Life is one big circle of thanks and intertextuality:
From Lisa Ray, who found it in an obscure book in Goa:
"I began to see how my fascination with the drama of my emotional life and my too great faith in the powers of my intellect had withered my spirit. You have become imprisoned in the knowledge you acquired. Now you must let it go for another knowledge to come in."
Narc. What words. Truth drips from them, sucked and almost dry.
From Shekhar Kapoor, born of his own mind and mouth:
"I think I was around 24 [years old] when I realized I had wanted to give up something in life. And what I had to give up was to be in a structured career because then I was following predetermined path set by other people's ideas and insecurities. And I wanted to discover for myself what life was about. To me life was much more about experiencing and building."
Finally acknowledging the yearning glowing in the pit of my stomach, only fuelled by sitting next to a row of extremely The yearning for hearing something familiar and grounding, anchor-force that might root me to something. Give me a history, a history of resistance, a history of knowledge.
How is it nostalgia if there's nothing to reminisce about? How do you move forward with nothing to look back upon? That's the best kind of moving forward.
In other news...I'm trying hard not to feel anything but cool, reasonable and educated disgust on the Israeli attack on a flotilla delivering goods to Gaza but somehow vindication at the consequences "commandos" and the three-year blockade of Gaza must face is setting in. Back to the books before it gains life.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Malcontent.
The sun has finally come out in Toronto. And I don't mean the fake sun -- where it's -20 outside and whipping wind but it's deceptively beautiful or the snow is so bright it blinds you kind of sun -- no, I mean real honest-to-goodness spring/summer sun. Warm and glowing and receptive, welcoming and uplifting, almost motherly as it watches over you, watches you frolick and bask kind of sun.
I do love winter...I love the way everything gets very quiet. There's no other way to describe it but I've always noticed as october turns into november, once all the leaves are gone, once the air starts to shimmer with the promise of snow, everything gets really - silent. As I walk from home to the bust stop, I hear solitary crows or ravens calling to each other forlornly and my heels echo in the vast corridors of residential, suburban, cookie cutter houses with neatly-trimmed front lawns and three mercedes' in the drive, just for the heck of it.
I really fucking hate markham. It is a hole of no end, a deep abyss where everything goes to die -- or settle and have 2.5 kids on 2.5 acres with 2.5 nannies and 2.5 cars with 2.5 pets. It's not only isolation, it's not only the ridiculous smell of farms mixed with urbanization and domesticity, no, it's the way Markham kills absolutely any creative spirit with the posh prevalence of money. Richmond Hill and Thornhill are worse still. No, it's not that I don't appreciate living in an area where the crime rate is virtually zero and the only problem we have is grow-ops but -- why the manicured-ness? Why does every island traffic divider have to have flowers? What is so "quaint" and "charming" about Main Street anyway? Why is First Markham Place and blood silvercity at the richmond hill BUST STOP and Ten Ren/go for tea/east beaver creek the only ACTUAL place to hang out? And why, why, why, in the name of sweet beavers is it that the only thing you can do in markham is shop -- the alternative to which is eat?
My hatred, this sour taste on my tongue that screws up my face almost unrecognizably, extends (or is slowly extending) to Toronto. Sharp intake of breath! I know! Blasphemous! I know! And then...actually, the country. Egads, she is off her rocker, this is treason! But it's true. Walking down Queen Street last night only made me realize this even more. Toronto's downtown is ridiculously small. But even small areas can have hubbub, excitement. Seems nothing has changed though (besides 187287878.3487 condos going up) Bay St. is still Bay St. Bloor is still bloody Bloor and The World's Biggest Bookstore is still another name for Heather Reisman's indie-bookstore eating mega-chain. If it sounds like I'm crying for some authenticity, I'm not. There are plenty of pretty little boutiques, lovely starter businesses, plenty of competition, vintage clothing stores, comic book emporiums and record stores.
But there's no feeling. Crossing the street at the downtown core (whatever your core is -- Harbourfront, Union, Queen's Quay, Bloor, UofTville) at its most busiest time of day doesn't give you this feeling of metropolitan insomnia, big-city inspiration. Mostly, you marvel at the architecture or the pretty day or the funny people but your heart doesn't linger on the city. I find that sad. And it's like that with the whole damn country. Everything is burgeoning, everything is underdeveloped. It's small-scale and that's fine. I guess some people are content with that, drawn to that. Some people love Montreal's art-fashion-club scene.
Maybe I'm expecting too much, comparing it with cities in my head like London and New York, Bombay and Dubai. Maybe the time-factor is too hard to overcome just right now -- these places have been around forever (with the exception of dubai, lol). Or maybe the charm of Toronto, given it's size is just more subjective -- requires a different eye. Or maybe it takes a different kind of person to love it. And those are all fine. Maybe I've been here so long, I need a fresh pair of eyes to like it again. But I didnt fall in love with it instantaneously so tepid, lukewarm like is the only return I can hope for. Bearing that in mind, I think that the time has come -- or is soon approaching -- where malcontent for Markham, for Toronto and overwhelming love for...the world, really, is going to catapult me to action.
For now, I must make do with the promise of summer and endless evenings, crepes (yum), pandas in lattes (yumm-ier), beaches, and reading.
I do love winter...I love the way everything gets very quiet. There's no other way to describe it but I've always noticed as october turns into november, once all the leaves are gone, once the air starts to shimmer with the promise of snow, everything gets really - silent. As I walk from home to the bust stop, I hear solitary crows or ravens calling to each other forlornly and my heels echo in the vast corridors of residential, suburban, cookie cutter houses with neatly-trimmed front lawns and three mercedes' in the drive, just for the heck of it.
I really fucking hate markham. It is a hole of no end, a deep abyss where everything goes to die -- or settle and have 2.5 kids on 2.5 acres with 2.5 nannies and 2.5 cars with 2.5 pets. It's not only isolation, it's not only the ridiculous smell of farms mixed with urbanization and domesticity, no, it's the way Markham kills absolutely any creative spirit with the posh prevalence of money. Richmond Hill and Thornhill are worse still. No, it's not that I don't appreciate living in an area where the crime rate is virtually zero and the only problem we have is grow-ops but -- why the manicured-ness? Why does every island traffic divider have to have flowers? What is so "quaint" and "charming" about Main Street anyway? Why is First Markham Place and blood silvercity at the richmond hill BUST STOP and Ten Ren/go for tea/east beaver creek the only ACTUAL place to hang out? And why, why, why, in the name of sweet beavers is it that the only thing you can do in markham is shop -- the alternative to which is eat?
My hatred, this sour taste on my tongue that screws up my face almost unrecognizably, extends (or is slowly extending) to Toronto. Sharp intake of breath! I know! Blasphemous! I know! And then...actually, the country. Egads, she is off her rocker, this is treason! But it's true. Walking down Queen Street last night only made me realize this even more. Toronto's downtown is ridiculously small. But even small areas can have hubbub, excitement. Seems nothing has changed though (besides 187287878.3487 condos going up) Bay St. is still Bay St. Bloor is still bloody Bloor and The World's Biggest Bookstore is still another name for Heather Reisman's indie-bookstore eating mega-chain. If it sounds like I'm crying for some authenticity, I'm not. There are plenty of pretty little boutiques, lovely starter businesses, plenty of competition, vintage clothing stores, comic book emporiums and record stores.
But there's no feeling. Crossing the street at the downtown core (whatever your core is -- Harbourfront, Union, Queen's Quay, Bloor, UofTville) at its most busiest time of day doesn't give you this feeling of metropolitan insomnia, big-city inspiration. Mostly, you marvel at the architecture or the pretty day or the funny people but your heart doesn't linger on the city. I find that sad. And it's like that with the whole damn country. Everything is burgeoning, everything is underdeveloped. It's small-scale and that's fine. I guess some people are content with that, drawn to that. Some people love Montreal's art-fashion-club scene.
Maybe I'm expecting too much, comparing it with cities in my head like London and New York, Bombay and Dubai. Maybe the time-factor is too hard to overcome just right now -- these places have been around forever (with the exception of dubai, lol). Or maybe the charm of Toronto, given it's size is just more subjective -- requires a different eye. Or maybe it takes a different kind of person to love it. And those are all fine. Maybe I've been here so long, I need a fresh pair of eyes to like it again. But I didnt fall in love with it instantaneously so tepid, lukewarm like is the only return I can hope for. Bearing that in mind, I think that the time has come -- or is soon approaching -- where malcontent for Markham, for Toronto and overwhelming love for...the world, really, is going to catapult me to action.
For now, I must make do with the promise of summer and endless evenings, crepes (yum), pandas in lattes (yumm-ier), beaches, and reading.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Heartbreak Warfare
On the eve of a huge exam and essay, all I can think about is you. Is it selfish of me to want to run into you? To place myself in situations so I can finally purge myself of every horrible and singularly lovely thought I've ever had about you? Have us stuck in a quiet piano room in Long & McQuade and hash it out until someone's crying or laughing or they shut the lights and tell us to lock up when the bloodshed is done?
That is Heartbreak Warfare.
I keep asking myself, why now. Why at this moment? Why mention it to me, why did she tell me that you had just broken up? I could have just as easily not known. I've tried again and again...many times, tried to think or go over events in my mind. Write you letters so I can finally be cleansed of any notion of you. So I can stop walking past the Globe and the Civic Centre without thinking of you. So that Militia Trail means nothing to me.
It's become a horrible game - a game of skirting around each other and making sure no one steps in, no one intrudes, reminds each other of their presence. They say maybe it was her - she changed you. Me, I don't think so. It wasn't all her; it was you too. How do I keep coherent thoughts on a steady flow when everything is convoluted? You are the one thing that was so multi-faceted, the one thing I just cannot seem to rationalize and work out - and that unnerves me. It has never happened to me before, that I am now unable to say your name outloud without a deep flush - a flush of anger and heat unexplained - rise up my face.
Where do I find the words from, how do I separate the emotions so that, even armed with the good word and its power, I can write it out? I want to yell at you and smack you really good and hard and at the same time, I just want to hug you - tired. I am tired of running about, running away. People are afraid of thunder and darkness, I'm afraid of stasis. But I'd like to stand still here with you.
The problem is that you're still on the defensive. Or maybe you're not. And I'm torn. Torn because I want so badly to just - fucking get rid of this horrid feeling of you, this memory; I want it to remain a memory, I want to step out of purgatory and either pass on or return back to life. It sounds dramatic but there is no more appropriate metaphor for someone who is so different now, it almost feels like He's dead.
What are you fighting for? Why are you fighting? What did I do? It was so abrupt...you gave me no explanation. And if I hadn't stood out in that hallway, outside of your apartment, tears in my eyes, asking why why why you would have said nothing. Is that really the kind of coward you are?
That is Heartbreak Warfare.
I catch myself thinking of you and then ruthlessly quash down any emotion that surges at the mere mention of your name. Move on. I tell myself, move on. I was never the girl who was attached, I was always the independent. But I can't stop myself from dreaming up ways to tell you about the pain - to hope for the chance to work this out or die trying. How far have we fallen? We're far away from where we first were...
I want to take hold of you and shake you back awake. I want to tell you to put your weapon down. I don't want to admit defeat - I want you to want to work this out. I want you to want this back. Make this landscape stand still, make everything go quiet. Suspend time and space. Put away emotions and memories. Just tell me how it is, how you feel, what you're like. Don't be passive, call out. This is no one's win, K. This is everyone's loss - this is my loss. There are casualties, there are. And no one wins.
That, too, is Heartbreak Warfare.
I'm afraid that someday life will take us so far - time and space will be more than temporal, they will be solid, physical. Even more so than today. And, at that point, it will be too late. I heard you loud and clear when I said goodbye, but don't you understand?! You can't just fucking bury the past and not look it in the face. You move on, yes, but not by stepping on remains. You always honour the dead. You never deface. Don't you know observation of those niceties aren't just niceties? Those are necessary.
And with this distance separating us, we'll never be able to work it out. We'll regret, always, not returning for last words, not coming back to hash it out. You might someday find the words to say what I know you feel and I might find a way to express my love and it will have been too late - life may separate us.
Why am I saying this? What good is this? Sometimes, there needn't be a purpose, just a trigger. Mine is rather funny: two summers ago was the last time I spoke to you over the phone. Do you remember what I was calling for? The John Mayer concert that we were supposed to go to together. And now, two years down the lane, everything is so fucking different. We aren't even speaking. You hate me and I hate you.
That is Heartbreak Warfare.
Battle Studies came out and setlists were made and two years down the lane, as I plan to attend another John Mayer concert, all I can think about is you. That's all that keeps pervading my thoughts, K. That last phone call, the potential. I never did go to the concert - how could I? How could I without you? It just didn't seem right. It didn't feel complete and it wasn't. What is the point of keeping up this pretense?
K: Please end this. Please mend it. Please let me end it. Let's end this Heartbreak Warfare.
That is Heartbreak Warfare.
I keep asking myself, why now. Why at this moment? Why mention it to me, why did she tell me that you had just broken up? I could have just as easily not known. I've tried again and again...many times, tried to think or go over events in my mind. Write you letters so I can finally be cleansed of any notion of you. So I can stop walking past the Globe and the Civic Centre without thinking of you. So that Militia Trail means nothing to me.
It's become a horrible game - a game of skirting around each other and making sure no one steps in, no one intrudes, reminds each other of their presence. They say maybe it was her - she changed you. Me, I don't think so. It wasn't all her; it was you too. How do I keep coherent thoughts on a steady flow when everything is convoluted? You are the one thing that was so multi-faceted, the one thing I just cannot seem to rationalize and work out - and that unnerves me. It has never happened to me before, that I am now unable to say your name outloud without a deep flush - a flush of anger and heat unexplained - rise up my face.
Where do I find the words from, how do I separate the emotions so that, even armed with the good word and its power, I can write it out? I want to yell at you and smack you really good and hard and at the same time, I just want to hug you - tired. I am tired of running about, running away. People are afraid of thunder and darkness, I'm afraid of stasis. But I'd like to stand still here with you.
The problem is that you're still on the defensive. Or maybe you're not. And I'm torn. Torn because I want so badly to just - fucking get rid of this horrid feeling of you, this memory; I want it to remain a memory, I want to step out of purgatory and either pass on or return back to life. It sounds dramatic but there is no more appropriate metaphor for someone who is so different now, it almost feels like He's dead.
What are you fighting for? Why are you fighting? What did I do? It was so abrupt...you gave me no explanation. And if I hadn't stood out in that hallway, outside of your apartment, tears in my eyes, asking why why why you would have said nothing. Is that really the kind of coward you are?
That is Heartbreak Warfare.
I catch myself thinking of you and then ruthlessly quash down any emotion that surges at the mere mention of your name. Move on. I tell myself, move on. I was never the girl who was attached, I was always the independent. But I can't stop myself from dreaming up ways to tell you about the pain - to hope for the chance to work this out or die trying. How far have we fallen? We're far away from where we first were...
I want to take hold of you and shake you back awake. I want to tell you to put your weapon down. I don't want to admit defeat - I want you to want to work this out. I want you to want this back. Make this landscape stand still, make everything go quiet. Suspend time and space. Put away emotions and memories. Just tell me how it is, how you feel, what you're like. Don't be passive, call out. This is no one's win, K. This is everyone's loss - this is my loss. There are casualties, there are. And no one wins.
That, too, is Heartbreak Warfare.
I'm afraid that someday life will take us so far - time and space will be more than temporal, they will be solid, physical. Even more so than today. And, at that point, it will be too late. I heard you loud and clear when I said goodbye, but don't you understand?! You can't just fucking bury the past and not look it in the face. You move on, yes, but not by stepping on remains. You always honour the dead. You never deface. Don't you know observation of those niceties aren't just niceties? Those are necessary.
And with this distance separating us, we'll never be able to work it out. We'll regret, always, not returning for last words, not coming back to hash it out. You might someday find the words to say what I know you feel and I might find a way to express my love and it will have been too late - life may separate us.
Why am I saying this? What good is this? Sometimes, there needn't be a purpose, just a trigger. Mine is rather funny: two summers ago was the last time I spoke to you over the phone. Do you remember what I was calling for? The John Mayer concert that we were supposed to go to together. And now, two years down the lane, everything is so fucking different. We aren't even speaking. You hate me and I hate you.
That is Heartbreak Warfare.
Battle Studies came out and setlists were made and two years down the lane, as I plan to attend another John Mayer concert, all I can think about is you. That's all that keeps pervading my thoughts, K. That last phone call, the potential. I never did go to the concert - how could I? How could I without you? It just didn't seem right. It didn't feel complete and it wasn't. What is the point of keeping up this pretense?
K: Please end this. Please mend it. Please let me end it. Let's end this Heartbreak Warfare.
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Dear Alexander McQueen,
Please stop killing armadillos to make shoes. No, please don't pretend, as others going mental over your abominations are that this is in any way post-modern fashion. In fact, it's not really fashion at all. If you are trying to bring the back surrealist or dadist movement and undermine our sensibilities by presenting such - disgusting clunkers, may I suggest a nice healthy dose of Krazy Katz and Ignatz to wash away those Surrealist blues?
We can even tolerate those...strange stilters tiled with skulls and towering on unwieldy spindles of double platforms. Heck, if Chloe can pull off double platforms why can't you? But - erm, these are not shoes. Yes, of course, we agree with you: fashion is wearable art. These are not art. We're not sure what they are having never seen anything quite so ugly before. We will gladly pick up a pair of Uggs in exchange that each and every one of these...creatures be burned and stamped out.
Ohhh, you clever minx! People just love a trend! They love to be outrageous. Everything seems so accesible! We can have a piece of the fame by owning these shoes! And you know this don't you? Otherwise, what (besides a bad trip to the bathroom) could have prompted you to design these?
Are you trying to unleash an epidemic around the world, now you've heard we're overdue? Are you trying to wipe out any modicum of sanity we have left? May we point out that just because the crazies (gaga andcruella deville guinness) have decided to encase their feet in vases of the 6th century BC, we really don't take that kindly to someone trying to case us in goat's feet?
We hoped that your shoes possessed a shred of transcendental quality - that eventually they would grow on us like the 2008 product of the Madonna and Justin Timberlake collaboration. Rather, we suspect, things will start to grow out of it, soon, given its current toxicity. In any case, everytime we look at it, for some sign of redemption, it, if possible, becomes more and more hideous.
May we suggest, as an immediate tonic, that you return to the drawing board and give Manolo Blahnik a call? Heck, go crazy, make it a party and call Christian Louboutin. Being creative doesn't mean you have to be on crack. You don't have to be alone. Help them help you get through this. Return to us. Also, Lovers: wearing these does not make you a walking canvas - you'd have to be able to walk in them first. Oh and - where did we get with that burning idea...?
Please stop killing armadillos to make shoes. No, please don't pretend, as others going mental over your abominations are that this is in any way post-modern fashion. In fact, it's not really fashion at all. If you are trying to bring the back surrealist or dadist movement and undermine our sensibilities by presenting such - disgusting clunkers, may I suggest a nice healthy dose of Krazy Katz and Ignatz to wash away those Surrealist blues?
We can even tolerate those...strange stilters tiled with skulls and towering on unwieldy spindles of double platforms. Heck, if Chloe can pull off double platforms why can't you? But - erm, these are not shoes. Yes, of course, we agree with you: fashion is wearable art. These are not art. We're not sure what they are having never seen anything quite so ugly before. We will gladly pick up a pair of Uggs in exchange that each and every one of these...creatures be burned and stamped out.
Ohhh, you clever minx! People just love a trend! They love to be outrageous. Everything seems so accesible! We can have a piece of the fame by owning these shoes! And you know this don't you? Otherwise, what (besides a bad trip to the bathroom) could have prompted you to design these?
Are you trying to unleash an epidemic around the world, now you've heard we're overdue? Are you trying to wipe out any modicum of sanity we have left? May we point out that just because the crazies (gaga and
We hoped that your shoes possessed a shred of transcendental quality - that eventually they would grow on us like the 2008 product of the Madonna and Justin Timberlake collaboration. Rather, we suspect, things will start to grow out of it, soon, given its current toxicity. In any case, everytime we look at it, for some sign of redemption, it, if possible, becomes more and more hideous.
May we suggest, as an immediate tonic, that you return to the drawing board and give Manolo Blahnik a call? Heck, go crazy, make it a party and call Christian Louboutin. Being creative doesn't mean you have to be on crack. You don't have to be alone. Help them help you get through this. Return to us. Also, Lovers: wearing these does not make you a walking canvas - you'd have to be able to walk in them first. Oh and - where did we get with that burning idea...?
Monday, November 30, 2009
I am dissatisfied. I am disenfranchised. Jaded, politically cloudy. I am walking through a haze of pop-culture and the wisps of its thick smoke - thickest on the outside, not the expected centres - wrap around me, heady and beckoning. I stop and smile and walk on by.
No one wants anymore. Everyone is content. No one understands what Derrida was talking about when he uttered the word differance. Not only for linguistic purposes but as a catalyst, as an entire universe of pository change and action, of distinguish and the opposite of lingering, the opposite of stasis and homogeneity.
The problem is that no one wants to learn for the sake of learning anymore. No one wants to sit and wonder and then explore hidden meaning. Those that do, seek to be published, lust for recognition, of the kind that Emily Dickinson exchewed. There is no passion in their work, only a few dozen articles in a database to their name - and my, what a name they've established. Indeed, when they're gone this earth will remember their name, will whisper it on the wind, will bear a mark of their own arbitrary system of words and languages.
The futility of doing - well, anything, really strikes me hard. But that doesn't mean I don't want to do. Everyone looks at you all funny when you say things like - I lust for knowledge, I strive for truth, I need to learn, I want to project and effect and - most of all - i want to BE affected.
I'm tired of these fucking markham street car racers and people lusting for Benzs and lofts. Waiting for the start of life which equals economic independence - their new Promised Land. I'm tired of people earning degrees to try and be the next CEO under 30 who gets published like that is real self worth - the real startup, Canadian/American dream. They think that getting a boyfriend or a girlfriend is their milestone and it puzzles me. It puzzles me that it puzzles me.
Me myself, I am a bolter, a great big run-away-er so I'm not one to talk; my opinion is biased. I am scared of something that has no name, no face, no identity that I can concretely call out to. See a devil, call him by his name? I cannot. No interpellation. Running away is the only way I know how. Of course it's true, beginnings are the best. When everything is new, when change is still rife in the air, hanging on a low wing. But after that...routine sets in. Familiarity.
Sure, everyone wants a rock, a bastion, somewhere you can return, somewhere like home. But what happened to process? Why does no one value the process? Why can i kid myself and want to pull the wool over the eyes of others, make up excuses for the reasons that I'm doing these things, pursuing what I want to y pretending their goals to a bigger something? They're not! They are lives in and of themselves! They are valuable in and of themselves. I don't want this to be another Waterloo.
An example of this restlessness and a need for the organic, the inspiration, the process in my life: an essay assigned ot me. I will not write it if I feel even a bit of resistance. There doesn't have to be a spark of inspiration but if there is any resistance, if it doesn't flow - I will put it off 'til the process is organic, 'til it feels like its time, like its right. These are internal processes, inexplicable and complex.
It's not only that the fun of everything is gone. It's not only that I cannot enjoy what I'm learning or studying anymore. I would love to be a doctor but if I had to worry about getting into med school...I would shoot myself. Cutthroat, goal-oriented. End results. Investments with the dependent clause of profit. Why can't the dependent clause be independent experience? Why can't the process be cherished? Practicality shouldn't be made a part of casting yourself into the future; it should be a matter of dreams, of wants, not what is feasible and what you should do today to make tomorrow happen. Tomorrow is already happening; it's happening as a virtue of today. We are in residual time. No one understands that. No one values that - very few, at least.
Everyone just wants to know know know. Where where where. Where are you going? When when when. When will you be there. How how how. How will you get there. Where is there, I ask? What is this 'there'? Why must I know and, more foolishly, how can I know? Clearly, I am not going to be a psychic, nor am I a machine that can calibrate. How can you ask me to predict the outcome of Chaos Theory or how an infitesimal shift in action, in thinking, in movement can change in my path?
What is the point of these plans? But then again...how does one go through. For those of us floating in a sea of nothingness, negation, floundering, wishing we had some way - some outlet. Not merely only to show the world that we're progressing towards something but to feel alive, to justify to ourselves that we are proceeding to something. Some...goal. Some unforetold horizon.
I just want to run away. I want to run away and live in a chateau, reading books and drinking wine and living like a recluse, the oddity in the village like the author of Wide Sargasso Sea. I want to get lost in a marketplace in Morocco and resurface, a year later, at the base of the Himalayas. I want to make people smile, I want to educate. Enough of theory- I want to activate. I want to write stories and see them come alive on film. I want to listen - listen to others, listen to the Greats espouse their thoughts, study and observe nuances. Marvel. No one wants to marvel. I want to stay in while it rains for days on end and watch as the world goes by with Miles Davis in the background. I don't want to speak anymore.
No one wants anymore. Everyone is content. No one understands what Derrida was talking about when he uttered the word differance. Not only for linguistic purposes but as a catalyst, as an entire universe of pository change and action, of distinguish and the opposite of lingering, the opposite of stasis and homogeneity.
The problem is that no one wants to learn for the sake of learning anymore. No one wants to sit and wonder and then explore hidden meaning. Those that do, seek to be published, lust for recognition, of the kind that Emily Dickinson exchewed. There is no passion in their work, only a few dozen articles in a database to their name - and my, what a name they've established. Indeed, when they're gone this earth will remember their name, will whisper it on the wind, will bear a mark of their own arbitrary system of words and languages.
The futility of doing - well, anything, really strikes me hard. But that doesn't mean I don't want to do. Everyone looks at you all funny when you say things like - I lust for knowledge, I strive for truth, I need to learn, I want to project and effect and - most of all - i want to BE affected.
I'm tired of these fucking markham street car racers and people lusting for Benzs and lofts. Waiting for the start of life which equals economic independence - their new Promised Land. I'm tired of people earning degrees to try and be the next CEO under 30 who gets published like that is real self worth - the real startup, Canadian/American dream. They think that getting a boyfriend or a girlfriend is their milestone and it puzzles me. It puzzles me that it puzzles me.
Me myself, I am a bolter, a great big run-away-er so I'm not one to talk; my opinion is biased. I am scared of something that has no name, no face, no identity that I can concretely call out to. See a devil, call him by his name? I cannot. No interpellation. Running away is the only way I know how. Of course it's true, beginnings are the best. When everything is new, when change is still rife in the air, hanging on a low wing. But after that...routine sets in. Familiarity.
Sure, everyone wants a rock, a bastion, somewhere you can return, somewhere like home. But what happened to process? Why does no one value the process? Why can i kid myself and want to pull the wool over the eyes of others, make up excuses for the reasons that I'm doing these things, pursuing what I want to y pretending their goals to a bigger something? They're not! They are lives in and of themselves! They are valuable in and of themselves. I don't want this to be another Waterloo.
An example of this restlessness and a need for the organic, the inspiration, the process in my life: an essay assigned ot me. I will not write it if I feel even a bit of resistance. There doesn't have to be a spark of inspiration but if there is any resistance, if it doesn't flow - I will put it off 'til the process is organic, 'til it feels like its time, like its right. These are internal processes, inexplicable and complex.
It's not only that the fun of everything is gone. It's not only that I cannot enjoy what I'm learning or studying anymore. I would love to be a doctor but if I had to worry about getting into med school...I would shoot myself. Cutthroat, goal-oriented. End results. Investments with the dependent clause of profit. Why can't the dependent clause be independent experience? Why can't the process be cherished? Practicality shouldn't be made a part of casting yourself into the future; it should be a matter of dreams, of wants, not what is feasible and what you should do today to make tomorrow happen. Tomorrow is already happening; it's happening as a virtue of today. We are in residual time. No one understands that. No one values that - very few, at least.
Everyone just wants to know know know. Where where where. Where are you going? When when when. When will you be there. How how how. How will you get there. Where is there, I ask? What is this 'there'? Why must I know and, more foolishly, how can I know? Clearly, I am not going to be a psychic, nor am I a machine that can calibrate. How can you ask me to predict the outcome of Chaos Theory or how an infitesimal shift in action, in thinking, in movement can change in my path?
What is the point of these plans? But then again...how does one go through. For those of us floating in a sea of nothingness, negation, floundering, wishing we had some way - some outlet. Not merely only to show the world that we're progressing towards something but to feel alive, to justify to ourselves that we are proceeding to something. Some...goal. Some unforetold horizon.
I just want to run away. I want to run away and live in a chateau, reading books and drinking wine and living like a recluse, the oddity in the village like the author of Wide Sargasso Sea. I want to get lost in a marketplace in Morocco and resurface, a year later, at the base of the Himalayas. I want to make people smile, I want to educate. Enough of theory- I want to activate. I want to write stories and see them come alive on film. I want to listen - listen to others, listen to the Greats espouse their thoughts, study and observe nuances. Marvel. No one wants to marvel. I want to stay in while it rains for days on end and watch as the world goes by with Miles Davis in the background. I don't want to speak anymore.
Friday, November 13, 2009
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
About a week ago I received a bill from my family doctor's clinic of all the services that I had used last year and I was assured that they were covered under OHIP.
"Dear Ms. MacKrekar" the letter read, "Please be informed that these services are covered under -"
Hang on just one bloody minute, I thought. I backed up, my eyes hardly believing that what I had just read could be true. Everyone always wishes for this when then get their credit card bills - hoping that all their extravagant purchases are sent to someone else while a batty old woman's can of tuna is the only thing listed on their own credit card bill - obviously the result of a bad mail switch.
For one wild second, this was me: it has finally happened, I thought. Canada Post finally messed up and sent me some old Scottish hag's bill. But upon closer inspection and second glance, I soon came to realize - this wasn't someone else's bill. This was MY bill. MY bill addressed to ME, Sarah Merekar. Or, MacKrekar, according to this doctor's office.
The lack of caring notwithstanding, I blinked and wondered at the level of incompetency and stupidity that must be rife in our society for someone to be able to mispell or enter incorrectly, someone's last name over and over and over again, especially if the creation of the bill was probably just a form to be filled in. All they had to do was enter the right bloody name. So shocked was I that I ran to fetch my health card and, of course, my health card informed me that my last name was firmly Indian, not some strange Scottish variant.
How hard, I wondered, how hard is it to spell a bloody name that isn't more than 10 letters long. It's 7 measly letters! Has anyone ever tried spelling OTHER brown names? They go on forever! Or let's take Russian or Polish names - those are just a long list of unfortunate consonants all rammed together, any sadist's dream. Or how many times can you say "polous" in one greek last name? My last name is not the hardest gawdamn last name in the world. In fact, all circumstances given, it is actually quite simple: two e's, two r's, a K, an A, and an M. And not in that order. It's so simple.
But no. No, they must mispell it. It's not such a big deal, really, people mess up names and last names all the time. Which is why Satish and Rajiv and Chandrashekar have to change their "ethnic" names to Saul and Ray and Charlie. And it was this, this very notion that annoyed the hell out of me. Once upon a time, I was indignant, yes, that anyone with an eastern name had to change it to something seen to be more "easier", more "integrateable" into Western culture. But now it struck me that besides all the tools of hegemony naming and renaming really introduce and apply, it was like a whole new identity. And here was a whole new identity being offered to me. A new form of imperialism? Maybe I'm too quick to judge, too quick to fly off the handle, to spout a theory. But I was affronted - affronted that they couldn't take the time to bother to check the spelling of my name when I, the ethnic "other" the eastern counterpart of Edward Said-like descriptions, would have to do so. And inexplicably puzzled that they had chosen, instead to give me a NEW name. For this is not a mere case of typos or letters being put in the wrong place.
Once - no, many times over - in grade school, I had a friend named Nadejda. The supply teachers would always pronounce it Nad-JYE-da. One day I got so annoyed at this blatant lack of care obvious idiocy that I blurted out loudly, "The E comes before the J!" I got detention for speaking outloud but I never forgot this moment. Thankfully, there are not many ways you can fuck up Sarah but a few had a hearty go at my last name - I got Marker, Meerkat, America, Mareep the Sheep (when Pokemon came out. dear god.).
But here is a psudeo-scot name being offered to me. Being fashioned and given, a new form of evangelical, Christian missionary. Here, it is not the Bible that is the Sign taken for Wonders. It is this identity, this new name, that, when donned, integrates me into the culture but also allows me to stand up, now in the skin of my conqueror and look back at him.
Madness, you may think. Post-colonial theory in a simple health letter? But intended or not, dormant or not, latent or clear, they are there. It is there. It is inherent. And whether the intention is there or not, whether the awareness is there or not, I am very aware. Very aware that it is NOT spelt MacKrekar or McKrakken or any of that. It's Merekar, thank you very much and I think I'll stick to that for now. Unless Gerard Butler seduces me and I succumb, of course.
"Dear Ms. MacKrekar" the letter read, "Please be informed that these services are covered under -"
Hang on just one bloody minute, I thought. I backed up, my eyes hardly believing that what I had just read could be true. Everyone always wishes for this when then get their credit card bills - hoping that all their extravagant purchases are sent to someone else while a batty old woman's can of tuna is the only thing listed on their own credit card bill - obviously the result of a bad mail switch.
For one wild second, this was me: it has finally happened, I thought. Canada Post finally messed up and sent me some old Scottish hag's bill. But upon closer inspection and second glance, I soon came to realize - this wasn't someone else's bill. This was MY bill. MY bill addressed to ME, Sarah Merekar. Or, MacKrekar, according to this doctor's office.
The lack of caring notwithstanding, I blinked and wondered at the level of incompetency and stupidity that must be rife in our society for someone to be able to mispell or enter incorrectly, someone's last name over and over and over again, especially if the creation of the bill was probably just a form to be filled in. All they had to do was enter the right bloody name. So shocked was I that I ran to fetch my health card and, of course, my health card informed me that my last name was firmly Indian, not some strange Scottish variant.
How hard, I wondered, how hard is it to spell a bloody name that isn't more than 10 letters long. It's 7 measly letters! Has anyone ever tried spelling OTHER brown names? They go on forever! Or let's take Russian or Polish names - those are just a long list of unfortunate consonants all rammed together, any sadist's dream. Or how many times can you say "polous" in one greek last name? My last name is not the hardest gawdamn last name in the world. In fact, all circumstances given, it is actually quite simple: two e's, two r's, a K, an A, and an M. And not in that order. It's so simple.
But no. No, they must mispell it. It's not such a big deal, really, people mess up names and last names all the time. Which is why Satish and Rajiv and Chandrashekar have to change their "ethnic" names to Saul and Ray and Charlie. And it was this, this very notion that annoyed the hell out of me. Once upon a time, I was indignant, yes, that anyone with an eastern name had to change it to something seen to be more "easier", more "integrateable" into Western culture. But now it struck me that besides all the tools of hegemony naming and renaming really introduce and apply, it was like a whole new identity. And here was a whole new identity being offered to me. A new form of imperialism? Maybe I'm too quick to judge, too quick to fly off the handle, to spout a theory. But I was affronted - affronted that they couldn't take the time to bother to check the spelling of my name when I, the ethnic "other" the eastern counterpart of Edward Said-like descriptions, would have to do so. And inexplicably puzzled that they had chosen, instead to give me a NEW name. For this is not a mere case of typos or letters being put in the wrong place.
Once - no, many times over - in grade school, I had a friend named Nadejda. The supply teachers would always pronounce it Nad-JYE-da. One day I got so annoyed at this blatant lack of care obvious idiocy that I blurted out loudly, "The E comes before the J!" I got detention for speaking outloud but I never forgot this moment. Thankfully, there are not many ways you can fuck up Sarah but a few had a hearty go at my last name - I got Marker, Meerkat, America, Mareep the Sheep (when Pokemon came out. dear god.).
But here is a psudeo-scot name being offered to me. Being fashioned and given, a new form of evangelical, Christian missionary. Here, it is not the Bible that is the Sign taken for Wonders. It is this identity, this new name, that, when donned, integrates me into the culture but also allows me to stand up, now in the skin of my conqueror and look back at him.
Madness, you may think. Post-colonial theory in a simple health letter? But intended or not, dormant or not, latent or clear, they are there. It is there. It is inherent. And whether the intention is there or not, whether the awareness is there or not, I am very aware. Very aware that it is NOT spelt MacKrekar or McKrakken or any of that. It's Merekar, thank you very much and I think I'll stick to that for now. Unless Gerard Butler seduces me and I succumb, of course.
Saturday, November 7, 2009
I think this is so kickass:
UTH OYE
Design, check. Heart and soul, check. People ready, check. Sustainable development, check. It's simple, its clear, its sexy and its 100% wearable, non-shrinkable t-shirt love. So order away - I'm getting two. Handscreened pouch?? yes please. And its a great initiative....we should think of starting something simple like this here.
Plus the website is pure design, CSS style sheets and flash LOVE. So get off your lazy ass and contribute (in a microcosmic way) - UTH OYE!
UTH OYE
Design, check. Heart and soul, check. People ready, check. Sustainable development, check. It's simple, its clear, its sexy and its 100% wearable, non-shrinkable t-shirt love. So order away - I'm getting two. Handscreened pouch?? yes please. And its a great initiative....we should think of starting something simple like this here.
Plus the website is pure design, CSS style sheets and flash LOVE. So get off your lazy ass and contribute (in a microcosmic way) - UTH OYE!
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Somewhere between reading the critiques of Adorno and the changing landscape of Coconino County with How I Met Your Mother running faithfully in the background, it hit me. It was amusing, yes...but these jokes on Canada...actually sort of bothered me. It's not the first time I'm hearing them, of course. And, okay, so the 80s lasted a little while longer here (judging by when I first arrived here...can anyone say pouffy hair?) but that quip about marriages not being really recognized as such? That was kind of sucky. Like how are money really isn't money.
Which is funny, of course, because Canada and the U.S. are on par. So what's there to get worked up about, they're only jokes. Yes. Yes, they're only jokes and they shouldn't matter and usually I snicker alongside with them. Like an outsider - in a very knowing, superior way. I guess the issue here is not so much the joke but the fact that I was bothered by it - which would, of course, signify some sort of identification.
And then it struck me...I am no more the outsider. Of course, I will never wholly say I am Canadian in the way my little brother will be able to - he was born here, and I was not. I've moved around everywhere and he has not. But after experiencing a smorgasboard of cultures, your mind always drifts back to where your roots are. And true as this might be...I think I have finally been in this place long enough to feel...annoyance when someone cracks a joke at our country. Canada, being that country. Mind you, when I think of Canada, I think of Toronto - and Toronto is pretty effing great. But this whole country is completely unexplored by me. And yes, those history lessons were a PAIN: a few provinces and 3 measly territories, no great history, no great global participation, pacifist, American-kissasses, always harping on the great glory of one thing or another (the russian hockey game or the suez canal crisis or that damned battle on vimy ride - my ears BLED).
But then I really thought about it - no bloodshed on our hands. No cultural hegemony. No massacres. No apathetic uninvolvement until we got hit cuz then it was our problem. No masquerading as the supporter in a war and then trying to take over when the war was won. No furthering of global expansion goals on the account of developing nations. No exploitation of resources when countries are at their most vulnerable. No masking all this under the Puritanical, pre-destined, biblical crap. No spouting of separation between state and religion, democracy and secularism when really it's there. No fallacy and failings of an American Dream.
So okay. We might not have had major cultural movements. Our authors may be a snore because all they want to talk about sometimes are the Maritimes. Okay, so we only have one major national highway. But in a rare act of patriotism for a Western country (which is as close to patriotism for a western country I'll ever feel - besides New York, because that is not patriotism, that is love) I'll ever experience, I just want to say:
Our money is awesome and colourful. Our national anthem is great and not steeped in history. We glorify things that happened ages ago to nurse our wounded pride and keep the spirit alive. We don't get that involved and we like to think of ourselves as peacekeepers - heck, some of us even are. We don't have creative movie studios (we really don't have that many Jews...). And marriages here DO count. Love here IS real. Fall and Winter are separate seasons and we're a chartered plane ride away from the Aurora Borealis and land where the sun never sets.
And we DO NOT pronounce it "ABOOT".
Which is funny, of course, because Canada and the U.S. are on par. So what's there to get worked up about, they're only jokes. Yes. Yes, they're only jokes and they shouldn't matter and usually I snicker alongside with them. Like an outsider - in a very knowing, superior way. I guess the issue here is not so much the joke but the fact that I was bothered by it - which would, of course, signify some sort of identification.
And then it struck me...I am no more the outsider. Of course, I will never wholly say I am Canadian in the way my little brother will be able to - he was born here, and I was not. I've moved around everywhere and he has not. But after experiencing a smorgasboard of cultures, your mind always drifts back to where your roots are. And true as this might be...I think I have finally been in this place long enough to feel...annoyance when someone cracks a joke at our country. Canada, being that country. Mind you, when I think of Canada, I think of Toronto - and Toronto is pretty effing great. But this whole country is completely unexplored by me. And yes, those history lessons were a PAIN: a few provinces and 3 measly territories, no great history, no great global participation, pacifist, American-kissasses, always harping on the great glory of one thing or another (the russian hockey game or the suez canal crisis or that damned battle on vimy ride - my ears BLED).
But then I really thought about it - no bloodshed on our hands. No cultural hegemony. No massacres. No apathetic uninvolvement until we got hit cuz then it was our problem. No masquerading as the supporter in a war and then trying to take over when the war was won. No furthering of global expansion goals on the account of developing nations. No exploitation of resources when countries are at their most vulnerable. No masking all this under the Puritanical, pre-destined, biblical crap. No spouting of separation between state and religion, democracy and secularism when really it's there. No fallacy and failings of an American Dream.
So okay. We might not have had major cultural movements. Our authors may be a snore because all they want to talk about sometimes are the Maritimes. Okay, so we only have one major national highway. But in a rare act of patriotism for a Western country (which is as close to patriotism for a western country I'll ever feel - besides New York, because that is not patriotism, that is love) I'll ever experience, I just want to say:
Our money is awesome and colourful. Our national anthem is great and not steeped in history. We glorify things that happened ages ago to nurse our wounded pride and keep the spirit alive. We don't get that involved and we like to think of ourselves as peacekeepers - heck, some of us even are. We don't have creative movie studios (we really don't have that many Jews...). And marriages here DO count. Love here IS real. Fall and Winter are separate seasons and we're a chartered plane ride away from the Aurora Borealis and land where the sun never sets.
And we DO NOT pronounce it "ABOOT".
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
You know what? I think it is distinctly unfair that Miranda, Samantha, and even Charlotte, have to bare their boobs but SJP never has to. I mean, seriously, why the discrimination?! Wtf is up with that? What could possibly be the rationale behind SJP never having to give us some of the ladies?
Not that I have a real hankering to see her ladies. But I just think...it's so discriminatory. In a sense. Because it's as if they're saying, look, she's the main character. Just to hit it home, just in case the fact that Carrie is narrating is not enough, we have to let you know that she's the main character and, as such, she's hella important. And she's just the right blend of neurotic, cynical, hopeful, witty like a man but fucks like a woman. She is the perfect blend of all equal parts of her girlfriends. She tempers everything.
And gawd, that is ANNOYING. Yes, you love Carrie the most because she is the most least craziest. She touches all departments. She obsesses, then she lets go. She's so...so...gah, she's so proverbial. So just in case all the blatant favoritism wasn't enough, we're not going to have her bare her drawers 'cuz no tasteful main character does that. Because, even though everything is in her point of view, she is still enigmatic and charming; she's crazy enough to have a one night stand but not so crazy that she'll show it like a two dollar whore. She's raunchy and proper.
Or is it because SJP is a producer? Or was it executive producer? Is it because she has a financial stake in it that she can't? You never hear her (Carrie) having an orgasm...the most she'll do is mourn. The closest we got to her having sex was Jack Berger and even then she had a bra on! And yet Miranda is yelling and screaming, Samantha is suitably outrageous and Charlotte is slow and sensual.
No, it makes no sense to me and I can't pinpoint the reason. I started to wonder if maybe it was because, eventually, as the show picked up, they realized that Carrie, with her love for Manolos, should be the bastion of fashion. That theory was quickly knocked down when I considered Miranda, Samantha and Charlotte. Look at Samantha! She's a bastion of fashion too! All of them are, in their own neat typecasts. The only one who breaks the mould is Carrie, and we're just supposed to agree with that; that's the reason, apparently, she gets laid so much. It's because she's "different". "Special". And not like, 'stop eating the paste' special, either. By the way, some of her outfits (most, really...50%) are just...stupid. They're not vintage, or cute, or M.O.D. or squarishly hip nor nostalgic enough about the 80s (or at least the screaming horror overpowers the nostalgia).
What I do love about Carrie, are her legs. Good thing they aren't covering those up. But really, it's made me wonder. Why no pecs Parker?
Not that I have a real hankering to see her ladies. But I just think...it's so discriminatory. In a sense. Because it's as if they're saying, look, she's the main character. Just to hit it home, just in case the fact that Carrie is narrating is not enough, we have to let you know that she's the main character and, as such, she's hella important. And she's just the right blend of neurotic, cynical, hopeful, witty like a man but fucks like a woman. She is the perfect blend of all equal parts of her girlfriends. She tempers everything.
And gawd, that is ANNOYING. Yes, you love Carrie the most because she is the most least craziest. She touches all departments. She obsesses, then she lets go. She's so...so...gah, she's so proverbial. So just in case all the blatant favoritism wasn't enough, we're not going to have her bare her drawers 'cuz no tasteful main character does that. Because, even though everything is in her point of view, she is still enigmatic and charming; she's crazy enough to have a one night stand but not so crazy that she'll show it like a two dollar whore. She's raunchy and proper.
Or is it because SJP is a producer? Or was it executive producer? Is it because she has a financial stake in it that she can't? You never hear her (Carrie) having an orgasm...the most she'll do is mourn. The closest we got to her having sex was Jack Berger and even then she had a bra on! And yet Miranda is yelling and screaming, Samantha is suitably outrageous and Charlotte is slow and sensual.
No, it makes no sense to me and I can't pinpoint the reason. I started to wonder if maybe it was because, eventually, as the show picked up, they realized that Carrie, with her love for Manolos, should be the bastion of fashion. That theory was quickly knocked down when I considered Miranda, Samantha and Charlotte. Look at Samantha! She's a bastion of fashion too! All of them are, in their own neat typecasts. The only one who breaks the mould is Carrie, and we're just supposed to agree with that; that's the reason, apparently, she gets laid so much. It's because she's "different". "Special". And not like, 'stop eating the paste' special, either. By the way, some of her outfits (most, really...50%) are just...stupid. They're not vintage, or cute, or M.O.D. or squarishly hip nor nostalgic enough about the 80s (or at least the screaming horror overpowers the nostalgia).
What I do love about Carrie, are her legs. Good thing they aren't covering those up. But really, it's made me wonder. Why no pecs Parker?
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Goodnews: Interview rocked. I gots the job. It's a lateral move pay wise but more to do with setting the stage for future ambitions than any real money grab.
Badnews: EFFING WALLET GOT STOLEN ON THE EFFING VIVA. who the fuck steals wallets from people who are OBVIOUSLY students, wearing worn out coats from three years ago, so haggard looking from the work of a fake reading week that they are easily mistakeable for a bag lady on the GTA's most privileged bus system?! WHO DOES THAT?! and why the fuck do i have to file a police report! I refuse to say 'fml' though...that's just bad karma.
Goodnews: All 6 seasons of SatC in 5 days.
Badnews: the above might explain why i'm so behind on my readings. Through reading week. two responses, one essay, one midterm, shitloads of articles.
Weirdnews: While heading to york on the almost ghost-town bus, the bus driver had her DOG on the TTC. it was the ugliest most pathetic looking googly-eyed, mid-sized pooch ever. I wanted to throw up and cry at the same time because it was wearing a pink Zellers hoodie from the girls 2x section and a DIAPER. Well first, I just wanted to hurl. Then it started to whine. The shrillest whine in the world. My heart shattered but I think if my ears were made of glass, they would shatter too. I think it had the runs or something...dear god, it was just the most pathetic forlorn sick dog I have ever seen. gagagag.
Goodnews: I stole the last cookie from my little brother. Ahh, the life of the mundane.
Badnews: I'm psyching myself out for the first essay of the term. Im so scared it'll be a repeat of last year's first essay. I keep saying, SNAP OUT OF IT, you know this stuff! But the pressure is mounting. I know what to say but I don't know when to stop. Hopefully though, the right combination of that will make it like last year's shakespeare essay: stellar
News: Missed TEDxGTA. Missed A.D. Sad as hell. Mad as hell. And also: The UN teams up with the Interpol to form a Global police peacekeeping force. Ahh arbitrary, standardized rules, just what everyone loves.
Badnews: EFFING WALLET GOT STOLEN ON THE EFFING VIVA. who the fuck steals wallets from people who are OBVIOUSLY students, wearing worn out coats from three years ago, so haggard looking from the work of a fake reading week that they are easily mistakeable for a bag lady on the GTA's most privileged bus system?! WHO DOES THAT?! and why the fuck do i have to file a police report! I refuse to say 'fml' though...that's just bad karma.
Goodnews: All 6 seasons of SatC in 5 days.
Badnews: the above might explain why i'm so behind on my readings. Through reading week. two responses, one essay, one midterm, shitloads of articles.
Weirdnews: While heading to york on the almost ghost-town bus, the bus driver had her DOG on the TTC. it was the ugliest most pathetic looking googly-eyed, mid-sized pooch ever. I wanted to throw up and cry at the same time because it was wearing a pink Zellers hoodie from the girls 2x section and a DIAPER. Well first, I just wanted to hurl. Then it started to whine. The shrillest whine in the world. My heart shattered but I think if my ears were made of glass, they would shatter too. I think it had the runs or something...dear god, it was just the most pathetic forlorn sick dog I have ever seen. gagagag.
Goodnews: I stole the last cookie from my little brother. Ahh, the life of the mundane.
Badnews: I'm psyching myself out for the first essay of the term. Im so scared it'll be a repeat of last year's first essay. I keep saying, SNAP OUT OF IT, you know this stuff! But the pressure is mounting. I know what to say but I don't know when to stop. Hopefully though, the right combination of that will make it like last year's shakespeare essay: stellar
News: Missed TEDxGTA. Missed A.D. Sad as hell. Mad as hell. And also: The UN teams up with the Interpol to form a Global police peacekeeping force. Ahh arbitrary, standardized rules, just what everyone loves.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Put your hand up if you loved Slumdog Millionaire but then cursed that bloody Jai Ho fucking remix with the Pussycat Dolls and were shocked (and annoyed) about the Bollywood Hero American Television Show Dance in Times Square and are now miffed at the sudden surge of Indian psuedoculture in Western cinema and dislike the smell of representation and cultural production, oversimplification and culture as a resource.
P.S. I love Lisa Ray. Ever since Kasoor and who cares if her Hindi was dubbed. She rocks my world.
P.S. I love Lisa Ray. Ever since Kasoor and who cares if her Hindi was dubbed. She rocks my world.
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Exeter. Balliol. Brasenose. Magdalen. University. St. Hilda's. These consume my life at any given moment. If I keep readings or don't do the work I set out, I wake up in the middle of the night consumed by guilt and do it. Cannot rest, cannot sleep. Too tired to process. RUnning self into ground. But it's only starting. It's only just starting and I cannot be weak. There's still so much more to do, to come and this intensity is the only way I know how. Feel it full. Throw yourself into it. It is absurd. Keep writing posts but don't publish them cuz I'm too damn tired. Found some amazing blogs - stuff to make me think - stuff about the world - about expeditions and social conditions and policies and development.
There's a girl who's a friend of this guy I know...and she's taking her combinatorics/optimization degree and trying to figure out how to create sustainable social development. Bloody amazing. Sort of wish I were good in math so I could skip the discussion and save lives or build infrastructure. Must keep it brief...about to pass out from 14 hours of sleep over 3 days and a coffee high that's sending me crashing.
Soon enough. For now, The Economist on convergence:
P.S. Kate Beckinsale and Sophie Kinsella (real name, Madeline Wickham) went to Oxford. WTF.
There's a girl who's a friend of this guy I know...and she's taking her combinatorics/optimization degree and trying to figure out how to create sustainable social development. Bloody amazing. Sort of wish I were good in math so I could skip the discussion and save lives or build infrastructure. Must keep it brief...about to pass out from 14 hours of sleep over 3 days and a coffee high that's sending me crashing.
Soon enough. For now, The Economist on convergence:
P.S. Kate Beckinsale and Sophie Kinsella (real name, Madeline Wickham) went to Oxford. WTF.
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Red Curtains
Recently, I bought some fantastic readymade curtains for my room. Well...red is a bit of an overstatement (if you're looking at it from a saturation standpoint) and also an understatement, if you're looking at it from a shade standpoint. It's more of a lovelt copper/auburn that glows a fierce and deep hue of red. I love waking up to it and feeling so utterly encased in a warm light, a cocoon that reminds me so much of when you're eyes are closed but you're looking at the sun - the light filtering in is bright but mellow, warm, not yellow, reddish.
I don't like using the word emo, but that's what I'm feeling. It doesn't happen very often (not unless its in a feeling-down-about-world-affairs-feel-their-weight-on-me sort of way) anymore. Perhaps writing off what I'm feeling in such a remorseless, thoughtless way is unfair of me and maybe I'm buying into pop culture more than I should. But...I have no words, none to describe what I'm feeling.
All I know is, now, I never feel like drawing the curtains, I'm sitting in a dark room with my father's office lamp (that I stole...it was mine first!) and tapping away at my desk...looking for a purpose. Looking for a reason to take action. It's not like I'm happily idle; I have a million things piled up. I finally finished an application last night and I have editing work for Existere - second round corrections are (mostly) in. It's due Friday but what is freaking me out is that we have to be ready by the middle of next week....the issue comes out on September 10th. Or it has to be in to the printers by then...I don't know. All I know is that there's shitloads of work piling up - and I have no will to do any of it. To even consider it. I'm imagining myself doing it; in fact, I'm feeling very go-getter, very productive. I have to start planning my duke of ed...I have to find money to take a dressmaking class on avenue rd. and find time to volunteer. I have to get involved, chase opportunities, be fresh and re-read last year's essays. Finish Benazir Bhutto's thoughts on democracy, and essays and lectures by George Steiner and Jorge Luis Borges, respectively. In other words, I need to get in gear for next year. I need to blow Johnathon Warren out of his Yale-educated mind.
But I also feel like I want to light a room with a thousand light bulbs and then smash them all. On occasions like these, I need to sit back and absorb. I need to...I don't know, get lost. Synthesize. I'm feeling tired, gross, icky. I'm feeling drained - not of energy or hope...but of will. Of reality.I'm tired of the 9 to 5, the children, walking to work and back every morning routine. This is why I could never be married. Domesticity makes me itchy. If I ever had to care about carpool and PTA meetings...I'd stick my head in the oven too, minus the lovely poetry. (not that that's why she stuck her head in the oven by any means...)
It makes me numb. It makes me smile falsely at the parents of the school where I work when underneath I'm too exhausted to even produce a halfway decent insult about the correlation between their children's level of indiscipline versus the cars they drive. It's a positive one, needless to say.
Sometimes, it's not enough...and sometimes, there's just too much. So I'm now going to go drown myself in A Bit of Fry and Laurie and finally watch Kaminey. Vishal Bhardwaj + Shahid double role. This, I gotta see.
I don't like using the word emo, but that's what I'm feeling. It doesn't happen very often (not unless its in a feeling-down-about-world-affairs-feel-their-weight-on-me sort of way) anymore. Perhaps writing off what I'm feeling in such a remorseless, thoughtless way is unfair of me and maybe I'm buying into pop culture more than I should. But...I have no words, none to describe what I'm feeling.
All I know is, now, I never feel like drawing the curtains, I'm sitting in a dark room with my father's office lamp (that I stole...it was mine first!) and tapping away at my desk...looking for a purpose. Looking for a reason to take action. It's not like I'm happily idle; I have a million things piled up. I finally finished an application last night and I have editing work for Existere - second round corrections are (mostly) in. It's due Friday but what is freaking me out is that we have to be ready by the middle of next week....the issue comes out on September 10th. Or it has to be in to the printers by then...I don't know. All I know is that there's shitloads of work piling up - and I have no will to do any of it. To even consider it. I'm imagining myself doing it; in fact, I'm feeling very go-getter, very productive. I have to start planning my duke of ed...I have to find money to take a dressmaking class on avenue rd. and find time to volunteer. I have to get involved, chase opportunities, be fresh and re-read last year's essays. Finish Benazir Bhutto's thoughts on democracy, and essays and lectures by George Steiner and Jorge Luis Borges, respectively. In other words, I need to get in gear for next year. I need to blow Johnathon Warren out of his Yale-educated mind.
But I also feel like I want to light a room with a thousand light bulbs and then smash them all. On occasions like these, I need to sit back and absorb. I need to...I don't know, get lost. Synthesize. I'm feeling tired, gross, icky. I'm feeling drained - not of energy or hope...but of will. Of reality.I'm tired of the 9 to 5, the children, walking to work and back every morning routine. This is why I could never be married. Domesticity makes me itchy. If I ever had to care about carpool and PTA meetings...I'd stick my head in the oven too, minus the lovely poetry. (not that that's why she stuck her head in the oven by any means...)
It makes me numb. It makes me smile falsely at the parents of the school where I work when underneath I'm too exhausted to even produce a halfway decent insult about the correlation between their children's level of indiscipline versus the cars they drive. It's a positive one, needless to say.
Sometimes, it's not enough...and sometimes, there's just too much. So I'm now going to go drown myself in A Bit of Fry and Laurie and finally watch Kaminey. Vishal Bhardwaj + Shahid double role. This, I gotta see.
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Mmm...Shoes.
YEAH. Enough said. These are quite possibly the sexiest boots alive. They are so beautifully English - I could wear these on a dozen things. I am quite obsessed with British things (must be the occupied Indian in me). They are just the most perfect riding boots...that alternate as a piece de resistance. I mean...you could walk around naked in those boots and still be classy. Not that I would walk around naked in these...I have yet to build up a body for that - currently I'm alternating between Bridget Jones on my lower half and someone thin on my upper half. What I'd like to be is April Wilkner all over.
And just because I love her so much - APRIL SPAM
Back to the boots:
Of course, at 198 quid, these are understandably out of stock. Sounds like a bit of a sham, very sketchy, really, because the official site states them for £264. Which...when you do the conversion, comes to about $479 CDN. Which, along with delivery/shipping makes me shiver in my knickers that this is wholly more than I pay on a visa bill in a month. It is nearly half my limit and that is...scary as shit. It is not more than I would pay in rent, since real estate is not really THAT down in Toronto. The only reason that keeps resounding in my head is that perhaps I should invest them now because this is one of the last times in my life where I won't have to worry about rent.
Also, I hate that I'm doing such a silly, frivolous post; the poor-rich girl likes, all she worries about is if she can afford shoes. But seriously...I would live in these shoes. Also, women are justified, especially single ones because they are prey to the metropolises they live in and have no one to badger about leaving the toilet seat up. So they must occupy themselves with shoes. Personally, in my experiences, shoes are a better investment anyway. Though the bitches will sometimes pop their heels or break a strap if they're feeling particularly underloved.
Really don't know how/when I'm going to be able to shell out enough money to buy these but, essentially, I must raid my the cracks of my couch and under my bed and in old jeans pockets before november. This is rather inconvenient, me falling in love with these shoes because I was kind of saving up for these (much less expensive but no less sexy in their own right) Steve Maddens:
So BRIGGHT
God...they're sexy. The boots. And I would finally own a piece of the british brilliance that is beatrix ong. Someday, I will not be poor. And by not be poor I mean able to afford shoes on a whim despite exorbitant rent-like prices.
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