Anyway

It's never been this important to figure out who I am. I don't know that I know. She asked me "who are you in relation to who you were as a kid?" and I started to cry. And then I didn't stop for the rest of the hour. I turned to look at my childhood and as I turned, my should jammed hard into this flat white almost opaque sheet. It had a clammy sheen to it and as my shoulder made contact, it was actually dry, it gave a little and then threw me back away from it like a vertical white trampoline. I couldn't look back there to who I was. I guess I felt sad about that. Last night I dreamed that one of my classmates from my small high school class died. She was a great person, back in high school, and a bunch of us who knew her, even a girl I hadn't seen since sixth grade, got together to mourn and one of my classmates who I had always been intimidated by hugged me for a long time. It felt good to be hugged.


When I turned 27 I dedicated this year to growing up. I quit smoking and started exercising a little more. And then I made an appointment with a shrink. She's cool. We get a long well. I think if she were my age, we could have been friends in another life. We have a lot of the same interests. She's half French. Roots in a town about 20 minutes from where I lived in France for a few years. Which doesn't really matter, but feels like another coincidence connection that made me think I could trust her a little more. Studied literature in college; finds dreams interesting. She lets me do all the talking, which I guess is the point, to let me hash out my life in a way I can't with anyone else because it's probably more boring than anything. She asks a few questions here and there.


Anyway, so I'm trying to figure out who I am apart from anyone else, even my B and my sisters and my parents and his family and....its not so easy to pull yourself out of the present and look at you like you were looking in a mirror. But I guess for some reason its important to me right now to chase this, even if it is a chasing after the wind.

I'm finding a current under my fields of sadness that I didn't really know was there. I spend a lot of time with my lady feeling sad. But I think that's human. I think to love and to feel sadness are two of the most human emotions. When I love or I feel sad, those are the times when I can be quiet or jump for joy inside of this bigger feeling that encompasses more than just the people in my little world.

Anyway.

I dunno.

What is art?

Is art something that is pretty? inherently? or is it something to communicate with? I mean, I know these questions sound silly, but its kind of what I work with here. The artist I sell for is incredibly skilled. Technically. But would I call his work art? Only if art can be defined in terms of something that is obviously, and without any effort on the viewers part to find or understand, pretty. Otherwise, the art of the artist I work for says nothing except for, "I am an incredibly talented artist."

I keep tossing around my job, trying to find out where I can settle, how I can settle into the sales part of it and get selling. I don't want to limit myself to a box and say, "I'm a bad sales person." Or "I'm not good at sales." Because I know that's not true for everything. I'm just not a natural bullshitter. Never was. Like, say, my brother is. And I know I was conditioned, as a child, to appreciate and make decisions based on intellect and ideas. And those together make me a piss-poor CRL sales person. I don't like his work, I think it's overpriced, when I'm shopping I don't like to be bothered too much and so I treat people in the gallery that way, I don't like to push people, and I am not exceptionally experienced. I also am realizing about myself that I'd rather do things I enjoy...I guess we all would, right? Like I'd rather work on an hourly salary or even base + commission at a gallery that sells art work I appreciate, even if on the whole it's ugly or takes a lot of time/commitment to "get" evne if that means I have a much smaller potential client base.

I dunno. Can I just say it? I don't like to work as a sales person? I don't. Simple. I'll take that into consideration next time I look for a job. But you can't really get away from that either, can you? Well....fart.

What the-

I just ran upstairs next door to use the potty. I'm here at work and I usually have to lock up when I'm on my own (has absolutely no relevance to this story). So, anyway, I just ran upstairs next door to use the potty and on my way up the escalator I said hi to our cleaning guy (the building's). He's great. I've never met such a positive old guy who's career is cleaning toilets and escalator handles. So I always smile when I run into him even though's he's a bit of an odd bloke. He's from some SouthEast Asian place, I think. He almost has an aboriginal look to him. Old, like maybe in his 60s or a worn out 50s. He always says some words to me but I rarely understand them. A mix of immigrant English and whatever language from wherever he's from. But he's a good guy. So today I say hi as usual on my way up the escalator. When I turn to run into the toilets room, there's a cleaning cart out front and the door's propped open. Huh. Interesting, this means they must have hired somebody new to help out, because I've never seen anyone but him cleaning the toilets. so, I run back downstairs and smile again at my guy and work for another ten minutes. But believe me, I had to pee bad. So as soon as I could get rid of my clients, I ran upstairs again. Still, my guy was cleaning the escalators. I yell, "I'm trying again" to him as I run. When I get to the corner, there he is! What the. The same guy, standing inside the men's door. He says "Hello" as usual. And I respond in kind.

So, but his is a bit unsettling. That means my cleaning guy is actually my cleaning guys and that, in fact, they are twins!


Hahahahahaha. Yay.

Maybe

that treasure thing feeling was just the urge to talk again. I'm coming to visit wyd at the end of the month for a few days. I can't wait. I think its going to be really good to reconnect, even if its only for minutes in between her study sessions.

I just scattered yummy crumbs all over the floor behind our desk. Hahaha.

Change is in the air. I've set it there. A big blinking neon sign that keeps me awake at night and follows me like a storm cloud in a cartoon. People stop and stare of course, but I pretend like its not there. I should probably just laugh about it. Sometimes the sign sneaks close to me, until in a moment of white shock, it burns the back of my neck or the skin on the outside of my arm. Lucky for me it didn't catch my hair on fire yet.

The process of Change is grinding, at times, isn't it. And there are way too many mirrors in this hall. Mirrors that catch my image and hold it just where I don't necessarily want to see it, especially right in that moment. Curses.

But then you come out on the other side of Change and you've blossomed. At least you feel like you have. The buds have bloomed into a mess of lilac purples and smells you want to sink into for an hour. And that's you. And that's why. But who said the goal is not the goal?

Anyway, there are days too when I wonder if I should just unplug the sign and put it back in the closet and forget the whole deal. It doesn't necessarily feel right to be focused so much on that. On me. Sometimes it feels way forced, other times self-centered, and sometimes just prolonging the drama that doesn't have to be there in the first place. Sometimes I wonder if I'm just playing the baby and making excuses and if I just decide to do it and then do it and shut up, then I'll be myself, I'll know myself, and I def won't be wallowing.

Well, there's that.

It's been about a month

since I posted my last blog. Gooolllee. November already! Can you believe how fast time is flying. We're about to pass into the year 2008. I gragitated from high school in 1998. Where will you be 10 years from now? Remember that question? Yikes.

Today we have flash flood watches and high surf warnings. It's been dumping buckets since 1o oclock last night. Cozy for sleep, I tell you whatwow. But made for a damp trek to work and earlier departure than normal. Higher maintenance, wrapping everything in my backpack in plastic bags and my sandwich, and packing my work clothes and wearing other clothes. It's windy here too, so my little baby blue umbrella wanted to fly away from me a couple times but I didn't let it.

These days, maybe these last three days, I have this feeling, overrides most others, that special things, treasure-like things, are in constant motion floating all around me and that some of these things are falling on me, even as we speak, as they must and I get to keep them and experience them.

Something to do with acquiring something new and with open creativity. Maybe through creativity I will make something beautiful and cool tha tI get to keep. Kind of feels like having a fridge full of exciting yummy things like ham and butter and fresh baked warm bread and chocolate and milk and yogurt and sprouts and mayo and tuna and honey and peanut butter and buttered popcorn, etc.

And warm coffee too.