4.18.2011

what are you going to say?


What.are.you.going.to.say?

What would they say, if they had to see my blood staining my shirts every day, drip drip drop,
if the truth about my father came out, one, two, fourteen days in bed, if I became a stench overpowering everyone? My body decomposing into a neat collection of bones, who needs food when you have cigarettes?
what if they knew that the way my toes are always waiting to run?
I will cut out my sexual organs and shave my head, or buy a chastity belt and sow up my mouth.
what if they knew about all the men I have killed, all the women I have raped?
If I was unclean, unsexed, lazy, and a drunk.
What would they say if I became a vampire, and I died in the sea, burned to ashes mixed with salt water by the sun? When they find out that I never learned anything, that Metz was right and no one knows de Kooning or Glenn Gould but everyone knows Snookie?
Would they be disappointed if all I did was watch TV and masturbate and never think another thing ever, until I get bored and knock back that bottle of Ambien I have in my drawer? When the crystal music finally became too loud and my nose dove into the snow? Aiming for the doe deer, wrapping christmas lights around my neck, swing there, swing back.
Would they try to stop me, would they be horrified? Would their faces melt because I hate them so much? What are you going to say when I do it?
Would you even care, fag? What are you going to do when you realize this is pasto pasta pastiche?

I can't even tell what my body is doing.



Hey, I am sorry I don't write more often. I have been doing everything and nothing. I go through phases of working like a maniac, to dissociating with everything, drinking into a stupor and napping for the better part of the day. I have so much to say, and so little time. Well, little energy. I am graduating too soon, I don't want to, and I don't want to talk about it right now. Me and Jwife have been having pretty intense conversations about it all. I don't know what anything means, I don't know what I am going to do when I don't have her or anybody else around. My soul is about to shatter into a thousand parts, I don't necessarily want to be around when that happens. 









Lately I have been feeling more worthless than usual. Well, more like I didn't take advantage of my school at all. I spent three years here and I have little to show for it. No thesis, no major paper, no extracurriculars. Just lots of pictures of drunken nights and a couple of new scars. Oh well. 









I go between having grand plans about the future, being optimistic, to having panic attacks at lunch, fueled by coffee, mate, or other drugs. 


Half Moon Glasses



But, I have been doing superficial things, like downloading all the Crystal Castles albums and all the dubstep Skins songs. I am obsessed with Crystal Castles now. I don't know what took me so long, but it's great music to study, read, clean, and even fuck. (Also Alice Glass is hot)

Crystal Castles - Doe Deer (right click to download)


I also started watching Angel again. It's awesome. I have watched awesome movies lately:

32 Short Films about Glenn Gould

Near Dark (do not watch if you can't handle gore)



Yesterday I watched The Virgin Spring AND read a Henning Mankel book. More reaffirmation of how incredibly cool the swedes are. I really really need to move to Sweden. I know this girl who got into grad school there. I want to try for next year. Hopefully it'll be a thing. Can you imagine, Stockholm? I wonder if there's gay people there. 

I don't really care as long as Max Von Sydow is there

Ok, I'm going to go read about cultural studies in film theory. Minorities making movies, who woulda thought?



<3

4.05.2011

That one time I met Fernando Pessoa


I was in Paris when I saw Fernando Pessoa. It happened in a bar at Belleville, at Rue du Faubourg du Temple, where I was killing time and waiting for a Alba. It seemed strange, because Pessoa never left Lisbon. When I went up and asked for a light, he seemed almost frightened. I asked his name, Ricardo Reis, he said. Of course, I thought. So, my name turned out to be Manuela Bonifacino, and I'm from Italy. Neither of us were fooled, but our delusions were bordering on maniacal.
He was a doctor and I was a patient. I started talking without waiting for answers, but secretly willing them. He drank the cheapest wine, his sad grey outfit screamed everything but worldly. I drank jack on the rocks, which is not the way of italian ladies. I talked loudly and complained about the weather and the men whispering cat calls in the 13th arrondissement. The bartender, a matronly-looking woman eyed us and complimented us free drinks from time to time. The wood counter was discolored from too many years of wiping, but it still looked greasy.
He interjected and told me that my incessant complaining about the italian government was tiresome, and that I should learn to mind my manners. He called me young and irreverent, his voice full of disdain, as if about to hurl. As I talked, he got more and more agitated, and interrupted me more often, until the only voice heard was his. Ricardo, the monarchist, complained about my outfit and my hairstyle. He wondered what kind of education they were imparting upon me, and I am pretty sure he called me stupid, although I didn't understand most of his insults. After a while, he asked me what I was doing.
“Waiting for Alba”, I said. He must have noticed something in my voice. I had changed, of course. I was no longer Manuela, because I had made her up to match his Ricardo. I really was waiting for Alba, but I didn't mind the weather or the wait.
“Who's Alba?” His eyebrows unfurrowed and his mustache didn't seem so abrasive anymore.
“She's a person I want to be in love with.” I said. I peaked his interest, the possibility of a homosexual relationship? A masculinized woman?
“Love is too much work” he declared, a bit too quick.
“True, but what else is there but waiting to die otherwise?” I prodded, half-believing what I was saying.
He didn't bite, he lowered his head. I twisted my mouth and felt guilty for a moment, but I didn't say anything.
The bartender saved us, and she asked: “Monsieur, tell us about the woods at home”. He was a patron, apparently.
He, Ricardo, Alvaro, or Fernando, started to tell a story about walking in the woods. Those woods looked like the ones near the beach in Uruguay, like the Bois de Boulogne, like the ones behind the Deerfield river. It wasn't a forest he had ever seen, but trees are trees are trees everywhere. Dark and green. His soul was in shards, he lost track of who he was walking next to in those woods. He talked about men and gods, about mystery and dreams, and his gods were mine, and his voice, soft and feminine, sounded eerily familiar. The way he smoked cigarette after cigarette, the way his drink moistened his mustache every time his arm raised to pour some more wine into his mouth. I had seen this movie before.
His words had been living with me for a while before he said them out loud. Once he said them, I already knew their meaning. My ears made those words real. I was sure I was listening to myself. I was sure no one else could hear them. But I mostly peered into his little black eyes, introspect. Will he ever step out of there? Is there an actual person inside of there or just a mirror, dark shiny surfaces?
Alba came in through the door and smiled. Her eyes are blue and clear. Her skin is wet from the rain.
“How are you?” she asked in broken English, but she didn't really want to know. I didn't want to tell her.
As she demanded a screwdriver (“the shittiest vodka, please”) I turned to the mirror, checking my hair.
“Look, it was nice to talk about semiology with you” I told him, “but I always thought you were kind of an asshole”. He seemed hurt. “It's okay, I'm an asshole too”.
He smiled, he knew.
“Goodbye Fernando Pessoa”, I said wrapping my coat around Alba.
“See you later, Laura”.



4.03.2011

coffee-induced panic attacks

I just finished watching this kind-of-docu film about Rock Hudson. It is called Rock Hudson's Home Movies and it is a great film. Sad. Rock Hudson, if you don't already know, was the biggest shit on the Hollywood block in the 1950s and 60s, big, masculine, more than 2 meters tall, dark, handsome. Oh, and also gay as a unicorn. Getting pounded by another unicorn. 


Afternoon Delight


Rock was in the closet all his life, obviously, because no one could ever be out in the 50s, because he was famous... he was motherfucking Rock Hudson. Because fate is a bitch and has a twisted sense of irony, Rock died of AIDS-related complication in 1985, he was a little over 60 years old when he died. (Later, I can write a little rant about how much I HATE THE MOTHERFUCKING AIDS BITCH CUNT)


The movie in question (which is on Netflix Instant Play) treats his life with humor but also decency. The movie understands that the clips they are showing are funny, but the fact that Rock was made to say these lines (lines dripping with implicit homoerotic content) is fucking indecent and mean. Directors and writers casted him in movies in which the recit would question Rock's character's sexuality. Several times, he played a straight man playing a gay man to get the girl. But he was gay to begin with. Ironic? Fucking mean? In the industry, everyone knew he was gay and still gave him these "innocent" lines to perform. They still made him get married and do a different kind of performance. Being a 'bachelor' turns suspicious after you turn 32, Rock


Knowing little grin.

And then, and then and now I think about all the actors that we know and love now, and how many of them are still made to be in the closet. I refuse to admit that in Hollywood, there is not ONE A List actor who is gay. Bulllllshit. But they are married, or otherwise don't say anything about their sexuality. Kevin Spacey is one of those, if you consider him A List. It makes me so fucking upset! Really, guys? Do you think you couldn't land a straight role if people knew for certain that you're gay. I mean, probably, yes, but that's fucked up. I bet there's Rock Hudsons out there, suffering. It blows. 

Got that right, Gervais. (also, fun fact, when google image searching "fuck hollywood", I saw a lot of dongs and vajayjays)


I mean there's rumors about John Travolta and Tom Cruise and, while I believe them, and I am frustrated that they won't come out, I understand. I'm really sad about living in a world where this happens. 

who are you kidding, my man?


In other news, this week was weird: I had two panic attacks, probably caused by drinking too much coffee, but it freaked me out. I hadn't had full on panic attacks for many years, and now they start up again. It obviously has to do with me leaving the country and my friends and everyone I know. And it's not like I'm going somewhere horrible, Jesus. Why do I feel this way then? My problem is that I get too attached to people and then I have to leave. I guess it's good, makes me a good friend, but it hurts so much. No one else seems to be getting this upset about leaving or... well, actually, leaving me. Behind. That is what I feel. Irrational? Probsies! 



But at least I watched awesome movies and TV (Born in Flames, The Hunger, Working Girls, Angel, A Bit of Fry and Laurie) and read awesome books (American Vampire, Interview with a Vampire) and articles (some Pessoa bits [of which I will write more in depth laterz], Laura Mulvey's various essays, and much on queer film theory, which was HILARIOUS because the scholar writing these [mostly gay themselves] would describe themselves as midle-class white queens with ridiculous tastes in movies). 

Thank god Stephen is out and proud. 


Oh and we also watched The Mummy and painted our nails Friday night instead of going out. 



They fucking SPARKLE!



<3