These remarks form a murmuring of indistinct voices from which a word or a phrase might emerge, decisive for what comes afterward. To read properly you must take in both the murmuring effect and the effect of the hidden intention, which you (and I, too) are as yet in no position to perceive. In reading, therefore, you must remain both oblivious and highly alert, as I am abstracted but prick up my ears, with my elbow on the counter of the bar and my cheeck on my fist. And if now the novel begins to abandon its misty vagueness and give some details about the appearance of the people, the sensation it wants to transmit to you is that of faces seen for the first time but also faces that seem to have been seeen thousands of times. We are in a city in whose streets the same people often run into one another; the faces bear a weight of habit which is communicated even to someone like me, who, though I have never been here before, realizes these are habitual faces, whose expressions evening after evening have become wrinkled or puffy. This woman was perhaps the beauty of the city; even now I feel, see her for the first time, she could be called an attractive woman; but I imigine looking at her with the eyes of the other coustomers at the bar, then a kind of weariness settles on her, perhaps only the shadow of their weariness (or my weariness, or yours). They have known her since she was a girl, they know everything there is to know about her, some of them may have been involved with her, now water under the bridge, over and done with; in other words, there is a veil of other images that settles on her image and blurs it, a weight of memories that keep me from seeing her as a person seen for the first time, other people's memories suspended like the smoke under the lamps.

-Italo Calvino; If on a winter's night a traveler

I have decided, after all, that I do need a computer desk.

When did we get this culture of drunkenness? Or better yet, when did I become a part of it?

Went to go see The Swordsmen last night. Very funny show. Two guys doing the talking and moving and acting and whatnot. Of course sword fighting. Some pretty impressive stuff. I was laughing though most of the event, which was always nice. Trying very hard not to sound like a third wheel. Then it was off to DeKalb to a party at Chris' place. We stopped at Steak 'n Shake which was Rachel's first time. Unfortunately for her, there's really nothing on the menu without meat in it. I can't imagine my high school life with vegetarians. When we got to Chris' we found some serious thugs there. Thugs. When we showed up and I heard the way some of these guys were talking, I had no idea who they were and I was pretty amazed that anyone I knew would know them. Yay for stereotyping. Brad was pretty tired and Rachel seemed like she was going to be crashing with him. We chatted for a bit and then they went to crash in Eric's room. Chris was drunk as shit, which was funny and Liz was trying very hard to get into his pants. Unfortunately she was having a better chance of getting mine and Legat's pants off. I confessed to Jason that my life was not quite as good these days sans Chris, which is true enough. Then I couldn't get to sleep. Don't know why. Finally got to sleep around six thirty or so, I think, and Brad woke me up around seven thirty. Got Rachel back to Chicago about twenty after nine, so I thought that was some good time. Took a nap and now I'm cleaning my place. For whatever reason this has just become a straight narrative. Strike tomorrow and then home for Christmas.

Had way too much to drink last night. I think the grand total was eight rum and cokes in two hours, which is about sixteen shots or so worth? Christ, no wonder I had a hard time getting home last night. I'm good and not hungover now, which is nice. But I feel like a jackass. Gotta go and appoligize to my friends today, who will tell me to forget it and so on. I think the lesson here is after the free drinks time ends you need to slow the fuck down. You can't keep buying like you don't have any booze in you. Because you do, a lot of it.

Last night I went to go see The Return of the King midnight showing. It was like visiting with old friends. I am so familiar with this story, I have known it for so long. Especially the end, it's the end of the story that has always stuck out in my mind. What happens to Frodo and Sam on the mountain, the book writing, the Gray Havens. All of this. It is so complete, no wonder that someone could get lost in this. But like visiting with old friends I feel somewhat empty the day after, knowing that they're gone. Not to mention the way the story ends, the complete inability to pick up a past life. However many times I learn that lesson I don't think it will ever get any easier. Because you lived it once, of course you could live it again, right? Of course. It's all part of the process of me moving on, I think. The people that I went to see it with are much more critical than I am. I feel in love with Tolkien when falling in love was easy. The movies are still magic to me. Magic. When they started talking about lighting in film I thank my lucky stars that I don't notice. I'm not interested in making film, so the way that it is done isn't as important to me as the fact that it looks so wonderful. That it takes me away. But here I am. "I'm back." And I'm a little sad.

I need to get my way though these days, hoping that there's a new dawn on the other side.

So I'm stuck with these stupid life-thoughts. Fuckin' goddammit. Being sick does this. Being in the cold and in Chicago and most of my friends being elsewhere does this. Having all kinds of free time and the lack of motivation to do things. If anyone ever asks me why I drink it's because most of the time the rum fends off these thoughts, and when it doesn't they seem profound and sparkling, like a star. But here I am registering for classes again with a new system and new things and so on and so fourth and I've gotta question this school thing. But more I'm thinking about life outside of school. The elusive 'real world.' I've been sitting at home for the past couple of days, been kinda sick and whatnot. These friends that I've made at Columbia are graduating soon enough, and then what I don't know. And it's amazing how thin my net of friends in the city is. Chicago is great, but it's hard to moviate yourself when it's really cold and there's no one to see any of these things with. Life, I guess, is really about the people that you run into.

These past couple of days have been the hardest so far. I think it's knowing that all my DeKalb friends are done with the semester and I've been sick, and therefore away from my Columbia friends. So I'm feeling lonely and isolated. I don't remember the last time I felt like this, and I'm sure it had a lot to do with the people I was living with were always doing something that I could jump on with them if I found myself with some freetime. I'd watch a movie with them or go to the store or whatever. I miss Chris and the girls on nights when I'm sitting at home thinking, "Christ, it's Saturday night and you're sitting at home." It's moments like this that make me push myself so hard, 'cause if I don't earn it then I don't enjoy it.

TinyDancer30982: if you can pick me up that would be great
TinyDancer30982: and then i will go home with you
TinyDancer30982: or anywhere you want

And, always, if he had a little money a man could get drunk. The hard edges gone and the warmth. Then there was no loneliness, for a man could people his brain with friends, and he could find his enemies and destroy them. Sitting in a ditch, the earth grew soft under him. Failures dulled and the future was no threat. And hunger did not stalk about, but the world was soft and easy, and a man could rach the place he started for. The stars came down wonderfully close and the sky was soft. Death was a friend, and sleep was death's brother. the old ties came back--clear and warm. A girl with pretty feet, who dance one time at home--a horse--a long time ago. A horse with and a saddle and the leather was curred. When was that? Ought to find a girl to talk to. That's nice. Might lay with her, too. But warm here. And the stars down so close, and sadness and please so close together, really the same thing. Like to say drunk all the time. Who says it's bad? Preachers--but they got their own kinda drunkenness. Thin barren women, but they're too miserable to know. Reformers--but they don't bit deep enough into living to know. No--the stars are close and dear and I have joined the brotherhood of the worlds. and everything's holy--everything, even me.

-John Steinbeck; The Grapes of Wrath

So yeah, being sick sucks.

Michelle81200: if you could have come it would have been a party

Because the classics never go out of style.

It isn't the sleep that I need, so much as the rest. The lying down while being fully awake and letting my body repair itself. Time to take it easy this week, if I can.

So I've been having this idea recently that if you spend enough time with someone you will grow to like them. Baring judging them immediately and bigotry and all of that, if you spend time with someone you initially dislike I think you'll eventually find that there are aspects of their character that you find enjoyable, and will notice and focus on those things first.

Sheps69th: shes not too religious....my dad is kinda. reminds of a story about someone in a flood...kept refusing help telling the rescuers that god will save them....they die and ask god why he didnt save them....he said he sent 4 rescuers

So the good news is that I'm easier to talk to once you're sure that you won't be kissing me anytime soon. Wait, did I say good news?

There was this fly on my windshield. On the inside. And he was totally in my way, as far as seeing. So I figured I would flick him and get him flying around and mostly out of my way, but when I went to nudge him with my flick I splattered his guts all over the windshield and my finger as well. Yuck!

With bird-like motions I open the door, almost hunting for the sleeping figure. The door squeaks, it has always squeaked. I curse the squeaking, as I know that I need to announce my presence, but I would like to do it in a more gentle way. To my right the voice comes, "Hello Josh." I look and respond, "Hi Teressa," I glance across the room, "She awake?" The reply comes, "Yeah, she's in the bathroom." I close the door. What I came to do had been done for me. I've never been very good at waking people up.

It's four in the morning. I just got home. I worked two shows of Dance Chicago today. I hit three bars tonight, a guy's place and a twenty four hour mexican restraunt. I had four drinks at the various bars, two tacos and a good deal of quality conversation. I was able to drive safely home. Total cost for the night: Four dollars. Whoever said it was expensive to live in the city?

Hangover going suprisingly well.

My paper cutter has been one of the greatest blessings of my life.

Happy Birthday, grace sterna!

So I get an hour and a half dinner break. I come home. Mary Ann happens to come home shortly after I do. I walk into the hall, "Hey." She turns around and lets loose one of the most frightening screams I have heard to date. I never realized it was that awful to come home to see me first thing.

Fuck, man, when did Thanksgiving get so close? Seems like just yesterday I had moved to Chicago. I've got some scary shit that will be tumbling down on my head anytime now. Maybe this was all a pleasent dream.

That's a cock, in my professional oppinion.

I go to check my email (for real) and Chris' login name awaits me. Mr. Wright was here last night. That fuckin' rules.

Woke up dizzy today. Bad sign. Plan: Get More Sleep must be enacted.

Three cheers for drinking on a Sunday night.

Happy Birthday Penny Arcade. They turned five today.

Robert Randolph. The House of Blues. Is there any more to say?

It's a feeling like butter running down your ass-crack. Er ... I should have slept more last night.

Bad spellers of the world UNTIE!

There is a bitterness in Margaret so deep that it's hard to see most times. There's a joy in her, too, that she's more willing to share. But she has seen a lot of things, and done a lot of things and I think they have taken their toll. It is refreshing to see that she is a person underneath; that she gets tired and works too hard and feels too much. It is also terrifying, at least for me, when she gets that far-off look in her eyes, seeing something that no one else could ever know, that she could never express. What scares me is not that given the choice that I would either choose or not choose to pay the price, I made that choice so long ago, signing on contract without reading the fine print. What scares me is the price that I will pay, without hesitation and the only chance to look at what I've done in hindsight. But I think it's not the theatre, really, that takes such an awful price, but life itself.

Ran into Mark Hackman tonight at Dance Chicago. I thought that was awsome.

I finally got some light bulbs, which means that I can read in bed and turn the light off without having to get out of bed. The amazing thing was that I had been getting full, restful night's sleep while having the overhead light on while doing so. Pretty amazing stuff. I love Chicago.

I'm a smart one. My computer was starting to sound like a jet again, the fan being so loud. I take off the side of the case and see if I can't adjust it, while it's on. And the damn fan takes off a goodly part of the end of my middle finger on my left hand. Serves me right for messing with something that sounds like a jet engine.

I got my first letter in my new place today! It was a Halloween card from my Aunt Gigi. Laura Tennal, if you're reading this, I am very disappointed in you.

So when I got out of the shower I noticed that my hair was greener than when I had gotten in. I am somewhat uneasy as to what this could portent.

Already, in the confused improvisation of the first encounter, the possible future of a cohabitation is read. Today each of you is the object of the other's reading, each reads in the other the unwritten story. Tomorrow, Reader and Other Reader, if you are together, if you lie down in the same bed like a settled couple, each will turn on the lamp at the side of the bed and sink into his or her book; two parallel readings will accompany the approach of sleep; first you, then you will turn out the light; returning from separated universes, you will find each other fleetingly in the darkness, where all separations are erased, before divergent dreams draw you again, on to one side, and on to the other. But do not wax ironic on the prospect of conjugal harmony: What happier image of a couple could you set against it?

-Italo Calvino; If on a winter's night a traveler

I remember once in high school I read this short story about a man that had invented a time machine. So he blinks out of existance for a second and then makes a cup of tea. His assistant eagerly asks him what happened. Sipping his tea he says that he doesn't rememember. He only remembers that he was shown everything and then given the option to forget it; which, obviously, he took. / I've been wondering about time for a while. Whenever I see the family pictures, every birthday, Christmas, Thansgiving and so on, as they mark our passing from one season to the next, then eentually from one year to another until suddenly a lifetime is enclosed in a stack of old photographs. As much as we might hope that time can change these things all I have to do it look at myself and my parents and their parents in our Christmas garb five yers ago to know that whatever I might change, time isn't one of them. / It is on those moments that I remember this story. It isn't the choice that he made which interests me, as the author assumes, but rather the fact that the choice could be made. Who was this phantom figure that could offer such a choice? How can one choose to forget and then have that actually happen? It has always been my experience that which I try to forget is always the thought that keeps me up at night. / Could it be God floating just outside of reach? That time, as I've been told, does not actually exist but rather is a figment of our imigination and if I could belife, truly believe that I could speak to my maker. Then again, I've always thought that was the case, if I could believe, if only believe (sounds so easy to say it like that), of course I could speak to my maker. But then, I guess, if He answered all of my questions would He give me the option to forget? Would I take it? Have I already?

Film is so deceptive in its size, it it's scope. I can film your face, or even part of your face, your nose and your eye and the main focus being on your eyelash, with nothing but darkness and nothing beyond. I can put some music over the top of it, building and building and building until suddenly you blink. All of this I project onto a screen three times the size if you to begin with, suddenly it doesn't even seem like your eye anymore, but some symbol of an eye that could not be connected to a person at all. Then after you blink this sweeping landscape, as if you were dreaming it, when you had never dreamt something of the sort and this landscape is no dream, but reality as I have photographed it. I have been using video this past week in a show I was lighting, and I have been thinking about it's applications to the stage. The stage, I think, is honest about its deceptions. We know that this thing isn't a real helicopter, we're in a theatre. I don't think I have a point.

Michelle81200: does that mean that you miss us?
The White Stick: I suppose it does.

Ran into Katie Jean on the train today. Crazy wild. She got on at one of the stops near me as I was on the way to the Mad Shak show. We talked for a bit. About nothing, really. The sort of things you talk about with people that maybe you know too well. Of course, as things are with Katie, I have a whole bunch of thoughts, but I don't know if I can really express them now. I will just say two things. First I think that it will be impossible for me to remove my idea of her from who she actually is, now and forever. Second I think there's some part of me that enjoys the fact that she broke my heart. Not that she broke it, persay, but that it happened and I'm capable of talking about it. How fucked up is that?

--==ASSHOLES==--
"We dumped that bitch that you picked up."
(but not before we fucked her)

My feet are falling appart. I suppose this is a bad thing.

Alright, I have a confession to make. It is cold today. It has been hinting at cold like this at various days previous, but today was actually cold. Yesterday I brought my scarf with me. It was not really cold yesterday, so I left it. I hope to retrieve it, if such is possible. It was the two hours between commitments that shook me to the core. Two empty hours, just enough time to realize that I have no where to go, no one to see, nothing to do. I realized that for as much as I stand on my soap box and claim that I create this for me, and for me alone, and that I refuse to give explanation, as I do not feel the need to explain myself to myself, that is not wholly the case. I have always felt that I must create, but I cannot justify creation for creation's sake, so this is where You come in. I create this for You (proper noun). If there is a you out there reading this, then I am most likely talking to you. But even if there are no eyes out there, and the You that is out there is vacant and void the possibly of a You is what drives me forward. I can give You a name and a face and a relationship to me, to I, the I who is trying to capture itself somehow to show to You, those names and faces and relationships are as fluid as water. Of course all people have names, and You, whoever you happen to be, have a name that you hold close to your heart, a symbol somehow of everything you are. The you that is out there, though, is not the You that I am creating for, perhaps. The you that exists in reality could never exist and the You that exists in my head. For the You that is in my head is I that is trying to see me the same way that you see me. But again, is filtered though the eye of I and cannot be otherwise. I will admit to my egoism and say that You are interested and that You like me, or like this thing here that I am creating, that I am trying to tattoo beyond my own skin. That I feel that You (real or imagined) are affected, in some small way, but what you see, even if it is only in your thoughts towards me. When you are negative, and attack me for what I have created I want to take what I have created away from you, but not from You. For it is the You, however sadly true, that I am trying to reach. It is the relationship between the I and the You that I am trying to establish. Reality comes in, from time to time, and the you that exists and the You that I imagine do not agree, and I am sent into upheaval. Suddenly it seems as if my shoeshine and my smile are not only not enough, but childish pranks at trying to speak the way that adults do. In practice, though, this changes nothing, really, it is a small point that I feel needs to be made. If not for You, then for I. So feel welcome, you that are reading this, for even if it is only an image of you that I am writing to, there is some part of You that I am reaching for, hoping for, creating for.

This made me think of Todd.

I slept in my bed last night!

House warming last night. And we have learned two things.
1) Do not go to buy smokes alone.
2) If a crack dealer askes to barrow your phone the answer is no.
The reason for rule number one is that if you've having trouble following rule number two your friend is there to say, "What? You don't even have a phone. You're way to drunk to be out in public. Just light your smoke and lets go."

I don't know why I'm so angry. So defensive. I guess I feel that people I've known forever and that are somehow thinking about the theatre should be thinking about it in the right way. Like there is a right way. Which, of course, there isn't. Even if I pull up names like Peter Brook and Antonin Artaud it's not like they agree either. The point, I guess, is to keep asking questions. I suppose that's what upsets me, when people come to me with answers. That this way is better than another way and so on. But perhaps my questions are not the way and the light either, that all I'm doing is destroying the foundation upon which a show is based. If is isn't broke, why fix it? And the work that comes out is half-hearted and hesitant. It's possible. Which then, again, leads me to other questions and so on down the road.

I cannot endorse this soup enough. It's really good, and filling and all of that. If you wonder how I'm going to get though the winter, look no further.

Man, that was some good soup.

Dance4Life181836: they lost i want to die
My thoughts exactly, Jen.

I've developed a love/hate relationship with my alarm. But then again, who hasn't?

Sometimes I'm amazed at how I can read Penny Arcade and think of Chris and I. It's like there is no uniqueness in the world, no original thoughts and that Chris and I are living a parallel life in Illinois that they have in Washington, sans the successful webcomic.

Happy Anniversary of the Great Chicago Fire
I don't want to put faces on my gods. I want them to remain vague and unclear, like a radio program. I want to be able to imagine them looking one way right now and another tomorrow. I don't think it was amiss to appear as a burning bush when you could just as easily appear as a person. I want to change the image with every word I read. What I'm talking about it author's pictures on their novels. John Steinbeck always looks much more greasy than I think he should. But there are many more.

As I was coming back from school this afternoon there was an Asian man at the Jackson Blue Line stop with a stringed instrument that I don't rightly know the name of. He was playing with a recording on a tape player to accompany him. The sound of the instrument itself loaned itself to slow and melancholy tunes, with what sounded like an electric guitar on the recording the effect was somewhat haunting. He stopped playing and the recording was fading out when he reached down and I heard the click of the tape player and the music abruptly stopped. I watched him start to rosin his bow before I turned away, my heart sick at the sight. I don't know how to explain what I was feeling then, other than a pulling and a longing. I felt suddenly angry at a world in which men who can't carry a tune wear suits and a man like this, who works with skill and grace, sits in a train stop. As specialized as lighting is, the point is to bring theatre to a general audience, to touch everyone. As specialized as playing an instrument may be, everyone can hear and understand music. I wanted to take him from that train stop and bring him into a club or a bar or anywhere that they'd provide him with some water and maybe a sound guy to run the mix and maybe prove that people have an appreciation for things that they should appreciate. I knew I could not do this thing, though, that it is something like this thing that I wish to do with my life as a whole and am seeking a path to do so. It was all I could do to just stare and the ground and avoid crying while I waited for my train.

So I went out to see Sting tonight. For free. The main thing I have to say is that I love Chicago. It was in Millennium Park, which is downtown, a bit south of the Art Institute. You can see a good deal of the Chicago skyline from the park, and a couple of buildings had done strategic lighting to support the Cubs. I wholly agreed with Jen when she said, "I wish I was in love with you. This is so romantic." My favorite part of the event was that Sting was singing a song that I think it called 'Legal Alien' and right in the middle of the second verse he said, "Stop, wait a second. Where the fuck are we? We're in Chicago!" And we all screamed and he started playing 'Roxanne.' I took the train home, which was great. Go Cubs.