Friday, November 30, 2001
saw REMY ZERO in concert again last night. (3 times so far, all this year). lead singer said the song Perfect Memory is about his dad who died. since my dad died too, i cried during the song. i wished i could have had a corner to really cry but my wool scarf was just as good. the main act was Pete Yorn. i left after 4 songs. he was good but i wasn't thrilled. he looks like a mix between alice cooper, lead of black crowes and the drummer on the Muppet show. i expected him to be cute. he was not. he was also somehow grouchy. the fans loved him though. going crazy, bobbing heads, mouthing words. smoking pot. drinking beer. -- now i've got a headache. 5.20 pm on a friday afternoon. i'm ready for the weekend. i hope i don't have to come into the office. i'm going to try and catch this conference: Art and Optics

Perfect Memory - Remy Zero

remember how they always seem to know
we had the forest in our eyes
but the earth was in our clothes
and they thought we'd fall
not at all

so look back on those treasured days
we were young in a world that was so tired
though it's not what we wanted before
even the saints had to crawl from the floor

summer was when the money was gone, you'd sing
all your little songs that meant everything to me
and i'll remember you
and the things that we use to do
and the things we use to say
i'll remember you that way

remember how they tried to hold you down
and we climbed those towers and looked out upon our town
and everything you hoped would last
just always becomes the past
it hurts but...

summer was when the money was gone
you'd sing
all your little songs that meant everything to me
and i'll remember you
and the things that we use to do
and the things we use to say
i'll remember you always

but then how this world sliped thru my fingers
even the sun seems tired
i still care
as they lowered you down
my heart just jaded
in that moment the earth made no sound
but you were there
help me lift my pain into the air

i'll remember you
and the things that we used to do
and that things that we used to say
if it don't hurt you it won't hurt me
if it don't hurt me it won't hurt you
if it don't hurt you it won't hurt me i know
5:28 PM

George Harrison "the quiet Beatle" was my favorite. sad.
11:58 AM

Thursday, November 29, 2001
HARRY POTTER (the movie) is terrible. I was so very very BORED out of my mind! i enjoyed the books. to be fair, I think the actors are all very good. loved Hermione. Harry is good. Ron is great. BUT my god. how slow can you get? I almost walked out. AND what made me really really ANGRY is how much emphasis is placed on competition. it's an aspect of the book I didn't like. in the movie Winning Rah Rah Rah was more apparent. why would grown teachers who are wizards nonetheless, care about a stupid Quiddich match? and why should all the different houses COMPETE with each other for an end of the year cup? who cares who comes out on top? all houses should work together. why would you encourage competition? it was a slow movie but the actors seemed hurried. there was no character development besides the kids. maybe all the grown-up actors hated the project. hated the book. acted for the money. besides the small cameo by John Hurt, I didn't like any of the adults. well... Professor Snape was intriguing. The chocolate frog was one of my favorite parts.
11:53 AM

Wednesday, November 28, 2001
"A kiss is a lovely trick designed by nature to stop speech when words become superfluous." - Ingrid Bergman
11:39 AM

Tuesday, November 27, 2001
i caught a clip on 60 Minutes about Thomas Kinkade. The 60 Minutes interview described him as "Americaís most popular artist, whose business has grown from reproductions on canvas of his original oil paintings to a whole line of merchandise. Kinkadeís company says $600 million worth of retail products bearing his images were sold last year, including everything from high-end canvas reproductions to table-top collectibles to calendars."

i find his work TACKY. and the fact he's using the ideas of love and peace to sell millions and millions of dollar's worth of "art" is disgusting to me. granted, if people buying his paintings put them on top of their fireplace and find solace in them, then those people are happier and nicer because of the "art". who am i to judge? yet i still feel all the kinkade collectors are missing the point. how can you live in a world of beauty, peace and hope if you're so tied to materialism? BUYING anything to "lead a simpler, richer, more satisfying life" is WRONG. isn't peace within us? isn't the point to detach from material posessions and find joy in a leaf on the ground? and is kinkade doing anything with the money he's making, besides hoarding it for himself?
10:46 PM

i saw Moulin Rouge last night. i started crying during the very first song and continued for the rest of the movie. it is very good. sad. lovely execution. "the greatest thing you'll ever learn is how to love and be loved in return" (Nature Boy lyrics).
3:04 PM

Saturday, November 24, 2001
IDENTITY

daughter
good student
hard-worker
good friend
girlfriend
30
5'5"
ca. 126 lb.
34B
09.11.1971
escaped romania
dad died
mom famous actress
dog TobyOne
very long last name

WHO DOES THAT MAKE ME?
1:55 AM

Monday, November 19, 2001
e x h a u s t e d
12:02 PM

Friday, November 16, 2001
somehow it's almost 1 AM. i had a little coffee around 3 PM. i have to wake up early too. and while i'm exhausted, i'm not tired. blah blah blah. who cares? who really cares about my sleeping habits? will i care 5 years from now? mom's watching a Discovery show on ghosts. people trying to record ghosts moving and speaking, with electronic equipment. i'm very skeptical. not that ghosts exist, but that you can measure them as if they're a Calvin Klein suit. maybe i'll have the leftover veggie burger. nothing like a late late night snack to give me odd dreams.
12:49 AM

Thursday, November 15, 2001
Birds developed wings to fly. Fish have scales for swimming. Do all business people manipulate in order to feel they are "successful"?
5:43 PM

Wednesday, November 14, 2001
The feelings I don't have, I don't have.
The feelings I don't have, I won't say I have.
The feelings you say you have, you don't have.
The feelings you would like us both to have, we neither of us have.

The feelings people ought to have, they never have.
If people say they've got feelings, you may be pretty sure they haven't got them.

So if you want either of us to feel anything at all
you'd better abandon all idea of feelings altogether.

-- D.H. Lawrence --
12:12 AM

Monday, November 12, 2001
last night i went down there. had dinner at a friends' apt. with a front row center view to the world trade ruins. at night the site is lit up with flood lights... a theater set. except it's not a play. looking at the remainder of the towers i saw the negative space. the empty space. i felt and saw what was gone. like a black hole, the space is missing. gone. charged but empty. death. violent. the ruins themselves are... to say elegant and beautiful is sacriledge... they are alive. they have transcended being buildings - structures. they are dead. and by being dead they have life. it is heartbreaking to see. it's so extreme i did not let myself feel. if i gave in i would cry and cry and cry and then the whole night would have been about me crying and not about having dinner with my girlfriend who lives there. -- a tv show was tracing the history of the towers. turns out that site used to be a native american cemetery. then a cemetery for slaves. now it has become a third kind of graveyard. photographs can't portray the reality of the disaster. reality...
7:20 PM

Friday, November 09, 2001
"Finally the time came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to bloom." - Anais Nin
6:46 PM

Thursday, November 08, 2001
hmmmmm... what should i write? there is a discrepancy between what i think and what those around me consider "reality". i am still repeating patterns i started 5 years ago. 10 years ago. 30 years ago. i feel tired. not sleepy, just tired.
2:37 PM

Tuesday, November 06, 2001
i just talked to andie. and then aaron. they're two friends i feel so GOOD seeing. spending time with. talking with. i was just thinking how i hadn't spoken with andie in a long time. and then she called. that happened to me 3 times today. or was it 4? i called mom on her cell just as she was about to call me. then i sent vero email 5 minutes before she called. now andie. sigh. i dreamt i was walking in a field, gathering things - i noticed hundreds skinned dead tiger furs with the heads all bloody - hundreds of them stacked up in rows. the dream book says dreaming of tigers means unknown enemies. but killing a tiger means financial gain. -- how much money is "enough"?
6:13 PM

"Freaks was a thing I photographed a lot. It was one of the first things I photographed and it had a terrific kind of excitement for me. I just used to adore them. I still do adore some of them. I don't quite mean they're my best friends but they made me feel a mixture of shame and awe. There's a quality of legend about freaks. Lke a person in a fairy tale who stops you and demands that you answer a riddle. Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatifc experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats." - Diane Arbus
2:40 PM

Monday, November 05, 2001
session with Grahm: after our beginning talk he said if i let others take advantage of me i am comitting a crime against my Self. (i told him of my business situation). i have a responsability to myself. on the table, i thought of me as dad's daughter. this is my current identity. also had the flash "i don't like myself". but at the end i felt good. i still feel Good. not alone. calmer. desperation is easily confused with being calm. giving up vs. being peaceful. and feeling at peace can be and i think should be very empowering.
9:47 PM

...and it's OK. i go thru grey-moth moods all the time. maybe some coffee will help, if there's any left in the fridge. what's left. what is left? and how should i go about trying to find out where i'm supposed to vote tomorrow?
12:02 PM

this site has to change. i've been thinking of a new homepage for a long time. NOTHING. besides having to put up an online portfolio, i need a new direction. something more exciting than a photo and 6 links. the diary will stay. the image at the top will stay. maybe i'll make it vertical instead. change the format. change my mode of thinking. -- watched Hamlet (2000). it's very good. fast-forwarded a few scenes including the very end which is too sad. -- yesterday had a migraine except i refuse to call it a migraine. i'll say it was a horrible headache which lasted about 6-8 hours. was in bed for 4 of them. -- i've decided to do situps, pushups, and sun salutations everyday (yoga). i'm letting myself slip. i feel fat and old.
12:04 AM

Friday, November 02, 2001
[written on a plane back to NYC on sept. 29, 1996]
"A man fat women write sonnets about and thin girls get cavities from. You hold all songs within you and know when to pluck them out for the occasion. Sounds of leaves, of rats chewing, of ice cracking, of splinter entering skin, of petals falling, of glass breaking, cars kissing, people tripping on trash, of hands claping, of weed burning and Nine Inch Nails, of Beethoven and Patsy Cline and Three Dog Night and Adriano Celentano, but most of all, you hold the sound of a tree falling in an empty forest. -- You are mostly wolf. Steel grey thoughts pin down your rainbow of affections. You deliberate if you should bite or lick the hands that feed you. So what if i understand the way you make me feel? That still leaves a century of words between us. Thoughts you serve others with honey you give me raw. And i wonder why i remember you. a Billy Budd, Sailor, a Great Gatsby, a naked man. -- The lamb in you drowned out your orchestra of colors and i admit I didn't hear the yellow in your green. But you are a teacher and my four eyes slip comfortably into yours. Your eyes. I could plant an entire forest in them. -- I know what i want from you. But i'm not going to tell you. Because you shouldn't care. And you shouldn't ask. -- There are no fences or collars in my world. It's based on trust. So can i trust you to know if there is anything you want from me? Don't be shy to ask, baby blue. Don't be concerned about bluntness, my gentle man, and try to be - someone else."

God. I look back and read things i wrote years ago. and i remember FEELING. or thinking. being sad. being excited. writing and liking what thoughts came out. as if i was in these relationships just to write - no other reason. i was so young back then. i wasted so much Time. i spent hours making up scenarios. maybe this is why I DON'T TRUST WORDS. i know how fickle mine have been. what i wrote above... it was more about myself than alex. i never shared it with him. or maybe i did. i can't remember. and it doesn't matter. although, maybe if i had been smart enough to walk away from him sooner, i wouldn't be as cynical now. -- stevenm brought me these beautiful indigo/dark purple/aqua blue small orchids (the kind that grow along the stem). they're beautiful. i could look at them for hours. i don't care that they're probably dyed. they're iridescent. -- i cannot wait till yoga class tonight. 3 hours to go.
2:53 PM

first hang-over in months. it's not so bad. yesterday was the Day of the Dead. seems nice that i had a lot of red wine. -- new york radio stations are HORRIBLE.
11:14 AM

Thursday, November 01, 2001
i am very dizzy today. i wonder if the air quality is more rotten than usual. my new mental image of manhattan has a toxic green overlay. it's not pretty. i don't feel safe. this is retarded since any one of us can have something terrible happen at any moment. it doesn't have to be due to insane terrorists. it can be anything. the false sense of security is what i miss.
2:55 PM