I'm an elf! I took the "which fairy tale character are you?" quiz(see below). "The only distinction between your kind-- the midgets and elves-- is the funny nose. Yeah, that's the trait YOU have. You are the fun little men with the bells on your shoes that come to fix the sneaks of others!
Unfortunately for them, you're envious and selfish folk that don't put bells on THEIR shoes. Tsk. Even so, you're do-gooders. Or good-doers. Anyway, you do good. "
I rather like the idea of being an elf...I think it suits me :-)
So, I had a pretty good day yesterday, all things considered. We went over to the boy's mom's house. She's been having kind of a rough time. She's a cook in a church rectory and her boss of twenty years got de-frocked.
Apparently the news was all over the rectory on Friday. Forty years ago, when he was in his twenties, this priest had an affair with a teenage girl and it was put on his record. Now, I don't condone that sort of thing but there's a whole world of difference--both legally and morally--between statutory rape and child molestation. Factor in that it was a one time thing and occurred forty years ago, I really can't see the rationale for defrocking him. But with this new "zero tolerance policy", out he goes. The sad part is, he has since then done an incredible amount both for the church itself and the accompanying school and there have been no complaints about him. It seems that in a religion based on confession, repentance and forgiveness that something like this should not be cause for such a severe punishment so many years later. Especially since our own legal system has deemed that forty years is far too long a time to prosecute for an offense of this level.
Anyhow, so his mom has had a rough week, what with the media being all over the place, and her boss having to leave, and everything else. So we all went out to eat at The Little Tree, which has the best asian food I have tasted anywhere, including Chicago. Detroit might not have the fast pace or the aesthetics of Chicago but it certainly is able to compete in terms of cuisine. I had the Yaki-Udon which was tasty. The boy decided to stray from his usual sushi and have the Pad Thai, while his mom had Yaki-Udon with shrimp and a mini order of sushi.
Afterwards, the boy and I went to Cuppucinos for coffee. It's not a bad little cafe. We talked there for a bit, then went home and watched movies all night long.
I can't remember if I mentioned it here, but I've decided to go into Wayne's creative writing program. I mentioned all my reasons previously why I've decided to abandon my art therapy idea, though I'm starting to get really excited about going for creative writing again. Since finishing my novel, I've been getting inspired so I'm looking forward to it. There seems to be a lot of options within the English program. I didn't know what to think at first when I met with an advisor because she was kind of loopy and hard to follow, and she kept laughing for no real reason that I could see, but looking over it, I could see myself really getting into their creative writing and film classes.
Thanks to everyone who has been signing my tag board. It's always cool to see new notes left for me when I come back here. And thanks for reading :-)

June29, 2002

So, I wasn't going to write about this, out of respect for the person in question's privacy, but the stupidity is so profound that I've decided they have become too much of a parody to warrant discretion on my part.
There's a lot of rather pointless drama in the tale I'm about to tell. So if you don't like reading about such things, you may want to skip this entry. However, for the curious or those who like to laugh at humanity's foibles, you may find this entertaining.
So, there is this person. This person kind of tends to re-invent himself over time, as I have learned by how he constantly contradicts himself. I mean, okay, I understand the concept of cognitive dissonance. I understand that we all sometimes do a complete 180 when our life takes us down roads that go against our previously held ethics, sense of morality, beliefs, etcetera. However, I also under the concept of talking out of your asshole, and when someone constantly contradicts themselves in really blatant ways, then you start to wonder how much of what comes out of their mouth is what they think.
Said person did this a lot. Which is fine, we all have our quirks. And usually, it has a lovable quality to it. But in this case, he did it in an argument that was pretty pointless, and he did it in a way which was very condescending. Me not being pleased, I came back telling him that I did know that he was talking out of his asshole, and illustrated points that defended why. I said I was sorry if this was harsh, but this really kinda pissed me off and I couldn't keep my mouth shut about it.
This was a conversation about art, by the way.
I have heated conversations with a lot of my friends. Usually it's not a problem as my friends tend to be pretty fiery and opinionated as well. I kind of knew it would be a problem with him though, as he tends to personalize differences of opinion. So, I asked a couple of people whose opinion I trust if I was being harsh. I was told by both people, no. You're being blunt. But you aren't out of line, and there's no reason not to send it.
So I sent it. The next day, I got an email from this person. He gave an elaborate excuse saying "I'm going to be a hermit for awhile." I knew what that translated into though. It translated into "you said something I didn't like so I'm taking my toys and going home."
Now, this person tends to do that whenever he has the suspicion of a difference of opinion. He often will be on a mailing list and make what he thinks is a really volatile flame in a discussion (when in actuality his posts are pretty tame) then unsubbing for awhile before he can get any responses. He does the same thing with his "friends". Now, I think it's kind of childish and manipulative, a feeble attempt at getting people to not openly disagree with him lest they be denied the honor of his presence. And he tends to make a point of them knowing that he won't be writing for awhile, all the while conjuring up some excuse rather than just being honest about why he's doing it.
Well, if he wants to do that, fine, but I won't pretend to not know what it was. So I made a kind of vague one-line reply, insinuating that I knew it wasn't the prolonged excuse he had given me but a direct reaction to my previous email. He came back asking me what the sarcasm was for. I meant to write him back, but then the boy and I got caught up in swimming and hanging out in the jacuzzi, then watching movies and I never got around to it.
I figured I'd write it today, but to be honest I was in no real hurry.
Well, maybe it was the slowness to respond or maybe he'd been stewing on it for some time and finally decided what he wanted to say, but when I got up this morning, I received an email entitled "I wish to end our communications."
"Oh God," I thought. I hadn't even had my first cup of coffee, it was still brewing in the other room. But what I read was absolutely ludicrous. This is what he had to say:
"I don't particularly enjoy being insulted nor being cast in the light of a liar. Instead of writing this in my journal for you to find or simply ignoring you, I prefer to be upfront. It's not that I don't care for you deeply, it's that communicating with you has become an uncomfortable and difficult task in the past year. When answering your e-mails, I tend to censor myself way too much to avoid insulting you. I never know what you're going to make a point of contention and I have made it a habit of swallowing my anger.
Today, I contemplated on how I would feel about losing your friendship. While there was grief, I would be a liar if I didn't admit that there was also a profound since of relief. When a friendship reaches that point, it's already on its way to its death and to attempt to revive it is only to invite distress. I may regret the following in the next few days, but I believe it is for the best. I shall always think fondly of you, but this friendship is at an end. There is no need or want of a reply as it shall not be read."
Well, a few points occurred to me in this.
1) What kind of person assumes that I would read their journal just to find out what they had to say about me? That just seems like the height of egotism.
2) Our conversations really weren't *that* volatile. I'm not sure at what point he had to "swallow his anger". He often opted to discuss controversial subjects regarding things like politics, art, religion, etcetera. You kind of have to expect differences of opinions when you discuss stuff like that. If he didn't feel like he could handle a conflict of opinion on things, that's his fault, not mine.
3)Why did he assume I would get upset? I'm not so hypersensitive that any disagreement would deeply offend me. And if he did happen to offend me inadvertedly, I'd get over it and certainly not hold it against him. I suspect this was largely projection on this part.
4)If this has really been going on for a year, why on earth did he take a Greyhound from Chicago to Detroit to visit me? I don't know about anyone else, but I wouldn't much want to take a Greyhound for eight hours to spend the weekend with someone that made me uncomfortable. So, I wrote my response regardless of that one line at the end about not reading it. That's junior high school shit. Say what you mean, and be prepared to get as good as you give. So, I wrote this back:
"Wow, that was the most childish email I have ever received. God, would you grow up? If you don't wish to be my friend because I happened to bluntly have a different opinion from you, that's your business. I realize that you have a complete inability to differentiate between a heated argument and a genuine rift. I also realize that you really can't handle criticism of any kind. However, spare me the melodrama about grief. The fact is, if I had ever been someone you consider a friend, you wouldn't end this over something as petty. So please don't insult both our intelligence by making a big deal about the "death of a friendship" that you were never that committed to in the first place.
This is a classic case of "I'm taking my toys and going home."
As for honesty, there is none on your part. The mere fact that you wrote an inflammatory email then used the immature ending of "don't bother writing me back because I won't read it" shows a total unwillingness for honesty. YOU wanted to vent. YOU wanted closure. You didn't want the consequences of a response because you just can't handle it. You would have been better off writing it as a letter to me in your journal than sending it. Since I haven't really been following your journal anyways and, frankly have better things to do with my time than look for gossip about me in random peoples' diaries, I wouldn't have read it and you would have got the closure that you obviously so desperately need.
Oh and by the way? I did mention the argument to a few different people before I sent my response and asked if I was out of line. No one thought I was. The fact is, you're exactly the kind of person that you always complain about. The person with the super fragile ego that is constantly trying to be something you're not. I always knew this, and never minded it. However, don't kid yourself by thinking this has anything to do with me. I'm just one in a long line of people you feel bitterness toward because I didn't pander to the aforementioned ego."
Yup. Brutally honest and a bit over the top on my part, but that's what you get when you put shit like that in my inbox before I have a cup of coffee in my hands.
I mean, honestly, I don't care. If he really has felt that way for the past year, we obviously didn't have such a great friendship because I really had no clue. But as I said in my response to him, if he thinks a stupid argument about art is worth ending a friendship over, then we didn't have such a great friendship either. I guess there was a time when I would have been rather depressed about this, but not anymore. Honestly, I don't have time for it in my life anymore. If someone either doesn't have the confidence in themselves or the respect for me to have an honest conversation, to come to me when I've done something that upsets them or talk it out when we have a disagreement then I really don't want them in my life. And I can't really feel sad about them ending a friendship because they've proven they aren't worth having around. I've had enough real grief in my life and I'm sure over time I'll have plenty more, to let myself be brought down by someone who has so clearly proven they aren't worth feeling sad over. I'm still baffled by the ludicrousness of it, since a lot of these accusations seem really out of left field, and mainly the product of the imagination. But whatever, it's not my problem anymore.
Sorry for the drama, but that's how my day started and I felt the need to vent about it...

June28, 2002

So, I slept well last night.
Very well.
Oh my God.
The boy went down to the pool, and I mentioned wanting to check out the jacuzzi down there.
So we went down there, went into the jacuzzi and sat for a few minutes. It was so nice, so relaxing. After a few minutes, I was beginning to feel like a lobster, so we went into the pool and lounged for a bit. It was well into the evening, so we had the whole pool to ourselves. Then, we went back into the jacuzzi for a bit then went back to the apartment.
Oh.My.God. That was *so* relaxing.
We watched television for a little while, but by 11:00 we were both falling asleep in front of the television. This was not unusual for him since he gets up at five in the morning. But for me, it was pretty damned unusual. I've been going to sleep later and later every night. Night before last I forced myself in bed at two in the morning, and tossed and turned for another half hour. But last night...wham! Out like a light.
I slept well, too. My dreams were relatively pleasant (aside from those weird occulty, Argento-esque horror dreams, but it was more like watching a movie than having it actually happen to me so even that wasn't so bad.) and slept almost twelve hours.
This apartment is starting to grow on me. The jacuzzi, the pool, the sauna, the nice apartment, the woods for the cats to run around in...and now that we have seen what else is out there, it seems like a much better deal. We're going to stay out our lease. We talked about renewing, but we got behind and were late a few times due to the situation when we moved here. So, staying may not be an option. But if we could, it wouldn't be too bad. More than likely, though, we'll just find a house in Ferndale or some place. But, damn I could get used to this...

June27, 2002

So I have this new inner peace thing going on.
You know, it's not like I don't get pissed off at stuff for a time or am not really upfront and honest about what I think. I'm as honest and forthright as I always have been. Maybe even more so. But then I say it and move on. It doesn't continue to bother me.
I guess I'm finally be able to understand that I really can't affect other peoples' actions and they're going to do what they're going to do, but I can be honest about myself and thus not compromise myself in any way. Part of this is acknowledging that the things they do don't have any deep significance, it's just the stuff they do. And also the things I think and feel and say don't have any real significance, it's just the stuff I do.
So there's not much wrestling with the conflict, or anxiety at the conflict arising or the interpretations that might result, nor guilt or any of that other stuff.
Of course this is me we're talking about so I don't know how long this will last but hopefully it will be a little while.
I can't help, through all of this, thinking of that one episode where George's father is screaming constantly,
"Serenity NOW!!"
Heh.

June26, 2002

I just got my webmail set up at school.
I'm excited.
You see, I got the info in the mail on web registration, complete with my password and userID and everything else, but I had to activate it. When I did, I noticed there were a ton of other cool features as well. I figured I'd test them out, so I set up my webmail.
It's working just fine and I'm all excited. I'm relieved too, because I know that I'm in the system just fine so I should be okay to register. (knock on wood)
Though now if I could only decide what to take! There's a lot that interests me, I just need to narrow it down to what I want this semester.
Playwriting and Italian are must haves.
Then there's a whole lot of courses out of the other two to choose from. Heh, maybe that wingnut in the English department was right, maybe I do have "catalog fever"
Heh.
The previous entry was weird and cryptic and mind numbingly introspective.
I guess that's why, to an extent, I don't know if I want to become an art therapist.
It just seems more of the same, more of this screwed up tendency to feel the need to solve other peoples problems. More of this need to just be they sympathetic one, the one that is always stopping to think and analyse people, thinking about the things that affect them and going more on why I think they do the things they do than their actions.
One could make the argument that this would make me a good therapist. But I don't know if that's the right reason, and the halls of academia are filled with people who decided to become psych majors for the wrong reasons...wanting to solve their own problems, needing to be needed, some unrealistic notion of altruism that is contradictory to the realities of the profession...
And yet...
There's this driving force in me to be doing something that has some meaning, meaning to me and meaning to the people that my work would serve. You know, rather than just writing reports or formulating ad campaigns or something of that nature. I realize what a double edged sword that can be and so am quite wary of it, but at the same time there's occasionally this deep part of me that thinks I won't be fulfilled unless I do something that is more than just some nine to five office job where half my day is pretending to look busy so I won't get downsized. Where I spend hours upon hours on self perpetuating projects. Sometimes I think I can never be satisfied with that, that my biggest enemy is boredom and that I should take whatever it is about me that makes me seem so approachable and use it to my advantage.
I also think that a stronger background in psych might teach me things that would enable me to differentiate, differentiate and distance myself.
Still, I'm not ready to embrace this as more of a passing fancy or former fantasy. Five years ago I thought seriously about going for a degree in psych. And five years ago there was too much about it that nauseated me. That the professionals often had as much or worse problems than their patients and yet were in such a powerful position of authority. That the insurance companies owned the mental health industry and because of that, pharmaceuticals were often pushed well before they were ready, pushed not as a means of aiding therapy but as a substitution for it, so there was no one to monitor whether these drugs were making the patients better or worse. That so many of the theories of the profession become embraced only to be debunked five years later, and that so many patients seem to get caught up in the label of their illness, wearing it as a crutch and a badge, and there didn't seem to be enough done to teach people coping mechanisms.
And then the flip side of this. The flip side being that so many people don't want to help themselves. So many people want to indulge in the things that disrupt their lives, not fix them. Have you ever heard someone say "I'm moody because I'm a Scorpio that's just how I am?" or any variance of that? It seems to be the same with psychology. "Oh I can't deal with awkward situations because I have avoidant personality disorder" or any variance of it.
But still, and as no doubt obvious by this rant, I am passionate about psychology and there has been the conundrum that has haunted me for the past five years.
But for now, for this semester, there's no real need to make concrete decisions. I may just take a psychology course along with my playwriting and Italian classes, as personal interest. I can always minor in it if I really have the zest to learn in that arena...

June 26, 2002

When I was a child, living in a rather closed minded, blue collar small town in Pennsylvania, kids would often try to bully me for being some smart kid that read comic books. Being rather feisty, I was very good at fighting back, so most of the time the bullying was restricted to threats.
Every so often, there would be one bully that would turn physical. These were usually boys that were much bigger to me.
When I went home crying to my mother, she would always tell me "They come from a broken home. They have a lot of problems."
Since my parents were divorced and my mother was a manic depressive and we were desperately poor half the time, I always thought this argument was a stupid one. I always thought "Well, my life isn't all that great either, but I don't go around starting fights. What a bunch of crap."
As I got older, I have always felt that. We all have problems, that's no excuse.
But I have come to realize a pattern where I hear that in my head, "They have a hard life. They have problems" and how many people have come and gone in my life where a big portion of the interaction was one sided and basically involved me trying to solve their problems.
Just something that I've been thinking about.



June 23, 2002

Thought for the day: there are few feelings so gratifying as being able to wear pants that you couldn't fit into a year ago.
Of course, they are a bit tight, so I need to keep up with all my walking, but I don't see that as being a problem. Especially since when I start school, I'll be doing that walk twice a day, four days a week.
Yep, it's quite the ego boost.
Just my thought for the day.



June 22, 2002

I need to get out of here.
I'm too far east and too far north.
I see why I was so desperate to leave before.
I need to go someplace, like new mexico or something.
Yuck.

June 20, 2002

Ugh.
So, I have a job interview for a telemarketing job at a CPA on Monday. It sounds like it will be cool, but since I have a student loan payment coming up, owe on credit cards and haven't paid my cell phone bill in about three months, I decided I should go audition to dance somewhere. If I wound up getting this job at the CPA, I could always quit the club but I'd still probably make enough money to catch up on my bills and hold me over until I started my new job.
I went to the Silver Criket. Remember them? They told me to come back. Well, I got there, and they told me they were "full" (yet again.) Then they had me meet with the agent for the talent show and he told me that I would need to call him next week and come back then.
Yeah, right.
The first time I was skeptical and gave them the benefit of the doubt. This time I knew it was a bullshit excuse.
Now here is what I don't get. Not to be rude, but I've seen the girls working there and they aren't anything special. One of them definitely looked a lot healthier than I did, hell looked healthier than I looked even last summer when I went to Rome and ate like a pig since I knew it would be awhile before I'd have such great food again. (Not that there's anything wrong with that, but just so you get an idea of what I'm talking about...) the other looked like a crank fiend from the local trailer park with the standard 80's perm. Again, nothing wrong with that. The club itself was small and not the classiest of decors I'd ever seen. So why the hell was I getting the brush off?
Okay, sure I got it at places like the Admiral Theatre in Chicago where they had these gorgeous Russian model types but at a somewhat divey place like that? I mean, not to be vain, but I like to think I have as much going for me as any of the other women in the club. And since my tattoos were covered it couldn't have been the tattoos. And since, you can tell from my picture at the top, I don't actually look like I'm 31, it can't be my age. And since I was courteous and friendly, made sure to smile, it couldn't have been my attitude.
So what was it?
Was it the glasses? Afraid I looked too smart? Is it some conspiracy against brunette hipster types? WHAT??
So then we went down to BT's. I got a better reception but I was told they don't start amateur night until ten pm and unless I want to wait around for two hours, I should come back. Of course, now I feel like the dork who shows up before the party starts so I most likely won't go back there. And it's annoying because not only did I do the whole perfect hair and makeup, put on a nice dress thing but I actually got up the nerve to leave the house and go in. Since it takes a little tweaking of perspective to convince myself to go back to this work, even temporarily, this is no small feat. Of course, spending all day getting myself psyched makes not getting the chance to do this to be particularly infuriating.
Did I mention I could have really used the money?
Arrgh.
Fuck it, I'm gonna go rent some more zombie movies...

June19, 2002

Odd, random thoughts running through my head...
I feel myself changing...
Some doors slam, others open and this gets me thinking about people, about myself, about the fragments underneath the spontanous explosions of agitated thought and why they are...change, mostly brought on by me but not always causing these chapters to turn, and the most comforting thought in the past year has been the realization of permanence, that in the past five I really haven't changed that much. A bit more reclusive, a bit more paranoid, but more just resting in the interim until new experience comes my way.
Well, a few things changed. Sobering.
But there's more that's the same, when I think about it.
Tomorrow.
Well it's a tentative plan at least.
Now, with school mostly in order, my mind is free to consider more meaningful things.
Funny, how deluded people are. I always thought I was honest but all these years, I masked my lack of commitment to art behind some ideal of individuality. I realized that I just didn't have the zest for learning that I could have. That, while therapeutic, my heart was never really in it. Now, a novel finished, and me doing revisions and having decided that journalism wouldn't be so bad, as long as I can squeeze a few creative writing classes in here and there, I have learned that despite my claims to the contrary I've never stopped being passionate about writing. I've always prided myself on being honest with myself but I guess it goes to show that the whole world can see something but you, and you can sometimes be oblivious to it for years.
Weird.
Kind of a creepy, unsettling thought if you think about it.
But when I was in a slump, I'd just write emails and journal entries. Now I spend literally hours, revising this novel, working on new projects and it just feels right.
There's this feeling, this feeling that I'm about to make a breakthrough. And that tells me that I'm doing something right. But it's also disturbing, it feels like having a sentiment that you really have to describe, having a truth you desperately need to utter to those close to you, but the word hasn't been invented, and there's nothing in any language anywhere that comes close. Or maybe there is, but it's some language you don't even have the capacity to understand, something so outside your knowledge, that you couldn't possibly discover it.
There's this feeling like being on one of those bad reality shows, or like the old candid camera from the seventies, as its too close to performing, you're doing all these things that are natural to you and you're minding your own business but oddly aware of an audience.
It's like you don't have the truth to share but someone has the truth to share with you, and you're waiting for the phone to ring, and you're afraid to go to the bathroom lest the call come while you're on the can.
This wine has gone to my head.
I really need to sleep.

June 17, 2002

Oh my god.
Hatehatehatehatehate.
I hate this town so much.
Get this. I can't get a hold of anyone at Wayne. Not in the departments, not in advising, not in financial aid.
Why?
Because the red wings won the stanley cup. and that means a parade. That means almost the entire school took the day off to go to this stupid fucking parade.
I've said it before and I'll say it again:
SPORTS ARE FOR MINDLESS SYCOPHANTS WHO LACK THE INTELLECTUAL CAPACITY TO BE ENTERTAINED BY ANYTHING REMOTELY INTERESTING.
Yes, I am snobby on this point.
I hate sports. I hate them with a passion.
And you know what else? This "Detroit is number one" thing is purely the product of a city that is so shitty it has absolutely nothing else to be proud of. And besides, most of the team members aren't even from Detroit.
They're a lot of Russians and Canadians that happened to get bought by the red wings. If someone else bought them, they'd go play for that team. So if anyone has a right to be proud it's Canada or Russia, since they actually produced these guys. But, like everything else, Detroiters insist on claiming some feeble pride which has absolutely nothing to do with them.
My only ray of hope is the thunderstorm that was predicted, that it might hit the feeble minded paraders and soak them thoroughly, thus causing their red and white makeup to smear terribly.
One can hope.

June 15, 2002

Another late night, with chocolate covered mushrooms and all.
Thursday, I went to my interview at CCS.
I swear that was the most formal interview I have ever been on in my life. Meeting with different people, getting the HR psychological questions, the whole works. The people I met with were incredibly snooty people and really seemed to forget they were hiring for what was basically a monkey's job: selling paint to art school kids. Seriously, I have had less formal interviews for real jobs that pay real money.
Oh and get this: it's monday through friday, 10-4, and I need to pick my school schedule around it because they're completely inflexible.
So, part time...bookstore...art school...and yet I need to kind of screw myself on some of my classes for the job?
Um...I'll just do work study, thanks.
I can't believe how many crappy part time jobs here are just totally inflexible. It's weird. I mean, I have never seen anything like it, there's a mentality here that I swear, hasn't changed since the industrial revolution. The unions are responsible. I don't know how yet, but I know that they are.
Anyhow, so I went to meet with an English advisor. I got this woman that was utterly and completely insane. I told her I wanted a concentration in creative writing. She pointed an option of three different electives out of a possible 13 courses. I mentioned wanting to take more than that and she started going on about how I had catalog fever and saw a big university with all these classes and wanted to take all of them, and all this other stuff.
Um, no. But the art departments' concentrations, and the communications departments' concentrations, and about every other area that I have looked into have required a minimum of 24 credits in an area of concentration for the major. I would assume that the English department's creative writing concentration would be more than 9 credits. I don't see how that's going "out of control".
I pointed out to her that after the 46 credits for the major, and the 54 credits for general education, it still left me with twenty credits required to graduate. I asked, couldn't some of these other writing classes fill that elective requirement?
She started babbling some nonsense that had absolutely nothing to do with what I asked her.
Fun.
So, yesterday we went out. I had two drinks and got sick again. Ugh, I don't think I can drink stoli ohranj anymore.
God I'm getting old.
It's the arab-american international festival today. We're going to go in a little bit. But not before I stop at Ram's Horn to apply for a waitressing job...

June13, 2002

Things went well at Wayne yesterday. I'm still getting used to the mile and a half walk to the bus stop, but this will get me in shape at least.
On the bus there, there was some crazy man "muttering bullshit", trying to talk to everyone. I was very thankful that I had my cd player with me, so I could put them on and look out the window, pretending not to notice all his attempts to make contact with me.
My advisor was helpful. Everything that I expected to transfer, transferred. Actually, more of my general education requirements were filled than I expected, so I was happy about that.
I also talked to her about how I wanted to change my major and had decided that I didn't want to be a fine arts major anymore. She was very helpful about that, and informed me that it was not uncommon at all for that to happen. She gave me a bunch of information, then sent me on my way.
To get past any specific pre-requisites for creative writing classes, I need to meet with the English Department. I really want to take a playwriting class, but it has a creative writing class pre requisite, so I need to see if my old creative writing credits from Philadelphia will transfer, or if I'd need to take that over again first.
I have an interview at a bookstore at CCS, which is right next door to Wayne. So, after my interview, I'll just walk over to the English department to ask them about it.
On my way home, I had some charming fellow trying to hit on me. He got off at the same stop at me. I guess he worked in one of these corporate complexes. He kept trying to get my phone number, and I kept telling him "Well, I don't think my fiancee would like that," to which he'd reply "He doesn't have to know." So I'd explain that I loved my fiancee very much and I would know. He just kept saying "He doesn't have to know." So, I told him that I had left Chicago and come to Detroit to be with this guy, I wasn't about to turn around and cheat on him. This confused the fellow thoroughly, but got him to give up.
I have to go make the trek today. I know I should get used to it, because it will easily be October before I can get a car and I'll need to do it on a daily basis for my first month in school. But my feet hurt, and my legs are sore and I just feel so lazy....

June 12, 2002

Ugh can you believe they're shutting down the exits into downtown after the game starts tomorrow? That's how retarded people act in this town. They need to shut down the exits so people won't go en masse to riot in the streets over a fucking hockey game.
I miss Chicago.
Robert's coming to visit over fourth of july weekend. We probably won't be able to swing going to Toronto financially, but we can at least show him around, which should be fun.
We have decided to stay out our lease, which I think is wise. This apartment is still a lot nicer than anything we've found, and it's not that smart to be messing with our rental history this way.
I finished my novel! Yep, that's right, I finished it night before last. So, now I'm busy in the editing process. But I'm really excited that I finally finished it. 235 pages. I've been writing that thing for a long time. Now I just need to find an agent.
I'm going in a bit over to Wayne to meet with an advisor. My transfer credit evaluation is done and they should be able to pull it up so that should help me pick out my classes.
I'm getting optimistic about school again. I'm slowly but surely pulling stuff together. (knock on wood...)

June 11, 2002

My, am I a minority in this town.
As if the management company at our apartment wearing hockey blazers weren't enough, or the strip clubs with signs that say "honk if you like the wings", I was watching "Crossing Jordan" tonight when they interrupted it to say that the Red Wings won the game tonight.
That means if they win Wednesday, they win the Stanley Cup.
Which means that, according to my sources, there will be massive riots and people turning cars over in the streets, and much hullaballoo.
Which means we lock the door at seven and don't leave the apartment for any reason whatsoever.
Being someone who generally thinks sports are stupid...and that otherwise mature adults acting like a senseless mob just because their sports team won is utterly retarded...I am very much a minority in Detroit.
Well, considering it's a run down city with no economy, the highest homicide rate in the country and minimal night life, I guess it needs to get its source of pride wherever it can get it.
Ugh.
Can I go back to Chicago now? Please?

June10, 2002

The door is shutting.
The time has come to bury art far away from the public view.
Private, like religion, make it subconscious.
I want to return to words, and I want to put the words into vision on video. I'm not going to elaborate or explain except to say that I don't want to spend a lifetime getting these visions out, I want them to flow more naturally and I don't want to overanalyse.
Nor do I want to spend my life explaining concepts to people that are relatively intuitive.
Fuck it.
I disguised as fear what was really futility, a frustration that while certain things came out of me as therapeutic and cathartic that any real communication was null and void.
I don't want the world to see these things anymore. No more shows, no more aspiring to be the best. That's my private world and I just don't want anyone to touch it.

June 10, 2002

So we looked at a place today. It was very nice. Loft apartments, very nice and quite luxurous. We put in an application, so hopefully we'll get them.
After we looked at the place, we decided to go to twingo's. On the way there, we passed the building where the painting and drawing facilities are at Wayne. I asked to go in there. I wanted to see if it was as creepy as the other art building.
Well, it wasn't as creepy but it was as nauseating. After my appointment the other day, I went over to the art building to see the current gallery show. There was a proliferation of just really trite flower and butterfly prints and paintings. I looked on the wall and what I saw was similar. I hoped it was a fluke, but this building told me that it was not, in fact, a fluke.
I walked around, and on the door of the associate professor of the department's office, was an article. It was about a "museum for bad art" in some po dunk small town. Apparently, this museum took abstract and expressionist art and--considering it "bad"-- hung it in this museum for the sole purpose of being made fun of. We then walked around and saw lots of trite paintings of fruit or shoes, drawn so generically that it could have all been done by the same person and you'd never be able to tell the difference. I pointed out to the boy, "well actually this shit is all bad art." I'm serious, out of fifty paintings I saw maybe one that showed even the desire to put any style into it at all.
I can see the virtue of observational drawing, but I can't see it at the expense of any individuality whatsoever. That art building felt like a factory. And I decided then and there I want no part of it.
I might still take a drawing class here or there, and I might attend some open sketches at DIA, but I no longer feel the need to be academic about art. And I mean that sincerely. I have waffled on this matter for some time, but I really don't think the best thing for my art is academic. I want to expand the boundaries of my art, but I don't want to be taught to jump at bells or be part of an assembly line for work that matches suburbanites' drapes.
So I am still going to paint obsessively and I am still going to go back to school but the two shall not intersect.

June 7, 2002

I'm sick, so this will be brief.
I sent a letter to the president of wayne, stating I would not be going and my reasons for it. It got forwarded to the vice president of campus life and development, who called me within an hour. He talked me into giving the school another chance and scheduled a meeting for the next day.
The next day, Mike Wood from admissions called. This vp had got him to troubleshoot my registration problems, so apparently, that has been fixed.
I went to the meeting, sick as hell. I walked half an hour to the bus, then spent another hour commuting on two busses, one of which went mostly through some rather run down neighborhoods.
I got to Wayne, grabbed something to eat in the student center, and up to this guy's office. He had the associate vp meet with me in his place. This guy did nothing, basically just passed the buck, told me to go to other offices. I was annoyed.
I went to the office for transcript evaluations, as instructed by this associate vp, and was told to call back in a few days, because it was downstairs and they needed to get it.
I came home, feverish and exhausted. I caught my breath, called the vp, asked why he hadn't been able to meet with me. He told me that he'd forgotten he had a medical student graduation and that the man I met with was supposed to walk with me to all the places I needed to go, and make sure the stuff got done, and he was going to "have a talk" with the guy. He told me that if they dont get back to me in credit evaluations, to call him and he'll make sure it's taken care of. He seemed pretty pissed that this other guy had blown off the meeting in the way that he did. But he seems determined to make sure this stuff gets dealt with.
So that's good.
I guess I'm going to Wayne after all. I may as well.
I did call the office of orientation and they signed me up for orientation on June 20th. They need to send me a packet of materials, which includes something that I need to bring with me to orientation. Hopefully I'll get that this time.
Anyhow, so how bout that speech from the president? Am I the only one who thinks this is scary, wrong and all around fucked up? Downright Orwellian?
Ugh.
Now I really want to move to Italy.
Hell, the temptation to move over the border to Canada before things get too weird is almost all consuming...

June 5, 2002

This just has *not* been my day.
First the cable went out, at the most inopportune moment. With it, the cable modem. Fuck you, comcast.
But that's okay. I got the urge to paint. All I have to do is move this gallon jug of black paint to make room for ultramarine blue.
Then, the gallon stuck to the tablecloth of my art table, knocking over the cup of water for my acrylic paint, spilling everywhere, including my painting, ruining it.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
So, I moved the painting and tossed the tablecloth in the dryer.
I sat down with some poster board and pastels and began drawing.
It looked hideous, which should be no surprise because I feel rather impotent and uninspired lately. I'm unhappy with more artwork than I'm happy with.
I finally folded the damned thing up to throw it away. I bumped the dry erase board behind me, it hitting me square in the head.
Fuck.
I picked it up, resumed folding and stood up, getting hit yet again with the dry erase board which in turn knocked over my semi-ruined painting, causing it to become in even worse shape.
I threw out the pastel drawing, deciding that today is not a day to do art.
I am so frustrated...with drawing, with painting, with the visual arts altogether. The stuff that other people consider good I loathe. It's been this way for some time--I consider them soulless hacks with no passion or originality, they consider me some clueless outsider artist. Fine.
But now I don't even like my art.
I used to be able to just express myself and leave it at that, but I have some weird obsession with progress, some critical eye, and while I still hate both the trite people who think that a perfectly drawn fruit basket is "art" and the substanceless modern artists who think that if they can draw exxagerated genitalia on cattle, perhaps they can create a big enough controversy to get censored, and then at long last, their bad art will sell...I no longer enjoy my own art either. I have works of brilliance followed by long periods of frustration because I can't outdo myself. My art has become terribly self conscious at on some level, competetive.
I don't enjoy it the way I used to, I don't get inspired the way I used to. And sometimes I think I should stop doing it all together.
Those classes I took at Valley ruined something for me. I shouldn't have dropped out. I lost a lot of my enthusiasm and my joy, it was already too late by the time I dropped out. I may as well have got the credits. Woulda...Coulda...Shoulda...
Something is gone and I don't think it's ever going to come back. It sucks.

June 4, 2002

I don't think I'm going to explore the option of ccs.
The boy and I talked about it. We have this plan concocted. In the next few years we want to go get married in Rome. Well, not in Rome per se, as the actual legal aspect would need to be done here, but we want the ceremony to be done in Rome. I'm not sure if we can pull it off, but we want to go to Italy over New Years and investigate the possibilities.
Well, the thing is, once we're married, I'll have to report his income. I can't get any need based grants once that happens, and so most likely all that I'll be getting is loans. I don't want to go someplace that costs $17,000 a year if I might not be able to pay the tuition in a year or two. So, I think I'll stick to the state schools.
I still don't think emu would be a bad idea, but I have to go visit the campus and see how I feel about it. I'll probably plan for something in the next week.
Sometimes I am wrought with such uncertainty. I think I should just work on my art and write. I am almost done with the novel so I get the grueling prospect of looking for an agent. If anyone has experience in this area and would like to give me some pointers, let me know. I have actually been getting some calls for job interviews lately, and I'm just so ambivalent about school with all the frustrations I've had with it.
I don't know, maybe I'll still go because getting a degree is a particular goal of mine, but I'm not sure. Sometimes it seems so useless, I really don't know anyone who is doing stuff that I can do now who have got degrees in the things that interest me. I don't know anyone who is doing really innovative things in terms of writing or art and so it seems a bit pointless to me.
I waver back and forth with this. Oddly inspired and yet fed up, just weary of the whole process...
We went to a gallery opening saturday then an art fair sunday. Besides the cool purple snail lamp, made out of bicycle parts, that we bought...there was so little of interest. Looking at bad photography, and the rather uninspiring paintings of a recent WSU graduate, I wondered what the point was of really formulaic, really structured methods of learning and if I might not be better off just getting a bartending job and experimenting in my own time...maybe opening the gallery...
Sometimes, I just don't know.

June 3, 2002

Okay I need to officially take care of my stomach.
It's been hurting me the past few days, mostly over dinner. But today, it got really bad. I noticed one of the cats had thrown up all over one of my favorite books. Grumbling a bit, I went to clean it. I felt a bit queasy which sometimes happens when I clean cat puke, but usually it passes if I sit down for a moment. That didn't happen this time. I ran to the toilet, and started vomitting like crazy.
Yuck.
Now I can't even drink the cup of coffee that I just made for myself, because my stomach really hurts. Which sucks, because I'm incredibly tired.
I need to do something...drink less coffee, worry less, drink more milk. (I recently drastically cut down my milk intake, and haven't felt as well since.)
But yeah, this sucks.
So a friend of Rob's came over and we got to talking about the center for creative studies, where he went to school. It sounds like it would be a lot better place than Wayne, so I think I'm going to call and schedule a tour. The deadline is August 1st, so I still have time, though it might hurt me with stuff like getting ample financial aid. I want to talk to them to better assess how feasible it would be, but it's something to look into.
Oh yeah, I put up a poll about my various choices right now. Feel free to vote in it.

June 3, 2002

So, I think the woman at Wayne State who told me that everyone else was full of shit about not being able to find me in the system was in fact full of shit herself. Partly because she never verified any of my info, just asked me for it then said "oh yeah that's here". Partly because I find it hard to believe that five people would say "your social security number isn't in the system" and all be wrong. And partly because the director of admissions tried to look into it and couldn't figure it out, and now needs to co-ordinate with the head of registration.
I'm about ready to give up on this. I'm just sick of it. I don't have enthusiasm for this school anymore and I'm not even registered for classes. If they really don't care if I go there or not, then neither do I. I'm sick of spending literally hours on the phone arguing with them about this, writing constant letters, getting tossed from department to department while everyone tries to pass the buck. It just isn't worth it to me.
I sent an application to Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti. Since the boy works out that way, we would just carpool until I got my own car. That wouldn't be bad. The only thing is, while the deadline isn't until August 1st, registration has been going on for three months. Because of that, a lot of classes are full. So my first semester would be spent fulfilling my general education requirements and going to a lot of the big lecture hall type classes. But that isn't necessarily a bad thing. So I'll wait and see how that works out.
If not, I can always go to Henry Ford and transfer somewhere else, since I'm registered for classes there anyways.
I'm kind of bummed that I've wasted so much time with Wayne but, oh well.
If they pull their heads out of their asses and fix the multitude of problems, then great but I really am not holding my breath on it. I've talked to other people who have gone there and my experience is not unique. Frankly, I don't see the point of spending the next five years of my life getting in pointless fights with the administration everytime they fuck up. I have better things to do with my time.