Who am I

When I was a sophmore in highschool, I was assigned to write a paper on the subject of “who am I.” This is what occurs in catholic highschool religion classes. I wrote a paper telling the teacher to bug off, it was none of his buisiness. When I was a junior in highschool, I was assigned to write a personal statement which would be useful for college apps. I started it with “‘I am gay.'” explaining that my previous year’s paper should have started with that sentence. When I was a senior, I borrowed the phrase from Socrates that “the unexamined life is not worth living.” In college, they quit making us write these papers.

Maybe that’s why I have so little sense of self now. I was talking with Amy, former housemate, on the phone today and she asked who I was without Christi. I have no idea. So I’m giving up on self-loathing, because I’m not even sure who I’m mad at. I used to rant about how individuality is over emphasised in Amerikan culture. I still think this is true. “Rugged individualism” is a myth put forth by people who want to renig on the govt’s role in the social contract. But maybe some individuation is a good thing.

I’ve had a very crappy couple of years. My mom died. My marriage broke up. I think that I can’t live for other people. Other people are unreliable. They die or leave. I have to live for myself (whoever that is). This is, of course, tempered by the idea of community. There’s a fine line here. I need to be self-reliant, and I need to be conscious of how my decisions affect other people.
My plan was to explain the aimlessness of my mid-twenties by explaining that I was “finding myself.” Unfortunately, I wasn’t looking hard enough. Jean says that by the time my Saturn Return is done (I’ve got one year left), I’ll be an entirely different person than I was before, so I’m guessing it means that it’s ok that my sense of self is somewhat confuddled.
My friends and neighbors that I’ve been talking to all tell me “hey you look good!” Like I’ve undergone some sort of change. And a positive one at that. I was thinking that I’ve finally met my goal of becomming mellow as fxck, but then someone told me that it was having short hair. Alas, still angsty. Not yet mellow.
Saw Autmn and Stephen and my dad tonight at a show at 21 Grand. It was groovy, especially the first tow acts I saw, most especially the second one. Beforehand, I played my new tunes for my dad. He heard the triad one and asked if I was going to see a shrink at school. I enjoy this reaction, actually. I want people who hear the piece to think of throwing themselves in front of trains. I want it to sound more melancholy. I want people who hear it to feel the crushing pain of existence bearing down on them from all sides. I want them to realize that in two short years they can lose the two people who are most important to them. That love doesn’t conquer all. It doesn’t conquer anything. Everything that they have faith and hope in will eventually crumble and come to naught and trying to stop it is like trying to stop the tide. I want listeners to taste their own mortality.
So far, I have not come upon exactly the right sound design to get these reactions.
when next I post, I’ll be back on the east coast.

what if you gave an open house and nobody came?

I think I will now go knock on my neighbor’s doors. We have the tie, but I feel uncomfortable not having a margin. And zero people have come over, even though a lot of guacamole was made.

one vote short of a tie

talked to more neighbors yesterday. two units agreed to abstain. two more said they would be fine with the temporary structure remaining. so i just need one more vote. but i should have more to be on the safe side. and of course, everything could go terribly wrong at the meeting.

the two abstaining units, both owned by the same person, didn’t want to side with me against the whole compound. they voted last night at a proxy meeting, so i can’t go back to them and say they’d be in the majority if they sided with me.
i dunno if i can get the one more vote. i talked to all the mellow people first.
yesterday was the deadline for applications to the Bang on a Can summer session, which I guess I will not be attending. Dunno what I’ll be doing this summer. I want to go to the Michigan Womyns Music Festival. And the Deep Listening Retreat. And I guess I’ll get a job and write some tunes. Which coast will I be on? dunno. know nothing.
leaving here sunday morning. If you are an east coast reader and want to give me a ride from the hartford airport around 9:00 sunday night, contact me for details! You could get onion rings out of the deal!

Scitilopolitics

Here is the two channel version of Scitilopolitics. Best heard with headphones, as it’s supossed to be a spacialized, 4 channel piece. Thi is the thing I did last semester with samples from Dubya and quotes from Jeffner Allen’s book, Lesbian Philosophy: Explorations (Palo Alto: Institute of Lesbian Studies, 1987). More info about it was posted on my blog earlier: http://celesteh.blogspot.com/2003_12_14_celesteh_archive.html#107137905962361902. It is 11 minutes and 2 seconds long and is 9 megabytes of data. Recall that I just learned yesterday how to record the output of Supercollider. This peice is (like the triads recently posted) algorythmic, so this is just what happened when I ran the program this afternoon.

more

the hoa board president just came over and related concerns of people who are trying to sell their places and how the temporary structure might affect them. so we’ve got three yes votes and 11 probable nos. Ellen started talking about how she wouldn’t have moved here. why didn’t we talk to her before building the thing? i wasn’t even around then, i was at school.

when my mom was sick, a group of people and I went to see Minority Report at the big megaplex theatre in Mountain View. It was a Tom Cruise movie with lots of action and random violence, although somewhat written by my favorite sci-fi author. I shook the whole time the movie was on, totally overwhelmed, and hoped that nobody would notice me shaking. Afterwards I panicked in the parking lot about whether my mom would take all of the toxic pills that my dad refused to put out of her reach.
i feel like that now.
I couldn’t keep my mom safe. i couldn’t make things work with christi. i can’t garuntee that ellen won’t be cast into fast food jobs. i can’t cant cant do anything. cant do anything but sit here, tiwtiching, blog posting.
I think “i’m an asshole,” but then i think it’s been stressful lately, “this is not who i am.” well, then who the hell am i? i am a failure in relationship. i am someone who lures people here with false promises of working space, then shows up unexpectedly, has a major crisis, acts like an ass, is unable to deliver the promised work space and is totally incabable of dealing with the stress. i can’t go to the dmv without having to breathe deeply the whole time. but, hey, maybe this is not who i am. maybe there is a capable human lurking deep somewhere, maybe out for a holiday, maybe getting a bite for lunch, maybe hiding under the bed.
these woes aren’t even that bad, not like mom swallowing a pile of god-knows-what in the middle of the night. (thank god she never got into the pills. i did not hysterically go insist in the middle of the night that something be done. i can’t remember how this was resolved.) why can’t i function?

today

Ellen told me the Halvah eases the crushing pain of existence. I think she may be right. I’ve been in the kind of mood lately where thoughts like “I’m an asshole” and “I am a bug splatted on the windshield of life” seem profound. So a short scene came to me on bart.

We walked into Mamounds. “You’ve been so glum lately,” she said, brushing a wisp of her long dark hair from her face. She smiled encouragingly and her hands fluttered gracefully.
The woman behind the counter stared at us impatiently. “Can I help you?” she asked.
“What do you have that eases the crushing pain of life?” I asked.
“Halvah for $1.50” she indicated the display case on the counter.
“Can I have a chocolate one and a turkish coffee?” I asked.
“For here or to go?”
I shrugged at Jessica.
“For here.” Jessica directed.
I got my truck smog checked and registered. It took a long dern time. And I figured out how to record audio on supercollider. The help file has a bug in it. and I wallowed in self loathing/pity for a while.
I talked to two of my neighbors about the temporary structure in the backyard. The Home Owners Association is meeting a week from today to decide if they will compell us to tear it down. Ellen was explaining to me this morning that if she loses the temporary structure, she’ll lose her Seattle gig and be forced to take minimum wage jobs and live in a studio apartment and have a budget to buy a few pieces of drawing paper periodically and dabble in art on weekends.
Please light a candle dedicated to your diety of choice that the association decides to let it stay. their issues are twofold: 1. It didn’t get pre-approval from the design review committee. (my defence: uh sorry. i wasn’t here when it was built.) 2. It may cause water penetration (my defence: it’s only going to stay up until may 2005. the possibility of structural damage in that time is remote. and i would of course be responcible for any repairs required as a result of it’s being there temporarily.)
One neighbor was supportive. the other was on the board. she indicated that people have to face consequences for their errors. So because the review comittee was skipped, there is no way in hell that she would allow it to stay. also, it’s important to keep art in perspective. it has it’s place in life, but that is secondary to property values.
we’re having an open house on saturday so people can see the temporary structure and get an idea of what things are about. of course, neither ellen nor i posses social skills in any significant degree. i fear it will be a disaster. i’m thinking of trying to pull in outside talent to pitch our case.
doom.
i don’t have the energy for this. i have important self-loathing to do.
any suggestions from anyone would be extremely welcome.