these texts are an archive of my life in the San Francisco Bay Area from march 2007 - march 2015. it stands as a record of close to a decade of my life, charting the struggles i faced as an artist, daughter, and lover. messy and chaotic at times, eloquent and poetic at others, these texts are an index i am proud of. it was here in this electric box that i learned how to be honest about my experiences and the person i needed to become. it was here that i first learned the truism that words make the world and how to trust such a beautiful, rife, hard fact.

thank you for meeting me here in such tall grass.


my artist website is here.

Apr 13, 2010

what fun...

childhood memories are funny. i love hearing them. especially what people thought about the world when they were small.

this morning when i stepped outside a big fat drop of rain splatted on my cheek and it knocked a memory loose that totally explains how i became a RAIN HATER.

i stopped jumping in puddles and playing in the rain pretty early in life because, if you remember, in the mid to late 80s (i was born in 1980) all of a sudden every body got FANATICAL about ACID RAIN. and i was told about this in school. and i have NO CLUE why GROWN UPS thought it was a GOOD IDEA to tell LITTLE KIDS about ACID RAIN when the hot movie at the time was "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?", a movie that included the death of sweet little cartoons by way of THE DIP! THE DIP = ACID and then i go to school, sweet and shy and gullible and full of trust, and hear all about ACID falling out of the sky. and when i welled up the courage to raise my hand and ask if the rain could hurt me, my teacher responded "well... just don't get it in your eyes." AHHHHHHHHHHHHH! how stupid are you????? why would you say that to a little kid? hahahahahaha! so then i became afraid that the rain could BLIND ME. geez. this is worse than being told we're in the "Last Days" and Jesus will return any second so you'll never get to grow up and be an adult and get married and blah blah blah. that tid-bit is directly responsible for all sorts of kids having a strange breed of peter pan-ism because LAST DAYS = NO FUTURE. do people really forget what it's like to be a child???? how scary and weird and big the world seems? how confusing? and how magic is real? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU???? hahahaha!

i'm laughing my ass off right now!

good morning. :)

19 comments:

Avo said...

Oh great now I'm humming acid rain to the tune of a popular meme.

I remembering rewriting the script... as I watched Roger Rabbit. The evil judge got replaced by "Doc Brown" (from back to the future, also played by Christopher Lloyd), and the villain became roger rabbit (he was so annoying). It involved an unlikely number of coincidences and a ridiculously tangled plot that I can only vaguely remember.

Agreed, there are number of things that amaze me about how people treat children... But then I wasn't really listening back then, if somebody wanted to reach me they would have had to write it in a good book.
All that just to say that acid rain (oh good grief now I have purple rain playing in my mental jukebox), just say no to drugs, eat from the two food groups (fat ans sugar), and not only flew over my head but out on another planet. I reckon I figured or reasoned out them out in my own time. I thought it was a normal part of surviving...

I'm smirking my smirk containers off right now.

And a jolly good morning to you too.

Anonymous said...

Ah this post triggers a memory of fifth grade. That damn teacher hated me and I hated her. We hated each other. (This was when corporal punishment was legal -- and considered perfectly ethical.) That damn teacher beat my ass almost every day -- and I could tell she enjoyed it, missed doing it after an hour or so, etc. My nickname then was "JC". One day she heard of this and in front of the class asked, "What, are you Jesus Christ?"

I still hate her. I am sure she still hates me.

Unknown said...

alesa, when i was little i believed EVERYTHING adults told me. EVERYTHING. and that probably would've been alright if there weren't idiots/monsters in the group. i was definitely that kid who thought you can always always always trust your parents, aunts, uncles, teachers, and police officers. and the dentist. i was very much an innocent, sweet child who did whatever i was told. the result... totally fucked-up teenage years. hahaha!

Unknown said...

jeff, i'm SO GLAD that shit has been outlawed! that woman is a monster and i think you're right to still hate her and now i hate her too!

my principal had really long gross red acrylic finger nails and she liked to dig them in to our necks when she pushed us around.

Unknown said...

p.s. alesa- roger rabbit is TOTALLY ANNOYING! hahahaha! but...

favorite line from the movie comes from jessica rabbit:

"i'm not bad... i'm just drawn that way."

hahahahahahaha!

Avo said...

But then you have the other side of the spectrum... In junior high school (in Ga.), I had a black vice principal who would always let me off easy for roughing up racist 7yo bullies (I'm a halfie and was therefore a choice target, also I couldn't help getting involved when they picked on the ONE black kid and the ONE native American kid). I think he knew what I was dealing with...

Besides how boring would we be if we all had idyllic happy childhoods? A brave new world...

Avo said...

Addendum: Agreed, that is a great line.
The bit where Hoskins says "What you could have gotten out of those handcuffs at any time?" "No, only when it was funny." Tickled me too...
Over all I loved the princess bride more (book and movie).

"Let's not waste another minute!"
"Anybody want a peanut?"

or

"I don't think that word mean what you think it means."

Unknown said...

i loved the princess bride!!! i even tell my sweetheart now "oh my sweet wesley! what have i done?" and "as you wish." hahahahahaha! and the peanut line is my FAVORITE from the whole movie! yes!!! and when andre the giant jogs the guys memory too hard. hahahahahaha!

i think you're right though- those childhood struggles DO make us more interesting adults a lot of the time. and i'm proud of you for standing up for other little kids. having the strength of character so young to stand up against racism is AMAZING!

Alanna Risse said...

When I was a kid, I thought we lived inside the earth, so whenever a space ship took off, it had to punch a hole through the earth. I was always concerned that no one else seemed to be concerned with this.

Doll said...

Silly, silly adults... So many taking the wonder out of children and replacing it with worry.

angela simione said...

alanna- we were the exact same type of child, i think. ha!

that's so sweet! i can totally see you saying that as a kid!

angela simione said...

doll-

sigh.


yep.

i think my ulcer started growing way early.

Doll said...

Two of a kind, sister... two of a kind....

Avo said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Avo said...

I just posted some links in my "other blog" to short videos that reminded me of you... If you haven't seen them yet, you may like them so here they are (they're both ink painting focused):
This first one is a professional ad.
The second, is a final project for a Masters.
Cheers.

Elisabeth said...

The image of a drop of rain knocking a memory loose is wonderful Angela, so wonderful, and I love your particular memory. I love the way children think, their logic and efforts to understand.

angela simione said...

elisabeth, i still catch myself opperating under a child's logic sometimes. :) i think half the time, this is a good thing. the half... not so much. but i am thankful to retain some of that innocence. thank you. <3

angela simione said...

alesa! these are wonderful! this is such a great way to start the day! thank you! and because my brain is still sleepy, i was so struck by how ink looks exactly like smoke! and i've been thinking a lot about the image of a horse lately too! this was such a lucky thing for me this morning! i'm going to post a video up top by one of my favorite artists for you!

angela simione said...

doll-

(((hugs)))

i promise if i find a cure for worrying i will pass it along to you immediately. :)