Butterflies and Zebras

Yes, my very own handiwork on the versatile Amanda.

 

note: everything you see is a prop

Sometimes my selfishness astounds me

Sometimes, when I'm wallowing in my own petty bullshit, I have to take a step back and think about the meaningful things in my life.  There are things of so much more import out there to care about that sometimes I need to be reminded.

Darius Weems was born with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy.  It is the number one, 100% fatal genetic killer of children in the world, and will one day affect his heart and breathing ability.  Funny thing is, at 20, he's led more of a life than most of the people I know.  These guys have devoted themselves to raising money and awareness for DMD and they are my favorite organization.  When I grow up and get a job and make lots and lots of money, I'm giving a boatload of it to them ;).

They made an amazing documentary that will make you laugh and cry.  No seriously, it will make you laugh and cry. 

www.DariusGoesWest.org

P.S. See ladies? Awesome, smart, passionate and intelligent men do exist!

Would you make it strong? 'Cause I don't need to think...

Julian Casablancas just came out with a new album, and in light of my friend Alex's recent post in my honor, I think I owe it to Mr. Casablancas to quote him here:

"Everything seems to go wrong when I stop drinkin', everything seemed to go my way last night.  Everything seems so wrong to me this morning.  I know things will be brighter later tonight."

Julian was an alcoholic for the majority of his time with the Strokes and finally cleaned up his act, got married, put out a solo album, etc.  I don't intend to do any of this, except for maybe slightly clean up my act.  As Alex mentions, I'm not an embarrassment to my friends, nor do I wallow in my bathtub with ice cream and Jack--just ice cream.  But sometimes drinking gets old.  And since we're not 17 anymore, it's not always pleasant waking up and feeling like a crushed dandelion.  So, let's end with a call to action (in honor of the speech I have to give tomorrow morning for my Oral Presentations class in which I will end with either a question, a quote, or a call to action).  Don't forget that there's more to life than drinking!

(I will now drink the antidote serum I've saved for moments like this, when Sister Sammy Sunshine comes out to pontificate and must be stifled.)

Cheers!

I’m All For Being Non-PC But Come On

As I watched the darkened female silhouette bump and grind against the body on the bed I thought, “This better be good.” For a commercial, it was already wildly inappropriate. It was only when the camera zoomed in on the male face that I knew what the hell was going on. A sweaty, panting Hitler-impersonator looked up (creepy mustache and all) just as the words “AIDS IS A MASS MURDERER” flashed across the screen.

REALLY???

I get it, but DAMN. The truth of the matter is, the commercial was outrageous. Will it incense a couple thousand people? Probably. Will it make people think twice before having unprotected sex? DEFINITELY. Viceland.com, the website dedicated to independent fashion, film, music and foreign news indignantly remarked that the commercial was merely equating people who don’t use condoms with Hitler. But if you think about it, if you spread AIDS you’re technically helping to kill people in the long run.
In the vein of ridiculous ads, my 16-year-old brother showed me a British advertisement in which a teenage girl is texting behind the wheel when she smashes into an oncoming car. The friends fly around like bingo balls despite seatbelts as another lone reeling vehicle careens into them. As ambulances and helicopters swarm, the driver screams and cries, her friends bloodied and unconscious. Alive or dead, audiences don’t know. As I watched my brother’s reaction I thought Damn right. That’s what happens if you text. Now put away your damn phone, punk. Commercials like that have already saved a few teenagers’ lives. Maybe even his.
So where do the lines of censorship come in? I mean, between the militant anti-smoking campaign and authorities threatening to forcefully vaccinate the state of Massachusetts, these commercials seem normal.
A tee-shirt encouraging men to support breast cancer sounds like a great idea, right? Is it okay that it says “Save the tata’s!”? It’s raising money for breast cancer awareness. You’re not going to please everyone--but if you’re at least making money for a cause or raising awareness, you’re ahead of the game.

You can never be too thin. There, I said it.

Flipping through pages of fashion week coverage, I grabbed at the excess jiggle around my belly. I’m not fat, I reasoned, I’m just not a model. Models aren’t too skinny. There’s a reason they’ve represented ideals of beauty for decades and it’s not because they “look sick”. There are exceptions but, overall, being 5’9” and 125 lbs. looks damn good.

Many have asked why I don’t model. My instinct is to say, “Because I’d need to lose about 50 pounds and I love food.” But I graciously brush it off. At 5’9”, 170 lbs, I’m no waif. But I love models.

While I have days when I would kill to look like Giselle, I realize that she is naturally built that way. And if you read the Rolling Stone article (RS849), you’d know that she consumes lamb shank, beef kabob, and of course salad “with gusto”.

Take “The City” reality show’s character Kelly Cutrone. Upon meeting model Allie, she promptly asks, “Are you okay? You look really skinny.” There is no way in hell (contrary to speculation from “The Moment” blogger) that her “concern is genuine”. It was hostile. Probably because deep down, all women want to be skinny.

Haters should center their arguments around drug use, malnutrition. The National Center for Health Statistics showed a 15% increase in obesity from 1980-2004. Last I checked, we have the highest obesity rate, and a little salad never hurt anyone. Sure, some models have issues with food. But for many of them, it’s work. There’s nothing wrong with the fact that they exercise a little harder and eat a little less shit than the rest of us.

As I type this, I can hear the Beth Dittos of the world crying out in indignation. Ditto, lead singer for the band the Gossip, is known for her OBESE (not voluptuous) physique. No one has commented on her risk of heart disease or diabetes. Ditto is fat. Part of me wants to say “more power to her” but the rest is saying “Give me a break.” And some salad.

As I waved goodbye to the woman who had taken care of my brother, my sister, and I for over a decade for the last time in a long while, I called out jokingly, "But Jean! Who is going to watch us?" My sister Cara, 21, rolled her eyes and chuckled, Nick, 16 did one of his much-practiced "wooooow Sam"s (kids these days) and I, almost 24, stood there waving, wondering if I was really kidding after all. Jean had been coming to clean our house every Wednesday--she had two children of her own, 11 and 3, and hadn't "babysat" us in over 8 years. But something in me that day wanted her to stay and cook us dinner, tell Cara to do her homework (Cara's now finished her associate's and on to medical technician school) and put Nicky to bed (Nick will be a Junior in high school this fall).

I stared at our cluttered foyer as her minivan pulled out of the driveway. All of the stuff I'd decided to take to my new apartment sat waiting to be packed into the car. Posters had graduated to framed pictures, and silly signs and accessories were mostly gone. This was grad school. Even now, sitting in that new apartment, reading over the syllabi for my graduate classes, I wonder if this is how it's supposed to feel. They say the unexamined life is not worth living. But sometimes all this analysis gets exhausting.

It's not that cooking for myself and doing my own laundry is daunting--it's not, hell why do you think my parents let me live home for so long? I did my fair share of chores. It's the expectation that now I would have to produce. No, not reproduce. I mean produce results. Make that 55 thousand dollar loan into something. I know it's not for another year at least but it seems that for every person that loves what they do every day, there are more who despise it. I continue to be determined not to be that person in the longrun. But who can I be in the meantime?

As I neurotically approach the beginning of the end of my academic saga (grad school at BU), I've found myself compulsively wondering how millions upon millions of people have moved out of their parents' houses, relocating to a new home, with new things, and leaving their childhood rooms, essentially their lives, behind. I've asked about 5 people now what they did with "all their stuff" when they left, and was appalled to find that the majority "didn't remember". Maybe I'm just developmentally living in Neverland or something, but as I stare at the drawer of junk (one of MANY) sitting on the floor, awaiting perusal and inevitable downsizing, I can't help but panic when I think about what is to become of all the things that I have meticulously collected and accumulated over my most significant years.


I've gathered no less than 5 bags of garbage, in addition to 4 bags of "give-away" (denim purses, too tight t-shirts, expired makeup, you know, things that I realized I had no use for, despite desperately having held on to them for way too many years) and there is still no end in sight. What about the band photo albums, books, cds, picture frames, favorite childhood stuffed animals (i mean FAVORITE), and my 8th grade journal. You tell me you can look at entries written from a time when you didn't know what unrequited love felt like, and throw them out? Yeah right. Or the letters upon letters from your grandma, who used to laugh and cook for you and teach you rhymes that you'd say to each other, but now calls you her niece. And the pictures of your parents when they were young. Where can it all go? What if it's too much to save?

Or maybe it's just me, wanting to hold onto something that's already gone. Maybe it's not even about the stuff after all.

This is not goodbye, New York.

Before I left New York, this was my life.

Dong, you've inspired me.

Starting over

Everyone says it's never too late to start over. I figure it's never too late when you don't have any other options. Everyone should have an all-out panic attack once in their life, it really is refreshing in retrospect to be like, wow if my body hadn't flat out refused to let me abuse myself for one minute longer, well hell, i might be dead! (Or in a mental institution).

I will go to New Orleans someday, but for now, it wasn't meant to be I guess. School is coming up fast, and I've gone from super excited (probably for the wrong reasons) to panic attack (duh) back to really excited (for the right reasons). I'll miss the city somethin wicked, but having a person with you who knows you almost as well as you know yourself is always the best. Knowing you'll own the city you're going to because it's a third the size and like an eighth as cool? Priceless ;).

Don't want to be too twittery and lame (I made this blog to be ironic and reflective, not like, to update anyone on my well-being, i have facebook duh), but soon there will be more pictures on here. I have to complain for just a moment though about the pain in the ass of uploading pictures on a 5-year-old mac. Like seriously people, if it wasn't going to take me literally 45 minutes to wait for my computer to deal with a new upload of pictures one by one, and another half hour to actually copy them into an email, I would be much more eager to post. Sort of sad really, being that I am really into photography and have zillions of awesome pictures just sitting in my camera (and desktop) waiting to be shared. I'm pretty sure that gig of ram i spent a hundred bucks on a couple years ago has been sitting, improperly installed, in my computer, doing absolutely nothing. Ha. I'm silly.

Here's to good memories and many more to come. Pics are Barcelona, November, 2008.

Who can resist Cinnamon Bun?

Tattoos are usually really cliche and boring. One I can't get out of my head was the "dancing nancy", from Dave Matthews' Stand Up album cover on the small of a fan's back a couple years ago. The figure itself is lovely and it was an identical image, but at the end of the day, you have a picture from an album tattooed on your back. Come on.

Now I love Dave as much as the next Jane, but when you reach a certain level of pothead-fame, it's like having a koala bear with a jester's hat tattooed on your arm (or whatever the hell the Dead's logo is). But there was one I'll never forget, maybe because the adorning artwork was so delicate. There were two vividly colored coy swimming around the words ....we're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl.... And somehow, I have no idea how she managed it, but it was not tacky in the least. Probably because there are few lyrics as true as those.

Thus I arrive at my latest goal; to pay some sort of homage to all of the "Art" that inspires me without sounding like a toolbag of doucheyness(i say it in quotes because I am so wary of scenesters at this point that I'm afraid to even say the a-word)--which is what this girl managed to do in an awesomely unjaded fashion. It was almost like the words themselves proclaimed how aware she was that we're all just losers wandering aimlessly and if anyone thinks they're remotely cooler than anyone else, they deserve a slap in the mouth--and therefore, she was allowed to have such a tattoo. Like "hey guys, I'm with you...I just thought it would look cool tattooed with some really groovy looking fish". Hooray for irony that doesn't suck

I haven't written in a while because I'm still sort of stuck in the whole why-would-anyone-blog-instead-of-write-in-a-diary-i.e.-no-one-gives-a-shit-about-what-you-think-anyway frame of mind, but I'm starting to see that that's not the way it has to be. If you have a contribution, it's nice to share. And continuing from my last post, with that picture from London, I am PRAYING that I get into The London School of Economics. For some reason, one of the most prestigious schools in the UK costs TONS less than Boston University and also offers the coolest joint program I've come across so far. (Oh damn, I have to live in London for a year and earn my Master of Science, and then jet on over to LA for the second year to earn my Master of Arts from USC. I guess I can make an adjustment... COME ON). I'm almost certain I won't get in but that's just being realistic. However, if I do, you'll probably hear me whoop for joy from here in joisey.

Anyhow, so long as I don't fall off the wagon and let the UK's ridiculous lack of self-control and morality taint me too much, I suppose it will be, for lack of a better phrase, the time of my life. Granted, if my recent adventures are to be of evidence, I better join AA now, but I figure I'm just getting all the silliness out of my system before it's time to buckle down, and stop considering Starbucks a real job. I mean yes I pulled an "oh shit I definitely left my credit card at library" but when the bartenders make you a literal mind eraser (not those pansy shots the state school kids do thinking they're badass--what are they like sprite and schnapps?), but a Library-after-hours-$6 pint of black hole induction, you're lucky that the only evidence left of your debauchery is a forgotten credit card and a polaroid of you eating "the crazy roommates"' ice cream like a friggin' deer in the headlights. But then again, you know it's time to move on when PICTURES of you doing things are getting you into trouble WHILE YOU'RE STILL DOING THEM. I'd like to thank Chuck for bringing back the Polaroid.

And on that note, here's hoping.

Did you get your autograph?

Writing a song is damn near impossible on the first shot. Usually it comes to me while I'm like humming something else on the subway and since I'm apparently living in the 80s and refuse to get an iPhone, I have no way of recording the little diddle. Actually, come to think of it, my ramshackle phone does have a recorder, but I've never been one to sing on the train.

I bring that up because that's how I felt lying (lay, lie, lain, whatever) in bed last night, thinking of what to name this cockamamey thing and debated getting OUT of bed to write the idea on a postit. Milkorwhiskey may someday make a reappearance, but for now, I'm thinking of my grandpa, and so a spinoff of Landslide lyrics wins out. Point is, it's also damn near impossible to be original anymore. I mean totally original.

My taste has never screamed original though, and I don't say that in a "I'm so hip, I set trends by rolling out of bed" way, I just mean for someone who laughs at practically everything, I don't laugh at what everyone else laughs at. The most poignant part of Slumdog Millionaire (saw it last night) was not the kiss at the end, or even the reunion with the singing boy (though that was a close second). It was the flashback at the end to the autograph. If we could all be so brave and

guileless

as Jamal. How many of us would jump through human waste to greet our idol? How many would risk seeming totally insane to try to get what we want?

Our waitress at the diner last night (remember, still in NJ) had to be in her 70s and she asked me if I was "the sister or the mommy" (good lord), but after a bit, she said "When we were kids it took FOREVER for Christmas to come around the next year! Now Christmas was last month." You never stop being young, it just so happens your body does.

Speaking of young, this is one of my favorite pictures from London, where we studied abroad. I'll never forget this night. I don't talk to the subjects much anymore, but I can still feel my heart racing, running to take this picture.