travellingtoes

[travellingtoes]

October 1st, 2013.

 Valentine licks things he loves in order to understand them better. And so as he licks the suede couch, he is saying I love you for the perch you provide me with for watching my mother and she leaves for work, but i do not understand you. And so as he licks me from head to toe, he must be saying I love you, but I do not understand why some days you treat me like shit and forget to take me out so then I pee in front of the door. 

I haven't made serious eye contact with anyone other than my mother in weeks, it feels, and this is not to say I haven't had the chance, but lying in my grandmother's bed there's often phone chords (like house phones, woah) and tabloid magazines and sheets between our eyes making it to each other. And when talking to a blond-haired, college student acquaintance after leaving training class at the CR&C, we shoot glances, and then turn away, look, turn away; this endless game of dashing to make sure the ground is still at our feet.

I think this is why after gazing into the eyes of my neighbor/best friend/old 13-year old lover last night at Frank & Tony's Bar, my heart was saying, love, love love, as if the heart was sizing up its loneliness, flooding to my brain THIS HAS NOT HAPPENED IN A WHILE.

And the fact that I had to clarify that us going to see Don John (Yes, it was the the American version of a Don Juan featuring Joseph Gordon Levitt & Scarlet Johansson as Jersey Shore guidos) was NOT a date, made it feel more date-like, so much so that I felt I should buy him a hamburger eraser from a gum ball machine & bought a round of air-hockey afterwards. 

[travellingtoes]

September 12, 2013

If I had like, a "career" forever and ever, one I was committed to for all of eternity, something I wouldn't even call a career because we were that in love, it would be interviewing people. Not to publish an article on them, not to like, figure out their secret behind making billions, but simply because the medium of conducting an interview with someone you are interested in is intensely intimate. And also, people are way nicer once you let them talk about themselves for a while. (Generally speaking. I know some people who really hate talking about themselves. But even those people could benefit from a little self-exposure.) 

I interviewed my grandma yesterday. This is the start of something. We didn't record it yet because she wanted to just "practice." Can you imagine? A lifetime of experience, love, work, situations, only to have to "practice" saying it all right, as if you could really get it wrong. When she was talking about growing up in Cleveland in the 40's and 50's and explaining things I hadn't ever heard her explain, I wondered what we normally talked about. What we have formed between us that is "normal", and yet I didn't know all of these details about her life. And the more you love a person as the love for a family member is often expressed, the more shocking it is to find corners of their hearts with untold stories & then my ego taps in and I wonder why I had never thought to ask her such questions. At least I'm doing all of this now.

[travellingtoes]

September 6th, 2013

Day 1- ACL & Meniscus Surgery.

I woke up from surgery crying when the first thing Dr. Solak says to me is "Well, you shouldn't run anymore. Cross marathons off your bucket list." I was so furious. Who says that to someone who just came out of a coma? "High schoolers always wake up from their coma in tears. It's normal."  Young4life. On the other side, I guess my knee was in a lot worse shape than either of us thought- cartilage was torn, my hamstrings were tiny, and my ACL had been completely torn along with my meniscus torn in several spots. I'm not kidding you, I was almost walking normal the days leading up to the surgery. Yesterday I hung shelves and cleaned my room. (High pain tolerance runs in the family.) 

I had a huge support system in the surgery room, from Patti leaving me an iced mocha on the nurse's desk to Aunt Rae putting a rosary in my hand.. She had me in tears of laughter going into the surgery, the anesthesiologist was way caught off guard. 

Moms. It's the ultimate relationship- it's life in a nutshell. She's my biggest fan, my worst critic, the person I owe everything to, and yet its so hard to love her! What a double triple dichotomy. 

Patti says shit's happened to everyone she knows. It's inevitable, right? Everyone walks into this world and is dealt with something. While I will admit life for me has been pretty easy, I will also say that I skip away form pain pretty damn swiftly. It's nice to surrender sometimes, and look around and see how many people have my back. I'm happy to be lying in bed with mom, hoping these next few weeks will be a lot of things new. 

[travellingtoes]

Coming Soon.... Camp Zine! 

[travellingtoes]

Flower Boxes.

Manhattan. NYC.

August, 2013.

[travellingtoes]

A list of New Feelings

September 4, 2013.

Having mother as a roommate, seeing Cleveland through a fresh lens, new opportunities for friends and confidants, a time for my family to take care of me as I prepare for this stupid knee surgery. Feeling jealous about my friends living together in Athens, overjoyed for the friends starting new lives in Denver, inspired by my Scorpio mama, blessed to spend this autumn in a place where the leaves change. (Last year this time I was in Quito- specifically being told by another brilliant woman, Sandra Goya, to surround myself with art, musical instruments, books, flowers, animals, good people, & coffee.) Wishing there was a Good Friend Doctrine, one my friends and I would follow. Wishing there was a Good Daughter Doctrine, one I would follow. Wishing there was a secret society for people looking to love each other. Wait, that might already exist. Wishing there was a secret society like that here in Cleveland. Wishing to tap into my mind reading capabilities. Hoping to make-out with someone again before I turn 23, honestly. Sometimes you need to cry so you turn on the television.

[travellingtoes]

August 13, 2013.

A list of things i am going to miss about this summer, and last summer, and how all summers will never be quite like these summers.

Canned green beans and canned everything. Cans of cans of cans of vegetables. & white bread erryday. Ew.

When the marshmallow pops under the pressure of the graham cracker.

Running across the field at night with no shoes and boxer briefs.

The hum of insects having sex.

Damp everything. Dreaming of waking up in fields of dew.

Being woken up by Eileen's renditions of folksy songs about how the moon is a woman.

Kids crying & shouting at night.

Sneaking around to use my cell phone.

Never swearing but occasionally saying FUCK when gettin' burned in the fire.

Covered in paint always. But not really that much.

I am gonna go hang out with my friends.

[travellingtoes]

August 3rd 2013 This is for anyone who's glass is half empty. This is for anyone who lives in a society that tells us we need more than we can possibly obtain or consume. Working at summer camp is me as a rubber band being stretched in seven directions. It tests the strength of my knees and the size of my ego. Are you doing something that challenges you in ways that you are proud of? Scream it out loud! I feel myself growing every single day as my heart races. My whole life has been a coming out process, and I'm not just talking about my sexuality. My life has been me trying to be original, and in turn, i run into myself inside other humans, everywhere i go. Every day is a stretch, a giant heart beat, a defeat of the nightly demons that tangle my campers toes.

[travellingtoes]

We watched Lion King last night and I realized Simba's dad's voice was my voice of God for many years as a child.

[travellingtoes]

July 25th 2013 uncertainty is a necessary artifact pulled from these days of my life and yet the familiar sunset folding over the sky reminds me i have lots of places to return to that will certainly draw the tears that i have been searching for

[travellingtoes]

July 17th 2013.

You said your goal in life is to be a human trash bag, a disposal for the good of all of humanity. One, i think that was a stupid thing to say. Two, I've been questioning the role of a "good person" and how anyone could ever call themselves such a person. I need you to go to bed so I can write. 

[travellingtoes]

Writing prompts for you.

July 8th, 2013

-Create a list of things you wish to master. Make reasonable goals for yourself.

-Create a very explicite list of your daily necessities. Cross them off in different colors, until you are left with your bare minimum.

-Keep a list of your human interactions for a day, and write what you learned from each one.

-Write about your first & your last human interaction of each day for a week. Do you notice a pattern? 

-Commit yourself to becoming a sociologist of your own human encounters. Make every interaction an attempt to remove set patterns you have of interaction. Try to avoid using phrases such as "how are you" "what's up" or "have a good day." Document your findings. 

-Keep a list for a day of what you eat and what you know about the nutrient each food provides for you. It's okay if you don't know. Look up the nutrients later and become conscious of what vitamins you are lacking.

-Think about a day where something very unexpectedly significant happened. Maybe you met your best friend, lover, got the job, or whatever. Now think of the day before that day and what you were probably doing. Write about the little things leading up to the unexpected event.

-Brainstorm different life mottos and write them all down. Commit them to memory by writing them down every time you sign a receipt, a bill, or an email. 

-Think of 5 famous and 5 not 'famous' people in your life that you love, respect, and admire. For the famous people, write about how you support them in their fame. Do you buy your favorite band's cds or do you illegally download?

Do the same for the 5 not famous people in your life. How do you support these people in their endeavors? Brainstorm how you could be more supportive.

-Write about how others support you in your own life.

-Find out what in your life "flows" and why. Write about it. What can you do hours of, but it seems like its been no time at all?

-Create a list of things you want to do but don't. What holds you back and what would it feel like to do these things?

[travellingtoes]

June 23 2013

A dedication to all things Camp. A promise that I will probably eat more white bread, bags of fritos, and red apples than desired. An expectation that I will wake up early and go to bed very late. A devotion to 8 kids and maybe more. The renouncement of alone time in search for better uses of time, maracas banging on plastic bowls, feet squished in mud, and hair in tight braids.

[travellingtoes]

6/13/13

everyone is single or theyre taken. this is my binary. they are taken by forces that are way beyond their control, they are taken by girls who love them, they are taken by anxious thoughts, by fears, past experiences, failure, paranoia, thirsts that cannot be quenched, identities failing to surface, etc. when you meet a new person you are meeting with all these forces.

[travellingtoes]

apathy and lesbians

31 of May

Margie said she maybe judges people older than her too fast, and I respond that I judge everyone too fast. I met this older lesbian couple, and I asked them if they had any other gay friends, and the one woman’s eyes opened wide, but kind of curled at the top, as if she really had something to say. “No, not really. As a matter of fact, I find most gay people incredibly boring. They carry around all of this psychological baggage and it’s all they talk about.” It’s interesting, because of all unsensitive things a person could say, I was very taken aback that she called gays boring. Yes, the experiences many gay and lesbians have with their families and society are similar, but I wouldn’t call them boring. And then she went on to say that yes her family disowned her, and her partner’s parents don’t know that they’re actually together and not just best friends. No psychlogical turmoil there? They’ve lived a normal life and have traveled a bunch, and they said in the Czech Republic locals actually came up to them and hugged them, thanking them for being American and thanking them for Reagan, proclaiming “WE LOVE REAGAN! (For tearing down the Berlin Wall)”

The one lady told me she is most concerned that our generation of young adults are apathetic. I secretly wondered if I’d be as apathetic as she seems to be.

Apathy: a state of indifference, or the suppression of emotions such as concern, excitement, motivation, or passion. An apathetic individual has an absence of interest in or concern about emotional, social, spiritual, philosophical and/or physical life.

I feel apathetic when I have an overabundance of food available, when I sleep on a bed that is too comfortable, when my eyes feel droopy during a movie and I give in to sleep… And I also feel apathetic when I am at one of my parents houses for too long. Also when I am spending money without any concern, even when I don’t have a job.

I am concerned about the mental and physical health of my friends, my family, my grandma. I am concerned that I will lose touch with friends I love, and that it will take years to form a bond with my brother. I am concerned that I will not fall in love again, but not that concerned. I am concerned that I won’t find a job that I am passionate about quick enough, and that I will not find an art form that can sustain me for a career. But once again, I am not that concerned.

I am excited about the roadtrip home with Carley & Margy. It’s exciting to sprint at the end of a four mile run. I get excited when a fresh pot of coffee is made. I am excited for camp this summer, and I am excited to know what my future holds.

I am motivated to do work to educate myself on what it means to be a woman, and learn about the different waves of feminism. I am motivated to work in an environment that is empowering to women, where I can talk with others about what this means. I am motivated to work in Latin America, with women and children. I am motivated to learn from others and accept different points of views different from my own. I am motivated to write letters to people at home.

I am passionate about equality, food, good conversation, rock climbing, writing, and voicing concern. I am a passionate believer in “talking iT out,” constructive criticism, and learning from failure.

[travellingtoes]

30 of May

Last night's dream: Places where I lived.

 One was an apartment in the city but it seemed to just be Court Street. I had a small square room and all the walls covered in long rectangular windows. There was no privacy and I remember worrying that now people would see me on my computer on Friday nights.

There was also a house made out of cooking utensils and keys, but the walls were lined in displayed shoes resting on their boxes, like an aisle of a shoe deparment.