well it's times like these i feel so small & wild;

154;

2008-07-18T08:02:27Z

i wrote this in here over two years ago:

" so new plan:
change my name to delilah, wear a yellow dress, go to marginalized industrial nuclear wastelands of eastern europe, explore buildings and take pictures for the rest of my life.

wanna come? "

i'm still down.

153;

2008-07-14T21:17:50Z

i'm in love with a saturated life, dizzy lights and screaming rollercoaster rides. i love to listen to eels and think about all the things that matter and wring my hands around the things that don't. i love to go to spring garden every night and i love it when all the waitresses ask how you are doing, even though all you say back is "good" and it's not really conversational, but i like to know that i am noticed and my place is there, somewhere. i like the subtle drumbeats of a song in crescendo, i like to know there is something to expect. i like to wear aviator goggles on my head and stick my head out the window and watch the oncoming cars with the wind in my hair and i like to do tarot cards in 24 diners and i like not knowing whether i'm really happy or really sad.

i went to see someone still loves you boris yelstin in chicago on friday night. it was so fantastic. probably my favorite concert that i have ever been to, just due to the environment. it felt really friendly and nice and the band was so nice, they talked to us and we requested a b-side and they said they would play it just for us. maybe it's just that everyone from missouri is nice. maybe i'll move to missouri. i would totally be okay if everyone was uncommonly nice all the time. maybe everyone from illinois is just a dick. on the drive back the weather in front of us was so crazy, there was giant lighting and big clouds and silent thunder you couldn't hear because it was so far away. "english girls approximately" was the perfect song. it's always the perfect song. i remember the first time i heard it, two summers ago and at "just three words my love:" i got chills all over my arms and legs and lower back. everything from two summers ago is coming back. "you meant everything."

also one recent evening there was some more crazy weather and i saw a full rainbow in the sky. also at the same time there was lighting, and then the sky turned yellow, exactly yellow, bright gold. sometimes i think i'm going crazy and it's in the best possible way because i don't care about much of anything anymore, about what anyone thinks of me, i just assume the good things are on their way and the bad things will keep on coming but it doesn't matter when they do because there are some weeks when the whole world thinks you're beautiful, and other weeks when they all think you're a slut, but it doesn't matter because when you're on, they'll swear you're on.

sometimes i wish i could write in here how i feel about certain people and certain events and not be so vague. i want to tell you who i think about all the time. but i'm scared to make anything concrete, because as soon as it's all not up in the air, it goes away. i don't know who i love anymore and i wish i knew who loved me, i want someone to say, "give me your eyes, i need sunshine," i want someone to say, "i'd take you where nobody knows you, and nobody gives a damn either way."

152;

2008-07-09T22:11:10Z

i still like to do this every once in awhile.

Comment anything that you want, and post it anonymously. Anything. A story, a secret, a confession, a thought, a fear, a love, an opinion -- anything. Be sure to post anonymously and honestly. Post twice if you'd like. Then, put this in your LJ to see what your friends (and perhaps others who you don't even realize read your LJ) have to say.

151;

2008-06-26T00:50:58Z

well i know it's summer because i've got bruises on my knees, scraped-up shins and twenty thousand mosquito bites too. today i cleaned up my room at my father's house and it actually looks really nice. i don't think i ever appreciated this room enough, with its wood on its walls and wood on its floors, slanted sage green ceilings, and the ornate glass lamp at the top. i wish it was a chandelier but i remember when i used to live here, my dad said i couldn't have a chandelier because it would hang too low. there's an air conditioner in here now. i love window air conditioning units, i don't care how much of a waste of energy and all that they are. i love the way they smell and sound. i wish i could extract the smell of air conditioners and make a perfume. i wish i could extract the sound of air conditioners and make a symphony.

in an abandoned house i found a picture of a mountain on a lake, and i liked it so i took it home and taped it on the wall above my bed. it's really hopeful to me. i like to look at it, i don't know, it's really hopeful. also from the house i took a book of the arabian nights stories. it has some nice drawings in it. i think i want to start reading children's literature, like arabian nights and alice's adventures in wonderland and heidi. also i found a working typewriter, but that was in my closet. i forgot i bought it i guess. it's light blue and seafoam green and electric. it works and it makes me really excited. i get excited about things like this but i never do anything about it. i get excited because sometimes i feel like writing and i feel like i could maybe write something but i never do it. it's too big of a deal. i don't know where i'd even start. i think about ideas for pictures a lot lately too, even just from things i find on the ground, i think, "oh i could make a picture with that." i never feel creative in the summer, it's weird, i don't know what to do with it all (i don't actually do anything, i just waste time by cleaning my room and flirting with boys who i don't find very interesting).

i am supposed to go look for apartments in chicago soon. i am really excited. i hope we get a really wonderful apartment. i don't know if i'm going back to school, but i know that i will at least go back to chicago. this is a choice i am making. i will try to love the city again and i will try to forget all of the associations i made between places and people who aren't going to ever come back anyway. i wish i was in the city for the summer, i love summers in the city, i like it when the air tastes like the colors it looks when the sun is setting, orange and strawberry and pomegranate and blue. if you can taste air. i don't know what i'm talking about. i like it when people have their windows of their apartments open at night and you can see the light inside. i don't like the crowds outside of bars or the people in my way, they make me nervous and i don't like it when the sun is too hot and there are so many people around. i like it when the roads are big and empty and there's nobody around.

here, sometimes i am social and i'm with these groups of people and i don't want to be there, at least lately anyway. the first few weeks of summer it didn't bother me much, but now i find the things they say uninteresting and their basement parties boring. i guess it's not their fault. i can't tell if the people are getting worse or i'm just getting meaner. i found a way to make money easy. donating blood plasma. i got forty dollars on tuesday and i'll get forty more on friday, tuesday, and friday. anytime after that i will only get fifteen because i am small and cannot give very much plasma. i'm also going to try and sell some clothes. there was a big flood here and we went swimming in the flood water, which is a bad idea because there are lots of bacteria, but it was fun and there was a playground half underwater.

150;

2008-05-23T17:41:39Z

i haven't been on livejournal much lately. i finished my first year of college. i'm back in rockford now, i'm not sure for how long. my hair is getting longer and everything smells like lilacs. days and nights are spent mostly the same, driving around with the windows down (when it's warm) and stalling in parking lots, trying to figure out something to do. my favorite times are when we just go to parks and walk around. i like being with trees at night. drove into the city on a whim one night at one am, sometimes we get real fucked up and sometimes it's good when my head's all dizzy, and sometimes i can see hate in everyone, a loathing i can't see without the help of illegal substances. sometimes i really like it, getting to know lots of people and all, but sometimes i miss my life back in the city when i was mostly by myself. at least i didn't have to try to make myself like the company of everyone. there was something in awkwardness that made me more aloof, that made it so i didn't need anybody else. i don't know why i force myself into social situations and feel like i have to like everyone. i don't really think much of anyone, except the lucky times when there are people you can tell in instant they are genuine and true. i want someone actual. until then i'm just biding my time.

but everything's funny at least, or half-heartedly amusing, and it really is a good feeling to not have anything better to do. i haven't got any money but i haven't got any responsibility. not until i figure out what i'm doing anyway, as far as a permanent living situation and a job. i'm stuck in the place between being a kid and an adult and i'm starting to think i hate most aspects of either. i don't know what i want, yet i expect everyone else in the world to know what they do. i think i want to spend every night driving fast down country roads, but nobody's got money for gas and i'm tired of trying to impress everyone. i want an old rusty truck, an amber necklace with a bug inside, and to learn to play an instrument and speak french. i want to sit on big mossy rocks on the side of a river and read gould's book of fish. i want to go to abandoned houses and i want to write a story. i need to pick a direction because i'm sick of not going anywhere.

as far as school and money go, i don't know what's going on, but i'm devising a back up plan. i need to draw paths on maps and i need to print out big colored pictures to tape on my wall. if it doesn't work, i'll probably stay in chicago for one more year, sharing an apartment with a friend and saving up all my money until the lease is up, when i'll take off for the south, mode of transportation to be determined, or southwest, and i'm gonna start over and i'm gonna do everything right this time, i swear it. more than anything i'm sick of feeling like a bad person, but i'm not strong enough to stop. one day i promise i will become a girl of conviction.

"i think there's a a kind of adolescent alchemical phase in human development --a dangerous age from 15 to 21 where you'll either kill yourself, or sell yourself out, or actually find something worth doing with your life."
-alex grey

149; polyvore

2008-05-08T18:38:22Z

okay so polyvore has been the greatest impediment to my getting anything at all done these days, so in order to procrastinate more on packing, i thought i'd share some of my sets with you. :]

one my first sets.

another early one.

i really want fingerless leather gloves.

i don't care how trendy it is, i love straw fedora hats!

yay lumberjack jacket.

alice in wonderland inspired.

i want a really cute old bicycle like that. too bad i don't know how to ride a bicycle. :[
also mcdonald's soft serve vanilla ice cream cones are the best thing in the world.

i have a hat like that one.

i want to go horseback riding.

and also on a road trip.

rain storm in the prairie -inspired.

i'm obsessed with those little silk shoes.

and clear plastic umbrellas!

yay summer.

heathens -inspired.

if any of you have polyvore accounts, you should add me as a contact.
okay really need to start packing now.

148;

2008-05-06T21:54:57Z

i like to pretend that when they see me get in the fancy cars, they think i am someone fantastic. someone special and interesting with many secretive affairs, with older men in black cars with tinted windows. i like to pretend they're watching me as i drive off, so i am sure to hold my chin up high, to elongate my jawline so it looks like i am going somewhere important. i like to pretend they picture me in thirty thousand square foot apartments, with walls all made of windows, clean and lowly lit, or ushered into a bar under the arm of a man in a dark suit, a collared shirt with the top button undone, long hair and a beaten-up book in his back pocket. i like to pretend they count the different cars and wait for me to get back, but i know they probably don't notice at all and their eyes aren't following my every move.

i need to stop standing pigeon-toed.

i have to remember that what i want most from money is not cute, cheap clothes, but instead adventures, traveling to see my friends in all different places. i have to start saving up for my plan. see, if everything doesn't work out, i am just going to pack up and head south. i'll go somewhere warm, and i will have a small apartment that is maybe actually a small house, with a back porch and windows overflowing with plants. it'll be like starting over, it will be really great.

didn't go to sleep until 730 in the morning. woke up at 3pm and now my day is sortof fucked. i hate that the sun's already getting lower in the sky. it's 81 degrees! now that's just ridiculous. i prefer it around 60, i think. i need to start packing. i move out this weekend. i'm really ready to get out of the city for a few weeks. my last class is on wednesday. it's so weird that my first year of college is almost ever. it doesn't feel like it even happened. i guess i just expected to accomplish something really great, and i didn't. oh well. i'll figure that out.

i don't know, i thought i had something else to say, but i forgot what it was.

147;

2008-05-02T00:39:53Z

it's weird, i remember we were driving in your car late at night on the way back from somewhere and this song came on your radio, and it was the first time i'd ever heard it and i remember thinking it was the most beautiful song i'd ever heard, and you were the most beautiful person i'd ever met. i want to tell you this, but i think we're past the point where we say things like that anymore.

(your pretty eyes don't blink or i've got nothing to look for.)

146;

2008-04-20T22:35:42Z

i'm afraid this isn't what i want anymore.

i read all these articles on contemporary art and artists, i look at contemporary art and artists, i go to classes and i don't know. it's all so over my head, it's all so big and i don't think i have it in me. and it's not fun anymore. even writing, i don't enjoy doing it anymore. i get these deadlines and i wait until the very last minute to reach them (like now). i haven't written for enjoyment since junior year of high school, it seems. i wish i hadn't taken that creative writing class my senior year because it seems like i've been bastardizing it ever since. i don't think i've got any stories left, i was a one-trick pony and now it's done. and drawing just makes me so angry. i get so frustrated, and just angry, and it's weird. i do like taking pictures still, but i'm afraid to take a class because i'm afraid of losing the love i have for it left --and i don't want to be conceptual, i'm sorry i just don't. my work is not about ideas. it's just not. it's never been that way and i don't think i should feel less worthy because of it. i was reading this thing, about how art should get people talking --about ideas, and --and i don't know, this is all so disjointed, i've been trying all year to figure this out in my head, and i don't feel like i'm getting any closer to feeling comfortable with my stance on things --which is, essentially, taking a stance against taking a stance, i guess, haha-- but talking about ideas, not art, and i want to make art, i always wanted to make art because i wanted to make beautiful things, and most of the time i feel so stupid for ever wanting that. i should be bigger than that. i should care about.. issues. but i don't.

i get so astounded reading artists' statements (an entirely new concept to me, to begin with) and comparing it to the art. maybe i'm just a little slow, but i just don't see it. people make these things and they're about something else entirely. i'm totally okay with art just being pretty. sometimes people go on and on about what they're trying to say and i just want to stand up and shake my hands in the air and say, "i don't care about your ideas!!!"

i don't even know what i'm doing with myself anymore. my art is directionless, my writing is nonexistent, and i wake up in the morning and don't even know how to get dressed. i'm one person one day, someone entirely different the next. i worry so much about being decisive and brave and true that i end up mucking around in accidental self-deprecation and weak-mindedness. and i'm so mean. i think i'm funny when i'm just being mean. having a sense of humor is overrated. i should stop trying so hard. i should stop being threatened by everyone i pass on the street. i'm worried i'm going to grow up to be one of those people who had all the potential in the world, to become something really fantastic, but just wasn't strong enough.

i can't live with my mother this summer because they have to find a live-in nurse for my grandma, but i think i might have something else in the workings. i don't know what to do though --i can't explain, i wish i could, but i can't say it here-- i feel like any second it's all going to crumble between my hands. i've been too lucky for too long, and my life hasn't been terrible enough for things to be this great, yet. i should start looking for a job here. but what i think i'm going to do is at the end of the semester, go back to rockford for a few weeks, get my driver's license just for the sake of having it, see friends, all of that, and then head back here to work and live.

my mother didn't fill out the fafsa. she said she was going to see what she could do, but she probably forgot --which is totally, one hundred percent understandable, of course, with her dad dying and her mother scarily close behind, with all the money and employment problems she's been having, how lonely she probably is-- but if i don't get government aid, i won't be going back to college. i wanted to put a period after every word in that last part of the sentence, but i thought that would be over-dramatic, i just wanted to emphasize how hard it hit me when last week, she told me she'd forgotten to fill out the form. i have such a huge scholarship here, but it's not enough to cover everything, of course --it's a really expensive private art school-- and the fact that my mother is a single, hispanic woman without steady employment was incredibly key in getting as much money from the government as possible. i'm not going to take out a hundred thousand dollars in loans because i realize that once out of school, i will not be landing a cushy, financially stable job enabling me to pay back my student loans with ease. i don't know what you can do with a bfa. i don't really want to go into commercial arts, advertising, graphic design, anything like that. and i don't want to be a teacher. and i don't think the art world caters to someone like me, as stated above. so basically what i'm saying is i need that money. and if i don't get it, i'll have to drop out and immediately start paying back the loans i've already taken out. which means a full time job, minimum wage at best since all i have experience is a few months of waitressing, which probably wouldn't cover the costs of both and apartment and paying back the loans. but i will not go back to rockford (wanted to put periods after each of those words too). i'm not going to be one of those people who gets stuck in their hometown. as much as i love all of the abandoned stuff out there, and my friends, and the familiarity of it all, i know there's nothing there for me. (i think secretly i've always known i was the best thing ever to come out of that place.)

even if i end up being just another girl, working nights at a diner and scraping by on six dollars an hour, no college education, no big time future, i want it to be somewhere else. if i don't go anywhere figuratively, i'll know i at least did it literally. if i don't go back to college, i'll stay in chicago for a year, and then i'm moving south. nashville, atlanta, orlando, new orleans, i want a city with sparkly lights and sweet air, love waiting for me in the corner of some dimly lit bar. i'll pretend to want a simple life because i don't know what else to want anymore. i wish you could make a career out of pretty picture books and making themed mix cds, abandoned buildings and knowing all the best places to go when it's warm out and you're drinking strawberry wine, late saturday nights. getting crushes on strangers and relating to nobody. picking out the typefaces on billboards and wearing appropriately symbolic bird charm necklaces. i don't think i was ever supposed to get any older than age seventeen.

145;

2008-04-14T02:10:12Z

it's been nearly a month, hasn't it? i don't really know what to talk about, any points of interest from the past few weeks are currently evading me. the weather's been getting better, except for yesterday and the couple days before it. it was all rainy and windy and cold. went back to the field museum yesterday. i like being there, i like the taxidermied animal exhibits and the northwest coast indian exhibit. they had a nice display of tibetan things too, and walking through the pacific natives section, every time i looked at their various clubs and other instruments of bashing, i pictured getting hit with them. i wish museums weren't so kid-orientated though. like only kids want to go to museums, and they have to throw in a couple things to keep the adults entertained? no way.

my heart's been beating real fast since i woke up this morning. i don't know why, i'm not really nervous or anything. i need to go print some things for one of my classes, but there's some sort of function happening on the sixteenth floor, which is where the printers are, and i don't really want to go up there and be around all those people. so i've been sitting here all apprehensive about it. i'll probably just print it off in the morning. or maybe i will go up there. i don't know why now, all of the sudden, i have this weird urge to talk to people, to strangers, to get to know new people when the entire rest of the school year i entirely avoided it. but then when i'm actually put in the situation i don't want to anymore. i'm attempting to take up awkwardly smoking cigarettes outside of school buildings. i don't even like cigarettes that much but it's the only way people at this school get to know each other. i like cherry cloves, maybe i'll go out and buy some of those somewhere.

it just hit me that there's only a month left of school. just a month. i still don't know what i'm going to do for the summer. i'm having dinner with my mother on tuesday, i think i might ask her if i can stay with her at my grandparents' place for awhile. if she says yes, i'll look into getting a job at the nature museum. i'd really like to work there. it makes me happy to be in that place. the bad thing is my mother lives so far south, by midway airport. maybe i could get a job at the airport. i wouldn't mind that at all, really, i love being in airports. but it's so far away from everyone and everything. i don't know, i could still go out to rockford a lot, get my country fix. it's not like i socially interact very much anyway. and i wouldn't have the time, with a job and all. that would be okay. i'll ask her on tuesday.

then in the fall, i'm probably going to end up getting an apartment with this girl, brittany, who goes to uic. she wants to live somewhere along the blue line. i'm hoping for wicker park (unlikely) or logan square (doable). i like those areas and i am relatively familiar with them. lincoln park would be nice too, especially if i worked at the nature museum--but i'm getting ahead of myself. the last couple times i've been in lincoln park it's been nice out and the crowds have been absolutely insane. i was pretty terrified, even though i was in a car. minus all the people, the summer is my favorite time to be in the city, and i figure it'd be really sad if i spent the season not in the city, you know. actually spring is shaping out to be nice, too. i love the days when it's only like, 40 degrees, but you're just so excited that it's finally above freezing you're like, "ohmygosh! warm!" and you go out in miniskirts and kneesocks like it's practically summer, but at any other time of the year, 40 degrees would not be kneesock weather (with me, all weather is miniskirt weather), but because it's been so long, it's fantastic.

i love the song raspberry beret.

and the book the glass castle, by jeannette walls. i like the things it makes me think of, the desert and small towns and appalachia. i have a crush on rex walls, her father. he's this cowboy who knows everything scientific, but drinks too much, but loves his family to death, and when they don't have any money for christmas, he takes his kids out to the desert and tells them to pick out a star, and that's what they get for a present. you should all read this book. i think it is important to note it is a true story.

i cut my hair. not a terribly drastic change. i still want to grow it long, so i kept the length, but i've been agonizing over whether or not to get bangs, so i did, sortof. i cut it myself, so it's sortof lopsided and shaggy, but i really like the way it turned out!

i have a green shirt that says yellow.

i think it looks better when it's not-straightened, like this.

okay that's it.
(this morning you called me your little lolita and it made me want to die of happiness.)

144;

2008-03-19T01:12:28Z

so i'm back in rockford for a few days, hopefully to spend my lousy excuse for a spring break exploring and being outside and getting coffee and seeing friends. also i get to do laundry here for free! on the train, the conductor took my ticket and said, "are you the flame eater?" i thought he was kidding because i might've looked like a gypsy, with all my suitcases and my shabby coat/scarf/silly hat get-up, so i said, "yes!" later he returned and asked how my stint in california was. apparently, he had spoken with me a couple months before and i said i was on my way out to california to eat some flames or something. um, i didn't really know what he was talking about, but i went along with it and i figured he's either mistaking me for someone or he's delusional, but you know i wouldn't really mind being a traveling fire eater anyway. when i was getting off the train he asked if i had a card for my business, and said, "no.." and he said, "well if you get one, you should give it to me! i'd love to come out and see your fire eating act." and i said, "okay i'll do that!" so i've got another new persona to take on in the presence of strangers. i decided my name is carolina honey, and people will be like, "that can't be your real name!" and i'll say, "well no, it's not, my real last name is wheat but i decided if i had to sound like an exported product, i'd rather it be a sweet one." i'll be from rural florida, maybe cassadaga like the bright eyes album, and one day i would like to perform on late night television.

this summer i want to accomplish many things. i want to learn to play an instrument, may-be the harmonica or the mandolin or the tambourine, and i would like to do some cute covers of my favorite songs. i want to learn to ride a bicycle, and learn to drive a car, and i want to film a movie with my friend michelle, and i want to go out to lake chippewa, that abandoned amusement park in the middle of a forest in ohio. i also want to go west, out to the badlands and yellowstone national park again, like i did when i was little. i want to drive there, i want to go on a really long roadtrip. i want to go to albany of course, and maybe see new york city, especially coney island. i want to go camping at devil's lake again. i want to make a hobby of making dreamcatchers. i want to grow my hair long and read lots of books. i want it to be the best summer ever. i guess i'm probably going to have to get a job.

i think i'll be staying at saic, at least for another year. in the fall i'll probably look at other schools to transfer, just for the love of never staying in one place for too long. the writing program's got me convinced i think. i had a really fantastic critique the other night. not that everyone was super positive-- there were definitely some negative comments, but it was incredible, because the class got in this huge discussion over my paper, and the way i write, and if it's effective or not, and it was so fantastic. i was flattered more than anything, i think, that people would look that far into my writing, that they would think about it that much. this class is filled with mostly third year writing majors, unlike my other writing classes, which were mostly freshmen, so may-be that explains it. i've only ever gotten "ooh pretty!/i don't get it"-type responses before, and this was so different, and intense, and it was really great. i need to stop apologizing for myself though, i put disclaimers on everything i say, even if i don't intend to-- adding in things like "really/sortof/kindof/i think/i don't know" all the time, not in writing, but in speaking in general. one boy in my class who i know better than the others wrote "don't doubt yoursef so much" on the bottom of my page, and i have people who are close to me telling me that all the time, but when you hear it from someone you don't know as well, it resonates more, you know?

i want to remember this one really nice day i had last week. it was warm outside, at least 40 degrees, and sunny, so i took the train out to oak park. i don't know why i like it there so much, i don't know why i find so much charm in affluent suburbs, but i do. i just walked around, went in this really cute toy store. they had those air balloons you hang from the ceiling, sortof like the ones i got in france, and i want to buy some more some day. i glanced in this old record store, went to a small grocer and bought a pear and this fantastic thing i'd never heard of before-- honey lemonade. it was only a dollar and in a glass bottle and so, so fantastic. nesbitt's honey lemonade. i'd never seen it anywhere before and if i have to, i'm going to go back to that grocer and buy it all the time, if i can't find it anywhere else. i sat in the park and had my pear and honey lemonade, then bought some polaroid film, and went home when the sun started setting. it was just nice to walk around. it's really starting to feel like spring. i even love grey days like to-day, all misty and rainy and eerie. it's midterm now, i can't believe the school year's almost over.

i've been falling asleep to what's eating gilbert grape lately. i really like the feel of that movie. the small town and those silver spaceship trailers. johnny depp and that girl, well it reminds me a lot of something. i hope that something is going somewhere real nice.

143;

2008-03-10T21:15:59Z

this is what i will do if things fall apart. even if it's right this very second. i need this plan, i need to make sure things will be okay.
if it happens anytime from the beginning of summer and onward, i will get my driver's license. i will learn to drive and i will get a car. maybe i will steal a car. but i will get a car and i will drive far away. i will end up somewhere when my money runs out and i will start over. i will change my name. i will pretend that this whole other life of mine never happened.
or i will drive to somewhere safe, somewhere far away with people i know, people who love me. i will fall asleep on their couches and i will stay until things are better, maybe i'll never go anywhere else. i will stay and forget everything that has ever happened.
if it happens today, tonight, right this second, or tomorrow, i will immediately leave this room. i will not stay, i will go to somewhere safe. maybe my mother's house, but i don't know. maybe back to rockford. i will go somewhere i will not be alone. i will not be alone, not even for a second. if you die in a room where no one goes no one will notice for days. i am not strong enough, i cannot do this on my own.

142;

2008-03-09T21:02:07Z

i'm feeling really anxious right now, like i can't sit still, but i don't really want to get up and do anything. i have lots of homework, but may-be i'll go shopping instead. i saw this pretty box and these legwarmers i kindof want. may-be i'll skip my second class to-morrow, because, i don't know, may-be i just will. i could run a mile right now, ten thousand miles, i want to get out into a big gold field and run ten thousand miles. not really, but you know. i'd like to get to the ocean. i'd like to chase trains.

glen bought this cd this weekend, by this band, black mountain, and we listened to it. it gets really sabbath sometimes, but there's this one song that's so pretty, called "stay free." i am going to upload it for you. to me it's kindof the new "freebird." i don't know why, it just makes me feel that way. i want to find a block of wet cement and write in it, stay free.

i went to the museum of contemporary art yesterday and there was an exhibit on gordon matta-clark, and it was really fantastic. it was called YOU ARE THE MEASURE. i want to write that in cement too. i'd never heard of him before, but he worked in the 1970s, and basically what he did was go into abandoned buildings and cut giant holes out of them, out of the floors and the walls, and he displayed the cut-outs and pictures of the buildings, even though most of the places were demolished shortly after. i think the work holds way more weight in person, but here

i like how he arranged his pictures like this so you could get this kindof overview of the place.

this was my favorite picture in person for some reason, i don't know why.
(see, the thing is he cut the house in half. with a chainsaw.)

he died when he was thirty-five. this makes me sad. i want to hang out with him. if you're anywhere near chicago, you have to go see this exhibit.

it's semi-nice out sometimes these days. and sometimes it's snowing. sometimes it's snowing one minute, sunny the next. i just want it to be nice out. i think i say that every entry, i think i say that every day. but it's all i think about lately.

141;

2008-03-06T17:32:27Z

if you're going to san francisco by scott mackenzie is exactly where i want to be right now. summer and people with flowers in their hair. i like to believe that everyone was as happy in the 60's as it sounds in this song. i want to sit on a sunny hillside and make a daisy chain and wear it like a crown on my head.

i've been listening to a lot of old songs lately, more 50's than 60's. i wish i could just listen to fun old pop songs forever and that way i would never be sad. and i'd always know all the words and i could always sing along. this summer, i think i'm going to have a fifties backyard barbecue party. i mean, well, i don't really like parties, but this will be super fun. we'll dress up in fun patterned clothes and wear big sunglasses and it can be in my dad's backyard, because he has a big pool and astroturf on the ground. i'm making a mix cd for it right now. i've been making a lot of mix cds, and i've been thinking i'll upload them and post them here, so you guys can download them if you want. i'll probably post a summer nostalgia one too because i've been listening to a lot of summer songs.

i rearranged the room a bit. i don't have roommates anymore and i got sick of waiting for emma to come pick up all her stuff, so i just shoved it in a corner and i moved everything i own to the space by the windows. once i get everything all set up real nice, i'll take some pictures. i really like having a place of my own.

these are some things i want: a necklace with a dead bug encased in amber, brown leather driving gloves without fingers, a holga diana camera, a pet button quail, big feathers to tie in my hair. i want to drive an old pickup truck and go horseback riding and i want to learn to make dreamcatchers.

140;

2008-03-03T04:40:40Z

i'd give anything for things to be like they were two summers ago. i'd give anything for somewhere to go home to, a lap to rest my head on. my mother's house, the yellow house, is gone, the bank took it months ago and finally changed all the locks. my mom got back in some time ago and she told me the place was completely flooded, up to your shins, see, this pipe broke and the whole place is soaked, stinking of sewer water and the walls soaked it up like sponges, the walls are dripping too, it's raining like a downpour from the basement rafters. the place is going to the dogs or whomever, i guess someone got in and took the television set. all that's left of mine is this old toy horse, my mom grabbed it from my old upstairs bedroom because she thought it might be worth something, but she accidentally left it on the living room floor, and then the place flooded, and all that's there is just this horse in the middle of an ocean in the downstairs of my old yellow house.

it's weird that something you once lived in is becoming abandoned, like all the abandoned things you explore, only it's different because you lived there. i don't know how to explain it, but it's weird. i know i always said i never felt like anywhere was home, but if anywhere was close, it was there, and i wish i'd known when i left fall 2006 that i'd never be going back. i ran away from home and ended up displaced ever since, and i'm sure it'll be a long time til somewhere feels as close to what home should feel like as much as that house did. i'd give anything for home again, my oily skin, my straw-spun golden hair, i'd give money and heaven all for somewhere to go back to.

it was warm to-day, like 52 degrees and it was fantastic, for the all of ten minutes i was outside. i'm lazy, i procrastinate like i got nothing else left, and i'd stay up doing homework all night if i had the motivation. but i don't, so i don't, and i just stay up crouched in the corner by my bedroom window, listening to old songs, monster ballads and thinking about where i'm going to go when school's all over with. it's only a few months from now. i could go back to rockford, stay with my dad, or i could stay in chicago, somewhere, i don't know, but i want something to go back to, i want to know for sure what'll be waiting for me, what fantastic things are in store. this summer better be fantastic, i'm putting in all the hope i got left.

139;

2008-02-24T04:53:09Z

i can't get myself to write this paper. i really can't. i'm going to be so frustrated to-morrow when i have no time to do it, let alone my other projects. ugh. school.

i think the way this world is run is so unfortunate. nobody's really all that happy i don't think. it should be more about fun and being outside in the sunshine all day. that's what i think.

i cut the tip of my finger on some broken glass from a mexican catholic candle that fell on the bathroom floor. now there's glass all over the bathroom floor and a cut on my finger and i don't feel much like updating when i'm real sad. it's been like that lately.

i wish i didn't eat as much as i do. i wish i had more friends that are girls. i spend too much time with boys. i've been falling asleep to the movie matilda these past few times i've tried to fall asleep. it's such a nice movie and it's real comforting, i guess, which is why i can fall asleep to it. it was my absolute favorite movie when i was little. i wanted to be matilda, and when i grew up, i wanted to be miss honey, a grade school teacher with a cute cottage in the woods and yellow flowers on my desk every day. with long brown hair and big brown eyes. and reading charles dickens every day. but i don't know if i even really like charles dickens all that much. and my hair is blonde.

i don't know what i want. sometimes i'm around all these people and all i can think is how i don't want to be around these people. then sometimes i want to be around fantastic people, there has to be fantastic people, somewhere, doesn't there, and may-be like a week ago, i was missing my high school years, and i wanted that back, but this week i don't think i want that. i don't really want to be in the city, but i don't really want to go anywhere else. i don't want to start a new life, but i don't want to stay here. i don't want to be alone. i don't want people to be as important to me as they are. i want to read good books in interesting places, i want to sit on a big rock by a small river in a big forest and read children's stories, i don't want to think about the real world. i want my hair to be long and i want to love my family.

138;

2008-02-15T20:14:44Z

and you can go to hell, i'm moving on.
<3

137;

2008-02-05T06:12:56Z

so to-morrow i have things to do, i am going to skip class and wash the laundry and reattach the planets to the wall again. i want to go on a little adventure, may-be out to oak park to sit in a diner and pretend i am in a small town, but it's been so rainy here lately. actually that's not really a problem at all, to-day was a beautiful day, very rainy and misty, especially this morning. i looked up into the sky and you couldn't see the frames of the very tall buildings, just the lights in the window glowing through the fog, like little floating orbs. and it wasn't too terribly cold, i like days like to-day, but i really want it to be spring more than anything, i want sunny days and blue skies and bright green trees. but to-morrow i have things to do and may-be thursday i will take a trip.

i want something to look forward to. i want to be sure of myself. i want something specific and constant in my near future, some exciting getaway or step ahead, but there's nothing like that. i mean, there's nothing bad either, there's not anything, is the thing. i don't even know what i'm doing this summer and normally i've decided by now. i don't even know where i'm going to be living. i might go live in my great-grandmother's old house on the south side of the city, though it would need to be cleaned out and fixed up a bit, but nothing too major. only the neighbourhood is sortof bad, and not full of people my age, so that would get kindof lonely, and it's so far away from everything else in the city. and i couldn't come back on my own late at night. but there's a nice little coffee shop on a corner just a few blocks away, and i love to imagine myself working there, and making friends, and having a nice little house to go home to, with an authentic 1950's kitchen and a big beautiful back porch. and there's three bedrooms there, i could have people come stay with me all the time. it would be so nice if i knew more people around there.

or i could go back to rockford, but i'd have to live with my dad, and i wouldn't like that at all. but at least i would know people there. i don't know. i want to learn to play guitar, or ukulele, or mandolin, and even if i could only play a few chords or notes, i don't care, i want to make a band and play simple songs and covers of my favourites. just for the summer, just for fun. i saw the diving bell and the butterfly and it was absolutely perfect, absolutely amazing, everything i expected it to be and more. it wasn't disappointing in the slightest, and normally movies are when i get so excited about them. it was beyond incredible, especially the cinematography, and you have to have to see it. also i saw there will be blood and i liked that too, even though it made me nervous.

soon i am going to make a post all about the death house. may-be even to-morrow.

136;

2008-01-29T16:12:59Z

i don't know what's wrong with me.

i keep listening to girls just wanna have fun. it's such a sad fucking song.

yeah i don't know. i had three classes yesterday and they all went pretty well i think. i think i will like them. english is first in the morning, the teacher's this really sweet awkward hyper lady with curly orange hair and blue eyes and red lipstick. the class is called "the first novel," and i guess we'll be reading first novels. right now it's less than zero by bret easton ellis, and i don't know, it's okay i guess, i've been reading it since seven thirty this morning, but i just don't care about sex, drugs, and rock and roll. it's not poorly written, i'm just not really interested. at least it goes fast. but this book was written in the early/mid eighties and everything is exactly the same now. may-be it's this whole club-throwback-scene thing, but all the kids here i see are exactly the same. cocaine and ugly sunglasses. i can't stand it (not the book, the actual thing). i want warm grass fields and ribbons on wrists and county fairs and honesty.

in the afternoon i have research studio ii, which is a required first year class, but the theme i guess is self-identity, so i probably won't have a problem with that because all i do is talk about myself and take pictures of myself. that teacher seems nice too, she's this big pink blonde lady with pink glasses and a pink scarf and a slight brooklyn accent. i think she thinks i'm interesting. or at least semi-amusing. our first assignment is to take twenty pictures of our self. piece of cake!

at night i had the writing class i wanted. it's so terrifying! but, i mean, in a good way i think, because eileen favorite, the teacher, seemed to want me to be in the class so hopefully that means she thinks i can handle it. i'm the only freshman in the class, the rest of it is like, third year writing program majors, and they're all so scary and good and more than anything, unafraid. they're not afraid to read aloud or be critiqued or critique and they're all so picky about how to critique, i'm afraid i'm going to be critiqued on how i critique. i'm not necessarily afraid of critique though, i'm just afraid i'm actually a terrible writer and they're all going to be so bored and annoyed with this little first year girl. normally i feel about sixteen years old in the presence of peers, but here i'm twelve years old. i feel so small and blonde and soft.

to-day is worse. i skipped the class i was afraid of, the one i didn't do any of the work for over break. it's a required studio class, it's seven hours long, and we're supposed to be learning all different sorts of media and "dimensions" of art. like, it's broken up into three rotations, 2d, which is drawing and painting, 3d, which is sculpture, and 4d, which is "time based media," aka video and sound (yeah i know, sound art, i'm a little wtf about that one). i'm in the 3d rotation right now and it's not that i hate sculpture, i did fine with a found-item sculpture last year, it's just we're using stuff like plaster molds and giant scary woodshop tools and i don't now why, but i can't do it. like, it all just falls apart in my hands. my plaster thing just crumbled between them and i freaked out and threw up in the bathroom. and we were taught how to use all the woodshop tools and i don't know what's wrong with me, i think i'm seriously mentally retarded because i forget everything within minutes, and then when i go to use the tools i have to have the shop administrator explain it all over again, and even then i still fuck it up and i shake too bad and go throw up in the bathroom again. i didn't want to go back to-day and have that happen again, and not have any work done, and seriously i'm so stupid about stuff like this, like i could just kick myself over it, i don't know why i can't just stop being afraid and do what i'm supposed to. but there's so many people in that class and there's so many people in the woodshop and i can't work around people, i just can't, i can't even draw around people, like my hand gets all shaky and my lines are all wonky and i don't know. i just hate that i look dumb and little and inexperienced and young around all these people i don't even know, i don't know why i care. my looks don't help much either, it's like everyone's wondering how this fourteen year old got into one of the most prestigious art schools in the country. it's like everyone's just wondering what i'm doing here.

anyway that class is required and i want to drop it but there's all these blocks on my account because of money problems so i have to register through an adviser so i don't know if i'm going to be able to drop it. then i'll just transfer next year, or if i stay here, retake the class and do it right for once. yes. okay. sorry this is so long, it was really more just for me, it helps to clear out my head and figure out what i'm going to do. if i drop it may-be i can get a job. i don't want a job but i should probably get one or i'll feel guilty as shit about everything. but i just want to read books and draw pictures and drink chai tea and chocolate milk and have a nice small house and decorate it pretty, and, i don't know, i want to live in appalachia.

135;

2008-01-25T09:39:40Z

okay well. i'm back in chicago now, hopefully everything with registration is worked out, or at least will be. i'm trying to see if i can get into this writing class i really want to be in.. it's taught by this teacher i had last semester whom i really liked. it's full, but there's a possibility she'll let me in anyway, so i'm crossing my fingers. if that happens, all of my classes will be on monday, tuesday, and wednesday, which will be hectic of course, but leave me with a four day weekend every week! imagine how wonderful that would be. theoretically i would have lots of time to do work, but honestly i'll probably just use the time to get out of the city. even if i don't leave the city, i'll have lots of time to go on day trips throughout the city. i might do that to-morrow, if i get the chance. i might go out to oak park, eat in that nice diner. it's silly to take nearly an hour long el ride just to eat in a nice diner, especially when it's too cold to really walk around or anything, but i haven't got much else to do, and besides, i like long train rides. i'd very much like to go back to the nature museum, where they have that butterfly room --and the button quails!-- but it's sortof inconvenient because there's no el that goes real close to it. gosh i wish it weren't cold.

to-night i had a nice diner, crepes and fresh fruit, it was great. i like home-cooked (well, not hand-made of course, but you know) food so much better than fast food. i don't feel disgusting after i eat it. i think, overall, i've lost weight since the summer and that's really fantastic. my hair is getting longer too, and i feel prettier than i'm used to. i watched the waitress to-night --yeah really lame i know shut up-- but keri russel is cute and i guess i can kindof relate to her character, ha. actually really. but i don't know, i wish life could really be like that. i know it's just idealism when i say i really wouldn't mind being a waitress in a small town for awhile, waiting for something incredible to happen, but i can't help it. it just seems so much more hopeful than this. i wish i had some useful talent, like baking, rather than what i can do now. sure it's interesting, but in the end you're highly forgettable and i don't think i've got the drive for it anyway. i just want a nice pretty life is all. i want to hang things from the ceiling and put flowers in the window.

i stay up very late now, and sleep in very late too. i don't like falling asleep, falling asleep is the absolute worse feeling in the world, but actually being asleep is amazing and i think i'd like to do it for a very long time, days, weeks, even, and i'd like for a whole huge gap of time to pass and not to even notice. i'm not so lonely like this, more i'm really developing quite the aversion to human contact --i mean, even more so than before-- and i don't really mind. sure i'd like to have some close friends but i'm pretty sure i'm terrible at that sort of stuff anyway. i don't think there's people like i need people to be and i'm becoming fine with that. my mother bought me a pack of stickers of the glow-in-the-dark solar system and it made me so happy because it was a surprise. i made the planets go in an arc on the wall above my bed. i started to put the stars up but ran out of that sticky tack stuff. if i could reach the ceiling they'd be up there but i can't. actually i've gotten a lot of nice things lately, may-be i'll take some pictures and post them here.

it's a terrifying thought to me to have to leave this room. i hate to think of all the people i have to pass on the way, how each and every one will look at me because no matter how hard i try, how much i cover my face and duck my head, i can never be nondescript. i hear voices of people passing in the hallway and it makes me want to die because i'm much happier pretending there's no one else in my world except the people i choose to be there. i hate to walk on the street, i hate the condescending looks from my peers or the up-and-down eyes of the dirty men. never the nice ones, the nice ones never look at me. at least i know the type of girl i am, what kind of attention i attract. if you know these things, you can handle situations better. some day i will know how to handle every situation, it will take time but some day i will be able to pre-meditate every interaction between myself and any random other, and things will go nice and quick and smoothly. some day i will be able to stand up for myself, but for now i give in to everything, i will never say no. i want people to like me. i need to quit trying so hard.

there are lights on everywhere here, all the time. it makes me think that there's still someone up, still someone waiting for me.

134;

2008-01-10T07:42:44Z

i feel most beautiful with tears in my eyes, but ugliest when they spill over. i feel like i didn't do anything, i didn't do a damn single thing. not one, i just sat there, completely ignoring it all, read a book, ran away to lean my head back against some old brick building, drop twigs between the bars of some old rusty grate. my head hurt so bad i couldn't stand up straight, all i remember is a hospital room swimming around me in ocean green.

i want things to be normal and simple again, easy like a rock song for the radio, or kids to play in stereos, like high school, i want the world to be nothing bigger than the walls that surround me, the trees on the edge of town. i want to take the time to really like a boy and not worry so much about falling in love. i want to go off-roading in old pick up trucks, i want to drive around with nothing to do, because there's nothing to see, i want to watch movies in basements and hold hands and kick rocks down sidewalks and turn simple songs into anthems, just because the moment's right. i know what i'm doing is wrong, but i don't know what else to do about it. i just want to keep making wishes for things to work themselves out. i don't want to make a decision, i just want to sit and wait it out.

see the thing is that as you're getting older, you're supposed to be getting stronger, but i see more strength in my tiny thirteen-year-old fists, more bravery behind my skinny little arms, then, than i do now. i can handle less and less, i hole up in myself more and more, at every little thing. i'm terrified of people, especially new ones, i don't make friends anymore, i'm just too afraid. to do anything, to even solve the situations i'm in. i'm too afraid, i just sit back and wait, and i wish i was brave, i wish i could stand up on my own but i really can't.

but the other night i was sort-of brave. i went back into the death house, in the middle of the night too! the blood splatter was painted over, but just a thin layer of white paint, you could still see everything, it was like a big pink silhouette, but there were still little drops the painter missed. i wonder who the painter was. i've searched all over, at least the internet anyway, and i can't find anything about, it's like it didn't even happen. and there never was any police tape or anything. i wonder if anyone ever found out about it. may-be it was all a big secret, all covered up, may-be the painter was the murderer. you can still obviously see it, he's got to be coming back. and i don't think they'd be renovating that house. it is kindof trashed, and it's old, and they're building a subdivision in the field behind it, so they'd probably just knock it down instead. i went in the house next door too, i know the name of the family that lived there, but i don't know what would happen if i tried to talk to them. they probably wouldn't tell me anything, they have no reason to. i'm just curious is all. i can't stop thinking about it. i don't know why i get so wrapped up in this kind of thing.

anyway i think i'm going there soon, so i'll post some pictures of the place because i've talked about it so much. here are three:

okay that's all.

133;

2008-01-06T09:45:29Z

so holidays new year all of that.
christmas cards didn't happen, sorry. next year ok?
my grandpa died, we buried him christmas eve day. it was cold, i was wearing small black shoes standing on frozen ground and dead leaves and i got back into the car, i couldn't feel my toes.
now i'm covered in dog hair and there are so many scratches in my computer screen. but i think it's alright.
i don't really want to go back to school, the word "art" just kindof makes me want to throw up. may-be i'll be a librarian, a children's librarian, or a preschool teacher, or a marine biologist.
i could work at seaworld, i could stand on dolphins' noses and they could push me up out of the water, into the air when they jumped.

i don't know what to say. i don't know what to write about, i want to tell you all these secrets, i want to tell you the meanderings and the happenings of life every day but even that's secrets now. more i just want to write it, remember it for me because i want to remember happy things when i look back at this some time from now, but all that's not secrets is the sad things, the distress and uncertainty over funerals and finances and futures and i want to talk about the fuck-ups, the ones that already happened, not just the ones oncoming. you see there are walks in forests, three or four weird days in a row, right after it snowed, when it wasn't too cold and the wind didn't move and all the snow and ice just froze and stuck right to everything, and it was all a pretty sparkly silver world, everything. but yesterday, and to-day especially, it started getting warmer, the slim lines of snow sitting on top tree branches started clumping, melting into lumps, onto the ground where it disappeared, into broken corn stalks and puddles in streets.

tried to go sledding but the hill was too steep and the ground was starting to show through. big tall poles holding up water towers, criss-crossing sticks lit up in red and pink glow from a light on the wall of some brick building in the background, a man at the bottom, talking low on the telephone.

i want to remember the way you look lit up in car light flash, cut out against a black sky, i want to remember you pale-faced and cold.

i had this dream last night, i was in this abandoned house and it was collapsing on the insides and trees were growing up and everything was dark and shadowy under foliage, little glints of light coming through, and everything was fine and nice and then two people came running at us, they said there was a man coming. he was a big man, big in a tan shirt, with sparse hair and a fat face and a mustache, very big. he said "no, no! no it's okay i'm not going to hurt you. you see i just used to live in this house. i just wanted to see what you were doing here. but i see you are just taking pictures, i see your cameras, it's okay." and we weren't afraid. and he said, "it's okay that you're here, but you probably shouldn't come back. i used to live here and i'm having this place knocked down soon, in six months time. you see i killed my wife here." and he walked over to a big bag on the floor and opened it up. we were afraid, we didn't move, we didn't know what to do. he opened up the bag and he pulled out a tiny filipino woman, with tiny tan arms and long black hair and a white dress, and he pushed her into his chest and he said, "she's not quite dead yet," and he pushed and pushed and she waved her arms and legs around and then he set her back in the bag, she was still breathing. and we all walked out calmly together. we were afraid of him, we didn't know what to do. after, we were in a living room with a land line telephone, we wanted to call the police, the woman was still alive, but we didn't want the man to find out it was us who called, we didn't want him to come after us. we started to use the land line, but "no no! that can be traced." i think we called the police, but i don't really remember now for sure or not. i saw her moving around all day.

i watched the virgin suicides, and i liked it, i think, but it's so hard for me to tell if i've liked a movie if i've read the book already.

(it's because i don't believe in you ok?)

this is the song that was going in my head when we watched him die.

"don't kiss me good bye, baby. baby"

132;

2007-12-18T08:01:22Z

the train back to-night was slow, real slow and i don't know what time it was really, just like 100am or so but it was taking forever. and anyway there was this super tall man sitting across from me and down the car a bit, and he kept giving me eyes, he had to be about thirty five or so, and he was pretty cute actually, REALLY tall, so i smiled at him. and we got off at the same stop, he lives close to me. we talked about cold, how we both almost went out the wrong door, new york and chicago, and christmas in the city. he told me i had a great smile, and then when i was like "all right, well i cross the street here," he said, "okay bye. you look really great." i don't know his name or anything. i don't know, things like that make me feel cute and happy.

131;

2007-12-13T15:13:15Z

who wants a christmas card?
comment with your address.
comments will be screened.
<3

130;

2007-12-12T22:53:45Z

went to the most lovely place to-day. the nature museum in lincoln park, and there's this amazing butterfly room on the top, a big greenhouse like thing made of windows and full of plants and butterflies and moths of course. AND. these things!

it's a button quail!

baby!

they're tiny and little and flightless and run around on the ground and the best part is they can be pets!
christmaspresenttttttt.
sdflskdfkladklas

anyway. the butterfly room was amazing, it was so warm in there, and there were these moths that had wings that looked like the faces of owls, and then this one that the bottoms of the wings looked like dead leaves but when it opened up it was bright metallic blue. and ones that were white with thin black curliques, like wallpaper wings, and then there were shelf-like things with cocoons hanging off of them in rows, all different kinds and glen called it the butterfly factory and i thought this was very appropriate.

there was also a giant exhibit of reptiles and we saw lots of lizards and turtles and snakes. in the gift shop you could buy little rubber frogs, like the size of a dime, for thirtyfive cents and we each got one and now it is in my pocket.

then we walked across the street to the lincoln park conservatory and it was so pretty, right as the sun was beginning to set, going in at an angle through the old metal beams and glass windows of the building, and giant ferns and plants that touched the ceiling, and because it was christmas there were toy trains running all over the place, and sparkly lights, and one room smelled like pine trees, all like christmas, and it was great. only all day i didn't have my camera! so i couldn't take pictures of anything. it was very sad. i need to go back to these places real soon.

final classes this week and then monday and then after that i think i'll be going back to rockford. yes okay time to get ready for class.