Pull it up shove it out

I am excited. This is exciting. I just remembered: philosophy. I am so fucking in love with something, everything. I had an awful migraine on Monday, which of course reminded me yet again about what's important. I deserve migraines. Maybe I'll stop getting them when I don't need them anymore, and maybe that will never happen. That's ok. The pain is interesting, and I can bear it as long as I know it will end soon. I saw a movie about a dying man last night, Time of Closure. It was good. He had pain without an end. That would be unbearable. Ends and beginnings, we need lots of these. End of the workday. Beginning of a romantic interlude. End of a relationship. Beginning of freedom. How could I keep going if things were at a constant? Chaos and form, fluctuating back and forth (forever) throughout our lives. Creating cookies out of eggs and sugar! Breaking down the cookies using our ever-hungry absorption machinery. This living thing, so full, so much change! I have a friend who needs to create big events, big deals, the adventure to end all adventures. (S)he doesn't remember that we are on the biggest adventure already. This person has perhaps become addicted to what happens in their brain when intense stuff happens, which is understandable, because we were designed to be experiencing the big deal head rush all the time. Why do our bodies become tuned away from this? Why do we need more and more to experience the intensity that should be happening constantly just because we are alive? Do you remember when you were a kid? How little it took to make the big deal head rush? We were made for happiness. Our pasts turn into warm happiness as we get further away from them. The most difficult situations cause happiness. Everything causes happiness, we have to work pretty damn hard to make so much boredom and sadness. We are artful pros at this. Congratulations, you can make misery out of everything. You are the best at misery! Would you like a button or a sticker? I can make some.

Some old writings from last week, in reverse order (maybe):

***I feel like I've fallen in love with someone but there's no one to fall in love with. Who or what has captured me so? Honey, you make me forget I was sick of myself.

I love how people who've grown up in similarly overeducated privileged positions like myself feel kind of embarrassed and at the same time proud of how obsessed they are about living the best way possible. We all know there are more pressing problems out there, but still revel in careful excrement examination. We worry a zen Buddhist monk would find our worrying and questing funny or boring or absurd. We air our problems publicly and with irony. We try to appear mature and intelligent. Why is it so important to appear witty, zen, wise? I've always been drawn towards slightly older friends because I like to pretend I'm on their "level," but why do I think about this so much? Can't I just relax already and like people because they are funny or nice? What's the deal with this rush towards enlightenment? That's a stupid goal.

Also, I've decided the worst life situation is not being a repressed, tortured, child abused, and/or raped woman in a backwards country. People growing up in bad circumstances often seem, well, not thrilled, but resigned about their situations. I read a quote somewhere from a Chinese woman in England who said it wouldn't be a good thing for rural Chinese women to know how the rest of the world lives. They are happy because they think everyone lives like them. No, the worst life would be to grow up like me (or, even worse, in the top .001%) and then be thrown into that situation as an adult.

***Ack, you're right Jeanne, I apologize. Quaint is the wrong word. I do love New Zealand, just sometimes I miss that horribly cynical filter that runs rampant in US city culture. I was trying to make fun of myself for not enjoying art/events unless it's ridiculously self-aware and shoved through the irony filter. There's something innocent maybe? about New Zealand art. (Same innocence shows up in places like the news, but I think that says more about the American obsession with tragedy than anything else) I think you guys have a wonderful culture, and 90% of the time I feel so free in it, like I can call myself an artist or a builder or anything I want, but occasionally I get depressed by art galleries, movies (tthough the docfest sure looks great), street festivals, etc. Sometimes I miss being surrounded by artists who've been infected by the same culture as me. That's fair, right? No more making sweeping generalizations about NZ, I promise! I wouldn't live here if I didn't like it, and the US is indeed a much more problematic place to live, somehow managing to be both backwards and cynical. Thanks for calling me out on that. As I told my mom last week in response to her incredulousness at me airing all my private thoughts to the world, one of the main reasons I keep a blog is to keep myself honest and aware, and I can't do that unless people tell me when I'm being an asshole.

***Oh yum, today was strawberry day. Some medical facility was raising money by selling loads of strawberry sundaes in midland park. Every square inch was packed with people sitting in the sun eating ice-cream. Felt like Field Day only I didn't have to jump through tires. It's funny that strawberries come into season now, leading to terms like "Christmas Strawberries." Although come to think of it it's the same in Japan, and strawberries aren't even in season there. Traditional (and highly romantic) Christmas cake is vanilla with strawberries neatly pointing up around the rim of the top. They attach great significance to the red and white theme, which is why KFC is also popular at that time of the year. I was advised to put in my Christmas KFC order well in advance. Yuck!

December 25/26 and January 1/2 are public holidays here. In the government the 27, 28, 3, and 4 are all pretty much compulsory days off. If I tack on the 24th I am effectively being forced into taking a 2 week holiday. Gosh darn it. I haven't been able to find anyone who's free and in New Zealand over Christmas break, but the more I think about it, the more excited I get to be alone and travelling. The plan is to take as easy a vacation as possible. Right now I'm thinking go up to the far north and sit on beaches the entire time reading and having fruit and champagne, seducing myself. I like thinking about future me having a crush on present me because I had such a great vacation idea.


***I'm feeling a bit sad today. It feels good to be sad. I love being normal again, and taking care of my body. I miss you. I miss having time to do nothing. I miss my family, my friends. I miss cheesy movies and new cds. I miss biting my nails. I miss having someone there who cares about me a lot. These people don't think about me, nor I them. It's all good times now, but they're not gonna fetch me the vomit bucket next time I have a migraine. No one's around to tell me dumb dream stories in the morning, or wrap around me like a monkey when I try and get out of bed too early on Saturday mornings. I just get up. I'm up I'm up. I eat breakfast at 8:30 because there's no monkey there holding me back.

Monkey! :(