that was amazing.

this was truly awesome and i am truly blessed.

mayday! mayday!

H'OK

pact with future self:

you WILL have a print shop.
it WILL be somewhere else other than the cleve.
you WILL NOT always work for satanbux.
and if all else fails, you will buy a food truck so you can at least cook all day while traveling the country at the same time.

with your dog.


to all my relatives who THINK i NEED a boyfriend:
i am a LONER.
i've always been a loner.
like a puffin.
like my dad.
mind the cheese: c'est la vie.
i don't have one because i don't want one.
i want REAL.
i don't want settling and unhappiness and wanting like you.
i don't want to fill out some 'online' profile just so i can meet some fuckface and go through months to years of denial when i figure out what a shitbag he is.
just so i can pop out some 'catholic' kids and search for meaning.
and if i don't find what i NEED?
oh well, too fucking bad.
sorry to disappoint you.
but i'll just be this way forever.
fuck your pressure.
fuck you for thinking i'm desperate for 'love'.
i love you, but fuck you.
i have love. i've got bushels.
THANK YOU FAMILY PARTIES FOR MAKING ME FEEL SO SOOOO GREAT.


one of these days, i'm just going to get the fuck out of here with my car, a carton of smokes, tunes to last me a lifetime, a new puppy and my fucking mayday emergency backpack (thanks mom, in case of the apocalypse) and get the fuck out of here. use my flares to light a fire, my seed bank to grow some foodz and blow this popsicle stand.

aaahhhh monday

oohhh my gosh i love it when alex is home to show my useless funny things on stolen internets.


also, living away from home again is rad. i can eat portobello mushroom burgers and drink strawberry orange banana juice whenever i want! not to mention, i am literally 5 minutes away from my job. ughhuhuhuhuhuhhhhhhhh

but you and me, we're just crazy

F A L L : 2 o 1 o
i just have to spread the following amazing recap of what my life is to become in the following months. some of you might laugh to yourselves and say 'oh you dork', or you'll just be patting yourself on the back because you were RIGHT and its FREAKY - i'm talking to you sir! thats right! shout out!

so, as most of you know, i intern at this killer studio, the only real one in cleveland basically = i'm super blessed.

THIS FALL, I AM:
- coordinating and curating an entire art show consisting of work made by interns from my shop and 2 other major art organizations in Cleveland. i will have work in it, i will pick out the pieces, i will install and hang it. le yikes and le awesome at the same time and 75% of me is kind of terrified but in the most amazing way.
- starting in october, every sunday i'll be teaching a class on intalgio, which is just a really fancy pants way of saying etchings. people are paying to take this class = whoa.
- i have been given the IMMENSE HONOR of designing and printing my friend luke's wedding invitations. at least 200. we're not sure on a number yet. helllooooo letterpress, so good to see you again.
- CIA litho collection help and collaboration, with barter system litho studio time. time to build up these stone grinding guns again and to be totally cheesy i cannot wait to feel the burn. eh heh heh heh.
- one of my drive-thru regulars at starbucks makes mixed media art as a hobby. after recently discovering that i intend to be a printmaker, has commisioned me to do screen prints of his work on t shirts. quite a few of them.
- plus various never-ending and exciting shows and events like holiday parties and artoberfest and germans coming and all kinds of wonderful happening at the studio.


you know, when i was at the cape i finally had some time to just sit down and think. i read a heck of a lot of books and i thought a lot because summer isn't really a good time for me. no news there. and although i came away from that time still feeling like i had a million things to say and a million things to sort out and a million things to apologize for i realized: all in good time. i find myself wanting to go back to things a lot, i'm a ' can't things just be this way again ' kind of girl, or ' can't we go back to being like that ' kind of girl. it totally sucks, must be all that romance and dreamer stuff i plug into my ears and mind all the time, but i don't mind. it's just who i am.
i felt nostalgic for school today, moving into a house and living with my friends and being with them. having dance parties and cheesy movie marathons and stopping everything busy for an hour just to watch our favorite shows and snake bites in the wee hours of the early morning and cooking meals together. i miss that, but its not like i'll never have it again. it's just a time to make things happen right now. i don't want to go to grad school, i want to get roughed up a little bit. i want to move somewhere and be a little wild woman without having to worry about school being the only option i have. i've been nuts my whole life, i have no intentions of settling that. there are always options, shit economy or not.

no one is leaving, at the end of the day, we'll still talk like we always have and do. we'll still be ourselves, we'll still be us, we'll still have whats ours, yours and mine. we'll still have you're thing and my thing and coming together to do our thing because if there's any time in our lives where we really know whats real to us, i really think that its this time. you know what is and you know what isn't and you know what matters. thats all there is to it, hell or high water. after this, things can so easily become routine and doubtful and bland if you're not careful. so, go with your gut. know and be confident in what and who matters to you, make it happen and push and pray - apparently on average we only use about 30% of our brain capacity and we're all so passive aggressive about our untapped potential. to hell with what other people think, to hell with what matters to them, to hell with who or what you might upset or not effect at all. now is a time to do shit for ourselves, so in short, don't cop out.

i'm going to really try hard to follow my own advice in this matter. after this fall, depending on what may come and what connections are made, i want to be back up in cape cod by march. fall at the very latest, bottom line. i've looked up everything from gallery positions, to screen printing factory jobs to cranberry harvesting - no joke - to waitressing to cooking to whatever. i'm not settling for anything less. i'm going to start out making small woodcuts and screen prints on a table press in a small apartment or room but i'm going to do it. i will get those pieces into galleries, next to all the ridiculous amounts of painting and pottery. that is what i'm going to do and i know it because if there's one thing i'm damn fine at its pushing so instead of waiting for someone to push me, i'm going to push me. sprinkled at sea.

thats all for a while. the only thing i want anyone looking at after this is my art work blog because thats all i want to worry about. it's fall, its been nice and slightly chilly here the past few nights that i have to wear my flannel to bed. i'm going to sit on my porch with best coast and an american spirit.

passenger seats

in about 72 hours, i will be leaving for the ocean.

i need this break. i need it badly.
in a way, i've been holing myself up a lot lately, mostly running on empty automatic and whenever i get a spare second to even think about anything, it has no outlet. it just sits and i don't have the words for any of you, if it even matters. i don't have the words to explain to myself or any of you any of the other things that are happening outside of you.
lately, i keep waking up with this sick feeling in my body, choking back this sick immense feeling of 'you ruined something', 'you wanted this', 'you did this', 'you should not have done that, you should have done this', 'its gone', '
'of course you fucked this up again.'

necessity is the only word i have. one day, i'll have more.
until then, sound does a decent job.



one day i'll have my own shop to print in, for other people to print in.
one day, i'll have a restaurant.
one day i'll talk and you'll listen.
one day you'll talk and i'll listen.
one day we'll speak.
one day i'll get in my car.
one day i'll go.
one day i'll step into the water and not want to take the deepest breath i can.
one day i won't feel the need to go.
one day these bones won't be so tired.
one day these bones won't matter.
one day my soul will feel young again.
one day all i will see will be land and sky.
one day we won't need to make excuses.
one day we won't need to feel guilty.
one day the funks will be a little easier.
one day life will be a little sweeter.
soon.



i'm awesome at post cards. message me your address if you want one.

oh
tell me.

what am i going to do with you?

a dream:

i was at the swimming hole, on the bank of slabs of rocks and silt and dirt. water was pouring over each tier of rock, by the gallon, rushing over as opposed to its slower, gentler, safe speed and trickle. the water was deafening and i could hear no other sounds, just foaming water pouring over. the water was dirty, light brown and foaming with small pebbles and silt and dust it had gathered along the way, what had been washed into it. instead of meeting at the hole in a gentle whirlpool, the streams of water kept over lapping, colliding with each other to diverge their own paths, forming lines of swirling water and foam. it was dusk because the trees around had started making silhouettes against the sun. there were no animals, no birds, no sound, no people. i stood on the bank and smelled the water, the air it made. i wanted to go in but i knew it was dangerous, i knew i might slip, but i couldn't avoid going in. i wanted to and i knew that i needed to. i stepped in and felt the waters force hitting my legs and pushing them and they started to shake. i walked through, into and past the streams fighting for directions before i got the the middle, where i leaned against one of the ledges and let water pour over me too. i let my clothes stick to me, i lost my shoes, but none of it was heavy. my jeans weren't weighted down with water, my t shirt was wet but hung on my body like it was dry. i dropped down into the swimming hole and into the strong whirlpool it was making. i submerged myself and held my breath while i opened my eyes. i looked above me at the surface, watched the separate streams come together over my head. when i was a kid swimming in my aunts pool, i would sit under the pump that would jet water into the pool, to see the separate streams making otherwise invisible movement - it reminded me of that. i was underwater forever, i just stayed there floating and looking at the surface while bubbles of air escaped. air was leaving my body, but it wasn't hurting me, it didn't feel like i was dying or drowning but i wasn't breathing. i stayed down there until the sun rose, and with the new light on the surface, i knew that the scene above me had changed. the streams of water had become gentler, there was no foam and i saw the face of my mother along the edge of the surface, looking in at me like she used to when i would submerge myself in the bathtub. she smiled and walked away. i stayed down the for a while longer, my head was now trying to figure out what was going on and where i was. the light changed on the surface again and the water became clearer, it became still. all of the sudden my body shuddered and that signal inside my brain went off telling me to rise, you need air, like when you try to stay underwater for as long as you can with your cousins or siblings and something inside your brain and body just says 'ok thats enough'. i pushed myself up to the surface, grasping water - the depth had changed and i was farther from the surface now. when i got there i rose slowly and felt sunlight stealing into my eyes and onto my face. i had changed. my skin was pale, the color it is on the inside of my arms, all over. my hair was long again, even longer that it was before and i felt lighter, not necessarily skinnier but lighter. i looked down and i wasn't wearing my clothes anymore, i was just wrapped in layers and layers of un-starched cheesecloth that i use for lithography, its almost like gauze. for some reason, i was able to stand up and the water now only came up to a little above my knees. i looked down and under the cheesecloth i saw red marks and lines, scars across my stomach, my heart and in between my lungs. i unwrapped the layers to look at them, to see what had gotten to them. i looked down and the lines cut into them were sewn up and healing. there was no thread, they weren't bleeding but they were red and irritated from healing and i knew that they were gone. i looked down at my heart and thought 'well, yes i am an organ donor on my license but who would want this? not to mention, i smoke too much.' i looked down at my lungs and knew they were still there because i was breathing and i though 'what would they want with the howl, all the shit that sits in there?' i wrapped myself back up and looked around. it was a little chilly but only because i could smell it in the air, i couldn't feel it, but the sun had that look about it and the stillness was similar to a fall morning. i realized i was in a lake of some kind, or a very large and very still river because on my left or right sides, i could clearly see banks, but north and south of me had no ends. all around the banks were trees, but only pine trees. not big ones like redwoods, but smaller ones like spruces or firs, like you ones you look for in christmas tree shopping. the banks looked like they were covered in moss but as i made my way towards the one on my right, i saw that it was all pine needles, but not spruce or fir needles, they were long and thin. it was a beach of pine needles. i stepped out of the water and onto the beach. they were soft and layered under my feet, all still green, none of them were dry or brittle or pointy. i felt them sticking to my feet and to my arms, hands and legs as i sat down. i sat in the sun and could hear nothing, there was nothing. i sat for a while in the sun, but i didn't seem to dry off at all except for my hair. it dried and became a little shorter, wavy like its supposed to be. i looked to my left and saw emily coming down the pine needle beach. she was wrapped in cheesecloth and her hair had dried too. she came up to me and sat with me, we didn't say anything but she was smiling at me and she started to cry. she saw that i had some irritated scars and put her arm around me, she was still crying but she was smiling. we sat there for a while indian style, looking at the lake/river until the sun started to go down. it was dusk again and i knew we had somewhere to go. we got up, smiling and taking one last look at the lake/river before walking into the woods.


i don't remember my dreams very much.
i woke up after this, last night and it was thunder storming badly, but the air and the rain smelled nice.

i'm very blessed you know.
actually, its borderline spoiled and i know it. forget it, it IS spoiled. God spoils me. big time.

thank you for everything.
all of you.

thank you to those closest, who have done such a good job of building such a strong nest around me that keeps my eye on the ground but keeps me from falling. i miss it constantly.
thanks for changing plans, thanks for sacrifice, thanks for drives, thanks for tears, thanks for listening, thanks for staying, thanks for being consistent.
thanks for making me laugh. thanks for making me food. thanks for snuggling. thanks for holding onto me when i'm shaking or crying.
i know that wisdom and learning come with time.
i know that the best and proper way to look at change is not in the hurt it makes us feel but in the way it makes things grow, in a different direction but nonetheless for something greater. at the end of the day, this is just a change of plans and no one is going anywhere and no one needs to be anything different.
there's a lot i have to do, a lot i have to figure out if i'm ever going to accomplish what i want to but i know who i have, i know what i have and thats all i need.