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30 July 2006 : from where i came.
return to these moments, find in them space that leaves you aching. you should have known.
"it's the convienence that kills you," he said, nodding sagely. he leaned back, eyeing me and rubbing the exposed pouch of his stomach.
he's always been able to disarm me with a sentence; not always because he is right, but because he is always righteous. pretty impressive when you're covered in tattoos and coughing up black from the smelter. makes rules and breaks them nearly simultaneously, but something about him convinces you of steadfast will.
he was talking about the contents of his refrigerator: chocolate milk, vodka, an economy pack of hot dogs, baked beans. that unfortunate potbelly.
convienence is the watchword, if you think about it. mcdonald's is far easier than the preparation and consequences of a well-balanced, home cooked meal. but i've come to discover that comfort zones are inherently dangerous. wallowing in sadness makes you more sad, breeds self loathing, and eventually wears so thin you couldn't even wear it on the red carpet. i've been waiting for something (or someone, really) to come along and add a little excitement to this life, but i ought to be able to do that on my own.
despite that, i've come to terms with some of the things i'll never do or be - it's been difficult, especially since i have to see them so close and in 3D. but shaking off 23 years of training in watchfulness and caution is no easy task. i'd even venture so far as impossible.
i will always be afraid of new situations. i might delight, but there is never a foreign moment without a little tweak deep behind my sternum.
his ideas about the dangers of convienence were merely a way to pass the time. he doesn't worry, he's so solely existent that sometimes it hurts to look at him. if you'd met him, you'd know what i mean - there's too much focus, too much concentration, no blurred edges. he has something to say about everything, swaggers into any situation unprepared and full of an inordinate amount of chutzpah. its really very buddhist, the way he lives his life - consequence has never entered the equation, only action permeates his view of the world.
how my parents spawned two such different creatures, i'll never know. to guess would be to delve into a family history so long, deep and painful that i'd emerge covered in bruises and drying blood, with no answers and wrung hands. in common we have vanity and a pesky tobacco addiction, but it comes to a screeching halt as soon as you step out the back door of our shared childhood home.
he was talking about drinking and driving, women spending the night, being non-union in an industrial world.
i had more sincere considerations for the direction of our conversation, but the lazy sunday afternoon had no patience for my existential dilemma.
posted by lindsay at 20:09 :: 1 comments
16 July 2006 : the hour yet to come.
this heat is making me drowsy, anxious, restless, predatory.
no one has it in them to comment, or at least no one i see. i want to plaster photos of myself all over town.
my dramatic and fatal statement for this week is: i will die if i don't learn how to play the piano this year. the songs in my head have gotten out of control and need to be made fit for public consumption; i will pay off my credit card and buy a fancy keyboard, i will play a show at the irving - if it kills me.
it has to be the heat; weather like this makes me dream. fall, corduroy, red lipstick are calling.
you've gotta move, you've gotta move, you've gotta move.
i've gotta move, i've gotta move, i've gotta move.
posted by lindsay at 23:06 :: 6 comments
02 July 2006 : crash, crash, crescendo.
i'm aware of movement, mostly. i have to take in small details and work them out one at a time, otherwise i'd be spun, knuckles to the wall. there's too much going on, too much changing, too much happening to keep my eyes on it all.
culmination is key. i wear black, perhaps, to tie it all together and consider carefully the placement of my commas so you will know exactly what i mean.
because i needed a signature, i walked into a conversation at precisely the right moment and two days later found me once again introduced to the other side of the microphone. i can't explain the nature of such a thing; rediscovery had the same shock of still, cool water that had hooked me in the first place.
for three years, i've been fine without music. i've missed it in quiet moments, on occasion smiled at the sound of myself against Ben Gibbard in the car, but i kept it to myself. brushed away the itinerant pang of longing while my guitars sat dusty in some corner of whatever bedroom i happened to occupy.
it had to work this way; there was no room for wiggling or wanting, only that rush as i hear it over the p.a. - dripping or gushing or folding in a rustle like silk - so many minutes later. there had to be shock, i had to be punched in the stomach with remembering. in the intervening years the sound of me has broadened and deepened, grown past adolescence, started smoking camels and learned how to walk in heels.
what i hear on the monitors is not a product of ego, really. if anything it has to be a symptom. to me it sounds like a door slamming shut with finality, like a man dusting his hands off one another in satisfaction at a job well done. it sounds like the turn of a key in the ignition of the car that drove me home from california.
i have to sweat, shake my hair back, i have to swing what hips i have and step forward on the glide of a finger, mimick finality with the smell of hot metal and working electronics in my nose and the feeling in the back of my throat, wrapping my muscles around something the shape of which is nameless - not to squeeze but to hold, to expel slowly, slowly. sugar, something soft and silky and molten in my mouth.
it pours, and it looks like the sound of every moment of the last decade. it looks like lindsay's face when we crossed the border, it looks like scott's hand on my waist, it looks like the bags under my mother's eyes the week my father died and she was awake for six days straight. it looks like that man who crossed his legs under flourescent light leaning forward and touching my arm when he laughed and it looks like that slick dark parking lot and fingers on my mouth, the taste of blood and the pain of kissing and it looks like life.
a stolen second of pleasure, the flavor of what's to come. this is what i plead with myself about on the nights that i can't sleep - don't let it go, lindsay, don't let it go - wear yourself like a sundress and stay poised to spring forward every time you're scared. nothing specific, just don't let it go. this must have been it.
i guess i just always needed a moment.
posted by lindsay at 23:15 :: 3 comments
return to these moments, find in them space that leaves you aching. you should have known.
"it's the convienence that kills you," he said, nodding sagely. he leaned back, eyeing me and rubbing the exposed pouch of his stomach.
he's always been able to disarm me with a sentence; not always because he is right, but because he is always righteous. pretty impressive when you're covered in tattoos and coughing up black from the smelter. makes rules and breaks them nearly simultaneously, but something about him convinces you of steadfast will.
he was talking about the contents of his refrigerator: chocolate milk, vodka, an economy pack of hot dogs, baked beans. that unfortunate potbelly.
convienence is the watchword, if you think about it. mcdonald's is far easier than the preparation and consequences of a well-balanced, home cooked meal. but i've come to discover that comfort zones are inherently dangerous. wallowing in sadness makes you more sad, breeds self loathing, and eventually wears so thin you couldn't even wear it on the red carpet. i've been waiting for something (or someone, really) to come along and add a little excitement to this life, but i ought to be able to do that on my own.
despite that, i've come to terms with some of the things i'll never do or be - it's been difficult, especially since i have to see them so close and in 3D. but shaking off 23 years of training in watchfulness and caution is no easy task. i'd even venture so far as impossible.
i will always be afraid of new situations. i might delight, but there is never a foreign moment without a little tweak deep behind my sternum.
his ideas about the dangers of convienence were merely a way to pass the time. he doesn't worry, he's so solely existent that sometimes it hurts to look at him. if you'd met him, you'd know what i mean - there's too much focus, too much concentration, no blurred edges. he has something to say about everything, swaggers into any situation unprepared and full of an inordinate amount of chutzpah. its really very buddhist, the way he lives his life - consequence has never entered the equation, only action permeates his view of the world.
how my parents spawned two such different creatures, i'll never know. to guess would be to delve into a family history so long, deep and painful that i'd emerge covered in bruises and drying blood, with no answers and wrung hands. in common we have vanity and a pesky tobacco addiction, but it comes to a screeching halt as soon as you step out the back door of our shared childhood home.
he was talking about drinking and driving, women spending the night, being non-union in an industrial world.
i had more sincere considerations for the direction of our conversation, but the lazy sunday afternoon had no patience for my existential dilemma.
Labels: Charmed I'm sure
posted by lindsay at 20:09 :: 1 comments
16 July 2006 : the hour yet to come.
this heat is making me drowsy, anxious, restless, predatory.
no one has it in them to comment, or at least no one i see. i want to plaster photos of myself all over town.
my dramatic and fatal statement for this week is: i will die if i don't learn how to play the piano this year. the songs in my head have gotten out of control and need to be made fit for public consumption; i will pay off my credit card and buy a fancy keyboard, i will play a show at the irving - if it kills me.
it has to be the heat; weather like this makes me dream. fall, corduroy, red lipstick are calling.
you've gotta move, you've gotta move, you've gotta move.
i've gotta move, i've gotta move, i've gotta move.
Labels: Two steps forward
posted by lindsay at 23:06 :: 6 comments
02 July 2006 : crash, crash, crescendo.
i'm aware of movement, mostly. i have to take in small details and work them out one at a time, otherwise i'd be spun, knuckles to the wall. there's too much going on, too much changing, too much happening to keep my eyes on it all.
culmination is key. i wear black, perhaps, to tie it all together and consider carefully the placement of my commas so you will know exactly what i mean.
because i needed a signature, i walked into a conversation at precisely the right moment and two days later found me once again introduced to the other side of the microphone. i can't explain the nature of such a thing; rediscovery had the same shock of still, cool water that had hooked me in the first place.
for three years, i've been fine without music. i've missed it in quiet moments, on occasion smiled at the sound of myself against Ben Gibbard in the car, but i kept it to myself. brushed away the itinerant pang of longing while my guitars sat dusty in some corner of whatever bedroom i happened to occupy.
it had to work this way; there was no room for wiggling or wanting, only that rush as i hear it over the p.a. - dripping or gushing or folding in a rustle like silk - so many minutes later. there had to be shock, i had to be punched in the stomach with remembering. in the intervening years the sound of me has broadened and deepened, grown past adolescence, started smoking camels and learned how to walk in heels.
what i hear on the monitors is not a product of ego, really. if anything it has to be a symptom. to me it sounds like a door slamming shut with finality, like a man dusting his hands off one another in satisfaction at a job well done. it sounds like the turn of a key in the ignition of the car that drove me home from california.
i have to sweat, shake my hair back, i have to swing what hips i have and step forward on the glide of a finger, mimick finality with the smell of hot metal and working electronics in my nose and the feeling in the back of my throat, wrapping my muscles around something the shape of which is nameless - not to squeeze but to hold, to expel slowly, slowly. sugar, something soft and silky and molten in my mouth.
it pours, and it looks like the sound of every moment of the last decade. it looks like lindsay's face when we crossed the border, it looks like scott's hand on my waist, it looks like the bags under my mother's eyes the week my father died and she was awake for six days straight. it looks like that man who crossed his legs under flourescent light leaning forward and touching my arm when he laughed and it looks like that slick dark parking lot and fingers on my mouth, the taste of blood and the pain of kissing and it looks like life.
a stolen second of pleasure, the flavor of what's to come. this is what i plead with myself about on the nights that i can't sleep - don't let it go, lindsay, don't let it go - wear yourself like a sundress and stay poised to spring forward every time you're scared. nothing specific, just don't let it go. this must have been it.
i guess i just always needed a moment.
Labels: old chestnuts
posted by lindsay at 23:15 :: 3 comments