my timecard.

some, people don't
have to
do much.
some, people have
to do much.
i am the latter.

shady

all the wonders of the world. adventure; places, behold. me. hold me. it's a jump & a run or a halt & a stop. come hither. you from the past. old body new. & new form. the grayish. is not. it is. come stand old tree. do you exist? did you ever.. lay on my grass for while, for old. times. sake.

it's all happening, really.

so taylor hamlett has entered blogdom via mayday letters. and so has danielle middleton with yellow kites. i've been having the most incredible conversations with miss hannah elspeth recently. and we just come to the conclusion that we are overwhelmed by the presence of our friends, that we have to (as rachel might say) just lie back, close our eyes and absorb the wonder of it all. because everyone is doing such important things, that i'll look around and think "it's all happening."

i'm really sorry about this one.

good morning. can i admit something to you? girls, back me up on this. i'm having that extremely irrational, totally overwhelming, completely rootless enormous emotion overcome me and that attacks most women every twenty-eight days or so. it's 5:51 am and i'm watching the sky lighten out my window, i can't sleep. it's the anger and sadness that kicks my ass while i just lie here, and literally i kick my feet in a silent hissy fit of frustration. i hate being a woman some days.

it makes you do crazy things. not crazy good things. like crazy "giving women a bad wrap" kind of things. ideas will come in my head like it would be a good idea to text my boyfriend at six in the morning. no. wrong. always a bad idea. it even crossed my mind to call him. why? i don't know. just seemed like a good idea. but i reiterate, no. bad idea.

sure, i like being a girl. i can say it, i like wearing dresses. bows, curls, perfume. i like when shawn tells me i'm pretty. i like mascara, i like wine, i like the colour red. i like a lot of other things associated with being female.


but today, no. i hate being a woman. i despise it. i hate the stomach ache, the rootless emotion, the seclusion. and today i feel rejected and undesired. wonderful. love it.
no.

march first.

it's been hard to write lately. i'm working a lot. but i have a few things up my sleeve.

first, i am working on a little group project for blog world. we'll see what form it takes, it's still an ongoing process. i'm also hopefully going to do something with red balloons...but that's a whole big thing i won't talk about now.

i have a few new friends over there. so please, read, because everyone has something important to say.

i've been thinking about yale drama for some reason.

and listening to beirut and wanting some mexican french fusion country residence.

and thinking about june with great anticipation and excited but also wondering when the phase of life of moving every nine months will end.

pieces of san fran, or the way it was

tiny colored houses on a hill. we enter the city destroyer on the radio. city music he says. tts a trip down market and angled streets to city lights. warm air bright sun. up hill. down hill. to our place we meet our friends. last night still lingers in pain. i have a hangover. chinatown crazies seedy dark small streets of tenderloin there are so many lost and hidden places in san francisco. its rough to play here, parking’s a bitch. but i love this city. this grand small city where i was born. they say all of life is a coming home. and it is. it is. and then day turns into night.


weary on wine, we went to mission district to pick up lauren’s friend...dancing at a club someplace. its the one with the pink sparkly door and fifty people outside. we wait against the wall around the corner, heat pouring out from barred windows. burns, me, shawn, crouched like bums, cross-legged on the sidewalk. a guy with a backpack comes up to us, “you want some whiskey?” “no thanks man.” the friendliest corner. i liked him. to our left up the street a bit were latinas in ill-fitting tight black clothes and down on the right, hipster kids in plaid, black tights and vests, oxfords, hats. lolie and mike come and sit with us. a girl from norway, miata, comes and bums a light says how much she loves the city, doesn’t want to go back to oslo. a guy comments on shawn’s shades. our harmonica plays some dylan and others lolie and i shake our noses at each other bouncing our hair. warm night, indian summer.

said the owl to the girl

day defeated.
day of hope.
constantly traversing.
and that's prolly the wrong word.
but it fits for me, i look like a dirty gypsy,
and this is a defeated day so
i don't care.

my red balloon of hope comes and goes.
in and out. here then gone.
so many things to pay off.
lots of missed chances because of finances.
and then encouragement from people who've been here.

(if you are a person out there that i owe money to.
just remember, i haven't forgotten.
i just don't have it.
and i'm sorry.)

i hope in the meantime, our friendship is sufficient.
but know that i understand, these are all hard times.

and weekends full of friends aren't even
withstanding me these days. which is sad.
but i'll say oh well, like always.

some days, oh so content in my little crowded bedroom
with my bed on the floor and magnolias and owls and
tiny versions of former roommates staring at me.
old coffee cups not rinsed out.
masking tape. and postcards. and poems. and flutes.
and books and my scarves that drape above me and
sometimes sit under the covers with me. and the papers
and journals and scribbles that live in my bed i sleep
next to these words and the pencil drawing of the large,
naked, nameless women and my piggy bank holding nothing.
i can be happy.

and other days are long days in the box office where i sit behind
barred windows, speaking to ungrateful patrons and backstage
to get food i walk past actresses with their hair and makeup and
silky robes warming their voices and i miss that world so much
but my break is over i have to go upstairs and later clock out,
drive home, change, look in the fridge, none of that food is mine,
and drive to azusa and watch seinfeld say goodnight and drive home
again to dark house finding my sweats with the light from my cell
phone don't bother to wash off the eyeliner i'm tired but i could
keep going if i had to. and i have to. and i know i can't pay rent
tomorrow. and that's when i get a text from (him) and it says
something like you're beautiful or remember when.. and it's
enough to get me to sleep so i can start over soon.

and she said, "we should write a book about post-grad life."
and i said, "please." and thought please can we go back in
time and i could read it before i graduate?

on the day of forty-four sunsets

i once saw a sunset driving down the 5 that made 

me cry silently in the back seat, they never knew.  

transfixed, i couldn't stop staring at the wonder.  

and a god said to me,                      "you have no idea." 

i see the animals run past me

( jan uar y eleve n )

midnight. i want breakfast.

and they all start school tomorrow.

and i turned twe nty three-three days ago.

there is a lime tree.  and couches outside.

chipped nailpolish and scribbling.

i remember when i was a lady ragdoll.

planes and orion. the garage recording studio.

rachael is a name.  and so is johanna. 

columbus was fame.  and i'm waiting for the light to go off.

i remember two summers ago depressed.  insane.  cabin fever crazy.

i wrote things i didn't know.  looking at my books.

was looking at unknown author.  you write when you are longing.

( eig hte een )

mixed tapes with the warm sound.

for my friends.  and the epic who.

quilts and bugler and dirty typewriter.

parades and girls for monday.

and growing out your hair is painful.

brown paper packages are wonderful.

and all the colored girls said.

do do do do do duh da do do do.

swedish sisters.  robes.  head.

lost songs.  flowers.  rediscovery.  renew.

back scratch.  one kiss.  lennon.  mods.  sugar.

stripes.  doll house.  sex.  globe.  nametag.  audrey.

i called them all my best friends

we sit on my bed. the two of us. i'm lying on the quilt and playing with my hair, having thoughts. he's sitting, back against the wall, playing the guitar. fiddles with a melody; repeat, repeat, repeat. i'll scribble on my hand, or on some paper or on his knee. it's generally quiet. he finishes a song. i start a new poem. and this is how we go. and creating excites me, in still moments on my bed. just because we're living. and in fits of hallelujah creation he's writing a lot and will record soon. and sometimes, he kisses my tear that comes from his words and i seriously can't wait for you to hear it. 

and though its not the one that made me cry, you should listen to a demo of "friday"

pouncing; and! hilarity

qui est les personnes?

la suisse.

see? Hilarity!

je'n sais pas.

oui, les dents. comme les dessins..

squatting & HIGH TEA really?

and! hilarity

vraiment

"electrifying" she said.

nearing the end. spitfire.

"do you feel illuminated?" he said.

at first, nothing.  then a wave came over my head all gloopy feeling my whole body i leaned back on him and looked at her.  she grinned and leaned forward cupping both hands to my ear and she whispered “remember this for your book.”  i cried so many no tears always coming always coming.  “i’ll have to come back” he said.  i know they’re staring at me.  i was starting to feel better but then started this writing the words had to keep coming but the less that i breathe and try to feel better i’m writing these words also to feel better the words are gripping me consuming me i’m letting go its worse ever feeling his heartbeat his heartbeat on me,  “i like to focus on my heartbeat.”  i like to focus on my breathing. its creeping heaving and in beat with beating.  beating my pen.  my pen is beating me at this game i can’t write fast enough, careful enough.  there will surely be words lost and that scares me and yet i can’t stop, i always keep going.  

(i have been somewhere else.  and cannot bring everything back with me.  like monica says, being a writer is a lonely place to be and it was.  it was.)

********************************

the duality.  the two opposing sides.  one evil, enchanting me on forward through the beautiful shapes on the wall.  i saw a bird with wings back.  i saw a low strapped helmet.  red.  i saw your face. and i was coming into it.  so gorgeous.  mesmerizing.  and as i got closer i got closer to hell.  the demons jumped through the wall and grabbed at me, at my eyes, green things with fingernails and begging me to go ahead lose myself.  then i’d get wave of absolute normalcy, the light.  a promise that reality still exists but demons whispering the lies that psychedelia is worthier.  constantly fighting. giving in, slipping by degrees (which is a phrase I stole from stephen dunn), then fighting again.  

my throat hurts from puking.  i was so aware in the beginning.  an uninvited loss of control.  i couldn’t move my body.  my head weighed four hundred pounds.  tingly sensations feeling awful.  and then my knees disappeared.  is anybody in there?  i could feel them looking at me, laughing at me but i couldn’t do a thing.  intensely frightened, and no escape.  i wanted to scream, to cry, to express every thought, sensation, word-play but i was so intensely aware of how crazy it would sound and the laughs that would follow.

then it became incredibly important to remember what lauren had said so i yelled for someone to get my journal.  i had to write it down and then i couldn’t stop.  shaking.  the campfire was burning my leg.  my head got foggier.  my stomach queasier.  i couldn’t stop writing.  even now.  i can’t stop, the more i write, the more words stay trapped in my head.  i was miserable.  

“do you feel illuminated?” he said.  

“no” i said.  “its dark.”  

oh, ghost

i met gary on the train to emeryville.  he must have been on speed but he said he was stoned, drunk, talking 300 miles a minute.  couldn’t finish a sentence telling me i’m gorgeous that's why his eyes are dilating having a smoke on the platform.  i’d wanted to read my book all the way to san francisco but i decided as annoying as he was, he must be kerouac’s ghost or reincarnated, oh dharma or something, looked like him, talked like him and i couldn’t get rid of him i’m too nice.  dirty jokes, how he’s traveled, been blessed, a young dancer and thespian given up for more money in sales, he keeps leaning forward getting in my personal space, or pleading with me or something.  won’t stop talking about san francisco, he’s gonna walk right into chinatown and eat all the dim sum he can, then to tenderloin for pakistani curry dinner.  all the sex he had last night on viagra some pills, he’s so glad he had sex last night he tells me.  he’s going sacramento - san francisco - san diego and i need another cigarette myself.  as he left he said “may your house be too small to hold all the people in it.”  amen i said and “i love life!” he shouts as he stepped on the platform in richmond.  goodbye gary.  

mapven

i'm done, she said, working for other people.

and there was left, a little shape beneath the moon.

running with scissors they did one time, just to prove it, i remember.

i went back to that place, briefly.

as a wanderer its easy to become comfortable.

i suppose, well now.  we were lucky to share that bed.

thank you.

she brought me sunflowers, like the poem.

they hang drearily now. 

because i can't take care of things that will die anyway.

how did we ever find each other?  i said.

a miracle.  he said.

and that was that.

and they walked down the street, laughing. 

i've been burgled

carrie walked downstairs, 7am, from our warm loft-like second story, to the ice cold living room where she found the front window open and my video camera bags laying outside. "happy birthday, we've been robbed" she says, i wake up groggy and voices coming from the hallway by the bathroom. i became twenty-three years old yesterday and woke up thankful my mac and purse were in my bedroom that night, my other roommates had their bags and computers stolen right from our house, out our front window. thankful no one was hurt but feeling very icky that this all happened while we slept, feeling safe in our own beds, as strangers came in and took what they might. mckenna had just uploaded photos from her summer costa rica trip and the camera that was stolen contained footage from cameroon taken a few summers ago that i've never uploaded or edited yet. completely irreplacable footage. my first day in yaounde where we watched a mother giving birth, our first drives down the streets of the city, so many important images and experiences. gone. needless to say, we at the olive, are a little disheartened. there's nothing like feeling violated and unsafe in the one place you are supposed to feel the most secure. frustrated at monetary loss but also mourning the passing of memories a stranger now holds and couldn't care less. i only hope whoever took the stuff in some desperate situation and needs the money more than we do. i suddenly feel an urgency to pull out photos from that summer and remember the faces, the dirt, the smell of cameroon, hoping not to lose it forever.

the resolution post

no. 

there is nothing about resolutions here, actually.

i am back in monroviatowncalifornia.

from scattering myself around. 

pleasanton. rocklin. san francisco. danville. berkeley. 

i spent christmas with my parents and brother and his fiancee.

i spent new years with some of my best friends. and my love.

new years eve.

still 2008.

it was the city.

and allie's roommate invited us to her room at the hilton.

where we drank cocktails, wore red lipstick. and i told her the news.

we were girls in the bathroom. we stopped in every liquor store

on the way.  little fifth bottles in coat pockets.

walked up more hills than bridges.  

the bus. that was funny. 

ziggy's arm around jess. he'd been eyeing the other one all night.

and he taught us "i may be easy but i ain't cheap" and we laughed.

it took us downtown. 

we ran. 

sprinted.

to union and market. midnite. and barely caught the fireworks.

we all kissed.  and were showered in champagne.

and sang auld lang syne. and i was reminded.

why this is one of my favorite favorite things.

old acquaintances not forgot. and glorious beginnings. 

we took the train back to alex's house.

and cosy, slept next to each other.

hometown blues

shoppers always. the end of christmas doesn't stop it. avoiding recognizable faces. private secret cigarettes and holding them downwind. busying my days to make the time go by faster. doubt le film. shoppers never ending.  je souhaite book writings were cohesive never cohesive but. walmart. bookstore. maps. poetry out of this pen doesn't come i can't move back here. je n'ai pas les amis ici. solitary. grandma's jewelry grandma's urn. video art and beauty urging spilling. commonplace; strangeplace. shoppers again. j'ai besoin un café. slow texts i'm learning a new phone. lists comme ça. spritz. come hither. distance and not seeing faces. o my heart hurts. mani-pedi ma mère. one day of laughter. to sprint quickly. technology and connection, barely. but it's not good enough. forcing this pen to paper, insisting it make shapes. 

my house

i live in a small place, only big enough for a little girl. it is like a doll house. it is in a garden. a shady, green and magical garden that has overgrown with enthused abundance. it is secluded. the garden is full and beautiful and has been there forever. there are more flowers near the house which i tend to myself. it is warm and sunny here and the light always floods in the windows in glorious shafts that crinkle my white curtains. further from the house it gets shadier and there are tall, sweet smelling eucalyptus trees and spanish feather trees and the ones with the thick trunks and low branches for reading. there is a patch of daisies in the back. they were my mother's favorite and mine too. i sit in them and weave them into the edge of my sleeves and sometimes i feel a little ladybug dancing on my shoulder. a ways off there is an old swing of wood and strong twine and every couple of years you come and have to fix it just like every couple of years you have to repaint the house. we always laugh and have a grand time and sip sweet tea and nibble the sugary bread that crumbles. the fountain on the side of the house doesn't work and i can't remember it ever working. there is a layer of moss and water for the birds. there are some stretches of beautiful green shaded grass a number of paces from the house of the left side. that's where the picnics always are...in those hidden areas. brought in a basket and eaten on that huge soft quilt i use for everything. my friends come over sometimes. we forget our worries, eat lots and laugh too much. the warmness of the sun overflows to the warmness of ourselves. we lay on the soft quilt and hold each other, giggling, and the daisies tickle our noses. and its perfect.

-22 march 2007 lyon, france

the internet

i'm at work. inside a tiny room of cream walls and barred windows feeling something like a mexican prison and realize: i'm getting paid (modestly) to check my plethora of online communities and pursue other promising futures and paychecks by emailing music venues for my boyfriend's band, searching for local auditions and drafting an online resume of theatre works, frequently switching from tab to tab, gmail, facebook, the troubadour, backstage west, blogger, etc. all the while, praying i don't become wholly apathetic which is a legitimate fear, even at 22.

this isn't a new realization. it comes and goes here in the box office. between the bush-ly economy and overpriced mediocre theatre tickets, we just aren't selling, making it quiet around these parts. we're either diving for the phone when it actually rings, or getting irritated when there is finally something work-related to do since it is interrupting our precious facebook stalking time. "they broke up?"

anyway. what depresses me is exactly how much time i spend on the internet. i spend my entire work day at the computer. processing orders in provenue and flipping back to the internet in between calls and direct sales order sheets. on slow days, like today, i can spend quite a bit of solid time writing emails, updating blogs, watching monkey's blow their nose on youtube... just to drive home and open up my more comfortable mac and once again, login to facebook, check gmail, etcetera etcetera. i can usually justify it. i stay pretty productive on the internet doing things that are worthwhile or reading blogs of my favorite poet friends whom i believe are truly brilliant and far far smarter than me.

but somehow it still depresses me to think of how much time i waste (and a lot of other people too) on the internet. the other day, shawn played me a new song he just wrote, for the first time. and as he's playing i'm leaning over looking at who else just posted on my wall. seriously? whoa, jamie. not even giving him my full attention as he's sharing something new and personal. that's sad and really really gross.

you would assume that i would end this with a promise to not spend so much time on the internet. no such promise. i mean, i would like to but i'm just not into making promises i can only average about a week in keeping. maybe i will try harder, but i'm certainly not going to post here on the internet for people to read and keep me accountable that i promise to take more time smelling the flowers and reading out of real books or actually listening to my boyfriend. i don't really have any other points to wrap up with or a closing argument about any of this. i just thought i should write a post so that i didn't feel totally useless and unproductive between now and when my shift ends. so there you have it.

phone customers

"playhouse box office this is jamie how can i help you?"

"who am i speaking to?"

"jamie"

"tilly?"

"jaamie"

"seely?"

"no, ma'am. jamie"

"oh hi amy"





"hi"