I'm sitting down to apply for this internship, and there's a pixie sitting on my shoulder going, why are you bothering, really, I mean come on, it's not going to happen, so why. Think of all the other things, all the other things, where you've typed yourself into a self pitying hole, dodging the gap between modesty and radical difference, trying to paste yourself into a place where only you will do, when you don't quite believe it, and being too different will ensure a fail.
It's that old gap between being different and special enough to get chosen in the first place, and being subtle and cool enough to fit in with that which already exists. I don't know why applying for stuff fills me with such dread. I suppose my lack of confidence plays down any positive attributes. I am jealous of them. I am jealous of people getting on, doing things, me watching from the sidelines as everything whizzes past, confused, my head whirring and looking for explanation, how did I get here? How did I land up on the side of the road, watching the race?
Actually, this morning, I suddenly thought, don't be so hard on yourself. You know, the way things went, you really were just car crash fodder. You left a degree with no training, no answers, not even the beginning of questions. You it difficult fighting for art admin jobs below you, concurrently losing skills for said jobs as the years went on. It's been 4 years and I haven't done anything. I am amazing at customer service. I can cater for 40. But, apart from that, I let everything else slide. I haven't played the flute for nine years. I haven't made any art in five years. Things that were strings are now just souvenirs.
At the same time, I must be careful not to dismiss things I do know. I do have a knowledge basis, it just is very stale and rusty. I should dust it off, and I intend to, but sometimes I feel so fallen that I just can't see over the wall. It's dusty and chalky and smooth and there are no holds and I cannot get up there, no way. There are lights, but they only come at good times. I don't want to send this application off half heartedly, so I'll leave it now. I need to just wade through this stupid half time and know that it isn't too far between here and there. And I am very prepared for the effort invloved.
Monday 21 September 2009
Saturday 12 September 2009
Extremely exhausted
I have just finished my dinner, and I'm not satisfied. I have been eating monstrously for over a week, waiting for the hormones to kick in and sort out, and I'm still waiting. Nothing is enough. I can eat veggies, I want chocolate. I can drink juice, I want cake. The body is knotted as it waits, we're waiting, getting fatter day by day on swollen stomach and excess consumption. Right now I have just eaten a dinner of (soya) peas and carrots stir fry, it was good, but something is still missing.
Stress arms are back. Heavy tenseness. Today was hard. I was so insanely bored, having many of those 'shit, this is me, in my life, now' moments. They drive me nuts. It was just this waiting for something to do. I looked at the clock at 12.30 yesterday, 6 hours to go, and I didn't even want to sob, I just wanted to wail like a banshee. I had a slight 'this isn't what it's all about, right', moment today. Like I saw myself decaying and wanted more.
I had a conversation with The Voice today. It made me 2 minutes late off my break. I am loving people. Imagine, me, loving people. I love it when people show me how amazing things can be, it's like I feed off their energy and drive, I just bathe in it. He emphatically said studying fine art was the best time in his life, I stared at his shoes a few times and believed him. They didn't really match his outfit, a reddish tone to the yellowish tweed, but in that way they did match. I wondered when would be my most exciting time?
I believed it when I said I was using the next months to sort myself and try and get things moving. I'm worrying I won't have ideas, I said. He told me to think of one a day, If you don't actively pursue them, how can you expect them to come? I think I put pressure on them, these Genius Moments, set them apart from life and made them impossible. What would happen if I had an idea, right NOW? The worrying thing is that I am out of practice, but this shouldn't stop me from trying. Good luck with the creative process, he wished me. And it didn't seem so outrageous.
Stress arms are back. Heavy tenseness. Today was hard. I was so insanely bored, having many of those 'shit, this is me, in my life, now' moments. They drive me nuts. It was just this waiting for something to do. I looked at the clock at 12.30 yesterday, 6 hours to go, and I didn't even want to sob, I just wanted to wail like a banshee. I had a slight 'this isn't what it's all about, right', moment today. Like I saw myself decaying and wanted more.
I had a conversation with The Voice today. It made me 2 minutes late off my break. I am loving people. Imagine, me, loving people. I love it when people show me how amazing things can be, it's like I feed off their energy and drive, I just bathe in it. He emphatically said studying fine art was the best time in his life, I stared at his shoes a few times and believed him. They didn't really match his outfit, a reddish tone to the yellowish tweed, but in that way they did match. I wondered when would be my most exciting time?
I believed it when I said I was using the next months to sort myself and try and get things moving. I'm worrying I won't have ideas, I said. He told me to think of one a day, If you don't actively pursue them, how can you expect them to come? I think I put pressure on them, these Genius Moments, set them apart from life and made them impossible. What would happen if I had an idea, right NOW? The worrying thing is that I am out of practice, but this shouldn't stop me from trying. Good luck with the creative process, he wished me. And it didn't seem so outrageous.
Friday 11 September 2009
Blueberries, maybe I like them now
I love smacking the last bunch of blueberries into the last dregs of Greek yogurt, 10% fat, straight into to bottom of the pot. I love fishing for them with a tea spoon, not quite enough room to fit on the surface comfortably, so they bunch up in clumps. Eat them fast like a contest, popping in between the creamy, always 10%, smoothness. Is there anything more sensual to eat than Greek yogurt? Velvety, creamy, tangy addictive.
I am reveling in the last few days of a lonesome house. Prancing round the kitchen in a tiny nightie making fake quick-steps to Singing in the Rain. Scoffing blueberries grossly. What else is there to do? I'm not going to miss the lonesomeness. It's been rather paralysing. She said how different it was, that in a big house, people will knock on and check you're ok. I was ill numerous times this year, and I struggled through without painkillers or soup or caramel digestives, because no one in London cared.
He said how easy it would be to double-and-more my friendship group in an evening. I am enjoying filling my phone with new numbers, putting a rather more serious dent into that seven million, collecting people. I should try, I have a lot to think, or a lot more space to think, I need to create my new self, one which continues to do things that can relate to other people. basically continues to live. I stopped living in Liverpool. There was no-one to compare anything with, share anything with, so I stopped things. It sounds overarched but I'm being serious. Even now I get excited when I share something with someone, learn from someone else. I spent so long in a vacuum I thought I was the odd one out, my interest too odd, my loves not quite right, my eye, dying.
So I'm moving into this shared space. I have already made a commitment to myself, with lack of contract, that I have to shape the time there into my own worth. I am paying for space to be creative in, have ideas in, learn, do, make. I will give this a really good go, and if I don't have any ideas or get anything happening by the new year, then I will have to take a serious look at myself and really sign myself off to something boring and staid, because, well, that might be it. But obviously I have this secret something, which brought me down here in the first place, that says there is so much more than running an almost-imaginary cafe, baking cakes at top speed for £7 an hour, teaching kids how to make windmills, applying for arts council funding, being around pretenders. Now is the time I can make a difference, re-place myself, and let myself go.
I am reveling in the last few days of a lonesome house. Prancing round the kitchen in a tiny nightie making fake quick-steps to Singing in the Rain. Scoffing blueberries grossly. What else is there to do? I'm not going to miss the lonesomeness. It's been rather paralysing. She said how different it was, that in a big house, people will knock on and check you're ok. I was ill numerous times this year, and I struggled through without painkillers or soup or caramel digestives, because no one in London cared.
He said how easy it would be to double-and-more my friendship group in an evening. I am enjoying filling my phone with new numbers, putting a rather more serious dent into that seven million, collecting people. I should try, I have a lot to think, or a lot more space to think, I need to create my new self, one which continues to do things that can relate to other people. basically continues to live. I stopped living in Liverpool. There was no-one to compare anything with, share anything with, so I stopped things. It sounds overarched but I'm being serious. Even now I get excited when I share something with someone, learn from someone else. I spent so long in a vacuum I thought I was the odd one out, my interest too odd, my loves not quite right, my eye, dying.
So I'm moving into this shared space. I have already made a commitment to myself, with lack of contract, that I have to shape the time there into my own worth. I am paying for space to be creative in, have ideas in, learn, do, make. I will give this a really good go, and if I don't have any ideas or get anything happening by the new year, then I will have to take a serious look at myself and really sign myself off to something boring and staid, because, well, that might be it. But obviously I have this secret something, which brought me down here in the first place, that says there is so much more than running an almost-imaginary cafe, baking cakes at top speed for £7 an hour, teaching kids how to make windmills, applying for arts council funding, being around pretenders. Now is the time I can make a difference, re-place myself, and let myself go.
Wednesday 9 September 2009
post humous post
I don't know why but all of a sudden I've started to feel like I have more choices than I could ever picture before. I knew I was free, but I never felt it. The universe was tying me down, holding me down, strapped. I crawled underneath a low laid cargo net scratching my hair and my knees, my palms pacing. This is your limit it said, this is as high as you can ever go, not even standing, scrabbling along under this level of lowness.
We were talking about the year that shaped you, the year that things happened that years later, you stand back from and feel affinity with, still feel excited by. I felt excited about 1988, when I realised there were other beings than myself, other places that home, and respect, humour and cleverness existed. I sat back and felt proud that now was one of those years. A negative at the time, but if you push through it, shove it along, the shit falls over the edge and you emerge running. Hopefully.
I had a complete meltdown yesterday. I started to feel sick, my stomach churned and I was sure it wasn't the bean soup with excess coriander, or too many almond croissant corners. It wasn't butterflies it wasn't driving test, it wasn't period it wasn't exams. It was sick to my stomach. I burst after serving him, the compassion generated in under a minute drove me to sadness as the rich man asked me for Colombia Dark, I turned round and my eyes were filled. I turned round and swallowed it, walked calmly down the stairs and burst. The sickness went and I ate apple pie. Weak and crumbled, but space for anew.
I was worried a few months ago that any extreme emotion I ever felt would drive me to tears. Sadness equals tears, immense realisation equals tears. I would suddenly see the world alight and cry, it glowed and I couldn't believe it. I am starting to realise the glowing world is not a priviledge, but a right. I am fortunate enough to not know true suffering, and I must spread the level of compassion I yearn for. I think people can see it. They see a glimmer in your eyes if you are believing in the world.
(5th September 00:18)
We were talking about the year that shaped you, the year that things happened that years later, you stand back from and feel affinity with, still feel excited by. I felt excited about 1988, when I realised there were other beings than myself, other places that home, and respect, humour and cleverness existed. I sat back and felt proud that now was one of those years. A negative at the time, but if you push through it, shove it along, the shit falls over the edge and you emerge running. Hopefully.
I had a complete meltdown yesterday. I started to feel sick, my stomach churned and I was sure it wasn't the bean soup with excess coriander, or too many almond croissant corners. It wasn't butterflies it wasn't driving test, it wasn't period it wasn't exams. It was sick to my stomach. I burst after serving him, the compassion generated in under a minute drove me to sadness as the rich man asked me for Colombia Dark, I turned round and my eyes were filled. I turned round and swallowed it, walked calmly down the stairs and burst. The sickness went and I ate apple pie. Weak and crumbled, but space for anew.
I was worried a few months ago that any extreme emotion I ever felt would drive me to tears. Sadness equals tears, immense realisation equals tears. I would suddenly see the world alight and cry, it glowed and I couldn't believe it. I am starting to realise the glowing world is not a priviledge, but a right. I am fortunate enough to not know true suffering, and I must spread the level of compassion I yearn for. I think people can see it. They see a glimmer in your eyes if you are believing in the world.
(5th September 00:18)
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