The Wee Democracy

true lies

i can hear the republican convention on the tv in the other room.

i was going to write some kind of scathing commentary about the lies and bullshit and general exploitation of your tired, your poor by the people who care the least about them.

i was going to attack guiliani and mccain for kowtowing to the party line, for endorsing a man who STILL cannot pronounce nuclear, and who has the mentality of a frat boy, and the intelligence of a crack-addled 7 year old.

i was going to cheer on michael moore, even though i don't always agree with him, for having the brass balls it takes to walk into the lion's den with a steak necklace on.

i was going to point and laugh and W for admitting that we can't win the war on terror.

i was going to say that arnold should have stuck to fighting predators and terminating and jingling all the way.

i was going to criticize the sickening parade of 9-11 victims brought out on the stage so that they could tug at our heartstrings and make us forget that it was the ineptitude of the current regime that led to it.

i was going to give a massive thumbs up to the 100,000+ folks who got up and protested and had the moxy to make all those fake caskets and to give a collective finger to the president.

i was going to do all that. but i can't. i'm too goddamn angry.

instead, i'm going to throw up.



feeling: happy as a lark, can't you tell?
thinking of: che
song of the day: californication - red hot chili peppers
born and raised by those who praise control of population. everybody's been there and i don't mean on vacation.

let's piss people off today

in the past i've more or less avoided any talk about religion, except for maybe back in february when i dissected my admittedly temporary amazement of the passion of the christ. once is enough for that violent-ass movie. (incidently, did you know kevin smith is planning on calling his clerks sequel "the passion of the clerks"? does anyone else find this to be a monumentally bad idea? speak up). and i know it seems odd that one day after i threaten what seems to be the vast majority of dallas public with bodily harm, i'd be talking about religion, but such is life.

i guess it began at the end of a train of thought while i was on the way to work yesterday. i live in a particularly spiritual and church-laden part of town, where people dress fashionably to go to church, pageworn bibles in tow, and will NOT be late or absent for just about any reason, even acts of god himself. again, i must point out the irony of the fact that there is a church on just about every block, and that i'd conservatively estimate about a 80% attendance rate among the folks around here at at least one of those churches, and yet, this is probably a comparable criminal element as well. it seems some folks want to have their cake and eat it to.

but this is all beside the point. i was going to explain a few of my particular beliefs, not as a method of conversion for all you heathens out there (and you know who you are) but more just so you can get to know what kind of things i believe in besides batman and civil rights for everybody.

first of all, i don't think christianity is the "right" religion. i believe salma hayek was right in 'dogma' when she said "no denomination's nailed it yet". but it's the one i've been exposed to more than others, so i'll admit a bias in my thinking, and that alot of my beliefe structure involves a reaction to what i've been taught.

i think jesus was a real person who had real passion and lived his life according to said passion, but i can't say for sure that he was the son of god. what i can say is that if half the stuff written about the way he lived his life is true, then he's the kind of person i'd like to emulate, yet would be kidding myself if i said i was even playing the same sport, let alone in the same league as that dude. infinite patience, love and understanding. sounds pretty good to me.

i have a friend, bryan, who is very christian-minded (sometimes) and believes that if you do not accept jesus as your savior, you're going to hell. he says that's in the bible somewhere, but the bible's been so translated and changed and retranslated and edited and restranslated again that i simply cannot believe that the wording of some of the "laws" are the original words, so there's that. but my primary argument against this rather harsh consequence for what can sometimes amount to being confused or just not entirely convinced rather than seriously immoral, is that it just doesn't seem like god's style.

i mean, you look at the old testament. he's all fire and brimstone and vengeance and "i am the law" judge dredd style. then at the new testament, he's all "i bring you love, you are the sheep, yada yada yada". and the way i look at it, the old testament was so far removed from what god is actually like and is so steeped in typical human beliefs (superiority, impatience, intolerance, vengeance, wrath) that it just seems that they anthropomorphized god to a ludicrous degree and said "well, you have to believe us, it's the word of GOD!!" and when they said god, someone shook a thunder sheet somewhere behind the altar and people cowered, cause they weren't too smart back then.

the new testament concerns that emotion that is probably the least understood human emotion, which is to say love, and in that respect is further away from humans and is more divine. and it is that difference that leads me to believe that hell is just the boogeyman that people never stop believing in. i remember when i saw 'wolf' with jack nicholson, and he goes to see that creepy indian knowitall, who wants jack to bite him. jack says "you'd rather be damned than die" and the indian guy says "damnation is not a part of my system of beliefs" and i remember thinking, right on. yeah, it's not a part of my system of beliefs.

hell is like the spiritual death penalty. it serves no purpose but retribution. you'll never get out, so you can't say you learned a lesson, because learning a lesson implies the chance to exercise the practice of that lesson. otherwise its just mindless punishment, and that is not the god i believe in (see "infinite love" above) retribution is a human construct, and i think god has better things to do than damning 2/3 of the world's population simply because of the way they were raised.

jeez, josh, you don't believe in hell, you question the bible, what do you believe in?

simply put, moral living. kindness and love and compassion, all of which are pretty damn hard to live by 100% of the time. wrath and vengeance and all that old testament crap are, on the other end completely, fairly easy to live by (hint hint, bush) . its hard to be patient with the people who test yours so consummately. it's hard to have compassion for everyone, regardless of their actions. it's hard to have a fundamental love for everyone, even if you've never met them. that's why i think this is the path that best suits me. it's not particularly easy, and it doesn't offer alot of easy answers.

not like that stupid bible.



feeling: alright - up early, sunny day
thinking of: cutting the shag
song of the day (really of sunday, but you know): lawrence, ks - josh ritter
preacher says that when the master calls us, he's gonna give us wings to fly. but my wings are made from hay and corn husks, so i can't leave this world behind

no, but i'll punchisize your face for free!

i'm no stranger to stupidity. i mean, it's pretty hard to remain oblivious to the copious amounts of retardation sweeping the country like some bad song a la the macarena or whoomp! there it is, or, even worse, livin' la vida loca (man, that song lasted waaaaaay too long).

when i was an RA at UT, i worked in a dorm called kinsolving the summer after my sophomore year. man, you're face with some dumbass people in that job, and this is supposed to be the future of america. and then you met the parents. toward the end of the summer, a girl came up to the front desk which i had to man from time to time, and asked "does check out mean we have to move out?". to which i replied, "yes." then, she got this kinda scared and puzzled look on her face, hesitated a moment, and said "completely?"

another time, answering the phone, i said "hello, kinsolving front desk, this is josh." a brief pause. "um, yeah, is this the kinsolving front desk?"

but, this always pales in comparison to the stupidity i have to face every day at work. man....them some dumbass people.

ok, maybe i'm being too harsh. maybe they're not dumbass. but if they're not that, then they're just awfully rude, inconsiderate, disgusting, willfully ignorant, lazy sonsabitches. if, for instance, a shirt is marked $39.99, and you are asked to take an additional 20% off, how much does the shirt cost?

alright, alright, percentages are not everyone's cup of tea. but, i mean, when a shirt costs 7 bucks, and you're still debating whether or not to get it, you're one cheapass motherfucker, and i've no tolerance for your fool self. and, please, if you're going to unfold a shirt to look at it, just unfold one. the larges look exactly like the mediums, just bigger. in size, that is.

but, there is no, and i mean, absolutely NO excuse for why i found a pee-soaked pair of jeans in the dressing room yesterday. none.

sonsabitches.



feeling: sleepy
thinking of: who in their drunken right mind would text message me at 5 in the morning?
song of the day: i didn't understand - elliott smith
my feelings never change bit, i always feel like shit

block quote

i didn't write this, but it certainly sums up alot of what i've been thinking about lately, which may explain my constant absenteeism regarding writing in this thing:

"the surgeon exists because holes are bad and need sewing. at the end of the day he goes home and knows he has sewn up thirty cuts, splinted ten broken limbs, and the world is closer to life and further from death over all. the philosopher exists because holes are bad and proceeds to find new holes, or take existing holes and try to tear them open further. at the end of the day, the job is never done, there is never anything concrete to show for it except confused looks, cluttered offices, and a few corpses of people who lived their lives and never got it anyway....

the question of the artist versus the ambulance driver, i've come to realize, isn't a simple question of how to live. it's a question, too, of how to promote living, how to stave off dying. the ambulance driver does it by simply entering the fray, plucking the wounded off the pavement and trying to sew them up. this is a noble thing. it's this nobility which makes the artist look bad, because how do you pluck the wounded off the pavement abstractly? how do you pluck yourself off the pavement? in order to live, in order to justify living, we can't just fill the space of our lives with empty amusement, with pointless light and sound and words - we're going to have to try harder now. "

food for thought, anyways.



feeling: speechless
thinking of: sunny days
song of the day: exit music - radiohead
and you can laugh your spineless laugh. we hope your rules and wisdom choke you.

i yam what i yam

i'm hungry.

i'm bored.

i'm impatient.

i'm a little lonely.

i'm pensive.

i'm tired.

i'm weak.

i'm looking for some action.

i'm in pain.

i'm still hungry.

i'm sitting in the dark.

i'm thinking about leah.

i'm grinding my teeth.

i'm scratching my chin.

i'm typing.

i'm struggling for thoughts.

i'm amazed by my back muscles.

i'm disgusted by my back hair.

i'm tonguing a scratch on the inside of my lip.

i'm achy.

i'm cranky.

i'm in need of a smile.

i'm in need of a hug.

i'm in need of a big strong drink.

i'm here.

i'm there.

i'm waiting, waiting, waiting.

i'm wishing.

i'm coming to grips with reality.

i'm still hungry.



feeling: all of the above.
thinking about: all of the above
song of the day: in hammersmith palais - the clash
i'm just looking for fun

princess leah

for a long time, i thought that carrie fisher's name in the movie was leah, because when i was a young'un, people kept calling her princess leah, thinking somehow that my mom named my sister after her. it wasn't until 7th grade, when i first saw star wars, that i got that it was leia (lay-uh) not leah (lee-uh). if you ask me, leah is the cooler version.

anywho, today's leah's birthday. i didn't get her anything yet cause my last few gifts (explosions in the sky cd, iron and wine cd, cool kitschy sweater (or so i thought)) have bombed. its a tough proposition, getting a gift for leah. it a running joke between certain family members to say around christmas time "did you find something for leah yet?". mostly, you just roll the dice and hope for the best. but, i digress.

so she's 27, 3 years and 3 months older than me. i've said it before, that she's the kind of person i aspire to me - extremely self assured, driven, yet totally chill and fun to hang around. she's the person from whom i generally get the best in new music (think interpol, modest mouse, dcfc, postal service, and that's just this past year), and whom i can trust for sound advice in dealing with my ladies.

here are some facts and mini-stories about leah, you know, to commemorate the occasion:

her lung collapsed when i was too young to take it seriously. i got to play with her sympathy toys.

graduated from high school with the geometry award.

makes badass silk screen art.

played with blanka in our rare street fighter tournaments.

has a small scar on her cheek which she used to blame me for, until i asked my mom where she got it - turns out, she got it soon after birth, scraping her face with her little wrist band thingie.

used to tell me i was adopted.

formerly planned to deck out her old room in pink neon and black and white tile floors.

used to work in a star magic, from which she stole many a birthday/xmas present for me.

used to wishbone my legs and kick me in the sack. she's not a saint, people.

helped me build a small fortress in my bunk bed to secure my sleep from the attack of the giant roaches.

owns two new kids on the block videos: hangin' tough, and step by step

used to have a twin sized waterbed. not even big enough for real waterbed fun.

recently advised me to pursue phone sex.

used to deal in "favor" currency. for instance, if i wanted something, it would cost me so many favors. for instance, a sandwich would be one favor. fetching her a pepsi would be a half a favor. preparing a batch of macaroni and cheese - three favors. i incurred alot of favor debt.

has once poured herself a glass of pepsi using only her feet, which are quite dextrous, considering how tiny her toes are.

rocks harder than anyone else i know. except maybe me.

happy birthday leah!



feeling: happy
thinking of: green
song of the day: "the young and the restless" theme song

really horrible dream

it's far to early for me to be awake, right now, but i'm not going back to sleep. some of the things that i've just spent the night dreaming about (is nightmaring a word? it should be) are things that i hope i never see in my life. dreaming about death is something that i tend to do from time to time, usually once every couple of years or so, and most of the time, its an accidental death, or natural or whatever. hasn't been murder before.

really, it was a unique dream in that it wasn't just the aftermath of something horrible. it was like the dream covered the entire span of the event. everything from the day before the murder, me hanging out with this person, to the sequence leading up to the assault itself, which i survived, and this person did not. the recovery, and the aftermath, all took place, grief, anger, denial, and this tortuous breakdown that ended the dream, when it finally sinks in that you will never see this person again. and it was all so real that waking up was again, like i was given a reprieve from this alternate reality by god himself.

coming out of a dream like that, that's so fraught with emotional tension is pretty intense itself. like i said about that new york dream, you wake up and in that split second that you finally realize that everything is ok, and that you are safe and sound in your bed and no one you care about is in any danger, is pretty relieving, and i really don't have any other response for it but to cry pretty hardcore for about 10 seconds. just lay there, and say thank you, thank you, god that this was only a dream.

a pretty goddamn awful dream, but not real all the same.



feeling: relieved. so relieved.
thinking of: safety
song of the day: tba

squeeze it out

its not like thing have been bad around here. or even mediocre. sure there are some aspects of existence that are more trying than i'd like them to be, but you know...c'est la vie, right? and i'm telling you, all this hype i built up around the getting of the cell phone? it was totally accurate. i feel much more connected to certain peeps than i once did, and it's nice.

fr'instance. i talked to riqui both thursday and friday night, which was the first time i've spoken to him in quite some time. most of the time, we just instant message. so it's just cool to hear a voice every now and again.

i'm also getting daily emails from my newest (and irishest *wink*) friend, michelle, whose provided me with more than a few chuckles, both with her words and with cute dinosaur surfer types: www.michellecopter.com. anyways, she's in malaysia now, but when i go to austin in a month or so, it should be fun. an irish vs. a mexican in a bar...should be interesting. really, you can probably blame her for this sudden drop off in the usually astounding level of circular logic and hot air perpetuation typically found here, seeing as how i've been writing her every day, too.

what a weak effort this is... *melodramatic sigh*



feeling: nothing
thinking of: stupid work stupid tomorrow
song of the day: starman - david bowie
he'd like to come and meet us but he thinks he'd blow our minds

man

i'm in a terrible writing funk.

influx of interest

so it really doesn't make any sense to me, this lack of drive for writing. like i said, it's not like things have been going bad lately, and even last night's minor setback regarding incorrect assumptions of bus schedule and subsequent strandedness in a mall parking lot, looking longingly at a fly by night carnival in the lot across the way, was able to produce a silver lining, whose shine and silvery hue made me feel alright.

but friday was good. i had lunch with a friend, and though it was short, it was most definitely sweet. thankfully, my stomach decided to behave himself and only let me eat one piece of pizza. if left to his own devices, three or four, i'm sure would have been devoured. then i made my way, eventually to work, where i found out that my boss had gone home early for the day. now granted, his reason for leaving early wasn't good news, but for me - i could act the damn fool, now, and sneak out early, if i wanted to. but, as luck would have it, i wouldn't need to, what with a co-worker offering me a ride home. so like i said, friday the 13th had been filled with nothing but good things. and lovely weather, i must say.

saturday was equally nice, as far as weather goes, and i got to talk to two friends: dana, an old english compatriot (we're both veterans of the andy c school of british romanticism, but she is more shell shocked than i), and michelle, a relatively new friend, to whom i had to say my goodbyes before she left for malaysia. but she's only gone for two weeks, so you know...

i also managed to find myself a free ticket to see alien vs. predator, which i wasn't planning on seeing, what with it being pg-13 and all, and that rating being absolutely ludicrous, and thusly limiting the extent of a cinematic vomitorium it could really be. and let's face it, the only reason any of us go to that movie is to see people, aliens, and predators get chopped into fucking meat. but who am i to flaunt free things when they are set before me? no one, that's who.

and as stated before, i was stranded in the parking lot for an hour last night, waiting for the bus, but i got to watch the exquisite beauty of a carnival that i want to go to -- the reds, greens, blues, the flashing lights of the ferris wheel against the dark dallas sky, usually so boring it makes me wish i was stoned, or something. but it was ok.

everything has been ok lately. and i'm happy. hopeful. content.

this is not to say, however, that i still won't pick up and leave when i can.



feeling: happy, hopeful, content
thinking of: green
song of the day: hands of time - groove armada
i never really felt quite the same, since i lost what i had to gain

write right

it's not like i've got a shortage of news to spread or ideas that need to be set free upon the world, but damn if its even hard to type right now.

you ever get that? where you want to write, either a blog entry, or an email to a friend, or a letter to your parole officer, and you just can't? you fight and fight and it seems as hard as it would if you were trying to make heads or tails out of a dream.

speaking of dreams and writing, have you ever instant messaged within a dream? man, shit is HARD. you make typos like crazy, mainly because you're not supposed to be able to read or write anything in dreams, opposite side of the brain and all.

anyways, i'm struggling right now with writing this, but suffice it to say, this weekend has been good so far, and friday the 13th found only good things, not bad luck. let's keep it up.



feeling: lethargic, or at least aspiring to be lethargic
thinking of: gettin' my grub on
song of the day: .....man, i can't even think of a song. um.....love me tender

stumbling down amnesia lane

so i'm sitting here in my house this afternoon, and the air conditioner is on the blink for a while (calm yourselves, it's fixed now) and i made the mistake of taking out my senior year book from high school. ouch.

having been firmly entrenched in the mentality that the seventies were an era whose coolness i should aspire to at the time of this publication's release, its kind of mortifying to try to reconcile that past incarnation of josh with my current pop sensibilities and personality traits. i mean, it wasn't like i was into floyd or black sabbath or something cool that came out of the 70's. i was into disco and ABBA and bad clothing. it was a failed attempt at being so lame i was cool, the end result being me being terribly lame. come to think of it, i really didn't start listening to soundly good music until i was a sophomore in college. but that's neither here nor there.

and flipping through those pages, realizing now how young and stupid we all looked back then makes me think about how much i've changed since then. that, and realizing how much cycnicism and animosity i still store in the annals of my mind about that particular timeframe of existence.

trying to quantify or at least document the changes i've undergone, or really everyone undergoes when they pass that particular milestone and really get into some developing on their own is an impossible task for multiple, and generally obvious reasons.

i mean, first of all, you're comparing the present with memory, which is pretty much just about the absolute worst means of recounting anything. it's like those oprah shows where they show just how unreliable eyewitness testimony is, and how everyone's story of the same event is so vastly different, it kind of makes you shudder with horror about the weight that same testimony is in the realm of the courtroom. this is me, condemning my past self to death on the basis of what can only be considered as trustworthy as the word of a housewife standing in line hoping to get some of oprah's favorite things, not terribly prepared to be witness to a staged purse snatcher.

you can, i suppose put things into a context, by thinking "yeah, i used to like disco back then, i was louder, and i thought that austin powers was the height of comedic genius", like measuring your day by what tv shows are on, counting down your time in half hour and hour long dramatic increments, literally wasting the time when nothing is on by sleeping or just flipping the stations for 30 minutes, hoping that for some miraculous reasons, happy days has been pre-empted suddenly by the simpsons. you can inventory your personality by what you thought was cool and when, and compare that to what you find to be vastly cooler now. thinking kc and the sunshine band was hot shit, versus touting the merits of modest mouse or something equally hip.

was i angrier back then? had that black cloud settled over my outlook as early as 17? have i mellowed or just accepted the void? am i masking things better now, or just rationalizing my shitty attitude in a sedate voice using all those bs'ing skills i picked up in college? revisiting the past generally tends to leave me with more questions than answers, but i guess that's the other skill you pick up in your higher education. when someone asks you a question, you can answer it with a question of your own that is so convoluted and generally asks for bigger picture thinking that the initial question is lost and the other person is left feeling generally bummed out because you've somehow tapped into a primal fear of theirs regarding the meaning of their own life, when all they wanted to know was what you had for lunch.

you could remember what you used to believe, when it came to religion and politics, but that runs the risk of thinking, god, i was so terribly uninformed back that, and so terribly opinionated based on absolute bullshit. you could think about how you reacted to other people's differences and recalling your take on the moment when someone busted your theories, or, for that matter, considering it was high school, your ass.

then you devolve into a mass damning of the entire period of your life, both your surroundings, and yourself, and lament at just how clueless a dork you were back then, and hope, with trembling fear that you've somewhat figured things out by now.

see? you see the can of worms i've opened when i opened that book? yearbooks are evil. don't take stock of your lives. leave your livestock alone.

move to new york.



feeling: terribly ....listless
thinking of: g train
song of the day: wagon wheel - old crow medicine show
i lost my body playing poker

good night's rest my ass

last night i had this dream wherein i was running through my neighborhood, trying to dodge and weave amidst the battered bond-o colored rustbuckets that pass for cars in this joint, and hide from a deranged englishman bent on violating my person in that the most horrible of ways.

now, i had told troy at work about "i'll sleep when i'm dead" which features a random young man being acosted and raped by malcolm mcdowell. surely this played a part in influencing my dream. but this is not the first fucked up dream i've had this week.

the other night i dreamed that leah invited me to a party at that huge barnes and noble on 18th and broadway, and then promptly said i'm going to another party...you can't come, thusly abandoning me in the city. this was just a traumatic dream, because i remember feeling very up for the beginning of it, and then dealing with the subsequent unraveling at being rejected and ditched by my sister at the zenith of said happy feelings. it sucked, and i remember being depressed by it when i first woke.

and then a couple of days after that, i was an airborne witness to an earthquake, in which i saw the teeming masses scrambling from the fastly splitting surface, being swalloed by the abyss. i was, for some reason dictated by dream logic, riding in a helicopter, and i distincntly remember the face of one young woman, who'd climbed a tree, looking up at me terrified, and pleading with me as the tree sank into the earth. that was pretty goddamn horrifying, and my heart was pounding when i woke up.

once, when i was around 18, i had this nightmare that was so horrifying, i still remember it. and the most fucked up part of it was that i woke up from the dream, like three times, and kept falling back into it as soon as i returned to sleep. notice how that happens? you can have a nightmare, wake up, go back to sleep and you're right back in the fuckin dream. but when you're in a huge white bed with a nude brooke shields, you're desperately trying to trick yourself into not waking up, and when you do its all gone, never to return.

i don't even get sexy dreams anymore. unless by sexy, you mean the threat of non-consensual intercontinental buggery, then yeah, i get those.



feeling: beat
thinking of: high school animosity
song of the day: chapel of love - the crystals
i'm sorry....shit's just upbeat

The Wee Democracy turns one!

i've thought about this entry for a while, now, ever since i noticed about a month ago that the one year anniversary of the birth of this blog was coming up. for a while, i thought i'd celebrate by re-posting the very first entry, but this was way back when august 2003 was a lost month and no one besides me could read it. but, i'd like you guys to go back and check it out just the same, to see how i've progressed from merely complaining about things like the heat and back pain, to grandly complaining about life in general and the state of the union of josh.

in the beginning, i called this blog 'sighs to the bored', but i was never content with it. it became officially the wee democracy in october, so really, this anniversary thing is kinda overhyped. i'll probably do something else on the day when the WD actually turns one. who knows.

anyways, i figure i'll just talk about something which alot of people who've met me actually after reading my stuff in blog form have asked me about: which is to say, why do i do this? how did it start?

well, as is now a part of common WD lore, it began some seven days before i left austin to move back to this dump of a town. my old friend riqui had been blogging for a little while, and i'd kinda been interested in trying it. so instead of spending the afternoon looking for porn, i spent it creating this page. like i said, it started out kinda irate and really only went further into irateness after that. lots of talk revolving around back hair and masturbation.

i don't really know what was the final impetus for it, but i knew that once i started, it felt good to get some of the rambling thoughts and irrational ideas out and put them into thepublic forum to let them marinate on their own. it still feels good. most of the time, i'm constantly assessing my surroundings looking for a way to vent what i feel verbally on this little piece of pie that is my own.

some of the time its a passive aggressive method of revealing certain information that i'm dying to get out, but really don't have the sack to state to the person i want to speak up to.

some time i'm just so goddamn pissed off at the government and i just can't talk to my mom anymore, so i've got to bitch to you people.

sometimes i'm unbearably happy and i can't wait to share my minor victories with my small but loyal fanbase. sometimes i just like feeling like i have a fanbase.

its yielded some good things, this little old blog. i met the immensely cool cuzi, put the wheels in motion to bring me and leah closer together, had something to talk about with her friends in NY who'd never met me but kinda knew me, so to speak. it also kinda irritates my mom, which is just a bonus, of sorts. little torture, hehe.

anyways, for the blog's birthday, i've gotten myself a present. it's something i've been wanting for a long time, and actually have mentioned in the blog several times. something fun, and small, and providing a modicum of privacy in this dallas-based gulag.

yes, my friends, i am the proud new owner of my very own cell phone.

happy birthday to the wee democracy.



feeling: great
thinking of: who i spend most of my cell minutes calling
song of the day: heroin - lou reed
it makes me feel like i'm a man, when i put that spike into my vein, and, i tell you, things just aren't the same when i'm rushing on my run, and i feel just like jesus' son...

recap wrap

july 29
i'm on the plane now, on my way home, once again feeling envious of the warm towels and comped cocktails that the swells in first class get. i notice that, unlike the flight to new york, the token hot passenger is sitting three rows behind me...not beside me. fortune has spun her wheel in the opposite direction. i haven't written in my book in the last four days, so i'm trying to remember all that's gone down.

oh yeah...

monday the 26th
so monday was shaping up to be a pretty kickass day. really, i guess if you wanted to break it down, the goodness of it started up just after midnight. leah's friend beth and i were heading back to greenpoint after seeing the bourne supremacy in manhattan. the good thing was this: if i want to get home in dallas via mass transit, i'd better get on that last bus that runs at 12:20, or i'd better find a nice comfy spot somewhere downtown to sleep for the night; but here, in NY, in brooklyn, the buses run all night, subways run all night -- it's just a matter of frequency. i remembered getting this sense of liberty and independence that i can get home relatively easily at any time of night, barring intoxication.

i've developed, by this time, an affinity for riding the subways, so going to leah's office for lunch is pretty easy and fun. grubbing at spring street natural, we discuss when i should call that girl, T, and what i should have ready for her as far as plans go. we also go over this bloggy material that i'm planning to read that night at the bowery poetry club.

lunch polished off, i earn my keep by heading uptown and dropping off three rolls of film at altkit on park and e. 18th. i also walk into barnes and noble, looking around, becoming fucking amazed at just how big their store is and what a wide selection they have. i find what i'm looking for and then get on a train bound for....

carl schurz park.

which, by the way is the prettiest park ever. the river helps its ambience so much. it is so pretty that time of day, and, as a bonus, it had no shortage of sunbathin' beauties laying out. i see where monty sits in the opening of the movie, and the little tunnel wherein he got the fuck beaten out of him. it's very peaceful. i'm happy.

so, back to brooklyn, all liquored up on the nectar of a day well spent, and things get better when i call T, who sounds excited to hear from me. it started out kinda scary, because i got her voicemail, but she returned the call promptly with said excitement in her voice. wednesday we meet for lunch.

so the only thing left on the day's docket is a trip to the bowery poetry club. at first it seems cool, and i'm having a good time, but it quickly becomes clear around the time of the fifth rape joke that the words "open mic" tend to attract all manner of stand up comedians who aspire to scrap the bottom of the barrel. some 90 minutes into this geek show, and hanging on by a thread, i turn to leah. "if the next person to get up there is a stand up comic, we're leaving." so, three minutes later, we're standing outside the door, heading home, and i'm angry....very angry.

the bowery poetry club. where poetry comes to die.


tuesday the 27th

there is no big news that does not involve drama on this day. instead, my day is spent basking in the glory of getting all my laundry washed, and folded and packed very neatly by the laundromat down the street for a mere five bucks. that, and eating greasy chinese. leah and i head to the pencil factory, where jill, whom i've decided is the most supportive and generally sweet-natured person i've met in NY, meets up with us to swill along. wednesday is the date, and there is no shortage of talk about that.

wednesday the 28th

so this day was the big day. it was that day where you just can't wait to get up and for the day to get going so you can hurry up and get to that point that you're just fuckin' stoked about reaching. i get up early, which is not so much a conscious decision as much as its about my near state of morninsomnia. really, i'd like to sleep in. kinda like when you get older and it is no longer acceptable to run into you parents room on christmas morning and demand that presents be open, so you either just watch cartoons while twin sloths snooze away precious unwrapping time, or you try to trick yourself into feeling tired and sleeping for an additionl 7 or 8 minutes.

but i get up, shower up, and head into manhattan around noon. i cut photos for leah, and bide my time until a respectable hour, at which i call T, and we make a rather convoluted plan for getting together.

i walk to williamsburg and meet up with her. it's good. i like her. sandobe, i think is the place we eat, and i ingest sushi with her, a bento box, because i don't want to be uncouth, or square. i want to impress her.

ice coffee, the onion, and a walk through an exhibit at FIT, not to mention a book store jaunt, in which we both try to assert literary superiority, are all part of the day-te. she likes my music. she laughs alot, and she's got that whole hearted, unembarassed laugh that just makes me feel good when i hear it. genuine, not polite. she curses, so i don't have to worry about accidental slip-ups or verbal faux pas's. she teaches me how to use chopsticks, and how to eat sushi, and as much as i try to hide it, she can sense how i'm not terribly comfortable with the idea of eating raw fish.

when we finally part, after four hours or so, i ask her if she'd like to join me and leah and her assorted friends as we head to a particular bar.

"i won't know anybody, and i'll probably be ridiculously uncomfortable. do you wanna come?"

i'll call her.

so, time passes and i'm finding myself at this bar, call placed, message left, an hour or so passing, me growing ever impatient. fuck this, i decide, i'm bored, and i'm going home. i make a large spectacle of leaving, and head to the G train stop.

fuck. it's down to one track, and i don't even know what way i'm facing. i do know, however, that i'm facing a decision. fate has it in for me, it seems, and i'm doomed to either stay here and sweat my ass off, or head back to the bar and get drunk alone-ish.

back to the bar, tequila shot ingested, i decide that i want to look like a hardass. saunter up to the barkeep and say, in a gruff voice, johnnie black! neat! downed.

hammered, i find leah. "you're friend called."

so, elated, and completely hammered, i call her back. a few minutes into the conversation, i say hold on! i've been drinking and let me get some water in me. call you back! and i do. and we talk. for a while. and it's good. hey, i'd like to see you again before i go home. can i call you tomorrow? great.

only one day left, and now this is all unfolding. why me, lord?

thursday the 29th - one last thing

i woke up today, acutely aware that i was at the end of something. there was a knot in my stomach as soon as i opened my eyes, and it hasn't left, some twelve hours later. all that getting up early and staying up late, with a minimal of napping, has resulted in my sleeping in. i imagine this is what a death row inmate would feel like if he slept in on his last day. leah's gone, jill's in the kitchen, caking. we talk alot. about life, about NY, moving, discovering what we want to do, how long it takes to get your shit really together in that mid 20's crunch. we talk about leah alot, and, not to sound like a wuss, but i've got to swallow a lump in my throat several times during this portion of the conversation.

ok, enough of this mushy shit, i say. shower time. we call leah, to decide on lunch.

"T called, she wants you to call her on her home number." she rattles it off, and i head down to the payphone. jesus, i'm gonna have to bite the bullet and get a damn cell soon.

"hey!"

"hey. we're going to a diner on south bedford called...uh, diner. meet us there at one."

"ok"

jill and i walk and talk, but mostly just sweat. at diner, leah's met with T briefly and informs me that she's gone to the little store right by diner. i go get her, and she seems happy to see me.

in diner, i can sense this feeling of mild tension, like everyone is on their best behavior. it's the first day at a new school and everyone's trying to be cool, telling stories, mingling with the new friend we just made, desperately clinging to some semblance of comfort. the food is greasy, and i almost abandon any hope of eating in a clean manner. but T orders a chocolate sandwich, so i'm secure in my own choice and eating habits, fried egg sandwich notwithstanding.

after lunch, leah and jill head out, and T and i start walking. we walk alot. she shows me her place for a minute, and then get gelato. we talk. she says she feels like leah was sizing her up and it made her a little nervous. i understand, i say. leah's inscrutable but she's a pretty good person. open minded and terribly cool.

eventually, we find ourselves back at leah's walk-in refrigerator of an apartment. we talk for a bit more, and T gets comfortable. a little too comfortable, and i end up reading for an hour while she naps on my futon.

when i wake her up, i've only got about an hour left before i need to get into a car and go to the airport. we sit outside, and talk for a while. when she leaves, i have a movie moment. things slow down inside my head and i really want to kiss her...but i can't. what have i got to lose? i'm leaving town in an hour. why is it the ones that i want to kiss i can't, but the ones i dont, i can?

we hug. we say goodbye. she walks away. go....run after her, tell her you didn't want to leave without a kiss. tell her that. go. go!

but i don't go. i walk back inside and pack. and then a little while later, i say goodbye to leah, too, and to new york, and to a trip that i don't want to end.



and so here i am, on this plane, writing, trying to remember so much. this is a poor excuse, but it'll do. we'll be in dallas in an hour, and as we get closer, my stomach tightens, my eyes clamp shut, and i just want to pray so hard to wake up, and see the familiar walls of leah's apartment, to have a few more days there, to know that it's not over yet. i want another miracle.



feeling: so much it hurts
thinking of: everything
song of the day: nyc - interpol

recap reloaded

july 25

this past new year's eve, the debauchery of which won't soon be forgotten (i'm lucky i didn't get shot, or at least punched in the goddamn face) almost never happened. that's not to say that the eve almost didn't happen. that would be far to grandiose and just plain absurd a statement. no no, new year's eve would have come and gone with or without my participation. just the same though, my usual n. year's eve generally revolves around sitting at home either alone or with a parent, which is essentially the same thing. it means fuck all in terms of fun.

what i am saying, though, is that my presence, my partaking of the activities and good times almost had the kibosh put on it by my mortal enemy: the blues.

but this is all beside the point. the point is that, even though i didn't feel at first like going out, i did, and i had a badass time, perhaps the baddest ass time i've had in dallas (aside from the baby doll's outing, which has yet to be trumped).

such was the case yesterday with leah's friend, amy. you remember her? i just mentioned her like, two days ago. keep up, slackers. we'd been instant messaging, i from leah's office, and her from her cubby hole in NJ, and she was protesting my requests that she get her ass out of the garden state and into the city. ok, ok, drinks, she agrees, too. but no gallery opening!

the gallery opening, incidentally, was the night's main event, and leah and i were just looking to kill some time and brain cells with the demon alcohol before we went. so we hit nowhere bar, which had a two for one well drinks special going on in the happiest of hours.

side story: i bought a drink from the bartender, paid with a ten, and got change for a twenty. honest injun that i am, i yelled out "hey, barman! you gave me too much change!". some of you might call me names for not taking the money. hey, fuck you. anyways, he lauded my honesty, and ended up doing a free shot of tequila with me. rock on. honesty gets you loaded just as fast as lies.

amy was not wanting to go out because of her own set of blues, which she explained to us, in detail. we dranked and nodded, and offered up what advice we could. and, amidst the ever-increasing gin-soaked haziness, amy put aside her insecurities about what the gallery opening might entail, and headed out that way with us. and she had a fantabulous time. see? lesson learned.

and me? i didn't do too bad, either. a girl gave me her phone number...and i didn't even have to ask for it. i am a golden god.

but is she irish?



feeling: stoked
thinking of: when to call
song of the day: just what i needed - the cars

recap'n crunch

july 23

i'm sitting, currently, in leah's office around canal st, in my own private steam bath, courtesy of my damp clothes and overly active body heat factory. lesson one, not having an umbrella in NY is a bigger problem than not having one in texas, because you can't just run across streets willy nilly: you've got to look both ways before you cross. but, not to worry, numerous vendors surrounding that bastian of black market purses and shoddy palo shirts and helfiger tees are ready to sell you a functional umbrella for around two bucks. the bad news is...it's only worth about one buck.

and the subway doesn't help. man, it surprising how steamy that tunnel of rat love gets pre- and post-rain.

the last two days have been quite, as we say in the hood, chill. they feature me going to a movie (i'll sleep when i'm dead, featuring the always badass clive owen), walking around greenpoint, drinking beer in the almost-too-early afternoon, passing out, waking up and snagging what turns out to be the tastiest and greasiest chinese food in the history of grease.

i'm starting to fear a bit that i'm wasting my vacation with these simple days of one or two hour outings, and mostly a lot of tv watching and lounging. but then i remember that i've still got six full days until i leave and this was not meant to be a trip for sight seeing and tourism, but rather a retreat of sort, and a chance for me to get reacquainted with an old friend i like to call: me.

so not only am i doing this whole self exploration thing with the opportunity to carouse arount the kickest-ass city on the planet, but i've finally gotten to fully and lovingly scratch that chinese food itch that's been going strong for a few months now (editor's note: no such thing as fully scratching that itch - i still crave me the nectar of southeast asia)

oh yeah. my eye's all better. turns out it wasn't pink eye after all. just an allergy of some sort. my lid got all swollen and puffy (not very manly, i'll admit) but my eye never turned red or even mildly pink. see? i knew i was a man. eight years old, indeed.

i find myself fighting my baser instincts regarding the fear of returning home, and dealing with whatever stressors are going on there. i can spend my time here searching for the ladies and for great rice, but i'll be damned if i'm gonna spend it worrying about being uninsured, or aimless in the job front. damned, i say.



feeling: cooler
thinking of: release
song of the day: baby blue sedan - modest mouse
(editor's note - this is today's actual song of the day, too -- 8/3/04, and therefore not exempt from the rules governing lyrical inclusion and so....
and its hard to be a human being, and its harder as anything else, and i'm lonesome when you're around but i'm never lonesome when i'm by myself)

recap revisited

july 20

leah said something to me last night during our conversation, and i've been thinking about it. it kind of goes back to that thing i wrote about a couple of weeks ago regarding my slow acceptance of the fact that a few people, a minority, if you will, might actually find me attractive.

"people like you", she said. it felt pretty good at the time, like some kind of fundamental compliment i'd been searching/fishing for for a long while. and it was a breath of fresh air, considering that 9 times out of 10, i don't even like myself.

chris rock, that modern day winston churchill, said that a woman has to love the crust of a man. she can't just love the white part. that's too easy. and i'm like that. i don't always like everything about everybody. all of my friends have flaws, but i forgive them those things and move on. and i'm not saying this in a self-righteous look-how-open-minded-i-am sort of way. but more in a way that their flaws are just part of who they are.

but i, me, josh, to this point, haven't been able to forgive myself of my own flaws. i see them as huge liabilities, cracks in the foundation in the sands the house of josh is built on.

lisa tells me i shouldn't use other people to prop myself up. it's called self-esteem for a reason, she says. ok, so i don't put other folks's perception of my at the top of my priorities. but that does not mean that i shouldn't use it as proof, or as an impetus for a reevaluation my own impression of myself, and maybe take a more accepting stance with regard to my self.

but all this self exploration aside, today was a good day. i can add the NY subway system to my list of vanquished foes, and i must be allowed to bask in the acquisition of a ryan adams cd for a mere 9 bucks, despite having to endure the scornful eye of the oh-so-hip tool that was working the register. i met leah's friend amy, whom i immediately liked a lot. "so damn cool that there needs to be another modifier besides damn to appropriately describe just how cool" i believe was my original impression. she made me want to walk down the street and get a tattoo right then and there -- either she did, or the four beers did.

leah is hesitant to offer me a rematch of chess. with all these consecutive victories over many and varied opponents and generally of an astounding one-sided nature, you irish lasses don't have a snowball's chance against hurricane josh.

i was almost tempted to write "a snowball's chance in texas", but then i would have to give up writing so i could fully concetrate on developing human cloning for the sole purpose of kicking my own ass.



feeling: a-ok
thinking of: renting a u-haul, right now
song of the day: so real - jeff buckley