12/21/11

i think there's a difference between giving up and thinking to oneself "hey this career path entails more than i signed up for and it doesnt really seem worth it and my talents would be better executed elsewhere." this whole time trying to be a tattooist it's honestly felt like an uphill battle. plus i can't do good artwork if the whole time i have to listen to someone moaning and groaning in pain BECAUSE of me doing that artwork. therefore i can't feel like i'm giving a tattoo with love therefore i can't do it well oftentimes. also there's the fact that as a tattooist you're expected to be a socialite and slut and party animal and all this stupid other shit is expected of you and you might ask "why did none of this occur to you for the past four years?" and that's because of my stubborn streak i guess, and the fact that i was "fired" from my first apprenticeship by a male chauvinist asshole and told that tattooing wasn't for me so, predictably, that just made me want to tattoo even more and made me want to prove him wrong. but why pursue a whole career just to prove one asshole wrong? ...i have this horse farm job and someone wants me to illustrate a book she's writing, and i've already illustrated one and i'm doing a cartoon with someone else. none of that sounds as sexy and badass as being a tattoo artist but i'm ready to just stop being in denial of the fact that i'm not badass at all. not one bit.

"this is a good cold one"

the boys have been putting dead batteries back in the fridge because they think if they get cold again then they're renewed again. for a while, before she figured it out, mom had to just be confused about why sometimes new batteries would work and sometimes they wouldn't.

for about a month, from september to october, i was seeing this guy alex. i was very happy and excited about him. it started to feel like we were together, even though we'd never actually had a verbal agreement that we were. then, abruptly, he went back to his ex, mackenzie. ....even though i had been so gaga over him, for some reason getting over him happened a lot quicker and easier than i thought it would. that was also the first time i was ever dumped (for lack of a better word) without crying about it. maybe over the years i've become more callous. i don't know.

tori and i aren't friends anymore. a situation happened--the put the story in a nutshell--where i was supposed to lie for her and i didn't. as soon as i said what i said to betray her i regretted it. i'd been put on the spot, made to feel bad for someone, and promised that tori wouldn't be informed that i'd said anything. of course, that promise was broken, she was informed and she was ripping pissed, heartbroken, hurt, disillusioned. i tried apologizing so many times in so many ways. i tried explaining the situation. i tried explaining how bad i can be at keeping secrets. i tried to get her to aim her blame at the person who was the other link. i tried defending myself. i tried analyzing and re-analyzing the situation to come up with more and more possible explanations for my behavior. i tried telling her i would do anything to make it up to her. i tried everything. she is not my friend anymore.

while i was betraying her i acquired a new fuck buddy, joe. i had met him through her. he is best friends with the guy (or one of the guys) that she's getting with, frank. for a few days i stayed in denial and told myself that having a new fuck buddy would make me happy enough to be able to forget about tori. i tried to tell myself he was worth it. then, of course, as with all phases of being in denial, it came to an end and i realized how empty my life is without her. joe will never fill that void and i'm always going to feel like a bad person and traitorous friend. last night joe and i were supposed to hang out, then at the last minute i told him i was too sad about tori and i wouldn't be able to. for some reason that just made him want to hang out with me even more. with some persistence and effort he persuaded me to let him come over, and for a period of time he did manage to make me forget about tori and have a good time with him.

i think as long as i live i'll still be trying to figure out how important people are to each other, and when and how often and in what ways and what different contexts. as long as i live i'll be trying to understand relationships (in the broad sense of the word).

i don't have that new apprenticeship anymore. ...the other night i was out drinking with my coworkers and i playfully tried to snatch my boss's lighter from him. he then tried to set my sweatshirt sleeve on fire. consequently i snatched my arm away and punched him in the head. he then grabbed me by the hair and pulled me closer to him, fixing me with an evil stare. he waited until there was fear in my eyes and i was leaning away from him with all my weight, trying to yank my hair out of his grip. then he let go and i fell on the floor. at that point i still didn't know whether to think we were just playing or whether he was really pissed off. then he started to yell at me and i knew he was really pissed off.

"think about what you do before you fuckin' do it!" he was yelling. "you can't fuckin' lay a hand on me! you punched me in the head!"

"you tried to light me on fire," i said.

"oh, i'll do way worse than that." then i left.

the next day i got all my equipment out of his shop. for some reason the lights were off but the door was unlocked. i thought that maybe, if anything, he was expecting me to quit and that was why the lights were off but the door was unlocked: to send the message that i could get all my stuff out without any confrontation. i thought that pat (who lives upstairs) was probably upstairs the whole time, aware of my presence (from having seen my car out the window) and aware of what i was doing.

i thought wrong. the next day i got a text from my other boss, grimy.

"did u climb in a window to get ur shit out?"

"no, the door was unlocked," i said.

"so i guess u quit"

"yeah"

"u think that's cool? to break in the shop take ur shit and bounce. no explanation or anything. like why would u do that especially if u know we know every tattoo artist and shop from here to west virginia"

"i didnt break in, it was open. its not normal for me to feel the desire to punch anyone. somehow you and pat are the only ones with the power to bring that desire to me which is why i can't work with u"

"liz are u that dumb? just because something is open doesn't mean u can walk in. if u guys leave ur door open i could just walk in ur house at four in the morning. it's called a B&E."

"ok so whats ur point? y do u care? i only took my stuff"

"the open sign was broke and the piercing sign was broke that's why i asked if u came in through the windows"

"weird"

"its just stupid that u couldn't be professional about it"

"i thought if anything pat was expecting me to quit. i thought that was why the lights were off but the door was open, to send the msg that i could get my stuff out w/o any confrontation. i mean what does he expect me to do? he tried to light me on fire. ...i really thought he must have been upstairs the whole time."

"no we weren't here at all why would he close the shop for a day just so u could get ur shit? and he didn't try lighting u on fire! he wasn't even close to u with the lighter. there was four witnesses other then me and katie."

"i dont wanna fight with you. u and pat just have an intense energy that i can't deal with. call me a pussy, call me what u will. i just can't deal w it"

"ok." and that was that.

mom wants us to open our own tattoo place. she has wanted this for years. for years i always said, "no, i'm not ready, i still need to learn more. plus i don't like to tell people what to do; i'd rather be an employee than an employer. i don't want my own place, i just want to work under someone." now, however, this idea of hers seems more appealing than ever. she and dad take care of the business aspect of it. they talk to the landlord, they get business insurance, they start the corporation, they talk to the township about zoning, they do the taxes or get the accountant or whatever. i take care of the tattooing. that's my job. that's all i want. i just want to be tattooing. i don't want to be trying to fit in with other already-established tattoo people. i don't want to be trying to make friends with trash and convicts and criminals and people that are going to give me panic attacks every other weekend. i don't want to do all that bullshit. i just want to be tattooing, plain and simple.

americans

you can't approve of someone but disapprove of the things they do. you can't love someone but hate the things they do.

i used to get so excited over christmas. over the years though, more and more lately, it just seems more and more to me like it's just a bunch of people celebrating consumerism. celebrating consumerism and teaching our kids to celebrate consumerism and materialism. they strive to "be good" so they can "get more toys." ...then again it is only once a year.

this one year when i was little i hand-made a christmas card for every reindeer, santa claus and mrs. claus. ...later on i was soooooooo pissed when i found out santa isn't real. i wanted to say to my mom, "you let me do all that fuckin' work for NOTHING, bitch?!"

"i wanna meet the monkeys that made us," is what peter said a few days after i tried to explain evolution to him. ...did i already write about that? i can't remember. i figured i'd put it down just in case.

"We've created a fake world obsessed with fake things and now, as it begins to crumble and fall apart we're realizing--we must go back to the earth." --my friend Lindsay

lately i've been wondering more and more...how do i put it? all these things going on in the world, the stuff going on with wall street, the indefinite suspension of habeus corpus, the recession, the fact that china is buying property in our national parks....all these seemingly preposterous and rage-enducing goings-on in the world that my facebook friends post links about on their walls....i've just been wondering how serious it all is in the grand scheme of things. i've been wondering if i would still think the nation is in a highly serious and compromised condition/position if i were alive during either world war, the civil war, the vietnam war, the great depression or anything like that.

the other day i learned that one out of ever four people in jail in the world are americans.

puppies...

...make the world go round.

laid

for some reason last night i had a dream with amanda (chris's girlfriend and sean's ex) in it. leelee was still alive. i was at the store buying chew toys for her. amanda was there helping me pick them out. whatever store we were in was playing music. that song came on--"laid" by james. amanda and i both started singing along with it, looking at each other as we were singing it especially at the part that goes "ah i think you're so pretty..." oh we were having so much fun. i don't know why i dreamt of amanda. maybe i wish i saw her more? i'm pretty sure i know why i dreamt of leelee. she was the only dog we ever had that came without behavioral problems, the only dog we ever kept until she died. i guess yesterday i was thinking that i miss having a dog. we found a new home for harry since he kept killing the chickens. we're not taking care of molly for denise anymore since she and my mom aren't friends anymore. we still have a huge economy-size pack of puppy pads sitting around. we've been trying to clear up clutter around the house in preparation for guests coming over for thanksgiving. dad was like "can i throw these out?" and mom was like, "no, that's just going to jinx it. as soon as you throw those out we're going to get a puppy."

my cousin christian has supposedly been feeling suicidal lately and has been in the hospital for it the last few days. he's only eleven. christ. what is the world coming to? mom was talking on the phone to aunt margo the other night (they're coming over for thanksgiving). for years my autistic cousin caleb was content with the hobby of putting wooden beads onto strings. now his latest favorite thing to do is to swing the strings of beads around. when he does this he doesn't watch where he's swinging them. he knocks stuff over all over the house and sometimes hits and hurts people. his other favorite thing to do is to run backwards. he (predictably) can't see where he's going when he does this and often falls and hurts himself, and has been to the ER for this several times. margo still has chronic constant back pain and is on medication all the time for it but it still doesn't totally take it away. celia is a senior in high school. lately she has this problem where she throws up all the time. nobody can figure out why. she's had to take a lot of time off from school because of it. also she has some kind of learning disorder. after telling me about all this, mom said, "after listening to margo talk about her life...... man, there is nothing wrong with my life."

four years

well i told pat all my thoughts & issues about tattooing, and my doubts about whether i should continue doing it. he just sort of invalidated my reasons for doubt one by one, and then said,

"you're the weirdest chick i ever met. you over-think and over-analyze everything. you're going to give yourself a heart attack before you're thirty. can you stop pacing back and forth, please, and just sit down?" i sat down and calmed down. i considered the fact that i switched medications a few weeks ago. for all i know, that's the thing that's making me worry so much. maybe zoloft makes you not care and not worry about anything, whereas prozac doesn't do that. i felt better after i told pat about all my thoughts and worries and issues. i think that was all i needed, just to tell him. i didn't need to quit. i'm not going to quit doing something i've loved doing for the last four years.

really

every single new person that i meet, when i tell them i tattoo they all have the exact same reaction: incredulous expressions on their faces while they say something along the lines of "what?! you tattoo? how old are you?" or "do you even have any tattoos on you?" or "i never would have guessed that" or "i can't picture you as a tattooist."

my brain hurts

thoughts and preoccupations:

i love tattooing but i don't know if i love tattooed people. actually i don't know if i love people in general. i want to tattoo people but i don't want all the stupid small talk that has to come before and after tattooing someone if you want to have enough friendly acquaintances that like tattoos, to be able to keep it up.

what do i do?

katie attracts clientele by being a bar tender i think. well i mean i know she's a bar tender but i don't know if that has anything to do with how she attracts clientele. maybe i could try to learn bar tending if someone would ever be willing to try to teach me. i don't want to ask anyone though. i don't like to ask people for things. plus....if i'm going to have two jobs (and that has to be the plan because tattooing is not steady money) it would be nice if one of them involved animals.

know what would be nice? taking care of horses at a boarding stable and being a trail ride guide. i just got a job like that today. i start sunday. it sounds like it's going to be fun and all except for the fact that it's less than minimum wage. however, if i work there i get to ride for free whenever i want. that shouldn't be important, though, should it? it should be important that i have a job that provides money and provides opportunities to meet new people so i can tell those people i do tattoos and thus attract business to the shop.

whenever i'm about to go into work, it shouldn't feel like i'm about to go in for my daily dose of abuse and torture. should it?

but i still like tattooing!

grimy and pat try to tell me that you attract clientele by meeting people in bars. you attract clientele by going out drinking. however i've tried that with them a few different nights now and so far it hasn't worked. i've just ended up spending my money on alcohol. i tried to talk to this one guy about potential tattoo ideas and he just thought i was hitting on him and got all pissy when he realized i wasn't.

pat and grimy try to tell me if i want to tattoo then i have to "drink a lot more and fuck a lot more." ...i'm really hoping they're wrong. what if they're right? would it be worth it? do they not ever have any fear of venerial diseases?

what if i like this horse farm job? what if i get more horse farm jobs since this one is only one day a week? what if i find another horse farm job that actually provides good pay? would i just give up tattooing for that job? i don't know about that. it depends how much i like the people i work with, i guess.

i really wonder if, having this new horse farm job, i'm going to actually meet anybody who wants to get tattooed by me.

would i ever just give up tattooing?

i was on the verge of quitting today. i had it in my head that i was going to walk in and say, "i've been re-thinking my life. i think i shouldn't be a tattooist." then they weren't there today. and then i re-thought that decision and told myself not to make any rash decisions. see how things work out. see if i can actually attract any clientele to the shop.

are there a lot of horse people that are also tattoo people? i've known at least one.

i could also try working at petland, where i've seen that some of their employees have tattoos.

i could try to learn bar tending. i could try to learn dog grooming. those are both things that have to be taught though! so i have to bother someone to teach me!

ok, here's the plan: see how this horse job goes. but what's the plan for if i meet people who want tattoos, versus if i don't meet people who want tattoos? hmmmm. if it doesn't work for anyone else, it might work for alyssa. having this job, i mean. bribing her into coming over this way. we can also go on a trail ride and since i don't have to pay to ride then we'll split the cost of her riding and then it's cheaper for her.

if i don't meet people who want tattoos? and if it's dead in the shop for long enough? and if i really like the horse job? and if i look around at other horse farms and they also need help? and if i get another horse farm job? what if i get another horse farm job and it's good pay and it fills whatever hole in my soul is there from not tattooing? would i just totally switch over? i don't know.....maybe, maybe not.

i told tori i wanted to learn grooming and she said she would teach me and it's easy. when is she actually ever going to get around to it though?

i have half a mind to ask katie how hard bar tending is to learn, next time i see her.

would i be able to handle being a bar tender? if i was a bar tender and a tattooist then that would mean i have two jobs that both entail dealing with people a lot. WOULD i be able to hack it?

pat and grimy trying to tell me i have to go out and party and drink and fuck.....is that just them trying to get me drunk and fuck me? ......the day after grimy tried to put moves on me and i wasn't going for it, he was really grumpy and wasn't acting like he wanted to teach me anything anymore. the day after pat tried to put moves on me and i wasn't going for it, he was really grumpy and wasn't acting like he wanted to teach me anything anymore. .....was hiring me just their little scheme to get laid?

ugh.

how big of assholes do my coworkers have to be in order for me to just give up having this job that entails having an artistic eye (which is what i want in a job)? ....i don't know, but that's what i'm starting to be forced to figure out these days.

deja vu

i've been wondering more and more lately if i should still even be tattooing. this apprenticeship kind of feels like deja vu. what if this whole time i've been tattooing i've just been trying to be someone i'm not? i'm giving myself a headache from stressing over it so much.

love what i do...

"you feel guilty a lot, don't you?"

"we should just tattoo your whole arm green."

"if i washed off my dick would you suck it?"

"just hook up with joe."

"you don't have to tip them."

"she's smarter than you give her credit for."

"she bounces back."

"did you really just go over and apologize?"

"are you spying on me?"

"i saw you just go over there and give her a dollar and say 'i'm sorry.' you don't have to tip them especially if you're not even standing at the bar."

"then what are they here for?!"

"i love you liz."

"i............loveyoutoo."

"what?! fuck you liz! just throwing words around!"

"was your mom a stripper?"

"you think too much."

"i wanna hit that before i disrespect her."

"i just don't get how you thought it wasn't okay to fuck your boss, but it was okay to punch your boss in the head?"

"ok i won't ever do that again."

"i just think punching someone seems worse than fucking them."

"you think so?.....i think sex is more emotionally loaded than fighting. what did you say before i punched you? you could have punched me back."

"you were saying to katie 'i wish there was something i could do to help' and i said 'yea there's something you can do to help, you can shut the fuck up.' and we were in your car so i wasn't going to punch you back."

am i a square peg trying to fit into a round hole?

or is this just what it feels like to be working again after so much time not working? is this the amount of stress that being a working person entails?

tori says shane and jenna are always fighting.

i made an ass out of grimy by going up to that stripper after he refused to tip her, and tipping her and apologizing for him (and then i gave her one of our cards; maybe i shouldn't have done that?). should i feel bad about that? was i in the wrong? did i cross some kind of line? am i on his team because i'm his coworker, or am i on her team because i'm a woman?

come to think of it, it wasn't even the fact that he didn't tip her. that wasn't it at all. it was the fact that he was being obnoxious about it. he was laughing at her, and laughing about her behind her back when she walked away. he was expecting me to laugh along with him.

i guess this apprenticeship is different from my last one because, number one, there's no way i'm going to fuck any of my coworkers. number two, i know i don't have to like my coworkers. they don't have to like me either. we don't have to like each other, and most likely i'm not going to like them because tattoo people are all pretty much douche bags (i hate to generalize, but, they are). all we have to do is help each other make money. that's all we have to do.

if i make money for them, i'm basically their equal. i don't have to kiss their asses.

but, then again, am i still going to love tattooing as much if i have to always be around guys that are douche bags whenever i'm doing it?

is it possible to love your job but hate your coworkers?

"love what i do, hate where i work." -shane

i guess it is possible.

this apprenticeship is also different because of katie, though. another apprentice. another girl. another person with asperger syndrome. we can understand each other at least somewhat. and when i said "hate your coworkers" i was only referring to pat and grimy, not to her. katie is cool. the idea of quitting would seem much more appealing to me if it wasn't for her. and, i mean, it's encouraging because it makes me think, "if she can put up with them, then i can too, right? somehow she does it, so it's not impossible."

richard vs. belle

a couple weeks ago i was with mark & caitlin & megan and some of their friends, and one of them had this sort of publication that west chester university puts out every now and then. some of tug's prints were in there. tug who won the senior show in 2008. caitlin saw me looking and said "yea tug was all tripped out on adderall doing those." i had some unpleasant feelings from hearing her say that. WHAT? that's like only some people getting to use steroids in the olympics. would i have won the senior show in 2009 if i'd been all tripped out on adderall? ...not that i didn't already notice some rules that the winner of the senior show had broken, like the rule that you're not supposed to use work you've done from the previous year. she had a shitload of work up from the previous year.

the more i thought about it, there were more and more signs and hints that the printmaking professor, belle, just rigs the show and basically decides who wins it. whatever students are her dedicated ass-kissing teacher-worshipping shining stars of little pupils, reap the benefits. tug was the one in 2008, because of his prints. becca was the one in 2009, because of her prints. has anyone ever won the show because of their sculptures? my sculptures were my main attraction, not my prints. ....maybe the professors think of the senior show more like a competition between themselves. the students just represent them. and belle is just the most competitive asshole. and that's why she tends to be so controlling and posessive of the work her students do. in her eyes it's her work too. that's why i've had arguments with her whereas i never had any arguments with any of my other professors. i remember my sculpting professor richard was the man. he would choose his battles. of course he would have tips and suggestions and guidance now and then but he let me make the ultimate decisions. if i ever didn't do something the way he wanted me to he didn't react as severely as belle, which made me respect him more and therefore want to listen to him more. ....or maybe it was his personality really. he could be playful. he could poke fun at me. we could do it to each other, because we knew it didn't matter because we both knew we liked each other. belle, on the other hand, was very careful not to step on any toes or say anything that might have a slight chance of offending someone to their face, so that she could hold it all in and wait until they were gone and ream their asses behind their backs. or maybe it was the way that....she just had a way of making it seem like she was asking a question or asking for your opinion about something and it was really her way of subtlely, subliminally, desguisedly, or whatever the word would be, telling you her opinion or judgement of something. ...and people are supposed to pick up on that or something. richard, on the other hand.... if he didn't like something he would just come right out and say it. "sounds awful," he said to my goblin idea. "were you getting tired of this dog sculpture series?" i said "was it going to be a series?" and then i forget exactly what he said but he made it clear that, yes, he thought it was a better idea for me to do a series. and then later he was trying to tell me to stay away from symmetry in my sculptures because it makes them less interesting to look at. "but this is just how dogs look when they're in that mood," i said, and he said "ok, i'm hitting a brick wall with you, so i'm not going to try anymore." then i thought about it a little longer and decided that, yes, i should try to make it look less symmetrical. and i did. and he liked it.

i guess it was just the way he had the attitude like "i'll give suggestions and whatnot but ultimately it's up to the student, which suggestions they want to follow. if they don't trust that i know what's best, i'll just let them dig their own graves in the senior show." whereas belle, if you ever didn't do what she said, tried to outwardly maintain her composure and act like she didn't care but on the inside she was livid. she would just let it come out now and then in little outbursts of disparaging comments. "how did you transfer your image to your linoleum?" she asked. "in beginning printmaking you taught us how to use transfer paper," i said. "oh, i taught you something?!" she said with an exasperated tone of voice and facial expression, making a jab at me for being rebellious in general (instead of pointing out a single specific thing that i should have done differently, and taking the attitude that if i listened i listened and if i didn't i didn't).

wallace

"[Ian] Wallace explains it like this: When someone pops up in your sex dream, it doesn’t necessarily imply you want to be intimate with this person. Instead, he or she probably possesses some admirable personality trait (such as leadership skills, kindness, or a flair for fashion) that you recognize in yourself but haven’t yet fully developed. 'Showing off your talents and traits requires that you open up and become vulnerable and exposed,' says Wallace — just like sex (which is why your snoozing psyche converts it into this extremely intimate act)."

Ian Wallace = dream psychologist & author

Hogwarts

from sept 24

today is the 20th birthday of the album "nevermind."

supposedly before the 1960's men with long hair weren't allowed into disneyland.

oct 1

last night i had a dream that i was at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. i was in a class. i forget exactly what the class was but i remember the professor could make plants grow just by pointing her wand at them. the only thing i could seem to do with my wand was drawing. i remember several people in the class had rats or ferrets sitting on their shoulders. several of them jumped down and started chasing each other around the room and then i had to get them to stop and separate them.

two nights ago i had a dream that i had tattooed my face and then regretted it right afterwards. i did something on my forehead and something on my cheek. i was so happy to wake up.

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one thing i learned from college is that there's a difference between a real friend and a friendly aquaintance who frequently makes you laugh.

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it often occurs to me how remarkable it is that my friend tug seems to be financially independent and living on his own. he has a brain like mine and he's the same age as me. that is, it's remarkable until i'm reminded of the fact that he has a settlement from being hit by a car when he was a teenager. according to what i've heard, he still gets like $800 a month because of that. oftentimes i am jealous of him. oftentimes i wish i were hit by a car when i was a teenager. i especially have that wish at those moments when i especially wish i could afford to move out of my parents' house.

but then i try to remind myself how good i have it, and remind myself that the grass is always greener on the other side, and there's always someone to be jealous of for one reason or another, no matter who you are or what you have or don't have.

grandmother (nana's mother-in-law) sent me three birthday cards this year, two of which had money in them. i didn't know whether she was doing it on purpose to try and tell me that i was taking too long with my thank-you note, whether she really did want to send me that many cards (which i considered less likely), or whether it was just that she's getting so old and she's not so with it anymore. i got forty dollars altogether from her. in my thank-you note i sent to her i gave her back one of the twenty-dollar bills. then, a few weeks ago, when mom dropped off peter at nana & pop-pop's house to spend the weekend there, grandmother gave it to my mom to give back to me. mom said she seemed offended or something that i had sent it back. gram told mom to tell me "i meant to send her two cards. i wanted to. i know when her birthday is! april twenty-- i mean may twenty--." "june," interjected nana. "june twenty-first," finished gram. mom finished this story by telling me that she thinks gram is embarrassed about what her age is doing to her memory, and it only puts salt in the wound for me to do something like send one of the twenty-dollar bills back to her, and not to do it again. ok then. i guess i won't. i was just under the impression that she had a finite amount of money to spend and put in birthday cards.

sept 21

so i got a new part-time job personalizing nameplates and step stools and piggy banks for kids. it's because it's one of denise's jobs now and she doesn't have enough time to do everything she has to do for that job and also run her photography business (which has recently entered another busy season apparently). yeah so now i just go over to her studio to help her out with that stuff almost every weekday for several hours in the afternoon.

mike & tori's friend bill seems to like me i guess. he sort of asked me out through a facebook message. i'm flattered by his attention but i don't know if i could be into him like that.

jelly seems to be finally acting like a rat. she's curious and playful and mischievous like a rat. she explores like a rat, runs around like a rat. yaaay. i guess it just means she's not a baby anymore.

so two or three weekends ago i went cliff-jumping into the conowingo dam with mark & caitlin.

last weekend (two nights ago) i hooked up with mark & caitlin's roommate alex.

i think i like him.

i think he likes me.

i think he's really good at cuddling and other things.

i think he's fun to talk to.

i think the sean situation is a lost cause.

i think i'm ready to shift my focus to alex.

not to mention i haven't heard from the other sean since july. that's fine i guess. he didn't really add anything positive to my life. well yeah he did sometimes but not as much positivity as negativity.

alex climbs trees for a living. he's 24. he has brown hair and green eyes like me. he does fun outside things like camp and snowmobile and ride dirt bikes and 3 wheelers and 4 wheelers, and he has ridden horses before. he's adventurous. he's intelligent. you can just tell right away by talking to him. he went to art school but only for a year, then he stopped because he felt like the program wasn't really teaching him anything. he says he's almost done paying off his student loans. wow. so maybe i would be almost done by now too if i had only gone to school for a year.

july to september

from july 30

apparently some people have skin reactions to the sun if their tattoos have yellow ink in them. 

Can vampires smoke cigarettes?

from aug 1

In a way i miss having a stupid job like cashiering in a cafeteria. In a way i  miss having stupid tedious things being required of me and if i don't do them there's consequences like my livelihood being 
threatened. I guess i miss the feeling of having things be required of me. Things are expected from me now from my family, but if i ever 
don't do them cuz i forgot or whatever, they're just like "oh thats ok. Next time." there's no consequences. When there's no 
consequences for anything...life sometimes can just feel too easy and pointless. However, in spite of me saying all this about missing my 
old job, i know for a fact that if i were hired there again i would instantly regret having said those words.  

from aug 15

Know what my problem is? I'm a tattooist but yet at the same time i find buying  tattoos to be an expensive extravagance that i wouldn't necessarily invest in any time soon. So i'm selling ppl something that 
i myself wouldn't buy. Thats my problem. I find guilt in that. I find guilt in being dishonest. Therefore i'm a bad salesman.

from aug 22

So the other night i had this dream about finding dead chicken bodies  everywhere. I remember picking up at least one of them and throwing it over a hill and into this valley that seemed almost incomprehensibly 
deep. From what i could see of it it looked beautiful but it seemed like the kind of place i wouldn't attempt to visit 
anytime soon. It seemed too hard to get there or something. Then the next day i found out harry killed one of the chickens. 
...the other night i had this dream about dopie. I found out that he wears some kind of retainer. It wasn't a normal retainer though. 
Somehow when he put it in his mouth, it changed the whole shape of his jaw and therefore the shape of his face. When he took it back 
out he practically had a different person's face And he wasn't really cute anymore. He wasn't cute at all actually. ...the other 
night i had a dream about peter (in california). I had a dream that we found out he'd really been in a coma, not dead, and he woke 
back up again and he got to see the drawing i made him and he loved it and i got to see him one last time and i stayed up and drank 
and talked with him and larry and mom. Then the next day he died. At least i got to see him though. I do regard dreams as just 
being another form of reality, so if i look at it that way then i did get to see him one last time...........damn i miss larry and 
peter. ....then last night i had a dream about tom, my old sculpting professor, of all people. I have no idea why. I haven't 
thought of him in a while. In the dream he just kinda Hit on me and did and said some things to basically send me the message that he 
thought i was hot. Then i remember him trying to give me a present. It was something in a box. I remember being hesitant to open 
it. I didn't know if i wanted to or not. Somehow he gave me the feeling that once i accepted and opened that present, i would be 
obligated to fuck him. Either that or i wouldn't be obligated to fuck him but there would still just be something in that gift box 
that would reveal something about him that would make me never think of him the same way again. There was something obscene and 
kinky in that box. I was still just looking at it and trying to decide when the dream ended.

Today i was out weeding in the rain. 

...last time i saw tori, i told her "i  think it's been too long since we made out" and she just frowned and made a shushing gesture at me. I guess cuz mike was in the next 
room. I can't tell if she and i have started growing apart. Maybe the friendship is just going through a dry boring spell. I 
don't know. I also told her that i was a bit peeved that we always do the same thing when we hang out. We sit there and drink and 
smoke and talk and either watch tv or watch mike play video games. Oh and sometimes, especially last time, i try to have a 
conversation with her and mike always listens in and interjects. He always has his 2 cents to put in, and it just makes me feel all 
self-conscious and spied-on and scrutinized and Analyzed and therefore the conversation just doesn't go how it would have 
otherwise. I just can't relax. I just can't spend any fuckin time with tori without fuckin mike right there fucking everything up. 
Sigh. Ok i guess it was bound to get to me sooner or later. It would all be not as bad if it weren't for the fact that for the past 
week or two we've hardly talked on the phone. We usually do semi-frequently. And she's not always around mike when she's on the 
phone with me so it's good, it's like one-on-one time. ...anyway but she says she's just been having a tough time lately. Which i 
should be understanding i guess. Her parents are divorcing. Her dad's best friend just died. Her ferret died last month. Her 
brother just got in a drunk driving car accident that Almost killed someone and shattered his femur.
yeah. Tough times.

from sept 7

It feels almost like something's gone stale between me & tori. Something doesnt  feel right or doesnt feel the same or something. I dunno. 

from sept 8

Men can be really sexy. They can have a hell of a lot of sex appeal. But they  can never make you feel safe the way women can.

later sept 8

As mom was telling me i didnt have the best upbringing, telling me she fucked up  and she feels guilty, telling me she was too young to have kids and in a lot of ways i took care of her as much as she took care of 
me..... As she was telling me all this i was suddenly feeling an automatic urge to say or do something to make her feel 
better, something to take her mind away from all this and stop feeling like this, stop feeling like a bad mom. But by doing that, by 
trying as hard as i could to console and distract her, i realized i would just be reinforcing the truth of what she was telling 
me. I still did try to comfort her. I denied the things she was saying. Then she simply said "you're happily in denial."  i didn't know what to do anymore.  i couldn't do my job anymore, my job of making her feel better.  it made me nervous.  i started to sway back and forth.  i do that when i'm nervous sometimes.  i kept doing that until she was willing to drop the subject and let me go to bed.

from sept 14

i don't know why those few lines ended up looking like that. i don't remember feeling like the needle was jabbing in sideways like that.

so many thoughts.

"she's smarter than you give her credit for."

the FBI is at dad's work and watching us and tapping our phones?

mom put black walnut hull crap in molly's bald spot (the black stuff that dyes your skin if you try to peel a walnut skin off bare-handed) and it looks way better, way less noticeable

why has my right index finger's fingertip been numb for the last two days? i know it started when i was gardening. i was pulling weeds.



from sept 18

Porridge cooked with apples and bananas and plums and cinnamon is the most  heavenly thing to eat when you're high. Eat some of that, then eat some vegan cake, then eat some pear sauce (like applesauce but made with pears) that you yourself made from pears growing in a tree in your backyard.  mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.  it's heavenly.

illusions

now this week my thoughts are more on dopie than sean c. it was definitely sean c last week. maybe next week it'll be more sean m. then maybe tori the next week and nobody the next week. i don't know why i do this. also i don't know if i really like dopie or just my illusion of him (i don't see him that much anymore). i could almost say the same thing about both seans too. hmm. does that mean when i like guys i don't really like them but just my illusions of them? haha.

planking & weezer

ever notice the lead singer of weezer doesn't seem to have much facial expression?

i don't really get the "planking" thing that's been all over facebook recently.

july

from july 10

how crippled are the "jackass" guys right now? how many injuries do they have that will never heal?

sometimes i think there's too many things i do just cuz people expect me to.

sometimes it's like the more people there are that like me and wanna see me and hang out with me, the more insecure and paranoid i feel. ....i've heard kurt cobain was the same way. i've also heard my handwriting is just like his. it cheers me up when i find similarities between me and my hero.

from july 11

"you're more potent."

tom's girlfriend sandy's kids showed up for 1.5 minutes, long enough for their mother to give them some kinda presents and then leave. mom was still putting the dogs away and making them stop barking, getting ready to meet sandy's kids, when they just left. it was pretty strange. i don't get why anyone would do that.

what is that creature at the beginning of the theme song video for true blood, sitting there underwater? i've wondered that for a long time. looks like some kinda giant salamander with spikes around its neck. i was surprised to discover this season that sam & tara aren't together. if i was a true blood character i would be jason. at least right now i remind me of jason. always trying to do good and do the right thing and never get into trouble, and it never ends up working.

"peter, don't stand too close to the grill! you'll get fired!"

"i don't wanna get policed!"

"what is that red stuff you're holding?"

"grown-up jell-o."

"sometimes jell-o is for kids too right?"

"yeah."

"this is sometimes."

"no, it's not."

"i have one thing to say, shantay shantay shantay."

so supposedly i am "more potent" than my half brothers because i was created out of passion, not just because of wanting to have kids. that's what mom says anyway. maybe she was just trying to make me feel better about having been born into a dysfunctional marriage.

i tested those shrooms i picked last month and they didn't do anything :( ...it could be just that my tolerance is up though, cuz i did eat some several weeks ago but then i knew they wouldn't make me trip cuz i was on zoloft, i was just testing them to make sure they weren't poisonous.

...amanda j reminds me of holly k a bit. ...i shared with her the reason why i'm never having kids. it's basically because of ralph and the fact that, while i was high, i somehow accidentally let him run away. how could i trust myself as a parent after that? plus there was nyxie. she died of mycoplasm pneumonia because i put cedar shavings in her tank one time. and vinny? i still don't know why he died. he was just cold one morning. did he choke? did he suffocate? did he have a heart attack? whatever it was, was it because of me or because of something i gave him? i don't know. ben was talking about vinny today and how much he misses him.

i figured out what children's book is about people like me: federick.

i saw part one of harry potter number 7 the other day with amanda and her friend britney.

my friend lindsay was gonna give me a bunny but then didn't once she found someone more enthusiastic about taking her.

4th of july weekend, the schlessers were all down here. we swam in the quarry that's down the street, among many other things. i tattooed my aunt and uncle and cousin.

i wouldn't be a good mom but i would be a good aunt.

we played an xbox dancing game.

mom listened to my story about sean c. and then told me that i'm paranoid and i hurt him. things i did bc of being paranoid and insecure, hurt him. later i thought to myself "maybe that's why the closest thing i've ever had to a relationship is with someone who just pisses me off all the time [sean m.]. at least i know i'll never hurt him more than he hurts me. i hate feeling guilty."

i saw darya and ray the other night. ray was making soap.

tom has been needing me to get him his weed. it's been more and more of a hassle as time progresses. a big part of the reason is the way he approaches it.

i need to find out online how old shrooms can be before they're not safe to eat.

tori's parents are getting divorced.

i need to tell sean c those shrooms won't do anything (i gave some to amanda & chris to give to him). i need to make business cards. i need to sell some things online. i need to see how much money is left in my bank account. i miss having my own computer. i don't get half the stuff done that i need to get done because of not having my own damn computer. why did i just start feeling a little down? maybe because it's the day after, or two days after, a big party that i had been looking forward to for a while. i feel feelings more acutely now that i'm off my meds. why did i go off them? so i could trip on shrooms. and then that didn't even work. great. all that for nothing. ...i still am saving money though. meds cost money.

the other night late at night i borrowed tom's computer and brought it in the pool room so i could skype with sean m. i didn't return the computer until it was barely beginning to get light out. tom just had to wake up as i was returning his computer to him in my tank top and underwear.

...that's why i'm down now, cuz the shrooms didn't work.

a memory comes to me: me telling dopie i wanted to hang out with him one night and him telling me "i'll probably impregnate you," and me not knowing what to say back. another memory comes to me: me as a teenager, mom looking at my feet and saying "do you want me to braid your toe hair for christmas?" ...since then i shave my toes. another memory from just last weekend: mom saying "no, no, not this song. yes, please, make it better," as that "hey jude" song by the beatles came on and it was at the part that goes "then you can start to make it better." haha.

...maybe i'm just partly down because the weekend's over. there's still stuff to look forward to: manny & linda's cookout/party thing, seeing lindsay, maybe seeing one or both of the two seans, seeing the schlessers again, maybe going to sandy's barbecue...

so i guess i did finally get to know amanda j at least somewhat. ...i was a little more conscious of the age difference between me and that group of people as we were walking around town and whenever i mentioned music or movies that were before their time, not realizing before i mentioned it that it was before their time. haha.

a memory i'm fond of recalling is one where i was trying to ask sean c about his parents and what they're like and what his relationship with them was like. he was telling me in some way or another that there was some amount of discomfort in his relationship with his father. i said "so if you went up t......" and started to giggle and it was hard to stop, and then i tried to say it again and then i started giggling again and he said "if i went up to my dad... yeah... ?" and i said "if you went up to your dad and said 'dad, how much do you love me? cuz i love you thiiiiiiiiiiiis much,' what would he do?" (i opened my arms wide as i said "thiiiiiiiiiis much"). sean laughed and said "he'd probably say 'what kind of drugs are you on right now sean?"

i hate when i can't tell if ppl are mad at me or if they're just not answering cuz they're really busy. and i dislike those moments when someone's flirting with u and it's someone u need to deal with for whatever reason so u can't just blow them off and u want to show them ur not interested but not be rude and its so hard to know how to do that.

chelsea's recently had some kind of relationship with a girl named niya. last i heard it was starting to go to shit. i don't know now though. their deal was that they were girlfriends but they were allowed to do guys but not other girls. ...sounds like a sweet setup. anyway but now that girl niya is moving to another town.

will i ever be a successful tattooist? will i ever become more successful and busy and popular? i would've thought that after i put that kickass sea turtle tattoo i did online, that i would've had new clientele left & right. apparently not though.

will i ever get to be with sean? if not him, can i be content or pretend to be content with the other sean? what about dopie? he's pretty adorable and cute and sexy. but sometimes i get the feeling we will never really be able to relate to each other the way i can relate to sean (c). i don't know though. i would prob give it a shot if he was willing. i don't know if he is or not though. he's been giving mixed signals. ...and who would be a better second choice, sean m or dopie? i dunno. andy? would i ever mess with him? i don't think i would. i don't think i would ever do that to sean. thats his friend.

i have to tag mark in that picture.

something just occurred to me, i have a couple pics from the party a couple nights ago. up until right now i was planning on putting them up on facebook. i dunno if i will now though. what if sean saw and felt weird that i was partying with his friends without him? ...could amanda and chris possibly feel like i was using them to get to sean?? i don't think they would think that. i dunno though. using them as in going to their party with the intention of dropping off shrooms with them for sean. hmmmm. is that rude or shitty in any way?

will i never be able to relate to dopie? never? and if i can't what's the reason? because we come from two different classes in society? but that can't be the reason can it? cuz i can relate to tori. speaking of her, why hasn't she talked to me all day?

now i feel shitty about getting amanda and chris all excited about shrooms that turned out to be ineffective.

from july 12

gaps in between periods last longer in the summer?

"i wanna meet the monkeys that made us." -peter

so today harry met a pig, i found out that "late night hess" means you order anything in the whole store through a window and pay for it through the window, and mom tried to tempt me into buying a rat at the pet store. i think maybe she was just doing that to make me decide if i'll ever have one again or not and therefore decide what i'm doing with vinny's old rat cage that's been sitting in the garage since last winter.

going into a dunkin donuts or seeing one usually reminds me of a black-eyed peas song.

i learned on "family guy" that the symbol "&" is called an "amperstand."

from july 18

i'm starting to suspect more and more that it really was just my tolerance or my meds not being totally worn off. i'm starting to suspect more and more that that's the real reason behind the shrooms not taking effect. we'll have to just wait and see though. now mike & tori have some, amanda & chris have some, and sean has some (or will have some). i'll hear reports sooner or later.

yeah i've been feeling kinda down and at first i thought it was pms but now it's lasting too long to just be pms so i think the effects of going off my meds were finally starting to kick in. so that means they didn't wear off until recently which means i took the shrooms before they wore off, which means i don't know how they affect people who aren't on meds. ooooooh the anticipation.