nine*

My life is a leitmotif.

LEITMOTIF: 1. In music or drama, a marked melodic phrase or short passage which always accompanies the reoccurance of a certain person, situation, abstract idea, or allusion in the course of a play; a sort of dominant label.

source: dictionary dot com.

stay tuned for original artwork.

probably drawings of dead horses.

slash emaciated horses.

and end scene.

Love,

Marge

*pronounced NIEN!

Funch

Interestingly enough*, Dear C and I were lunching today (because nobody spends their afternoons playing cops and robbers anymore. We all job and work and school in our afternoons. Lunch. We all do lunch. Fun lunch, aka: Funch) and we talked about how even we feminists (we're both strong and devotedly feminist and maninist) who are wildly amazing and independent and accomplished find ourselves quickly falling into being the adoring significant other. Not that adoring isn't bad, but it is when you slip out of being you and having your life and there's something precious that you compromise and you lose.

What is it that I lose? What's that word for what it is? I'm not talking about virginity or something physical like that. There's no wall of Jericho that comes tumbling down, there's no boundary that is crossed, no rules that are broken, it's an essence that slips through my fingers and leaves that gross feeling afterwards.

It is somehow related to the times when I'm interested in someone and my mind gets fogged up so that when he calls me and asks me to spend the evening with him I say yes and forget that I have friends and deadlines and to do lists and personal wishes.

I feel silly even trying to write about it because...I've found no words. Is there scientific proof that says we don't always think in words? Because I find always find myself struggling as I delve at cliffs of thoughts or maybe it's not like digging granite out of a quarry but more like clay. Sly smooth cool clay.

Oh dear, I'm still talking. Typing, I mean. And does the meaning come out? Hmmm...

Also, it turns out that I'm not the only one struggling from terrible dreams. I was watching my cousin's five year old, Dear Monstruo Uno, and the neighbor boy we were playing with noticed my earrings one day.

"Are those spiderwebs on your ears?"

"No, they're dream catchers."

"What are those?"

The conversation stuck with Monstruo Uno who asked my cousin for one to keep his nightmares away. She tried to explain...well, anyway, if you've been to a family dinner you can imagine how something so simple ended up involving P Diddy and God and cultural insensitivity and distinguishing the differences between Spanish cuisine and Mexican cuisine. So no dream catcher. And I don't have one either, really (a dream catcher).

I started thinking about the discussions I've had with people about my dreams. What I really wish could happen is that what Friend R--I sound communist, let's just call him Comrade R. Comrade R suggested imagining a beautiful mythical bird. Actually it was more simple when he was describing it and more beautiful. I should have written it down. But it was that tactic that people always suggest, put something into your dream, something good, to save you from the nightmarish parts. It's never worked form me in fact they turn out worse because then something good is ruined. But all the same, I'd like to explain this magical little trick to my dear Monstruo Uno because maybe it will work for him. And maybe if I imagine it will work for him it will work for me.

*I decided in trying to write a reply to a seven page letter from someone in Denmark that it is sometimes better to start as if you're in the middle of the conversation.

an age for an age for you to stop talking to me, addended again

I wore my helmet bicycle helmet today.

I realized as I was riding (helmet-less) to the grocery store that I have reached the point in my life where I care very little about how nerdy, odd, uncool, etc I look to other people. It's like I'm a fifty-year-old twenty-two-year-old. But face it, I am unescapably who I am, so I've decided to jump headlong into me. And my parents would really like it. And I'm really nervous about brain damage....
So instead of going: home, g-store, friend's hiz; I stopped home again and wore my helmet to friend's. But then a list of predicaments came up. Do I wear my helmet when I ride up to campus? Or when I go bike riding with friends? Is there safety in bike riding numbers? As a helmet wearer am I supposed to stand strong and wear my helmet at all biking times so that others will be less embarrassed to wear theirs? Am I really going to get into an accident? Should I get a pocket protecter?
If I start wearing a helmet can I really be choosy about when I wear it or not? It's not like me being a vegetarian which usually centers on me not wanting to eat meat but me needing to eat what people feed me to keep from getting a headache. Unless my helmet starts giving me a headache, which would be entirely possible with my head...
I don't know about this... I just keep repeating "brain damage, brain damage, brain damage, brain damage" to remind me why I would wear a helmet. Because it seems to be my biggest fear. Second only to chalk. So second biggest fear.

Or third.
I would hate to be trapped to someone for eternity who would turn to me at different junctures in our life and say, "You go into galleries that aren't hip?" or "I hate those pointy shoes and when girls wear scarves around their necks or have belts around their waists." Waste you. I feel like wearing a helmet will cut down on those people in my life.

In some other news, in case you're still reading, I got a seven page letter from someone in Denmark yesterday who said he thinks about me sometimes when he sees the boats come into harbor or when he meets a Norweigan fisherman.

It's always nice to be told that.

Blah, how did that all end up relating back to men?

ADDENDS:
Now I've been doing some reading. I'm stuck on the helmet fence. Apparently, when you do wear a helmet drivers give you less room as they pass you, increasing your risk of collision.

This is definitely true though, “When people try cycling, they nearly always say it changes the way they treat other road users when they get back in their cars.” That actually makes me frustrated and wish that everyone would do some bicycling time.

Any thoughts, anyone? anyone? Bueller?

bursting, addended

I'm facing escalating pressure from G.O., who is actually the O.G. of G.O.G., and from my Mom to write to you.

Plus it's sometimes very nice to be Marge Bjork. Like right now.

There is the constant threat of spider attack in my basement now. I found one on the wall by my head when I was laying in bed last night. I immediately screamed and jumped into my roommate's bed and made her kill it for me as I hyperventilated. I'm not sure which I am more afraid of: the encroaching spiders or the brain damage that could result if I continue to use roach spray to kill them. Brain damage would be a pretty horrible loss, I'm pretty pretentious about my brain. The other night I was remembering how, being the baby of the family I like to have my family's attention TOUT LE TEMPS, so on this particular family trip I was trying to charm my sister until she finally couldn't take it anymore and said, "Can you please be self contained!" So I started singing about being in a tupperware. But it just hit me, some five-six years later, of course in my family we wouldn't say something normal like "Quit it!" "Leave me alone" "Look what you did ya little jerk!" No. We say things like "please be self-contained." The more syllables the better, I say.

I can't help but be serious lately. So can you forgive me when I get gushy and say you're all pretty damn amazing. Don't doubt it, don't forget it. No one is cooler than you. My roommate, her sister, and I burned Twilight the other night*. The book. It's a great laugh for pretentious literary kids, you know, to burn it, but there was actually a real need deep down in my soul. E, my roommate, and I had been reading Twilight out loud to each other for a cheap laugh. But we got to the part where character B thinks that she's not good enough for character Vampire and I couldn't take it anymore. I've seen that too much. If you think you're not good enough for a Vampire, call me up and I'll set aside my battle against the dead horses and we'll kick it. Because me and God in Heaven have a hard time knowing that Vampire has got a hold on you. Then we'll kick the Vampire. No. Then you'll kick the Vampire.

Anyway, whenever I've been party to book burning, I've always been amazed at how beautiful the process is. It's a good thing I like reading books so much and I believe in rabble and rebellion and conformity and have a high ambiguity tolerance because otherwise I could join in with Chuchompfsky in Azbiristan and burn books for a living.

You start off by ripping the paperback covers off. Newer books have glossy resistant paper covers and need to be prodded and pleaded into burning. Then you rip the book into smaller stacks of paper. Start a few pages kindling at the edges. As the tops burn down and off and the flame dies down to embers you start digging through to find the untouched stacks of paper. Once you start to fan them out, blow on them and the flames will jump to life. The page will start turning darker and bubble up and shrivel into itself. I'd like to film the process sometime.

well...

fin. That's the french word for end.

love you,

Marge

* I respectfully do not like the Twilight series and do not presume nor wish to make fun of people who do. Please feel free to love every page of it. Amen to you.

****"Shake thyself from the dust; arise, sit down, O Jerusalem; loose thyself from the bands of thy neck, O captive daughter of Zion. For Thus saith the Lord: Ye have sold yourselves for naught, and ye shall be redeemed without money."
3 Nephi 20:37,38

I burned a candle for Balzac

My relationship with my bicycle started three years ago. I was home from university, feeling restless, and from some depthy place in my brain there was a spark that sizzed along the fuse until it led me to the creaky garage where my mother's old bronze Panasonic Tourist from her university days was waiting for me.

We cut loose. Bicycle riding came back easily and we meandered through town together, then took a left and hit the open road into the wide fields of the country. Nothing beats that. Golden growing grain achering out to each side, all brushed up with bushes and shelter belts around the corners. Nothing blocking my sun blue sky. All, achering out and out and out.

I couldn't quit my mother's bicycle. I went back to it day after day and when it came time to drive back to my state of university, we tacked it on to the back of our Dodge Stratus. We've been together ever since. For richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, for better or worse, I'd never leave Bicycle.

Also, did you know that Powerade is kosher?