long live!

drizzle drizzle drizzle.
sniffle sniffle sniffle.
the rain just keeps on coming down.

i got some new bright yellow rubber rain boots to clomp around in though so it makes these remaining winter days a bit sunnier for me.

yesterday, i sent out a big round of valentines and bummed around at the bookstore for awhile before i decided to go to macy's and look at all the designer goods. but cruising through the racks of clothes left me feeling very empty all of a sudden so i left. i hopped back in the car and listened to patti smith all the way home. as i drove and yelled and sang along with her, i realized that i have a bad habit of just swallowing my anger. i don't tend to express it very often at all. and there was just something about the rain and the emptiness i had just experienced and her voice that let me know that there are some things a person should be angry about. that anger can be the exact right emotional response to some things in this world. learning the difference between what is and is not appropriate is the tricky part. and perhaps that's way i've been so silent when it comes to anger... i have precious few tools to help me come to such conclusions. and then i thought... maybe that's one of the roles of poetry??? of art in general??? a way to present these uncomfortable things and emotions to the world... a slower way than screaming or yelling. and the slowness of it (and i mean in terms of the time it takes to make a painting or make a poem) forces an examination of emotions that, though ugly or uncomfortable or "shameful", imbue these things with an insight that those of us who grew up roughly might have lacked... that not all anger is bad anger. that anger doesn't have to be scary. that it doesn't necessarily lead to abandonment or abuse or neglect. maybe anger has a value too?

and then when i got home, i received an email from my buddy rebecca alerting me to the fact that yesterday - sylvia's death day - designer alexander mcqueen killed himself.

just thinking about it, just typing those words... my breath rolls out thick and slow. the horrible sigh. the horrible, horrible regret. the horrible, horrible question mark.





we must find a way to be ourselves. we must. who we are at the very core. whatever untainted piece is left, whatever small kernel of delight, whatever hint of justice that is buried down there. we must find it and bring it out. i must do this. the more and more i wrestle with all these big questions, i keep ending up with the same answer: be who you truly are.

and for as cliched as it may be at this point in our history of things, shakespere got it exactly right. "above all else, to thine own self be true". goddamn. i think of this quote every day and every day it kicks me in the teeth! it really does! when i start to zero in on myself and stop thinking so much about other people, their motives, their behavior, their wants, needs, struggles, i begin to truly see my own. i am, for the first time in years, seeing for sure what my values are... and also receiving the hard knowledge that comes when i look at the moments in which i've abandoned them. these are the failures against temptation or loneliness or whatever whatever whatever the day may bring. and sometimes i cry in shame over these things but i will not look away. these are the facts i need in order to stand back up. these "failures" are the moments when i stopped being my true self, when i allowed myself to be led around by the nose by someone else's emotions and behaviors. these are the moments that i can cling to, to use as a tool toward building a better life. they are my amazing, shining opportunities to really see who i want to become... who i choose to become, not what the world would have me be. that pressure, that outside demand, is too great. it is too much.

and patti smith sang, "those who have suffered understand suffering and thereby extend their hand...:

isn't that the great role of art? isn't that the hand of humanity sweeping across our pain? isn't that what we are here for? at least some of the time? to find a way, an avenue that allows us to not be beaten down and corroded by pain but rather to allow it to polish us... to polish and protect our great loves? to cling tighter to value and goodness? to not abandon them in moments when we need them the most?

drizzle drizzle drizzle.
sniffle sniffle sniffle.
ramble ramble ramble.

but i'm serious. knowing myself completely and finding the courage to just be that is the hardest, most beautiful, most important task i have ever set out to accomplish. and so, among all these big ethereal abstract questions, i simplify my day-

i make valentines because, when i think of who i am or would like to be, i am a girl that values small (albeit sappy) gestures of love and romance.

i paint every day because i want to be a person that paints every day.

i write every day because i want to be a person that writes every day.

i make silly postcards and send them off in to the world because that is an action i admire and i want to participate in things i admire. i want to welcome these great, glittering storms of compassion and beauty and pain even in to my life. i want to be polished. i want to be strong. i'm tired of losing time to a state of confused longing. i may feel that way... but i can feel it and still move forward. i can make valentines. i can hang heart shapes in the window. i can write letters and poems and make paintings and know that these things, these objects, these gestures give voice to my core self... that i can choose to be who i truly am without apology or excuse or argument.

people will believe whatever they want to believe. this is something that is out of my control. i can choose to have faith in my self and in the goodness of my life... in the goodness of my particularities.

i admired mr. mcqeen's particularities.

the fruits of your labor, sir, have not gone unnoticed and your entrance has been granted. rest well. rest deep in love. we'll see you on the other side. i'm sure your good work will continue there and i can't wait to see it. :)


alexander mcqueen sneakers
spring collection 2010