Haven't written in a long time. Come to think of it, maybe that's why I'm so aggravated. Lots of stuff pent up in my brain... getting a blog was supposed to rid me of that. I keep feeling the need to purge and I don't know how. Every time I reach out to people, it fails in a big way. Anyways... my god, I'm busy. I need this academic year to be over pronto. I'm tired of getting frustrated by doing things that are extremely basic and being chronically anti-social. Sure, I can go visit my old friends in the basement.. but they're even more busy and stressed than I am, so the less distractions the better... for the both of us.

Here are some things I've learned: getting mad at people is a skill I don't possess. Being honest makes you vulnerable. Communicating makes you vulnerable. I often have to "be the adult" when talking people who are a decade older than me (or more). Doesn't matter how old you are, but it matters how old you act. Some people can't get past this. I get a lot of flack for being young regardless of how I behave. Some people will always be ambiguous. You can't count on anyone to be there for you, regardless of their track record. I don't think I can trust anyone to be truthful. People never change. Nothing in this world makes my eyes water so instantly as Bing Crosby's beautiful voice.

You ever just want to pour your heart out to someone? It can cause more harm than good, believe you me.

Here's the last creative thing I did (or parts of it, at least):




I want to post sketches of my ideas for my Star Wars sleeve soon.. probably over Christmas. I plan to draw a lot. I hope to draw a lot.

I don't know what to do with myself right now. I'm perpetually behind. I was doing well up until I missed that week of school... and I'm still barely pulling through with all those projects. I fear its always obvious I've been doing things last minute. At least blogging I can pass off as a PROW100 assignment... of which I have 2 free-writing things due for next Monday, plus 6 pages of verbal vomit, then a comparative essay on the horizon. Not to mention, 2 big photography projects due tomorrow which I'm only just now finishing, a history midterm Wednesday, a huge Gestalt project due Thursday... my sanity was questionable from the get-go, but this isn't helping. When it rains it pours and pours and pours.

Emotional baggage issues aside, my next biggest worry is the midterm. I almost failed social studies in high school, it was my worst subject next to math. Actually, it was one of the classes that nearly frustrated me to tears almost every time I had it. I don't know why, either. I love and respect history, really. And I'll even watch TV shows about it and be attentive during lectures and everything. But for me to sit still and read through pages and pages of facts-- nu-uh. It doesn't sink in whatsoever. I will gladly listen to someone tell me about it, but I can't read about it worth a damn. Art history was something I had no problem with, though. For the most part anyway. My instructor focused primarily on concepts and historical context rather than stone-cold facts. Everything I learned was using paintings and artwork as a framework and it was so much easier to understand that way. Sure, I'm in "Design History", but I don't feel like I get to learn anything cool. I'd much rather learn about van Gogh's manias expressed through colour than the development of cuneiform vs hieroglyphics.

I really need to make art. Every project I'm doing this year involves drawing black squares on white paper. No, I'm not exaggerating. Triangles sometimes, and if I'm lucky rectangles too. Between that and learning how to use commas and capital letters, I'm starved for inspiration/motivation. This year is proving to be really hard on me. All the tiresome, bland basic training stuff I chugged through last year is being repeated even more basically and blandly this year. I'm expanding my vocabulary.. but I'm bored out of my skull.

I still have no friends, being chronically shy and antisocial, and the ones I do have are up to their hairline in painting and drawing. We're all busy, and we're all seperate. I feel so lonely. As far as other friends are concerned, I feel as though I've dropped off the face of the earth and no one noticed I was gone. A prevailing theme in what little socialization I have is to hang out with people that wind up texting/calling other friends while they're with me, and not actually bothering to listen to anything I have to say. I get teased and picked on a lot. My affection goes unreciprocated. I feel like I need some attention and love before my whole world is permanently black and white, but I've got no way of getting it. I realize this is all useless bitching. More ranting next time.. for now I've got to go lay in the dark till morning.

I am ruins.
My body is stone.
My white flag catches my tears of rain.
I surrender.
I am alone.

Tuesday- I dreamt of a glorious white mansion on top of a snowy hill. It was temporarily a gallery open to the public, a slew of us “normal people” were wandering the halls taking in the huge collection of art. At the end of a hall there was a trio of paintings that caught my eye. I couldn’t look away. A strange figure was in all three, like a jester or a demon. He was smiling. He was looking right at me. The smile was pointed and painted on a jester mask, and his eyes smiled mischievously. All of the paintings he was in were rusty, dark, and almost violent. I suppose I was holding up the line, because a man in a wheelchair behind me noticed my stare. “Those are fascinating paintings, aren’t they?” I asked him. “No, you shouldn’t look at those,” he said, “There--I like that one, no harm in that one. It’s pleasant.” He then pointed out a very bland looking landscape, and I rolled my eyes. Suddenly from doors at the other end of the hall the owner of the mansion barged in with a bunch of armed officers, and he was angry. He was looking for someone, apparently the whole city was.  The gallery was actually a trap, and everyone was petrified with fear as gun-like machines were scanning them for some flaw or error within them they had no idea about. Impatient and full of rage, the owner set off one of the scanner-guns blowing a giant hole through the wall and a ton of us fell down the snowy hill. I had to hide. I found my grandma in the wreckage, cooking. “It’s important to eat well before you go on a journey,” she said.

Wednesday- I can’t remember my dreams. I’m very weary from being ill, and still my anxious thoughts roll around in my brain with no way out. I want to talk to you, so I write a letter. I don’t send it, I doubt I ever will. It takes a page of text to condense my worries into one concern: we are disconnected. Can you hear me?

Thursday- This dream starts as a young girl, sceptical and vivacious.  She prepares for the city’s festival, which no one who is anyone is excluded from. It seems sort of like St. Patrick’s Day, the prevailing decorations are bright green- clothes, banners, face-paint, all. Everywhere people are drunk and rambunctious. There is music in the streets and so much commotion it’s hard to make sense of anything, until her eye lands on a giant skeleton monument being erected for the celebration. She gets a sinking feeling; she always wondered how the city can spend so much money on unclear celebrations when there are people whose homes look like a hard wind would destroy them. Shouldn’t they get help? She hides her doubts, for doubt and questions lead to trouble, and makes her way home. In the night, she comes across some blue flowers in a ghetto’s public garden. As soon as it was as dark as it could get, they glowed brilliantly. How beautiful!  A stone faced man walks buy, at first she is afraid, but she sees his skin glows too. She wonders, what’s so wrong with a world full of blue?  She makes her way home, away from the ghetto and blue people.

The dream shifts to the blue-man. In daylight, he looks like a normal person. But people of his blood are persecuted in the city and forced to live on the outskirts. He gets home to his family, his house full of harsh yellow light. They all look defeated.

Next, I am a bright young woman on her way to her cabin away from the city. She is meeting her lover there. They go there always; it is more like their home than the city. The insides are somewhat messy, for it is their place to relax and be free. That evening, an officer comes to their retreat. He demands to speak with her lover, and to test them. It involves blood tests, a prick of the finger to see if the blood is blue. She passes, her lover refuses to be tested. He knows he will fail. After many strong words the officer leaves, but not without promising to return. The woman looks for her lover to console him, and panics when she can’t find him. She runs around the house, calling him. Then she looks out the window to the field and sees his crumpled figure among the grass. It is night. He is beginning to glow, like the blue flowers that surround him. He is full of thoughts, but can express none of them when she runs down to him. Resting her head on his back and holding him, she tries to assure him it will be okay. They sit in the field and watch the sun go down.

Friday- I dreamt I was going back to school. I was packed and returning to my old friends, switching back to my original program, moving into residence. Only my program wasn’t Fine Arts, though my peers were mostly the same. And residence was some sort of giant Franken-house. The part I moved into looked like a combination of my back yard and a different bedroom, and many other blocks of bits of rooms were stacked on top and around. We were a community. My friends helped me unpack, and welcomed me back, and I felt bashful but at home. We are dressed like warriors. Zombies loomed on the horizon, we were there to learn how to defend ourselves and protect one another. Class starts tomorrow. Welcome back, we missed you. My would-be roommate was some princess-like girl, with a foofy cat and everything. She didn’t like me and I didn’t care. I was more worried about the zombie on the other side of the door. Now, where did I pack my shotgun?

Saturday- The only part of the dream I remember from Saturday night was when I was at some sort of fancy restaurant. Some girl from elementary school was having a huge party there- I guess it was her birthday. I thought since I was there, why not join in the cheer? I stayed on the outside, none of my friends were there, but decided I’d have a drink to celebrate her anyway. What the heck? I’ve never had more than a teaspoon of alcohol in my life, why not see what all the hubbub is about? One drink won’t hurt. It tasted nothing of alcohol, so I wondered if there was any in it. A friend of the birthday girl’s noticed me drinking alone and honed in on me like I was prey. He was very drunk, and asked what I was drinking. He assumed I was drunk. Next thing I know he’s groping my breasts and legs and trying to kiss me and tear my clothes off. I push him off, he persists. I won’t let him touch me, and he is frustrated that I’m not behaving like a drunk chick should.  I’m supposed to be too weak and let him have his way with me.

Sunday- I am in a mall, like many of my other dreams. I shop casually for jewellery. The light in the mall is warm and gold. I go down an escalator to find the bottom has stairs descending into a shallow fountain. There is a fashionable Asian woman walking ahead of me who is startled by it, and stumbles a little. I watch her feet, as her heels click on the marble, one foot is a whiter shade than the other. The heel of her shoe gets stuck in the escalator stair at the very bottom, in the fountain. She doesn’t notice at first until her foot pops off, shoe and all, and her step becomes a hobble. Since I am right behind her, I reach for her shoe and weird plastic foot pieces that are floating towards me to return to her. I look up to hand them to her, and she stares at me full of embarrassment and fear. She tries to talk, but doesn’t speak a word of English. She speeds away. I climb out of the fountain, drenched, and notice that my jacket is missing from pawing around trying to collect her foot. Somehow, there is a lost and found along the escalator’s side full of jackets. None of which seem to be mine. I check my pockets to be sure I still have my phone and wallet, which I do, and my loss of the jacket no longer bothers me. A pair of mall cops walks by to check if I’ve found it. They seem jovial. As they walk by, I notice Vince just behind them with his hands in his pockets. Somewhat aloof, but jovial too. It was like he expected to see me there. I followed him, who seemed to be with the cops, blathering like an idiot, trying to reconnect. “I’m really glad to see you..! It’s been a month; more than a month ... what are you doing here? How are you?”  My replies are shrugs and short answers. He didn’t talk to me until he was stopped in the food court, leaning against a counter and I embraced him. I felt warmth, and like a cold layer melted away. Then we could talk. Then the dream changed.

I was in this apartment or motel or something, another Franken-house.  It was a mash-up between my parents’ room and the living room, lots of their old junk still lined the drawers and closet. I snooped through it a little bit, discovering parts of them they had forgotten about. I forget how it happened, but Vince stayed there with me and my roommate- it might have been Claire. Three of us shared the bed, I was sprawled across the bottom, feet pushed my head and almost shoved me off the bed. We woke, left the apartment, tried to find what bus would take us to school. I was lost. I forget how we made it there, but we got to school. Only school grew and grew and looked like a hybrid between MacEwan and Balamb Garden. It was another first day of class, we ran around trying to find my classroom but the sheer size of the place and how it had changed had confused me. Vince ran ahead of me, somehow more familiar, holding on just barely to my hand as we ran. I found a room, but it was the wrong one. The room was full of kids. Even some friends from high school were there. One girl was talking about her revolutionary style of tattoos, her entire body was pink. The teacher started talking, he was flamboyant and had a lisp. I was in some how to write plays program, oops. I had to sneak out without insulting him.

The next room was like a fancy LAN party. People had suits. I felt calm, I was used to LANs. Vince disappeared to play games, I think. The dream shifted again.

Four people were involved with a wedding. Two getting married, two helping out. Their personalities and style of dress struck me as a combination of Sweeney Todd meets Rocky Horror. There was a lot of frustration, I told the groom to wear whatever he wanted and he would be at ease. My character left the room to cry, she was lonely. The only other wedding guest came in and comforted her, and told her he always loved her.

Oh. My. God. Today is not my day. I woke up after only about 4 hours of sleep with the worst sore throat ever, and I felt sort of hot and disoriented. Had to get up semi-early to finish shooting my photos so that I could bring the roll in to get developed this afternoon. I finished just in time to catch the last possible bus to school.

I contemplated staying home. But I decided to pull through. I thought it would be really bad to miss my second class of PROW100, that I'd be off to a bad start. Unfortunately I really, really should have stayed home Why? Because spending 4 long hours re-talking about where commas go and how to use quotation marks followed by excessive defining of nouns, pronouns and adjectives (we ran out of time for verbs) and talking about when to use capital letters and getting into groups to "make a list of 10 adjectives to describe a pig-- no wait, make it 5" or to find our favorite word in the dictionary makes me want to take my pen and put it through my right temple. My instructor actually apologized for telling a bunch of chattery kids to be quiet, "Sssh, okay? Sorry." I can't deal.

Wheezing, I made my way to London Drugs to drop off my film and crossed my fingers. Stopped at Colours to get a layout pad for my 2D Foundations class only to leave empty handed. Thankfully, my friend was off work and picked me up from campus. We met an angry cat outside my house who started off nice, but then hissed and clawed at us. I cooked us some food, all of which burned my throat. We went for bubble tea and a new guy was working, so service was lack-luster and the food+drink not impressive. Some texting people, resulting in my self-worth slowly spiraling (further) into blackness.

Now I'm back from picking up my photos. I was paranoid from the get-go, seeing as I'm painfully dependent on technology. It irked me not to know exactly how my photos were turning out right away care of a bright screen on the back of the camera. Sure enough, someway or another the film was exposed to light- either London Drugs fucked up or my camera is in dire need of a tune-up- and about 90% or more of my photos are completely screwed up. There was an entire set-up I had, around 6 photos, missing from the final set. Vertical bars all over most of them, some purely grey blurs with bars over top. They are due tomorrow.

What the fuck.

What makes you feel more naked?

I feel like I'm bored of school already. I have very little motivation to go, make friends with my new peers, or do any ounce of homework. I spent the last two weeks or so of my summer holiday in a deep depression, and I guess I just haven't been able to shake it yet. I think its quite likely that my depression just festered into ennui and/or apathy, rather than decided to go away.

As far as school goes though, I am interested to see how it will all progress. Last year, the focus was primarily (and heavily) on a learn-by-doing approach. This year, I've got an abundance of detailed presentations, hand-outs, and lectures to look forward to before I get into any major creating, which is something I'm really looking forward to. I'm not used to text-book oriented classes, though. On the first day of Design History, I must have taken close to 7 pages of notes. Sounds a little crazy, but I do feel spoiled in that class. To have a detailed power-point with actual notes on it, to sit in a bright room, and to not have to mentally filter through a Hungarian accent is something of a treat. Not to mention, I don't have to start at the crack of dawn.

Today I have to spend reading textbooks (which put me back about 400 bucks...bah). I feel like I know a lot already, especially in the photography aspect, so hopefully I'll just have to remind myself of things rather than re-learn. I find it hard to focus though. Again, no motivation, not to mention large pages of text kick my brain straight into day-dream mode. And I have a lot to daydream about.

There's a lot I feel like is on my chest that I want to get off, but its not going anywhere. Its locked up tight.

Despite my nonchalance when it comes to my appearance, I'm dreadfully self conscious. This past year has been one of evolution for me, externally at least. I've battled with control endlessly. Once my ex boyfriend and I broke-up I felt a certain rebellious freedom to do and dress as I please. So I did, a lot. I don't hold any hard feelings towards the guy; I indulged his control over me by always asking permission in regards to hair, clothes, body modification. It was that damn insecurity at work once more, without me even realizing it. Now I ask no one for permission. I need to feel in control in even the tiniest ways possible, especially when my life is spiraling out of it.

Having changed my hair at least once every two weeks for the past year, it has apparently become something of a trademark for me. I guess I'm alright with that... I'd rather be stuck with being the person who always changes than always stays the same. I think. As such I've grown really attached to my hair. The past little while, its been what I consider long (a little past shoulders?) because my natural hair is abnormally thick and frizzy, and growing it long would mean wearing 5+ pounds of weight. No joke.

My last hair cut, while not terribly tragic, wasn't really what I wanted. Someone told me I had a mullet, and it has been bothering me ever since. Rather than spend more money and go crying back to my hairdresser for giving me a mullet I took matters into my own hands. (Lesson?: Never leave me alone, depressed, with a pair of scissors when I haven't been able to sleep for a week.(I don't think my hair turned out bad, by the by... I'm just about 3 inches lighter)).

The experience of hacking away at (what has been decided for me to be) my main feature is... both liberating and odd. In my hand, I held inches which were manifestations of moments in time. Damaged by all the change I force upon it. Curling from my sweat, which I was covered in from the heat and from my anxiety. I wondered if I'd be risking androgyny again, like I was picked on for so often in junior high. My femininity was at risk of being destroyed. Heck, the bits of hair stuck to my bare chest and back and shoulders like the hair on a man's body. But I didn't care.

I feel better for it. Lighter in more than one way, no matter how silly that might be. Even for a moment, in a manic episode at 3 in the morning, I felt like I took control of myself. I have so little, that even doing just that made me feel empowered. I don't need to rely on my hair.

I just want to love freely and without inhibitions, rules, or restrictions.