Thanksgiving

I just got back from Thanksgiving break. Well, not just, but about five hours ago. I invited both Angie and Yaou, both chinese women ( fellow Ringling students) to come along with me. Yaou bailed out on the plans at the last minute. I could tell she was nervous to do so, but as a fellow flake, I understood, and we moved on. So it was back to just Angie and I after that, and we took off to visit my grandmother's house in Vero Beach. The college  has become very demanding as it goes towards the end of the semester. There's a kid right now as I type, flooding the bathroom, it's bothering me. He's showering, fuck, I'm going to go back in there and check if he fixed the problem..
.. alright, yeah, goddam kid, fuck. I told him that his shower was leaking, knocked on his stall, told him. He turned off the shower and said, "oh, okay". I said, "alright", then began heading out the bathroom, and I heard the shower turn back on. So he'd disregarded what I said, then I came into this room to write, and got all heated, and went back. And lo and behold the water had gone from the shower out into the hallway, and was making a larger pool on the carpet, and he's in there still 'showering', which a shower doesn't take much we all know. What a fucking idiot. So I knock on his stall again, "hey buddy! Your water leak has now extended into the hallway. You should change stalls, or get out." And he masked his voice when he replied, in a lower tone, like trying to sound more 'manly'. "Oh, yeah, oh, okay."
"Are you alright?"
"Yeah."
"Have you become drunk?"
"No. Cold"
I let the silence hang..
"Oh, yeah, yeah I see what the problem is. The drain isn't draining. I took the cover off, and it's clogged."
"Im going to call maintenance to let them know about the water on the floor, and then I'm going to bed."
"Alright", he said in his masked voice. What a coward. I know who it is too, he rooms across from me, and After I placed the call to maintenance and came to bed, I heard that door open and close as he slithered in before the maintenance crew could see him, but certainly after I had gone into my room. School wouldn't be so hard if the students had been raised right. What makes school nearly unbearable is cowards like this. I digress.

I'm twetny-six, which feels silly sometimes. I love to work, and there's not much harder work than this illustration program, if done right (fat). I sometimes (often, and since I was about fifteen) felt like I was rotting, spoiling. A lingering lack of application, that makes me feel useless. I really hate it here. Sometimes, I get to working, and I have a good day, but it's like some big simulator, and having a great day within a simulation is downright depressing. It was cool to see family. Just my parents, and surviving grandparents were present, along  with me and Angie, it was perfect- no kids, no racist uncles, just old people and us. It was very manageable, and a respectful environment- we could even talk about politics together. I'm reading some Nietzsche, from his 'book' Will to Power. It's interesting, and is helping me to see more pragmatically. It's hard to sound smart beyond saying that I'm reading it so I'll move along. I had a most wonderful time with Angie. I became very nervous about the trip just before we took off. I told her I was nervous- she guessed. Before we got in the car (she'd gotten in, then I, then I asked that we get out and talk about the trip), I smoked a cigarette, and I asked. "Okay, so Vero is three hours east, straight shot. We'll get a hotel when we get there. Would you like your own room, or one room for both of us? Or two beds or one big bed?" She kind-of said "I mean, whichever." "Um, okay. Alright. So probably one room. So, what if I walk around in my underwear?" "That's fine." "Nudity?" "Whatever." "Alright, okay." And so we went, and a minute in she asked if I was nervous, and I said yes, really nervous, and she asked about what, and I said I don't know, I guess expectation, and family, and I guess I don't want to be a creep, and we moved on to some other topic, all smoothly and without awkwardness. When we pulled into town, and I'd thought I would look for a hotel somewhere comparing and such, we came to a 'Knight's Inn', and Angie said, "That one.", and it was perfect, problem solved- we knew where we were staying. The hotel room was nice, nothing to it. We watched some television. I got down to my underwear after a shower, and spent a little time laying out atop the covers until I felt e'r more naked, and put on some shorts. It's hard to say what Angie was doing, not much of anything- simple things- reading on her laptop, changing the channel. We'd read for a long time in silence beside each other for a long time me Nietzsche and her some thing on her computer. Everything felt very natural. I was really loving our time together- nothing to it. She did the cute thing of falling asleep all-the sudden, and I turned off the tv and looked up at the ceiling a bit, and concentrated and went into my pre-sleep routine (in which, on my back I nod-off, having a vivid dream that climaxes somehow, rendering me awake again, as if my body is saying 'no-no, it's not safe to sleep on the back, though you're tired, it's time now to roll over', and I roll over onto my still flat-ish belly and take the large portion of sleep for the night). We woke late, around eleven. We hadn't touched in the night, we kept our distinct sides of the bed, as that's how we sleep. We talked a bit in the morning. She went into the shower, and I walked down the street a bit to get two black coffees and two hash-browns from McDonald's. When I came back, I think she was already dressed, and if not, it was not a song-and-a-dance of a dressing, and we sipped our coffees and she read on her computer, and she'd suggested I maintain my instagram, so I sat nearby her and went through people that I follow and deleted more than two thirds of 'em, until I was done, and it was nearly time for Thanksgiving dinner at Grandma's house, so we drove there. The food was perfect. Home cooking, the choicest dishes. Conversation got off to a pleasantly slow start, and devolved into what we'd heard on our respective news shows, and suspicions about what the future holds and what the government does. Angie sat quietly, and when asked gave a most appropriate answer as to what we were discussing, noting the eddying effect of media, which aims to make capital off its consumers. She really swept the whole board on that one, and that's about all that needed to be said. She was received well, and then the others mostly went back to talking about their suspicions, because they're old and idly talking helps pass the time. A cousin was coming over it was announced after considerable time digesting and talking and going through photos of my sister's first baby, and she would bring her two kids. This was like a fuse lit, and Angie and I made our exit as to not have to make introductions, or deal with kids. We drove to the hotel to change clothes, and to grab alcohol, and then we drove to the beach, where we found a dark spot by the grasses, and looked out at the sea and each drank a bottled beer. I lit a cigarette, and we passed my jacket back and forth between us in intervals. The beers became drank, and we got up and Angie went to use the bathroom in some restaurant, and I asked if she wanted a beer and she said yes, so I got a beer and we rendezvoused outside to drink it, and I chain smoked and told her about a handful of times I'd turned gay for a bit. We had a good time, and I got another beer for us to share, then we drove back to the motel. I got naked at the motel and slid under the sheets. I said "I'm naked." and she said with a tone, "Oh boy.", and that's all that came of that. Iput some shorts on. She turned on some movie called Mr. Nobody, and we watched the whole thing. At some point in the movie I got out my drawing pad, and we passed it back and forth on a collaborative drawing. We went to sleep at some point. My father planned to plant a mango tree in Eula's yard, because there was a perfect space for one, and I'd said that I'd meet him up in the morning when he called me, but lo come morning, I was very tired, and set him a text saying so, and he planted it himself. I didn't know whether to wake Angie or not, as it approached ten, then ten-thirty. I placed a hand on her shoulder and gave a rub- nothing. Then a small arm rub, nothing, then little kisses on her hand, which wrapped around her shoulder as she faced away from  me, sleeping- still nothing. I said, "Hello Angie, hello.", and with that she came to. I was so excited to see her. I got on top of her, and rolled with her across the bed, and we had a quick laugh, then knowing how late it was, got out of the room in quick time and drove to my Grandma's house. The tree my dad had planted looked very nice in it's spot. My dad was in a hurry because he'd been up since six and he was ready to get moving off to Blue Cypress Lake, our day-trip-adventure. So Grammy and Donna in one car, my parents in another, and Angie and I in this red rental car I'd got for the weekend took of to see the big lake and after thirty minutes, we arrived at the old fish camp and a little inlet of the lake. We walked around the fish camp for a little bit, not much to see, and told stories, and chatted up the bait-shoppe owner, and took some pictures, and took some cool breeze air under a big cyprus tree, then said our goodbye's to one another, then they drove off, and Angie and I agreed to go chat up this couple that the shoppe owner told us about- this couple who was road-tripping from California together, she a painter, and he a writer. Angie and I drove our little rental car across this little land-bridge archipelago thing and met the couple. They were friendly for being hassled by a couple looky-lou kids, and as it turns out she was a painter akin to those of (or maybe featured in) Juxtapose Magazine. She showed us this oil painting she was working on. It looked like Mark Ryden's work, but I didn't say so (I didn't know his name off the top of my head at the time anyway, but her style and technique was familiar somehow). I tried to play the name game for a little bit, but we didn't come up with any mutual friends. She was making the painting for a show in Murykami's space in Japan, and she handed Angie and I a bookmark with her website on it. I looked up her instagram and followed her. She had twenty-five-thousand followers! We didn't hear much from her writer husband, and afterwards used our imaginations to discuss (make up) a narrative for him that worked with his wife. Angie and I drove back to Sarasota, in very agreeable circumstances. Upon our return, we went to a mall, which I'd not yet been to. It was fun making commentary on corporate consumption and such. I think Angie gets my sense of humor very nicely. I took a couple markers for us from an 'art' store, and gifted her one. We went into a 'pet' store and visited with a cat that Angie really wanted. We moved on and went into the big main mall, where we got a pretzel after exploring perfumes and colognes, which bored the snot out of me. We made it out having spent under four dollars, and a couple hours. Somewhere in there, I realized we were in the middle of 'black Friday'. We made it back to school in time to eat dinner at our cafeteria, and meet again with friends to discuss our respective little holidays. I walked Angie back to her apartment, she carrying her things, and said goodnight. She thanked me for taking her on the trip and I told her she was welcome.

Lotte

Thought about it today a bit. I've had lovers, and at the time I thought Iwas going through what Werther was going through. Perhaps I am less than Werther, as I did not kill myself, but then what of Geothe? It's been a great day. No bullshit. I had a dream, and woke with intention to remember and recall my dream, ascribed the words 'savant artist' as a touchstone for the memory. I dreamt of a young boy, and I as him perhaps, but also separate, watching, ( when I go to a music show, I watch the drummer, and I am drumming, and we succeed or fail together). He was great, this boy. I learn a lot from my dreams, especially regarding painting. I have somewhat oblique (or not immediately critical) revelations to painting methods therein. It's really wonderful. SO, Werther; I guess I felt like he might get over it, or something. I don't know. I was talking with my friend over dinner the other night, and I confessed to her how I (am horrible, and) have led women on before. The basis I guess for this was how intense Werther's love for Lotte was, though it could not be. And Angie, my friend, corrected/suggested because it could not be. It's especially convenient to love another who cannot love you back. You have no power other than love, nothing legal or social, just unbridled love, and little accountability, it's perfect. And the relationship that Lotte maintains (and theoretically, any unrequited partner) with her promised partner etc. proves that she is able to be trusted, and worthy of love. It's a win win win, especially if Werther were to kill himself. Goethe loves to please, happy stories, truly. God, I'm trying to recall what my revelation was earlier today. I didn't get much sleep last night, which, really, I found, is the best way to come into the workweek, again in no-bullshit mode. SO Angie and I were talking, and I didn't say that I had a similar setup to Werther, as vacuumed, Hmm.. I'll digress for a moment and acknowledge how gall-dang snotty I always sound on here. In Werther, there's a line about bad attitudes being the most intolerable and most inexcusable kind of thing. And so when I speak, I do so with joy in my heart, and if I sound any one way or another, may we think of hegemony before stones are cast. See, there I did it at the end of that sentence. Terrible. This blog is a kind-of dead-end on the internet, just somewhere for me to pour out, as this bumbling probably well evidences. Thing is, I have so many Lottes. While I read the book, I thought periodically about whom my Lotte was, but she remained a symbol. I wondered if I had ever loved at all. Today I heard on a podcast a joke about having never loved at all- one speaker was speaking "and upon entering the room he discovered..." and he was interrupted by another speaker for a stolen punchline, "..that he had never loved at all!". This an echo, and this morning I kind-of painted like a savant too, really nice how things rhyme and cycle. I haven't smoked week or drank in a while. I feel great, and work a lot now, it's a good time. I'm kind of a Lotte figure myself if my promised partner is my painting practice (Painting as a catch-all for creative practice). I call this guy today who'd posted bills at our school (illegally/ unofficially), for a project that at the end of the day was about his getting elected into some position of political influence. He told me that the election was done and he didn't need any illustration anymore. I doubt he would have had any money to offer anyway. I don't  care about the getting paid I guess so much, just a chance to deal with a new client- I think these are like little drug trips, that teach much. (Have not done many drugs, and try not to intentionally now too).

Werther

I took a day off on Saturday, slept in. Aside from that i've become happily in the habit of rising with the sun of late. It's as if my caffeine intake is so high, that I get rollover into the next day, which by the measure of work I have to tackle, I am thoroughly into. There's a 'super moon' tonight, which means that I"m a little more batshit than usual, and I have not been especially great at communicating with others- that is, my balance- I've been talking too much. Here too, I'm pouring out (pouring in), and it may be against my best interests, in some convoluted way, but I am full of thoughts, truly overflowing. I read The Sorrows of Young Werther the yesterday, and the day before- had a good time with it, blowing through it, and with exception of looking up word I was unclear on, read quite lean. I learned the word terse, and it's synonym laconic- this from a whack google search about the sculpture Laocoon and His Sons. I did a great sketch of a version of this sculpture at the Ringling Museum the other day, when my painting class went for a drawing field-trip. MY paintings have been coming out relatively well this semester, I have made breakthroughs at nearly every turn. It feels so exciting to experiment! Today I made some fun works in gouache of a model in an Eastern getup, outdoors- this from a figure drawing and painting group that I am the president of at the Ringling College. In short, I took this club ( a Ringling tradition, dating twenty plus years) which had gone bankrupt, and picked it up by its bootstraps. I sold a bunch of memberships, that we can use to pay models, and now we're up to fifteen hours (extracurricular drawing time) per week. Today was my baby session, the Sunday six-hour. This session always gets me in a frenzied state- because I have so much homework to do, yet commit to monitoring the club from 9am to 4pm (with a lunch break). I get all worked up, and think about where else I could be, and what else I 'should' be doing, and I get all panicky and bitter. It's kind of like what happens sometimes when I try to meditate. So by the time its done in the afternoon, I take a bit of time to organize some of my thoughts and things, and prepare for the week ahead, and eat some food, (it's going to be a long night/week) and rocket out into the working night. Here I am in the middle of it too. I'll get back to the studio now. I'm working on a big painting. I've won over my painting teacher, so I'm thinking to please her with a banger piece. Something that I will love painting. I am very excited for this painting. I've built a support and stretched a canvas for it, and am in the process of grinding out a thumbnail onto its gessoed surface now too. I love the grinding up, though I thought it might be terrible, I like it.. Also, the sketch is really inaccurate, but so good. I love the sketch, so I am going to do that terrible thing where I just try to do the thumbnail, but bigger. Thing is, I feel as though I can see the whole painting in my mind, or at least see the completion of the painting. I've come so far, and have many ideas to problems I may encounter, and solutions I may employ, and experiments I might try- so the outcome is clear in a way that feels more like love and less like a gig. There's something inevitable about it. You can probably sense now how I mean when I say that I am intolerable to speak with currently, and yet they try, my friends and classmates have been approaching me a lot lately. Even my teachers have such pleasant things to say. I feel to leave many times. I sent an email to Cal arts, almost in a panic, on the basis that they were in LA. I have not been to LA, but thought that moving there would be a good thing to do. Something so different. I outgrew Tallahassee in that I was lauded so frequently, it felt like I should be somewhere else in a way. So I moved on. Now heaven forbid I king the school (in my mind). Let the praise not find me. May I not hear it. May I be perceived not as an end, that I may continue to grow. That's enough for now I say. Back to the studio.

PS. I ate food while reading Werther, contrary to my fasting during Faust. I did not wish to kill myself, or do much anything dramatic. I just read, and enjoyed the work. What a blessing that I not become fixed into a fantasy as sorrowful as Werther's. God, I get distracted, I can feel my heart pull like his too, daydreaming, and sorrowful. I digress, but there's a funny disconnect (perhaps the most sorrowful thing of all) that my focus has become manifest in that I am contented to myself, and my work. I am truly blessed.

Back to the studio

Few days

It was told to be to keep up my blog today. This is good advice surely. Yesterday I worked on a film set of a friend of mine, a sophomore film student at Ringling here. I woke at 8, to be on set by nine. I'd taken a Melatonin before bed. I felt that it would do two things; put me to sleep and get me into character. The character's name was John. I was John. My co-actor was Carmie in real life and 'Lauren' in the narrative. I was a slacker pill-head boyfriend, and Lauren had had enough. SO I took then melatonin the night before to knock me out and in effect I hoped to splice-in a bit of method acting. I read tonight about the effects of melatonin, and upon reading, kind-of felt that it might of been better had I not done that. I guess melatonin is produced by the pineal gland, and taken before bed acts as a signal the it is dark now (Pineal, I understand is in relation to the early reptilian brain. It can sense light, and is the seat of the mind, effectively the third eye.) I read tonight that a sufficient dose is .003mg, however the pill I took was 3mg. The journal I read noted symptoms of drowsiness through the following day as the excess melatonin finished processing through the system. Hard to say whether my taking the pill was a bad choice. The opening shots of my character involved a washed out John, vaguely watching the television screen. I opted for a flight simulator to be screened for my stimulus. I hope they keep with this idea in the final film edit. I felt that the role suited me well. Lauren, for one was a great name for my girlfriend. I've thought about this a fair amount- hard not to think about after dating a Laura, then another Laura, then a Leah, then a Laurel- I kind-of felt cursed, or stuck. What's more, I felt when I met (especially Laurel) that there was a spark of destiny in our companionship, like I was some confused reincarnate who couldn't quite recall whether it was one name or the other who I was meant to be with, but I thought it started with an L.. L something...
Also appropriate about my relationship to the character(s) was that I was fixated on some other thing, that was destroying our relationship, and that I called my mother upon her (Lauren's) walking out on me. It was not so hard to get into character in so many ways. I used to take amphatamine salts as a young adult, to help me focus, and to basically motivated me to do things that I either felt otherwise unimportant or could be put off. I became a monster (liberally speaking), if nothing more than to myself. I took the pills in the film in the same way. There were a few scenes of dialogue with Lauren and I in which I was under the influence of the 'loving' drug. I focused my energy, breath and blood to my heart, and gave it to her in every line and look. At some point, upon her walking out on me, I had a scene of overdosing. This was not something I've experienced personally, so I gave it a try with my acting. Also, during one of the takes for this, I frantically opened multiple pill bottles which I was told were all full of tic-tacs, however, upon pouring out a serving into my palm, I saw some little orange scored pills mixed in. I turned over my hand to spill them, and to try to recover the scene, then made a fake swallow. Yikes, I finished the scene which was strange, and useless, and notified my film crew buddies that there's some real pills mixed in. Those, I found out were xanax- yikes. I had a couple scenes of pain- one of me post-breakup- crying, and the other of me losing my footing, fainting and collapsing onto the ground after overdosing. I thought about the times where I (think I) know I'm safe enough to lie down, and fucked up (drunk) enough to pass out right there. I used my glasses as a little device to show that I was more committed to losing consciousness than to preserving the niceness of my personal things. I hope this all came out well. I feel that I did moderately well, and I hope that my greehorn-ed-ness shows minimally.
The day before I sat-in on a wiring team for some big ambitious space oddessy graphic novel that somehow a group of freshmen seem to think they have time for. I am as on board as they are, and the team seems strong too. We'll see what becomes of this. I listed my strengths as storyboard and art-direction, in hopes to gate-keep a bit.
The day before that I had a showcase at The Ringling Museum's 'Ringling Underground' event, with other fellow students of my Metal Fabrication course taught by Vicky Randall. A Sarah Valdez, whom I'd met in 2012 in Tallahassee when she came through to install a fine art show from Ringling (and I at the time was attending school at FSU, I think, or TCC maybe), who is now the artist liaison for the RIngling Museum, asked our (Vicky's) class to feature in the November Underground event. In short this would mean one month's work to show for three hours in a very high profile event. We all whorishly jumped at the opportunity. I began working on this ten foot circular ring (an excerpt from an industrial wire-holding wheel), adding little skis that it stand upright, and welding on doo-dads and metal rods to establish gestural lines. It looked pretty good, and certainly had that big presence needed for impact in an area so large as the outdoor courtyard at the Ringling Museum. I got the best, most prominent spot of the class to display my sculpture. It wasn't long before a bespectacled man in a sharp blazer approached me to inquire as to whether I sell my works. "Sure." I replied. He then told me about his affiliation to the city parks department and that he would be interested in perhaps purchasing my piece or commissioning another for a nearby park. I gave him my phone number, in addition to a little zine (booklet) I'd made about the sculpture for the event. I hope he contacts me, but think the chances are slim (trying to reverse-juju this one). The title of my sculpture was: and "She said, "You've got it in Spades Kid" and so we went- the punctuation and capitalization were a result of my dreamlike mindset leading up to the event- the mindset that got the piece done. It was approaching the piece in a top-down (that is, concept-centric) approach that prevented me from getting into the work, but as the deadline approached this title came to me as a mantra- "You've got it in Spades, Kid". It reminds me of Pink Floyd a bit, and of the encouragement from Vicky Randall- she would tell me that I have just a natural gift for sculpting- for organizing form in space. I agreed. But also the title comes from a verbatim quote, something that struck me when I first heard it, because it was so reassuring. It was from my partner at BMC (Body Mind Centering- what was for me a three-month embodiment yoga money-pit), after I touched on her leg, to give her a listening touch- maybe a fascia touch. She said, "you got it in spades kid". I loved her for that. I don't mean to be only critical for BMC, I learned a lot. I just mean to be funny. The quote itself, I felt needed resolve to be adapted into a title for my sculpture, as I added the 'and so we went'. I like the title. I think it has direction. like the piece. What's more many viewers interpreted the piece in much the same vocabulary as I was thinking as I was making it. It felt great hearing interpretations so similar to my own. It felt as though I was successful at tapping into an unspoken language with material (iron). This is what sculpture is about, I thought.