Under This Another

The Next Step!

2011-06-23T19:21:00.000-07:00

2010-10-17T18:31:00.001-07:00

RIP MJ

2010-06-25T09:35:00.001-07:00

2010-05-26T17:41:00.001-07:00

Hazy Cosmic Jive

2010-04-24T08:54:00.001-07:00

2010-03-22T16:00:00.000-07:00

Empty your chest.

2010-02-28T19:32:00.000-08:00

Say the word.

2010-01-23T16:01:00.000-08:00

Brand new mix for you.

You've got time.

2010-01-05T14:15:00.000-08:00

10/10/10

2009-10-11T10:39:00.000-07:00

Dream about Heaven.

2009-09-27T11:35:00.000-07:00

Ambergris Nebula

Today I made the best playlist I've made in a while.

2009-07-16T12:29:00.001-07:00

King.

2009-06-25T16:20:00.000-07:00

Forever came today.

Summer plans...

2009-06-24T19:49:00.000-07:00

I'll try not to sing out of key.

2009-06-21T13:52:00.000-07:00

happy father's day, dad.
i love you.

You're moments ago, but seconds away.

2009-06-14T16:36:00.000-07:00

when will i be able to shoot glitter from my hands??

The hopes burst.

2009-05-30T14:01:00.000-07:00

In love pool eyes float feathers after the struggle.
The hopes burst and shot joy all through the mind,
Sorrow more distant than a star.
Multi-color run down over your body,
Then the liquid passing all into all.
Love is hot truth is molten.
- Donovan from Goo Goo Barabajagal

mushitup.

2009-05-25T17:59:00.000-07:00

beauty is the promise of happiness.

Electric flesh-arrows.

2009-05-23T13:35:00.000-07:00

"Electric flesh-arrows... traversing the body. A rainbow of color strikes the eyelids. A foam of music falls over the ears. It is the gong of the orgasm." - Anais Nin, French born American Author of novels and short stories, 1903-1977.

And I was you and I was you.

2009-05-17T11:13:00.000-07:00

My absolute favorite person in the entire universe has turned 32 today.
There is no one I would want to celebrate the birth of more than him.
Happy Birthday Reg.

Rainbow Vein.

2009-05-14T16:26:00.000-07:00

Dream it; Build it

2009-05-05T18:33:00.000-07:00

Bloooonbikessss!

2009-05-02T13:56:00.001-07:00

Wet Dream

2009-04-29T10:41:00.001-07:00

Music video directed by Jacqueline Castel for Los Angeles duo Rainbow Arabia.

Ecliptique (autour du soleil)

2009-04-14T22:46:00.000-07:00

Make me stop my dreaming.

2009-04-11T11:08:00.000-07:00

Every morning he would wake up with a new bruise. Always in a new place, always about the same size, always a deep purple black. It had been that way for as long as he could remember - and for awhile he thought everyone experienced it: waking up to perform a bodily scavenger hunt to find the newly discolored patch of plum skin. At one time his body would be riddled with a full spectrum of bruises - violets, cyans, lime greens, and ambers - a staccato of unexplained injury.

But now it was all different. He was old enough to know that it was not normal, and the questions about his wounds were beginning to get serious. His school counselor was bringing him in every week now, rotating methods of interrogation and theories between abuse by a family member and self-mutilation. He almost enjoyed the days that he was suspected of self-mutilation; it gave him a thrill that someone actually thought he was a bad-ass. But it just wasn't true - he was too weak and timid for any of that. He was petrified for a month after he accidentally masturbated for the first time, sure that he was severely ill and possibly about to die. There could be no way that he would have the fortitude to cut or bruise himself. After the counselor had brought it up enough times he even tried it. He sat on the side of the tub, the setting sun outside the window casting a pink gold across his arms that he repeatedly scraped with the metal tip of a compass from his pencil case. He never could push down hard enough though - just enough to draw rows of white lines on his skin - a spiderweb of confusion.

He was brought to get a physical and have blood work done to rule out anemia or any other serious causes - but no definitive answers came of it. He just needed to "be more careful." He tried to explain, tears beginning to form, his voice rising in pitch along with the eyebrows of the nurse, "It's not me! How can I be more careful when I sleep?" He got depressed which quickly transitioned into raw anger and a Why-Me attitude. So he set out to solve it for himself. He refused to sleep for 2 days to see if the bruises would still appear. They did not. But around the 54th consecutive hour of being awake, a pressure overcame him, radiating from his neck to his shoulders. He fell unconscious to his bedroom floor and entered a state of dream-delirium that involved angry circus freaks cutting and eating little pieces of his body.

He awoke to a scream, probably his own, to find that he was covered in a salty sweat and somehow his clothes had been removed. He went to the bathroom, fumbling in the pitch black darkness of the quiet house, and flipped on the light. As he urinated in the toilet he caught his reflection in the medicine cabinet mirror and gasped. Like an ashen collar, a bruise stretched around the back of his neck and continued down to his shoulders. It looked almost like he was wearing a miniature cape, attached at the base of his neck below his hairline. He raised a shaking hand to touch the raw flesh, and immediately winced at contact. This was by far the most aggressive bruise yet. He returned to his bedroom to search for evidence of what had transpired, tearing the room apart and overturning the furniture. His stacks of library books on skin disorders, cyanosis, ecchymosis, and hematomas were strewn about, papers flying everywhere.

His knocks on his mother's bedroom door sounded much more aggressive than he had initially intended. The invasion of quiet left a residue in the air of the usually silent house, causing his adrenaline to pump and his senses to crackle.
"Yes?" her airy voice, undisturbed, floated outward.
He opened the door hesitantly, nervously. She was stacked up high on her bed, pillows, blankets, magazines, cigarettes, a few pissy cats, and a precariously placed ashtray all satellites caught in her orbit of pre-slumber ritual. He always hated her. But now even more - her refusal to offer him any solace or help with his problems, his fears, his terror. She raised her eyebrows, letting him know she was waiting, what the fuck did he want, when would he retreat and shut the fucking door, this was a waste of her time. All of that loaded into a simple facial expression and as loud to him as if shouted through a megaphone. Suddenly he felt that coming to her was all a pathetic mistake - he wanted to retreat to his secret world, safe in his room, where her eyes couldn't evaluate him. He touched the back of his raw neck, covering his shame, and licked his lips to speak. He was becoming paranoid and he knew it. The shadowed corners of her room were listening - did someone or something just move behind the curtains, lurking in the dark? The ceiling was lowering on him, the fan blades whoosh-whoosh-whoosh guillotining down on the top of his head. A small smile seemed to curl at the corners of her mouth as she raised her long cigarette to her lips, two parallel fingers pointing upwards, head cocked slightly to the side. He could hear the suck, crackle, and inhale.

"Uh, I need to talk to you. I have some questions," he started, hand still on neck. She was waiting, blanketed by the dim orange light of the bedside lamp. The only other source of light was coming from the end of her glowing cigarette in a rhythmic SOS pulsation. He shook his head, trying to remove all of his panicked thoughts, and continued.
"These bruises, I went to the doctor, it's getting worse. I need help. I don't know what to do. I'm really worried, do you know anything at all, was it always like this since I was born?" Everything rushing out in a single strand.
She flicked her cigarette and seemed to organize herself against her pillows. She sighed, one single expulsion of breath that seemed to demarcate the release of something, a decision, an opening of flood gates.
"Well, I sort of thought, I hoped, that you would be strong enough just to deal with it. That you wouldn't make this into a big deal. But I guess I was wrong," she began as he wrung his hands in terror and self-hate. She looked away, suddenly interested in the walls as she continued.

"I guess I didn't want you to feel like a freak. I wanted you to just be a normal boy that I could be proud of. That's why I never told you." she shook her head. Another drag on the cigarette, this time much longer. A slow exhale. More repositioning. A cat thudded against the floor and sulked under the bed, disturbed and indignant.
"When I was pregnant for you, the first few ultrasounds showed twins. But then towards the end of the pregnancy only you were showing up. The doctor said that one baby sometimes would block the other from being seen in an ultrasound. No one was worried. But then, I just delivered you. They waited and waited for the second baby, but there was no other baby," she rushed over her words, everything moving quickly like water through a breech. He was shaking his head, not comprehending much of anything, not understanding what this had to do with him or his bruises.
"The doctors haven't had many answers. All they could say is that in some pregnancies of twins the stronger baby will overtake the weaker, more unhealthy one. I guess that's what happened," she finished, looking at him once and then down at her magazines. She was done with him.
"Wh-wh-what are you saying? What about the bruises?" his voice cracked, dry and low. She shook her head and shrugged. She had said enough. He retreated quickly to his room, still holding his neck, beginning to feel feverish. He fell to his bed face down, crying into his pillow. None of it made sense. What had happened to that other baby? He rolled over and stared at the ceiling, the room rotating around him and his body covered in sweat and chills. Had he somehow overtaken his brother, consuming him whole? He felt bile rise in his throat, the whole idea both physically and emotionally repugnant to him. He tried to call out for help, his tears and sweat and vomit and fears mixing on his face and warbling his words. He knew in an instant what the bruises were from - it was his brother pushing from the inside trying to bust free. He passed out at the thought, only to slip into a dream world more insane than his reality.

The harsh sunlight piercing through the bedroom curtains awoke him. He stood on weakened legs, dehydrated, confused and drained. Head hanging low, he dragged himself to the bathroom to wash his face. His mouth tasted acrid and bitter, almost like blood. His face felt crusted over, fluids from the night before hardening and encasing. He didn't even gasp this time when he looked in the mirror - he had become so desensitized by it all that he was very far away in his head. His face had been transformed. A bruise covered much of the lower half of his face; blackness encircling his lips and fanning outward to discolor his cheeks, chin, and the tip of his nose. But this time there was blood too - tinging his cracked lips and teeth. He slowly opened his raw mouth to look inside and thought that a few teeth might have been missing. He noticed that there was a split on each side of his mouth, as if somehow the orifice had been stretched further than it should have been. As he gently began to wash his face, reddish brown drips mingling with the water in the basin and disappearing down the drain, he began to laugh. His mind had cracked like his face, and he was sure that somewhere in his bedroom, his small naked twin brother would be waiting for him, freshly escaped the night before from his bleeding mouth.

___________________

Judith Minty
"Conjoined"

The onion in my cupboard, a monster, actually
Two joined under one transparent skin:
Each half-round, then flat and deformed
Where it pressed and grew against the other.

An accident, like the two-headed calf rooted
In one body, fighting to suck at its mother’s teats;
Or like those other freaks, Chang and Eng, twins
Joined at the chest by skin and muscle, doomed
To live, even make love, together for sixty years.

Do you feel the skin that binds us
Together as we move, heavy in this house?
To sever the muscle could free one,
But might kill the other. Ah, but men
Don’t slice onions in the kitchen, seldom see
What is invisible. We cannot escape each other.

Glue it back with little sticks.

2009-03-21T13:33:00.000-07:00

I'm going back to the old ways.

One's never better than two.

2009-03-12T10:59:00.000-07:00

A crescent moon (below) and the planets Venus (L) and Jupiter (R) are seen in a rare alignment over Hong Kong on December 1, 2008. The three celestial objects come together from time to time, but often they are too close to the sun or unite at a time when they aren't so visible. The moon is the brightest, closest and smallest of the three and is 252,000 miles away from earth. Venus, the second brightest, closest and smallest, is 94 million miles away. And big Jupiter is 540 million miles away.

Throwing out a boomerang. Waiting for it to come back to me.

2009-03-05T17:30:00.000-08:00

I keep feeling this odd feeling - wondering about myself fifteen or twenty years ago. I guess that's what happens when you return - the taste lingers in your mouth and gets refreshed daily. Looking at all these kids, playing out this role, surrounded by this environment - I am missing my childhood; longing for those moments and innocence and ignorance. But the knot on the balloon was always untied and when I try to hold on tighter I just wind up pushing more air out.

Open Eyes Mean Closing Doors.

2009-02-07T12:44:00.000-08:00

As they try to change their worlds...

2009-01-20T18:56:00.000-08:00

ELIZABETH ALEXANDER: Praise song for the day.

Each day we go about our business, walking past each other, catching each other's eyes -- or not -- about to speak or speaking. All about us is noise. All about us is noise and bramble, thorn and din, each one of our ancestors on our tongues.

Someone is stitching up a hem, darning a hole in a uniform, patching a tire, repairing the things in need of repair. Someone is trying to make music somewhere with a pair of wooden spoons on an oil drum, with cello, boom box, harmonica, voice.

A woman and her son wait for the bus. A farmer considers the changing sky. A teacher says, "Take out your pencils. Begin."

We encounter each other in words -- words spiny or smooth, whispered or declaimed; words to consider, reconsider.

We cross dirt roads and highways that mark the will of someone and then others who said, "I need to see what's on the other side. I know there's something better down the road."

We need to find a place where we are safe. We walk into that which we cannot yet see.

Say it plain, that many have died for this day. Sing the names of the dead who brought us here, who laid the train tracks, raised the bridges, picked the cotton and the lettuce, built brick by brick the glittering edifices they would then keep clean and work inside of.

Praise song for struggle. Praise song for the day. Praise song for every hand-lettered sign, the figuring it out at kitchen tables.

Some live by "love thy neighbor as thyself." Others by "first, do no harm" or "take no more than you need." What if the mightiest word is "love" -- love beyond marital, filial, national; love that casts a widening pool of light; love with no need to preempt grievance?

In today's sharp sparkle, this winter air, anything can be made, any sentence begun. On the brink, on the brim, on the cusp, praise song for walking forward in that light.

The $179 hat, customized with Swarovski crystals, came from Mr. Song Millinery in Detroit where Luke Song has been making ladies dress hats for 25 years. (He wholesales his designs at many locations throughout the U.S., including Brasseur, Donna Vinci, Maxi, PJ's, Hat Library, Jean Nobles and Pam Imports in the L.A. area.)

You make my eyes go boom.

2009-01-19T10:03:00.000-08:00

My Etsy Shop is now OPEN! I've been working for a while on getting my act together and posting all of my handmade jewelry and accessories onto Etsy - and this weekend it finally happened! I'm very excited about it, and I hope there will be a good response to it! I'll be adding new stuff all the time and branching out into different directions with what the store will offer. Please go visit and take a look at what's offered. Let me know what you think!!

Oh, eight.

2008-12-31T14:54:00.000-08:00

Dear 2008,
You know you really kicked my ass at some points. I guess you were trying to share some fucking life-lessons with me, right? Loss was the big one, right? And appreciating everything and not taking anything for granted, right? Well thank you for the lessons. Nothing is ever safe – it can all be taken in a moment. I watched friendship, peace of mind, security, jobs, health, and all of my normalcies fly out of my hands never to return. I’ve been through DABDA in every direction, back and forth, back and forth. So now I focus upon what surrounds the hole of losses – all the things that are most important and survived – love, comfort, family. My prayers for 2009 are pretty simple – hopes of abundance, health, time. And there are many things I surely wouldn’t mind loosing– PCOS can go, anxieties as well, and this blanket of fears about you and for you can be folded away for good. So 2008, if you pass 2009 in the foggy dark tonight and make eye contact, please give her my best and let her know that I’m filled with hope for the goodness she might be carrying. Goodbye to you and many thanks for all you gave and took, shared and taught. I will see you again quilted into my memories. P.S. I’ve decided to catalog my Favorite Discoveries of 2008. I’ve taken much happiness from the random blasts of reverie found within certain songs/images/films this year – the distractions and inspirations from them were stabilizing and wonderful. Although some of these works were not created this year – I stumbled across them during this year and will selfishly claim/brand them as belonging to 2008 in my life.

Top 8 of ‘08

Tunes:

8. Of Montreal - Id Enganger

7. Metronomy - My Heart Rate Rapid

6. Hot Chip - One Pure Thought

5. Yamasuki - Yama Yama

4. Wild Beasts - She Purred While I Grrred

3. Gang Gang Dance - House Jam

2. Björk and Antony - Dull Flame of Desire

1. CocoRosie - God Has a Voice, She Speaks Though Me

Videos

8. I Met the Walrus

7. Björk - Frosti, Live at Opera Royal House

6. Empire of the Sun - Walking on a Dream

5. The Knife - Live - Forest Families

4. Kazuo Ohno

3. "Early Abstractions" (1946-57), Pt. 4

2. Mister Lonely - Harmony Korine

1. Fellini's Casanova- The Dancing Doll

Happy New Year.
Love,
Jeanne

New fruit fills the tree.

2008-10-29T22:19:00.000-07:00

Cold panic ripping a hole - the idea of losing you.
Pure fear 600 miles back; pure fear 6 weeks.
I still don't know where you went all that time; your hand squeezing mine back; asleep.
You were frozen; the world ceased.
Tubes and beeps, gowns and drugs, in and out.
I grieved and bargained; you fought hard outrunning the sheets of rain on your heels.
We rocked on, each others rocks, your girls and you feeding off each other's strength.
Now it's all extra; each new memory and moment a gift I saw almost fly away.

Upon the bunk a fervent funk.

2008-07-07T15:47:00.000-07:00

Come on:

Jeanne Cassanova: In the Wake of Awake
Joan Wich & Company

Opens Friday, July 11, 6-8 pm
Through August 2. 713-526-1551

Joan Wich & Company

http://www.joanwichgallery.com

4411 Montrose Boulevard

Houston, TX 77006

Playing with Fire

2008-06-14T11:51:00.001-07:00

Documentation of Installation/Projection

2008-05-30T09:49:00.000-07:00

Playing With Fire Installation

2008-05-22T21:23:00.000-07:00

We of Me

2008-05-15T23:04:00.001-07:00

it's you and me.

You'll pass this on, won't you?

2008-05-06T07:12:00.000-07:00

I dreamt of it again last night - always the same.

Back home, a child again, insecure and overwhelmed by the sweaty fabric smell of a new school blouse. Total fear of being separated from her; fingers grasping, holding through chain link fences. Hot morning asphalt tar evaporating into the fried smells of lunch as the sun directly overhead bakes exposed scalps in lines of parted hair.

Simpler worries - squeezed cat shit, slap bracelets, sticker books, Smashing Pumpkins, skinned knees, secret crushes. Recess schedules - holding hands Tuesday, Thursday; but walk away Monday, Wednesday, Friday. An old miniature toy piano in the garage warbly clicking out tinkly awkward songs; goofy grins miming. Back porch baby pool, left alone to swat at jumbo bees with Mardi Gras beads; hands dripping, terror rising, she's running, slamming the screen door and watching from within - a moire of no help. Metal in the microwave, burnt fingers; motorcycle engine, burnt leg. Freshly painted walls, lemon yellow; brand new bed, field of flowers - staring at the ceiling fan, fumes heavy, knowing I was going crazy, it was only a matter of time. Red nightlight, bed in the center of the room, feeling possessed - hot panic waiting for hell. Buddy Holly's Maybe Baby hiccuping from her tan Fischer Price, mini-medical briefcase kit spilled on the brown carpet, background 'butterfly in the sky i can go twice as high take a look it's in a book reading rainbow'.

All of this, stacked on the top of my head.
I dreamt of it again last night - always the same.

Receiver Hoof; Rotarty Face: I love Ewe.

2008-04-23T13:11:00.000-07:00

*
We never went to the Petting Zoo as children. My mother thought it was obscene and a filthy activity to engage in. It just heightened my attraction to it - my curiosity at what hidden pleasures there were in holding a handful of vitamin/cheerio smelling pellets out to a miniature donkey only to have the palm of your hand covered in clear slime, dirt and grass. I was even kept home on the days that the school's field trip destination was the zoo - just in case they would swing by the Petting Zoo area. My older sister had long ago accepted this insane flat out refusal of being able to pet animals - but that probably had much to do with the fact that even though my sister was about four years older than me she hadn't grown mentally or physically past the age of five. She was now twelve, me eight, and she was still having accidents around the house; some mornings I would awake, shocked and scared at my new friend and enemy, my morning erection, and rush to the bathroom only to have my sister's shit left on the floor right outside my bedroom door squish between my toes.
I only had one friend, a sickly boy named Zachary, whose parents were guiltily indulgent to his wants, knowing that his illnesses were their fault. He and I worked up a scheme one abnormally hot Spring day to have me stay over at his house for the weekend, during which Zachary would demand a trip to the zoo. And then I'd get to pet those fucking animals. Everything would be perfect.
*
We had broken away from his parents, bee-lining for the Petting Zoo, Zachary's breathing coming in high-pitched crackly croaks.
"Slow. Down. Man." he rasped. I barely slowed my pace, ready to do this before the whole thing would get ruined. I was oddly nervous, unable to suppress the thoughts of Mom, wondering if going into the Petting Zoo could really be detrimental in some way.
"C'mon Zack! Hurry!"
There was a line waiting to be let in to the fenced area, and the sound of excitement gave the air a pulse. Kids squealing, animals chewing - humming - snorting, and parents clanking quarters into converted gumball machines, cranking the handle and spilling dried pellet food into open cupped hands and onto the ground.
Zachary crouched to the ground and started collecting all the little dropped pellets, saving them in his turned up shirt-tail.
"Zack!" I shouted, pulling out quarters for an unused food dispenser. I had come ready for this.
We pushed up to the front of the line as the next group was let in, parents whining "Hey! No cutting!" as we passed. I glared at them over my shoulder, their fanny packs and plastic elephant juice cups and strollers all marks of weakness to me.
We got into the hay-covered ring, animals milling around pushing their muzzles into hands filled with pellets. Shit was here and there, little fecal mines for unsuspecting small children and their light-up sneakers. Zachary darted off in search of a pig, so I stood alone, animals beginning to encircle me. The sheep came first, baaing and eating all of the food I had in my hands. The other animals, a llama, a few donkeys, and some brown matted-fur 4-legged thing that was very low to the ground formed a ring around me, pushing me with their noses.
"Hey, hey!" I protested, startled by the closeness of the animals, their sets of yellowed hungry eyes zoned in on my hands. I could see the hay and bugs and dirt in their fur, smell the shit and stink, feel their mucousy gritty spit on my hands, hear their warbly demands for more food, and it made me feel sick. Their cheesy orange teeth were clicking away, working their cud and forming a collective staccato noise that was like a warning of intrusion. It seemed like every animal had surrounded me, they were 4 deep and at one point I was convinced I even saw a zebra poking its face into the ring. I fell to the hay-shit ground, the donkeys ganging up on me. At that moment a sheep bit me on the wrist and I screamed. I looked down at my arm to see the dotted ring of blood rising, skin broken and torn back. The animals began to move back, scattered by the yells of the Petting Zoo keeper.
"You alright?" he slurred, denim overalls covered in stains of various sizes and colors. I quickly covered my wound with my hand and got up. I nodded, tears prickling the backs of my eyes. I heard Zack giggling a few feet away, running after a pig and pulling its tail straight. His happiness and nearness to my fear and pain was a reminder of how isolated and insane I felt. I pushed past them all and got out of the ring, running faster and faster, my arm pulsating pain.
*
I stumbled up our steps and pushed open the front door. It had taken me two hours to run, and walk for the last half, home. The familiar smell of the house and the noises of dinner from the kitchen immediately comforted me. I looked down at my arm and was stunned to see that the ring bite mark had swollen up and was caked in dried blood. I made sure to keep my arm pinned to my side and walked into the kitchen. My sister sat in her chair at the table, my mom moving around the kitchen, always busy.
"What are you doing back here - I though you were staying at Zachary's?" she asked without turning around, never really surprised by anything.
"We had a fight, he's not my friend," I blurted out, hearing how insane I sounded, as images of Zack's maniacally happy face yanking on a pig tail covered me with a wave of disgust.
"Alright. We're having macaroni," she said evenly, scooping noodles onto my sister's plate. Her bib was already covered with some green mush, as was her face, and she beamed at me. Her tiny yellow teeth were chewing something, the click-click and wet cud sound turning my stomach. She had crackers in both fists as she raised her arms to wave at me.
"Heeeey! Hi! Heeeeey!" she said, yellow-white gunk shiny with spit in her mouth. I grimaced and Mom frowned at me, always disappointed in my reaction to my sister. She began eating the macaroni with her cupped hands, spraying most of it onto the table and floor. I noticed again the circular scar on her forearm that my mother had told me was from when she had jumped off the bed in my parents room and landed on the overturned rocking chair, before I was even born.
"Ma, did you ever go to a Petting Zoo, like before I was born?" I asked, knowing how ridiculous I sounded, and knowing that she was figuring me out.
She looked at me, eyes squinting slightly, "Yeah, we took your sister when she was 4 and I was pregnant with you. That was the last time - it was filthy and disgusting and your sister was knocked down. We're not going to a Petting Zoo, son, you need to just get over it." She sighed.
"If you want I'll take you to the aquarium tomorrow," she said softening, knowing that her attention could never be equally spread over her children and always feeling the overwhelming guilt that came with that. I nodded and headed down the hall to my room.
*
I stared at the ceiling fan above my bed, watching the gold brackets that held the fan blades on motion-blurring to form a sparkly golden bubble tube. Tears flowed uninhibited now, rolling down the sides of my face over my temples and pooling in my ears. My arm throbbed and each moment of the infected pain increased my terror and my pulse. I knew what was coming, I knew what was going to happen to me. It would be just like what happened to my sister - it was what my Mom had been trying to keep me from, and I had gone and ruined it all. I was infected by the bite and now I'd turn into what my sister was - a human/animal hybrid that chewed cud and slobbered everywhere and shit on the floor. I sobbed, my heart heavy with regret and fear, my life ruined forever.
The phone in the kitchen began ringing - probably Zack's mother calling to tell my Mom what had happened. Each ring was a baa - baaaa - baaaaaa - baaaaaaaaaaaa - baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.
*

Freak poofy-teeth kitty squeezer.

2008-03-06T22:14:00.001-08:00

There was this stupid little kid that always hung around my street corner named Bill. I called him Shit-baby or Vomit-cunt, something like that. Half his head looked smooshed in and his eyes were really far apart. His forehead was about 75% of his face and I hated his guts because he reminded me of how scared I was of my own ugliness. No one else was really bothered by him that much and the gang I hung around took to him like he was our little fucking mascot or something. They would even carry him around on their shoulders (because he had no legs from his knees down) and it looked like a mother fucking parade of retards coming to town.

Well it was Halloween one year and I was super pumped about the fact that the Fall Fair was going on and I had this sweet bag of vampire teeth that I had stolen for me and my friends. So we met up behind the church dumpster and I was already buzzed on some NyQuil and cider. I'd been wearing my vampire teeth for a couple of days now and they tasted like chemical cheetos.

I handed out the teeth to my buddies and let them know we would be the VampirePosse for the evening and that we should fuck some shit up. They agreed and Charlie pulled out one of those miniature bottles of booze from a hotel wet bar that he got from his whore sister who gave BJ's at a La Quinta on the service road and bribed her little brother to keep it a secret with the mini hootch. Just as we were passing it around I heard the noise that boiled my blood.
"Gaaaauuuuysssshshhh!!! Haaaauuuuuuyyyygggg!"
"Sonnofabitch!" I shouted in an uncontrollably high-pitched voice.
The gang cheered collectively at the arrival of Bill. He rolled up on his mini-wheel legs, drool covering half his face, a pathetic Batman cape tacked awkwardly to his shoulders.
"Douche-crap, how the fuck did you find us?!?" I screeched, the guys giving me the crazy eye and ignoring my rage. I swear to God I wanted to take back all of my awesome vampire teeth from those little douches.

"Whhhuchuu goys ghot on yur teeeets?" Bill slurred, yellow spittle exploding outward.
"Oh fuck no - fuck no," I began, knowing that this little ass-dick wanted some vampire teeth.
"Come on, man, just give him some teeth," Charlie said to me, grabbing for the bag.
I recoiled, spilling half the fucking bag into the dirt.
"Grraaaaaaahhhhhh!!!!" I screamed, hurting my throat a little.
"Fine, mother fucker, here's your teeth!" I shouted, throwing a handful of mud and teeth into Bill's face.
I knew as soon as I did it that it was a pretty fucked up thing to do, but I could feel the hate in my chest actually lessen as the mud-cloud and teeth made contact with his deformed head. I didn't expect that he would breathe some of it in, and he began wheezing and choking. Allot of the mud stuck to all that drool on his face too.

Everybody was looking at me like I was some giant asshole, as if I had been the one to ruin everything. Bill stopped sputtering and picked up a pair of teeth, "Fanks, fank eew." He mumbled, tears running tracks through the mud down his cheeks. I looked away, ashamed of my weakness, startled by his strength.

The gang started moving towards the fair, Bill giggling and gurgling high on everyones shoulders. I trailed along feeling defeated and sulky. The vibe picked up as we made it though the Fair gates, trickling through all of the booths and games and ecstatic people. There was a fissure in the pack as everyones interests pulled them in different directions, and I found myself alone in the Hall of Mirrors-knockoff with some horny teenagers and a crying bitch that wouldn't shut up about losing her mommy. I made my way through the reflective labyrinth, bored but contemplating taking a piss somewhere. The sounds became oddly muffled in there, distorted down to a bass thump, screams, and a jangle of creepy clown-jerk-off carnival music. And just as I finished pissing on one of those warbled concave/convex mirrors I heard the squeak-squeak of tires. In the mirror I could see Bill's even more distorted form coming up behind me.

I got a little panicked thinking he was going to try to fuck me up as pay-back for earlier. He had something on his lap and for a moment I thought it was a mini-weapon.
"Bill... I, wha-" I began, turning to face him.
"Hueey, shmeen luorrking for ya," he said.
"You been looking for me?" I asked. He nodded. He was still wearing my teeth.
"I whhon uh perrize! Shwanted ta guve shit ta ya fur thss teets," spittle everywhere.
He held out a tiny plastic Batman figurine, complete with actual fabric cape. I took it and studied it for any traces of feces or chemicals. It looked clean.
"Thanks, man. I wanted one of these." I put it in my pocket. He looked up at me quietly, his wheels still squeaking although he wasn't even moving.
"Listen, I- I'm. Shit, man - you know what I'm trying to say." I began. "I'm sorry about throwing fucking mud in your face." He grinned at the victory.
"Chu chu hate mes cus chu juss like mes." He spluttered.
"You think I hate you because I'm just like you?!?" I asked, voice rising.
He nodded slowly, looking towards my left arm, or where the nub was.
I sighed, knowing it was true. I looked down at my nub, covered in lumps and knobby tumorous hunks of flesh, and was filled with self-hate once again.
"Okay," I said, as we turned around and slowly began walking out of the mirrors together.

I got home late that night, but Mama was there waiting in the living room for me, perched on the couch, face still drawn up in makeup, masking the pocks and twisted flesh. She did that every night, it being only the two of us for my entire life. We had never even spoken of the rest of the family, if there was one.
"Hello, son, did you have fun?" She asked, lowering her glossy magazine, her mouth twisting to one side painfully.
"Yes, ma'am," I responded, looking away from her pain-filled face.
Her good eye didn't miss a thing, and she knew how much hate was inside of me, for my own freakishness as well as for that of those around me. She lifted her hand to her scarred face as she quietly watched me. I couldn't stand it, so I turned to go up the stairs. "I'm going to bed," I mumbled.
Her voice followed me, "Are you still being mean to that Billy boy?"
Her voice getting higher and louder as I ascended.
"Are you, son?"
I wouldn't answer.
"Because you know he's your little brother, don't you?"

There is an end.

2008-02-12T00:51:00.000-08:00

There she sat, hands folded gently upon her lap, the wrinkles and veins bubbling up, marking the passage of time like water in a bathtub. She began to speak, her voice a low quiver whose strength was leaking slowly, a balloon deflating. I hung onto every breath, every whisper, frantically trying to retain that fleeting fully-formed balloon in my hands but its shape was shifting so quickly that as the air went out, even my touching it expedited its descent. Every detail became so sharp in its beauty and yet so fractalized as well - the patterns upon the blanket creating a swirling field of colored flowers, the particles of dust hovering in the setting sunlight and moving close with each breath, the smells of a home and safety lingering in the air, Kiri Te Kanawa's Ave Maria floating near the ceiling and reaching down to pierce a hole through my chest. I heard her speak then, her efforts coalescing into a raspy voice, her hand reaching.
"They have all gone," she began, her eyes blinking so slowly, her eyelashes trapping the tears and then dropping them gently down onto her cheeks. Her breathing punctuated her steps as she moved unevenly down the hallway to the bathroom. She disrobed and sunk into the bathtub like a hermit crab changing shells, moving from her tattered house coat into the warm water of the tub. I held her wet bony hand in mine, crouching, staying close. The white hair around the base of her neck floated free atop the water as her head sunk back. Her eyes were still so clear as she gazed upward towards the shower-head, the ceiling, but so much further.
"I know it's coming now." I gasped at the easiness of the words that were filled with so much uncertainty that anything certain crumbled to its knees in its wake. "Please," I croaked, overwhelmed and desperate, clinging to what I could. Behind my eyelids I could still see the saturated green of a winding forest, the tan grainy putty of an endless sand at my feet, the golden burnt brown of his gentle eyes, the scarlet flame of a new sun just curving its way over the horizon to warm my face.
"There is an end," her whisper like the flutter of a wing so light yet so penetrating. In that instant her eyes went hollow with no one looking out, the bathwater turning to ice to match the coldness of her skin. As her body floated motionless and empty I looked down upon her, my heart overflowing with love and the realization that nothing could be undone, nothing could move backwards. I began moving upwards now, leaving her, leaving me. I moved like a bird and could barely see myself floating in the tub at all now, my house digesting itself into everyplace I had been, digesting itself into everyplace, digesting itself into every moment, digesting itself into everyone. And as I turned away I saw them all there without even needing to search. We had been connected all along.

Encrusted with sparkling specks.

2008-01-01T22:38:00.000-08:00

The air in the car grew too hard to breathe quicker than she had expected. The bass of the surging stereo pumping an incessant rhythm against her calf muscle which was pressed against the passenger door was oddly reassuring in a very in utero way. She didn't even realize she was crying until she touched her face, the warm tears startling her and shaming her instantly. Red and yellow and blue-white beads of water were splayed across the windshield and the light danced to a pulse. She could still see him and even make out the swells of his voice as he animalistically set off emotional flares into the night. All she had wanted was to be done with this, done with him, and now the water was encircling her ankles, her calves, her knees, her waist. She couldn't help but smile at how gorgeous her hands looked, motionless on her lap and glittery in the night light. She held them up in front of her face and laughed at the absurdity of their beauty; completely encrusted with sparkling specks of fine luminescent powder glinting and winking at her. Her mouth curled in horror as recognition set in - this glimmery snow was not snow at all but glass under her skin captured there when her hands had tried in vain to block her face from moving through the window.
Water can never be denied, it's power and strength and pull always there to give and to take, to build and to destroy. She knew this all too well and in that last moment her mind snapped free and there was no struggle as she submitted back into the water out of which she had once come. I know all of this because I had silently watched frozen to the backseat, waiting for her, only to have our salty sweat and tears merge into the black water that covered us.

Monster Myriorama

2007-12-31T15:50:00.001-08:00

Poole's Myriorama

To distinguish theirs from rival shows, they (the Poole brothers) started to use the name Myriorama, and by 1900 they had seven separate shows touring for 40 weeks of the year. They added elaborate effects to the scrolling paint-and-cloth panoramas: cut-out figures moving across the scene, accompanied by music, lighting and sound effects. The narrator, often one of the Poole brothers in evening dress, would describe and interpret. "Poole's Myriorama" was well-known and is even mentioned in James Joyce's Ulysses.
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"Even without your masks, you're all caricatures!"

2007-12-31T15:26:00.000-08:00

My Dad recently told me of a Twilight Zone episode that reminded him of my work. It's called "The Masks" and the synopsis can be read here.

Jason delivers his final tirade as he dies, explaining that "even without your masks, you're all caricatures!" He then dies. The foursome rejoices in the fact that they are now rich-until they remove their disguises and find, to their horror, that their faces have conformed to the hideous shapes of the masks.

Guacamole Recipes, Jesus, Baby Elephants

2007-12-31T14:40:00.000-08:00

Elephants can swim dozens of kilometers at a time, their trunks skimming like a snorkel above the water. Now experts have new evidence that the lumbering land giants may have inherited their expert swimming ability from a distant aquatic ancestor.

The researchers cut the preserved fetuses in razor-thin slices and put them under the microscope. They soon spotted something strange in the fetal kidneys: ducts, called nephrostomes, that also appear in fish and frogs. In most mammals, nephrostomes appear only briefly during fetal development. But in the slow-developing elephant, the ducts, which disappear before birth, seem to be present for at least 2 months. The scientists, who report their findings in the 11 May Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, propose that they are an evolutionary remnant of an aquatic ancestor. - Science Mag

Fetal elephant images from
National Geographic

Diagrams and La Venta

2007-12-31T14:21:00.000-08:00

La Venta Offering No. 4, Mexico (1100 B.C - 800 B.C.)

Olmec life was strictly regulated by a large number of ceremonies. Like all primitives and early civilizations, the Olmecs also felt such ceremonies essential if seasonal and other other cycles of life were to continue undisturbed. We know almost nothing of Olmec beliefs and ceremonies but the discovery of an Olmec votive offering at La Venta gives us a rare glimpse into their lost spiritual world - if we could only understand it.

We do not know why a ceremony was modelled and buried below the surface of a temple courtyard at some 3,000 years ago. The find has been named officially "La Venta Offering No. 4." Some unknown time after the initial burial, the site was opened again through the courtyard floor (clearly, someone knew exactly where the burial was located) and excavated to the level of the heads of the buried figurines. After this "inspection", the offering was covered up again and never opened again until our days.

Jacks, Privateers, Symbolic Heads

2007-12-31T01:12:00.000-08:00

A Symbolic Head
by Arthur Merton, 1897

Like other phrenologists of his time, Merton believed that "psychologic physiognomy is the only art by which all the powers of the Intellect, Affection, and the Will can be thoroughly and accurately measured."

Guano saturated cheesecloth.

2007-12-31T00:28:00.000-08:00

At the turn of the century, Dr. Charles A. Campbell, a physician and former city bacteriologist in San Antonio, Texas, began the first experiments with attracting bats to artificial roosts. The real reason was to find a way to control a disease that caused millions of deaths throughout the world each year: malaria. With a personal investment of $500.00, Campbell built the first Malaria-Eradicating, Guano-Producing Bat Roost in 1907 at the U.S. Experimental Farm near San Antonio. Inside, a series of inclined shelves had been carefully crafted for the bats to roost upon, and 20 yards of guano saturated cheesecloth were festooned on the inside walls for their further comfort. And to further attract visitors, he provided a meal: "three perfectly good hams with a nice slice cut out of each, exhibiting their splendid quality for the delection of the intended guests." After six years, Campbell's "monument" was home only to hundreds of English sparrows. It was dismantled for scrap lumber and sold for $45.00.

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Pass it back and forth.

2007-12-31T00:05:00.000-08:00

Doktor Schnabel von Rom
"Doctor Beak of Rome",
engraving by Paul Fürst, 1656.

Their outfit consisted of a hat to show that the man was a doctor, a mask to protect the face (including crystal eye-pieces to protect the wearer's eyes, and a "beak" which was stuffed with spices or herbs to purify the air that the doctor breathed), a wooden stick to push away any victims that got too close to him, a pair of leather gloves to protect the hands, a gown that was waxed on the outside, and full length boots.

My wunderkammer.

2007-12-30T23:51:00.000-08:00

I've decided to use my blog as a place to collect my discoveries and in doing so have a constructive outlet for my image/idea mining and spelunking. Most of this research is what gets recycled into my work, and it will be helpful to lay it all out in this way. I know that there is probably no one really looking at this, but I think it will be interesting for me to be able to get some thoughts/images/junk out there in a productive way. And who knows what will come of it.