people bust-a-move on the dance, dance revolution video game. i saw it all go down though and then the lights came on. everyone was in pajamas, mind you. the cops caught up with their getaway cab and then everyone who got beat up at the party went down to the station to identify the attackers. i felt bad for dactyl since it was her first party ever. it's a good story though.

earlier in the evening i attended a talk by anti-racism activist/theorist tim wise...
http://www.zmag.org/bios/homepage.cfm?authorID=96
he ruled. it was just really inpiring. so after a couple hours of breaking down issues of privilege from a radical perspective it was perfect having these fuckers from frat row further fuel the fire. look out. look out....

back to the present

it's almost four o'clock pm, central time. i find myself back in madison, wisconsin at a computer in the university library. i am here. i'm back. it is very weird.

i haven't really spoken to anyone since i've been back. got in at midnight on the van galder bus. i walked through the light snow up state street toward the blurry silhouette of the capitol. this was a strange experience.

when i was at bard college last week i was recalling what it felt like to return to campus after a break between semesters. you spend that time away remembering all the good things: your friends, favorite spots, and think about all the stuff you want to do when you get back. but this romanticized version always crumbled upon return. not that those things weren't there, it's just that they were floating around all this other shit that your tried to forget about. like how the first person you would see walking around was that asshole from your first year seminar that you tried to forget about, or biting into an uncooked piece of rice at kline commons. the messy stuff.

this is what was racing through my head as i walked home last night amidst drunken frat-boy-speak and shitty weather. is this the madison that i left two months ago?

when i reached my house i remembed that i had left my key inside. it took 2 rings of the doorbell for one of my 11(?) housemates to wake up and answer the door. "welcome back," jen muttered as she simultaneously opened the door and headed back up the stairs to bed. the kitchen was empty and dark, but i was greeted with lots of mail. some good, some garbage, some bad. since bria bailed on our subletting agreement i now owe friends' co-op over $600. sheeeit. if i don't pay half of this by tomorrow then i will be homeless. that's what the "5 day pay or quit notice" told me as i stood in front of the mailbox cubbies. i guess i need to get a fucking job, huh?

so so long to ten hour shifts and faking sympathies.
farewell to piles of bills, unpayed utilities.
all rolled up and unfurled like a flag.
wake up and pack your bag.

i have no regrets. the past two months has been amazing. i wouldn't trade all of these experiences for the entire planet. how could i have not done this. i had a craving for liberation and it tasted really, really good. and things will work out. this is just a small road bump.

valentine's day is next week. perhaps i could cash in on that weird phenomenon and try to climb out of debt. i could deliver roses or sing acoustic-punk-love-ditties to serenade anonymous crushes across this city. work in the valentine's industry: what a funny idea. i used to really enjoy the mid-winter ritual in elementary school when we would exchange valentines to our classmates and draw that big heart on the most suggestive message to our secret sweetheart. and lots of candy, of course. but by eighth grade things changed. that year, i walked down the hallway with a handmade "valentine's day sucks" sign tapped to my angsty, pubescent chest. now i feel ambivalent about this hallmark-holiday. i miss that magical feeling from elementary school, but i resent being forced to experience it by corporate culture. yeah, it would be hilarious if i got some sort of temporary job related to it though.

*

again, i really haven't talked to anyone here yet. said hi to jen as she turned for the stairs, and this afternoon i asked the girl working at the catacombs if they were still serving pesto pasta for lunch. she said yes. i gave her $3 and told her my name and then said thank you when i recieved my plate. those are the words that i have spoken in person here in the past 16 hours. it's nice to be back though. i'm back.

the inauguration was a funeral...

...but we had a party in the streets! indeed. we roamed around dc for hours creating songs like that. singing them to the cowboy hat, tuxedo, and/or furcoat totin' republicans. we sang "we're not gonna take it," while everyone stood in line for the counter-rally along the parade route. and "i believe in miracles" to some asshole wearing red-white-and-blue from head to toe waving an offensively large american flag at people with a shit-eatin' grin. he couldn't quite comprehend the irony of being called a "sexy thing." it was all captured on camera, by someone.

we had a blast, despite the implications of the next four years. it was a funeral for democracy but we sang the counter-eulogy, for a completely different world: one without inaugurations or presidents. and as the tear gas wafted toward the official parade we sang our hearts out and in that brief moment, we experienced this new world.

and we rock; because it's us against them
we found our own reasons to sing