12/19/07

i have nothing (new) to say (still)

this is from march 2007. but it is today too. and my "current mood" is still soulless:

ocean filled marbles
The rage of seventy-three oceans are in my head, all compressed to the size of a marble. Like a black hole. Such an extreme of gravity, density, pressing chunks of matter the size of the earth into a fingernail's thickness. I am collapsing in on myself. My body thinks it's a fist. I keep forgetting to breathe. Even my lungs are clenched and knotted.

I am a song on repeat.

Always lost. Always angry. A construction of rage, using the same adjectives over and over.

I am a song on repeat.

I should have been an Artist-- channeling my pain into dark beauty. But I can't paint. I can't sing. I can't even find words to catalogue and dissect it. Everything I write tastes the same.

I am a song on repeat.

I can't even think of an original metaphor. The ocean? How trite is that? But nothing else feels quite like the tide knocking you over as it drags at your ankles. Nothing else I know has such a sense of power and such a lack of conscience. Cool wet choking apathy. It is the only truth that comes close, cliché or not. I can remember being very young and touching the foam on the waves as it melted beneath my fingers. This was before the Disney movie came out, but I'd read the story of the little mermaid. Dead mermaids become foam on the waves. There always seemed to be such an endless amount of foam. I remember feeling sad about all those dead mermaids, and also feeling sad because it meant that they all died without ever being happy. I would imagine the little mermaid standing over the prince and his wife with the knife, right before she kills herself. At age four, I thought that was really stupid of her. She should have stabbed that prince jerk. Plus, I thought stabbing herself was really melodramatic and needlessly painful. I suppose I was a lot smarter at four… So silly. As if a few drops of blood could drain out an ocean. I know it doesn't work, but it feels like it should. A pressure inside my skull that I ought to be able to release, like popping a blister. But everything, any and all attempts, just feed it. Just make the black hole denser. Me, stupider.

I am a song on repeat.

I used to "feed the waves" at the beach-- with my hands full of sand and anticipation, and i liked how the waves licked my fingers. I thought of the ocean like a hungry wild-animal, so i fed it sand to appease it. But it was always still hungry. Just like that marble still rolls smugly around in my head, untouched, and even if I were to smash my skull open and claw it to mush, I doubt I could reach it. I am a song on repeat.

12/13/07

Symmetry

Symmetry. I think about symmetry a lot, because i am not very symmetrical. Well, sure, maybe in an OCD way... but i mean literally. (don't i always?)

i know most people have one slightly bigger side of their body, which they only notice when they have to buy shoes or a bra... but the left side of my body irritates me more often than that. my left leg is longer than the other one and i walk weird, but people don't notice. "people never notice anything."

anyway, i have been thinking a lot about my 3rd grade science project, which was about the halves of the brain. and the visual object lesson was several pictures of faces in the middle of the board, and a small mirror... and people were supposed to put the mirror up to the mid-line of the face so that you could see what a person would look like with 2 left halves of their face, or 2 right halves. perfect symmetry.

now, the point of my science project wasn't supposed to have anything to do with this next part, but this next part is what i remember best...

one of the pictures i had was of ted bundy. (yes, we had an extra picture of ted bundy lying around in the garage.) and the others were just of neighbors or people from church who let me take their picture.

so, the guy who seemed like normal-happy-church-guy looked fine both ways. 2 rights or 2 lefts... he looked about the same. still nice and happy either way. but ted bundy was rather more dramatic. if you doubled his face one way, he looked normal. and when doubled the other way he looked evil and psycho. i mean, it was shockingly noticeable, and many kids and adults commented on this fact, not just me.

so, i don't really know where i am going with this, but i thought about this a lot later on-- like when you learn how humans are attracted to symmetry, and how we instinctively know that symmetry means healthier and more genetically viable.

when i did the mirror thing and saw the 2 Ted Bundys... i asked if that meant there was a nice Ted was trapped inside the brain with the other one... but i heard back, "No. He is all bad now."

But i still worried about it.

i'm not incapable like a stroke victim or anything... But, i only use half of my face to make expressions.

12/8/07

Day is for day, Night is for night.

Amanda is not: sleep at night.
Am i stuck in a book again?
Fight, fight, fight all night... like Go Dog, GO!
??
i am INDO board. i am Watch-the-Tree-lights-dance. i am Listen to XM music on TV... and why, why do i get sucked into Infomercials??? but i really do think i want a Trikke... it looks so cool and swoopy-swervy... i am Sure i must need one... but i could just want to be Warm-and-happy-people-riding-near-a-beach and not cold-and-dark-snow-outside, like i Am.
can a Trikke ride in snow? go! go! go in snow? there is a ski kind too but i don't want that one, just the wheel kind, because i am not talking about SERIOUS snow, just the sidewalk kind.

Do you like my hat?
Do you like my hat?
Do you like my hat?

No. I do not.

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SALT

Today, I do not like Salt. I only like paprika. Mommy makes very excellent mashed potatoes, and she splashes beautiful RED paprika across the surface before she puts the bowl on the table. I like to scoop out the part that has drippy gold melts of butter and RED paprika SPLASH across all the white. I don’t know how long this day is or when it starts, but at first, Mommy would put the scoop on the plate for me, and now, sometimes I have to stop hogging all the butter and share.

And Today the radio plays Push It by Salt-N-Pepa all the day. And you love Salt-iN-Pepper! You think they have a great name. You have never considered salting your pepper, because you are not really a fan of pepper… but maybe that is because your pepper just needs SALT!!! But, you decide that Pepper, even salted Pepper, is not good all alone. However, SUGAR, is very different, and you like to eat that plain just fine.

When grown-ups say “AMANDA! You are A PILL!” …you agree and think you are probably a SUGAR pill and NOT the vitamin kind.

Today, we go to Joseph Smith’s house for dinner. Joe is Mommy’s professor at Law School. (Mommy graduates Law School when I am 7, so I was probably 6 at this dinner.) Joe is blind and has a guide dog. I already like Joe, because one time he gave Mommy a pack of stickers. The stickers were ALL purple circles, and he said he got it for her because she was so color-coordinated. And Mommy laughed and didn’t understand the joke, but I DID and thought Joe was very funny, and I was excited to meet him and his dog-eyes. And Joe’s wife makes HOMEMADE mashed potatoes, which sounds very yummy, because you love mashed potatoes… And since Joe is blind, he probably has a more developed sense of taste, because you know blind people sometimes have better sense after they lose their eyes. But the wife makes GROSS mashed potatoes. They are LUMPY and you like SMOOTH. And PLUS, no paprika. And PLUS, no golden river of butter! And you know your mother is a much better cook because she knows that instant potatoes from a can are much smoother, and therefore, BETTER. And you ask about Paprika, and there isn’t any, and Mommy probably gives you a LOOK to BE POLITE! And so you just use some salt, and you discover that SALT… DOES, in fact, help. And you feel sorry that Joe does not have a Mommy to make him really GOOD mashed potatoes, but maybe he can TASTE so well, that his (same) potatoes ARE good.

And later, you realize why people think, “salt of the earth” is a good thing to be. Because salt is pretty good.

And later, you notice that sometimes people forget salt all by itself is gross.
...if I were blind, I would know what you are...”
—Schemendrick the Magician (when he greets the Last Unicorn)
And you SEE that you HEAR a different meaning in that than most people, just like most people can not see the unicorn in the movie and instead just see a white horse.

And I wonder what else I am missing by not being blind.

12/7/07

Rain

The icy sidewalks were melted this morning. And it was raining drops so fine that i could breathe them in. I went for a walk and i could BREATHE. Not that it was quite nice enough to forgive Utah for not being Florida, but still, it was so nice to have rain and be able to pretend a little. And all the trees were looking black and wicked because they are are leafless and bony now, and so they were scratching up against the sky in a nice way, and it was not oppressively cloudy but just the right amount, enough to erase the horrible, suffocating mountains and give me the illusion of SKY.

SEER page 40

because TODAY, you SEE the Prism-Prison

SMASH!
(and SMASH! needs 10,000 more pages to be big enough to see how big the explosion was, but that would waste a lot of ink, so you need to stop and imagine it, because I do not have a paper that big anyway)

And the RAINBOW breaks out, and it is the most beautiful thing you have EVER SEEN.

SUN+GLASS+RAINBOW+DANCING+HAPPY-SCREAM!!

!!!!SCREAM-SMASH!!!!

and you can not speak. and you can not move. and you are FORCED to BE STILL by the power in front of you.

Because there is just so much LIGHT and so much JOY and so much so much that your brain WILL explode if there IS ANY MORE.

And you SEE a glimpse of WHY, MAY BE the WOW! and the dancing-joy-rainbow-song had to tone all of that down before you reached it, but also had to turn the volume louder for Mommy because also may be she would not have noticed otherwise, because you SEE that she is much less impressed that you are, even though she got to see MORE miracle.

And inside your head you hear the voice of King Haggard, from the Last-Unicorn-Movie, when he says:

“…they FILL me, with JOY…”

when he explains WHY he stole all those unicorns and put them in the sea, which is one sentence of why sometimes you love King Haggard the best, even though he is the BAD guy in the movie, because you know EXACTLY how he feels when he whispers that, and you long for a unicorn too, but the movie teaches you that unicorns are just not as good in a cage, even if the cage is as big as the whole ocean, because the BEST part is when the unicorns go FREE and spill out of the sea, and run and RUN and run back into the world, even though that part lasts for only a few seconds in the movie, it is the part that you watch the WHOLE movie FOR, because THAT is the good part.

And you remember how Mommy is a girl that really knows how to horde/hold onto a turtle.

And NOT so much a turtle-freer-sharer.

Mommy, in fact, is more of a CATCH-THOSE-UNICORNS!!! kind of person, quite a bit of the time. Just like King Haggard, but still nicer and prettier.


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...still











SEER page 38

Maybe Forever.

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Today, GOOD-Mommy gives me a present!

Present: Pre like baby or preemie. And sent by Mommy. And Pre… ZENT! Like, if you add a flourish or whip it out from behind your back, like Mommy does, so you remember that this is not birthday or Christmas day.

The name of the present sounds like PRIZZAM. (But later you learn it is spelled Prism.) And it is a small, triangle, piece of glass. And GOOD-Mommy explains that if you are careful, and can find the trick, you can see the rainbow inside, AND also, get the rainbow to come out of the glass. And GOOD-Mommy got the prism-present just for you for know reason! Just because she likes you! And she thought it was COOL! (like cool-interesting)

Prizzam: PRI like a PRIson, and also like an I AM is inside of the prison, and also ZZ like a trapped bee, buZZing and trying to escape. And the I AM part is a rainbow, and it is trying to escape the Prism-Prison.

And then Today is 2 to 5 years later. And you notice that 2 to 5 or 5-10 is how people say it when they get a prison sentence. And that a life-sentence means different amounts of time depending on what state the prison is in, and is not always the same as the lifespan of the prisoner. Which does not sound very fair, but Mommy says is TRUE regardless, and she knows because she is in Law School.

You think about how people’s Mommy and Daddies always cry about their kids being sent to prison, even when they admit their kid was BAD and did something WRONG, may be because Moms and Dads SEE how the SON and the I are trapped in the word prison, and they want to pry their kid out-apart because they want them to get I and SON and PRY and PRISON all straightened out and free again, instead of all tangled up and trapped in un-happy together.

But still Today, is only as far as you know that the sentence is 2-5 for the rainbow in prism.

And today, you have played and played with that prizzam(*line drawn through word, but blog format won't allow that) prism(*line also drawn through prism) Glass and tried and tried to coax that rainbow out. And sometimes in the 2 to 5, when you LOOK HARD, you can see a HINT of what MIGHT be a rainbow.

And some days, in the 2-5, this is the rest of the sentence:
…and I put a skittles next to the rainbow-glass to see if the rainbows will want to play together, since the rainbow-glass will not come out for just me yet, but I CAN taste the rainbow in the skittles, so I have decided to consult the skittles about how to play with rainbow-in-the-glass, and may be if I put them next to each other, and leave them alone, and then spy on them, I will catch both rainbows (the skittles and the prism) out playing…

Or Today… I tell Rainbow-glass that is does not have to do any tricks today if it is not up to it, because that’s ok, and I still like it anyway, and I still like for it to just sit in my window because I SEE that it at least wants to look out the window more than it wants to sit in a dark drawer, and I like to look out the window too.

And Today I add that I wish I could go play outside too, and tell Rainbow-glass that I will take it outside tomorrow. But since for today we have to play-inside, I will tell it about the solar system on the wall of my room that GOOD-Mommy pinned up near the ceiling. And I tell Rainbow-glass that it might want to consider a career as an astronaut, like I am, because then, the SPACE you get to PLAY in is pretty much unlimited, because it is also your JOB and so you get to work at playing in space all the time! And then Mommy walks into my room, and wants to know who I am talking to, and asks me very curious…

Mommy: What are you doing?

And I shrug and feel silly-awkward-baby-dumb and I say…

Amanda: I am just playing pretend.

Mommy (smiles): Oh! What are you pretending?

Amanda: Um… teacher, I guess.

Mommy: Oh. Who are you teaching?

Amanda: My room.

Mommy: You mean the TOYS in the room?

Amanda: Just… (shrug) my room. But, yeah, I guess the toys too.

Mommy: Oh. Ok… Well, I guess I’ll let you keep playing then?

Amanda (relieved): OK! Bye Mommy!

(But you didn’t really mean the toys so much… and MY ROOM and MY SPACE are common themes/problems in your story. Notice that farmer, astronaut, and horse trainer sound good to you—but never cop or fireman… at least, not until you are older and discover the book Fahrenheit 451, because THOSE fireman are a kind you have never heard of, and when you read that book you will have to re-think what you know about fireman, and re-consider your career options.)

BUT! Today, you are not that far yet, and it is still the 2-5 sentence.

And Today, you are somewhere in the house, but not in your ROOM… and… you hear Mommy SCREEEAM!!
From.

inside…

Your Room.

And you RUN as fast as you possible can.

But just as you ALMOST REACH the door to your room, Mommy cries out in sad-dismay-disappointment kind of noise.

Just like something has been horrible killed!

But Mommy looks ok… because now you SEE HER filling up the doorway.

And Mommy tells you that she is SO SORRY to disappoint you, and she is so sorry you just missed it… but… the thing is… there were just RAINBOWS all over your room, but they all stopped before you got here. (AND THEN) Mommy looks back in to the room, and says… (still disappointed sounding) well… I guess there is still just a speck left on that wall… but she wishes you had been here a couple seconds ago because…

(And this is where you SHOVE past Mommy into that ROOM NOW!)

Before you miss that last speck too!

WAIT!!!
WAIT! PLEASE!!!! RAINBOW-GLASS!
WAIT FOR ME!!!

…and you must be GOOD-dead in this part. Because you are SURE time stood still…

12/4/07

SEER page 31

Today one of your favorite foods is spaghetti-o’s in a can. You love the spaghetti-o’s with meatballs! And you are big enough now to open the can, dump them in a bowl, and warm them in the microwave, and eat them, all by yourself. And you like to make this delicious lunch for yourself quite often.

And today is saving meatballs. Just in case. Because meatballs are the best part. And you really don’t know WHY you want to save the meatballs yet, because what you really want is some kind of unicorn-bait to put in the yard so you can catch a unicorn. And you do not think unicorns are carnivorous, because horses are not. But you reason, that unicorns might be part LION, like their tails, and lions DO eat meat… so maybe unicorns DO like spaghetti-o’s or meatballs! And you think on this some more…

And Today, you get caught with a paper napkin full of cold meatballs, with the sauce licked off, walking out the door. And a puzzled and amused Daddy stops you, because he sees you take the meatball pile out of the microwave, where you had left it, (because bugs can’t get into either the microwave or the refrigerator when it is shut, but they CAN get to food ANYWHERE else) and you are asked to explain (to Daddy) just what it is you think you are doing?!

And you are pretty nonplussed about what he means, so you just answer,
“They are messier with the sauce on.”

Daddy: But… are those meatballs? And also, aren’t you going to turn the microwave ON before you take them out?

Amanda: Oh, no. They are easier to carry cold.

Daddy now starts to sound annoyed or perplexed.

Daddy: But… WHY DO YOU WANT COLD MEATBALLS??

I start to get nervous.

Amanda: Well, I don’t know, I guess first I liked hot best, but then I found out cold are good too, at least I like them cold anyway, and plus easier to carry, because hot rips the napkin and won’t carry as many, and is it ok if I go outside now?

Daddy: Well, SURE! I guess… go on outside then.

And he shakes his head, but not like he is angry or like you have done anything BAD, so you shrug too, and go out the back door of grandmother’s house, which is your house too at the time because you live there today… And you find that you need to eat a couple of the meatballs, so you can free one hand, to be able to turn the doorknob and open the door. And you wish you could open the door with your feet, and think you should work on developing that skill… just in case, next time your hands are full of meatballs again...

12/1/07

Genie in a bottle.

Dreamed last night. (Or day, since I read Mansfield Park and so didn't go to sleep until just before dawn.) I dreamed i was obsessed with Genies. Djinni? And i was sitting at a school desk, but it was not a school setting. Some one's house, and there were lots of people milling around. My brother was sitting at a desk in front of me, turned around in the seat, and i was telling him all about Genies and bottles filled up with them. And I kept getting yelled at for talking, but not by a teacher because there wasn't one, i guess by family, because my mom and dad were there, and some other extended family i dislike and/or barely know/knew. And so i wasn't allowed to talk to him anymore and i had to go into the kitchen and sit and my back was to the room and i hate that and people kept walking behind me and tripping over me or putting there hand on my shoulder to steady themselves and i got way stressed and went outside, and got yelled at by my dad, i can't remember what he said, just everyone was mad at me for going outside and making a scene.

anyway, it was an upsetting dream. and i got in a fight with Garret afterward because i yelled at him when i was trying to think and he kept interrupting me, and so he was mad and so then i just wanted it to be resolved and over, and i really hate that people don't accept that and think i am pouting or being manipulative or whatever because really and truly i just want people to GO AWAY and they WON'T and then things DO turn into a huge fight because they keep talking and the more they keep talking at me the more agitated i get so that then i AM mad. it's so stupid but i keep repeating this pattern with multiple people. sometimes i will say ANYTHING to make them LEAVE, i am mean and say horrible things just so they will get mad enough to leave me alone, and so i FAKE being all mad and scream and have to throw a fit so they will SHUT-UP, and then i do not feel the least bit bad about it. (we really didn't get in THAT bad of a fight today, i was just thinking about the whole pattern of it as i was lying under the bed) all i feel when someone stalks off crying or slams the front door on me is CALM. nice peaceful calm RELIEF. it seems like a lot of unnecessary drama. if people would just go away in the first place and wait for me to return instead of following me around and talking through doors or whatever, then they would be happier and i would be happier and so why don't people just LISTEN when i explain (later when i can talk) that they should just let me crawl under the bed and talk to the cat?

See, this i why i don't believe OTHER people now when they say they are not mad, because since people don't leave ME alone, it must mean THEY are really mad when they say they are not, because otherwise, why do they disbelieve me?