Do the Math

(night of December 9th)

I hab a code.  A code!  Idd by doze, a code.  Add by thwoat.*

Not doing too bad for having had only three broken hours of sleep over the course of last night, and kept waking in a cold sweat as the toxins seep out, and having been up for a long time now.  No point laying down if my nose won't clear.    Not desperate for sleep yet, doing okay...want to push it as long as I can or until my nasal passages clear long enough to be worth the attempt .   This is the aspect of colds i hate most, needing to sleep and not being able to.

What I want to do is create, suddenly I'm in the zone.  To draw, paint, build, sculpt.  Anything.  Now, when I'm sick??  Okay, sure, why not?  I need to do something if it  isn't sleeping.  My workspace is again not cleared for it but I can try.  Maybe I don't need a specific image, just some detail I like.     I've been pointed toward a home-made modeling putty that might finally be the right medium for sculpting details.  Unfortunately, the details would have to be fine, a little at a time when I'd rather be working in bulk.  Simple stuff, superglue and baby powder.  haven't got any to try yet, way shot on money.

I want to post, I want to post tonight if possible and I would like to add some image to justify it.  Anything, new or old.  Maybe I'll check out what little is on my flashdrives.  (Oops.  No, that was the flashdrive I lost.)  New would be better though that means waiting.  It's...oh, it's a mood thing.  the dream below was a mood thing.  We...need...to...express. At some point, everyone is on fire with a need to be heard about something.
  
Expression is very much on my mind lately, especially given the election.  If you don't know why then you have not been paying attention to the news.  It is a cherished American right and we are in serious danger of throwing it away mindlessly. 

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There's a  group on IMDb that picks short-lived Tv shows, watches an episode every Firday, and discusses them.  We recently finished Gerry and Sylvia Anderson's UFO, and I posted each of my own reviews to my other blog.  Might as well, it hasn't seen any other activity.  We are now voting  on  what to watch next.  Possibly Twin Peaks or Kolchak: The Night Stalker.

(Blog, what an odd word.  Sounds perfect to decribe how this cold makes me feel.  Blug.  Blogh.)
We voted a name for ourselves,  we are now The Sages of the Single Season (our motto: "We have episodes").**  I suggested The Idiot Box Savants, but it would probably offend someone. 
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Dana, grab a pen and something to write on.  Add 2129 to the address you lived at when we were in school.  Clatsop, that's me.  You can check a zip code map but I think it's the same yours was.  Whatever you've  chosen, at least don't leave me in the dark.  I've earned this, goddammit.

 Can you tell your story to yourself?  Because if you can, then  you can tell it to me.  Write it down, just for yourself.  Try it. 

Challenge me.  Tell me the one thing you've  least wanted me to know, even if its' just an imaginary exercize.  Find out if I react the way  you're afraid I will. You've lost me already anyway by your own choice, so what's to lose?  I'm not going to keep thinking well of you the way things are now. 
I keep  trying to challenge you and you never step up, so you challenge me instead.  See if it turns me away.
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One of the best dreams I ever had of Dana was many years ago (mid-'90s?), was one in which I actually got to be Dana for just a few minutes.  I cannot give a couple of prominenent details, but as briefly as I can: it starts with me (as myself) listening to a live radio talk show, late-night programming.  Dana is the in-studio guest, and she tells her audience of this guy she used to know.  Though she does not name me she knows that if I hear it I will know. She wants very much to think that I am listening out here somewhere.   I'm  an anecdote, and she fuels herself with the venom with which she relates it.  She wants to hurt me and by doing so,  she wants me to feel and comprehend her own hurt.   I do not recall where I am, maybe Northern California (that rings true), in a bar IIRC (not my kind of setting).

Dream then  segues to L.A. after the show.  I am Dana and I have no awareness of being anyone but Dana.  I have driven into the Hollywood hills, not apparently to my home but to some clinic where I will spend the night.  I am alone in a large room full of beds for patients, all empty.  I have the place to myself, and I deserve it.  I need this privacy.  The room is locked, no one will  disturb me.  I should sleep but can't, and sit in bed with my back to the headboard, restless, until the pentup energy makes me throw open the bay windows that overlook the city lights.  It's a hot summer night, now after one in the morning.   Music plays on the radio and I dance.  I want to tell the world, scream at the world, rage at the world to go fuck itself,  go to hell, burn, eat shit and die.  I (Dana) feel empowered by my outrage, which I have fucking earned.  I have a vague impression of Madonna from the song I dance to, as if I look to Madonna as a role model of personal power, a strong professional woman who rigorously controls her own identity and image and will let no one take that from her.

If that was just purely my own imagination, in a way I don't care...it was intimate and exhilerating!  
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(evening, December 10th) Finally slept, still stuffy, probably another long night ahead.  Eyes are sore and keep watering, they demand rest. 

*Oooooooh...and my cough, it's been a while since my cough was bad enough that I grey out, but that's started up again.  What a strange sensation, as the brain starts to come 'round again, dizzy, aware of sounds and images swirling around me but they're too choppy to make sense of...happened just now.

** It's not but it should be.

"Beware the Monkey"

That's what she said, the total stranger waiting for the bus.  Then she explained that she was referring to the Year of the Monkey in Chinese astrology.   It was meant to bring ill luck to everyone - bad, but supposedly not lasting and that something good is meant to come of it.  (Shaking head slowly) 2016 has been a ruinous year for almost everyone I have encountered.

I didn't tell her that my online aliases are all ape-based.

Mom was supposed to have some test results coming  that would lead to a decision on whether treatment would even be feasible.  I never hear back on that, so either no decision was made or (more likely) I have been kept in the dark about it.  Now mom seems to be getting some of the earlier symptoms back again.  Bracing for another season of panic and hopelessness.  I almost drowned once as a child, and this feels like a slow-motion version of that.

The election results promise that the bad has gone from personal to national if not global.  The Year of the Monkey does not end until January 28th.  Fuck.

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Maybe I should attempt line drawings, pen and ink.  Try for the 'adult coloring book' aesthetic that's the current fad?  It would be an interesting exercise if nothing else, get me far away from my usual thought process for drawing and focus on composition.  Theme?  Pages from  Stoker's Dracula, or positions of the Kama Sutra might be good.  I did a few sketches once of the actor Henry Irving as Dracula, seeing that Stoker had hoped Irving would play the role.  What else?  Kama Sutra would sell if I did a good job and found someone who could put them out, but from an artist's perspective seems kinda dry.  No variety to the sex itself, so that would be a challenge...strictly male-female couplings, one-on-one, no fetishes so I'd have to vary up everything else about the images.  Not into drawing men, either, but I'd want it to be inclusive.  Plenty of variety in people themselves.  So, the Kama Sutra, that angle sounds  a little dull but it would be a good marketing hook.  KS is more than just a catalog of positions, but that's the popular perception.  Have to admit I have not read it.

I almost (almost) wish I knew someone in video production.  Caught part of a movie review show on local cable access.  Kudos to them for actually making it happen, right?  Beyond that...hate to criticize them for the effort but it was dire.  So it made me want to try it myself.  On the other hand that might mean having to watch myself in order to edit...a prospect I loathe almost as much as having to hear my recorded voice played back.  Still, might be worth it to bring more attention to the movies of Shinya Tsukamoto.  I might not be up to reviewing Sion Sono as I don't have a bead on his work, but I do have a decent collection of his to work from.  Actually, I'm looking for anything I feel inspired to review and mostly coming up blank.   I  tried to write up Blue is the Warmest Color a year ago and it read more like a sociopolitical lecture than a review (I'm pro-, not anti-).  Jesseca has suggested Paul Naschy.    I have a few but they are all censored versions.  Most of the directors I've collected are mainstream, thus already well covered.  Argento is so well-read that I miss most of his influences  from Jung to classical artists of every field.   Ah, you can tell by my mood  that, um, I'm in a mood.   Anyway, Jesseca and I batted around a few ideas, if I could get Scott  to shoot me with his phone discussing movies and zip the files to her in New York, she could play around with them.  Full production, I'd love to do a Sinister Simian show for the Portland cable access market.  At least here the Sinister Cinema nod would be appreciated.  I wonder if I could manage a Planet of the Apes styled makeup job to turn me into a macaque like my avatar...that could be fun!

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The morning before Thanksgiving I dreamt of seeing Dana on TV, co-anchoring some half-hour news-magazine.  Her hair was straight, medium-short, and lighter.  Strange thing is I can't recall ever seeing her wear her hair this way in real life yet I've seen her look this way a number of times in my dreams.  Don't know why.  I reached out to caress her cheek but all I could feel was hard, cold glass.

(earlier today) Dreamt of Dana as a talk-show host interviewing her own alter ego.  She glanced at me watching the interview and seemed upset thinking that I preferred the exaggerated persona rather than her complete, authentic self.

Not quite two years since I reached out to her on FaceBook.  Though I want nothing more to do with FB, I keep hoping that my gmail will tell me she's sent a  friend request.   Someone looked at her page back then and told me that she was living with a guy. She could have children don't know.   I didn't want to know she was with someone , but okay... that wasn't unexpected.  She's probably with him still.  Well, I'm only asking her to open up a conversation with me as a friend so that's not a reason she can't talk  with me.

If I was ever going to fall out of love with her it would have happened a long time ago.  It's never going to stop hurting that I also lost her as a friend.  Funny thing is that if we did ever become a pair I don't know if we'd even be happy with each other.   No dream ever promised any such thing.  I saw little beyond us meeting again.  I held her in my arms once in real life (backstage after a show - she wouldn't have guessed what it meant to me).  I'd like that again.

Halloween

Usually my favorite holiday, not feeling it this year.  Saw Phantasm: Ravager, Shin Gojira (finallty, a new Godzilla flick from Toho, with English subs no less), and The Shining all in theater.  I also carved a couple of jack-o-lanterns for the father of a friend.  He's big on Shari Lewis' Lambchop.

That was fairly easy, and a small pumpkin.  I also did my standby, a skull, because I've had practice at it.  haven't done one in many years.  This was large and heavy, and relatively dry.  Some pumpkins crumble, I got lucky that this one held detail.  Now, the shape didn;t come off as well as I like - the sets of teeth too wide and not fully deep enough. On the other hand this has been the most structurally sound of them all, as I usually fully carve eaach tooth in the round and separate the jaws.  Because I remove all of the skin, these pumpkins shrink quickly.  That's also a problem for the bone structure between the eyes and nasal cavity - I never learn to make them smaller than I want them to be, allowing for shrinkage.  With a gap between upper and lower rows of teeth, the face can distort.  This year's pumpkin leaves both jaws one solid piece.  Took four hours, so either I rushed it or familarity with the shapes paid off...looking at it, I think it's a bit of both.  I'm mostly unhappy with the cheekbones which are way below my standard, though as stated I was trying to keep shrinkage in mind.  The original pics haven't gone through Gimp yet.

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I don't care to post about my family situation.  It's still unfolding on multiple fronts.

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I still miss Dana badly, and always will.  She now only rarely appears in dreams, often only represented by proxy or symbol, and I have no sense whether any are more than just dreams.  One stood out, from  around the time I mentioned the Cronenberg movie A History of Violence.  In it, she stood inches from me staring hard into my eyes like she was willing me to read her mind. Her right eye was closed in what looked like a permanent injury. On waking I realized that was an Odinic reference, the attainment of wisdom at great personal cost.

A few nights ago a dream-version of her said that she knew I wanted her to stay away from me.  I've never wanted that.

In all the dreams I've had of her from the beginning, there's been one thing she's wanted from me.  Not sure I know the single word with which to express it though...more than acceptance.  Tenderness.  Caring. 

I've always tried to offer her that. I still do though she never takes it.

nine hours later

Heard back enough to know that whatever happens will be short term.  mom has to decide on a surgery one doctor thinks she won't make it through or do nothing at all.   Family poison has started already with siblings getting nasty.  I need to escape this.

now

I have days.  Mom is being transferred to a hospital now after spending all night in the ER.  It has spread to other organs including her intestines.  They are deciding whether to perform emergency surgery.  Thy do not know if she will be coming home.  Jesseca may be able to get me to New York, but she hadn't planned on having to do it anytime soon.  I do not know what will happen.  My father in the care facility does not know that she is ill, but he's been having persistent nightmares suddenly that she is dying.

(no title)

I have finally learned what the doctor had to say.  If I am going to survive, I need to be out of here in a few months.  6 months to a year is the formal word. I need someone to help me be away by then.  It's not going to get easier.  There won't be any going to school here. 

closing

I am not being told the truth and my time is nearly up.  I will not have time to escape.  I was hoping to get a grant and some loans to go back to school and learn a trade, something I could use my talents or interests for but it cannot happen soon enough.  Jesseca has said that she will get me to New York and fix me up for a job somehow, even working for her but I don't see how she can. 

I love you, Dana.  I was a good friend to you.  I wish you'd known it.