31.5.06

bermuda cruise....

i don't know why i can't change the dates on these anymore, but safari doesn't offer that option. loosers. so here's the whole thing, or until my fingers cramp up:

sunday. arrived safely on board. z and i share a stateroom, much larger than expected. it will be so nice having her along, i'm sure. i feel a little insane. i don't know what's up with the culture thing... no i need to start at the beginning. the first feeling was disorientation. the lobby was packed, there are people EVERYWHERE. everything is enclosed and mirrored, swirly print carpet, rich colors and shiny metal. i guess people feel overstimulation in my colorful apartment, but this was a bit close to hell for me. and the rocking creeped me out- it got much better once the ship started moving. we were all disoriented because we didn't know what the rules were, esp regarding money. it's z's charge card, so i don't wanna charge her for things i can't afford. and this isn't the sorta stuff i wanna be spending money on- i wanna save my drinks, i guess. i drink to have a good time, and so to spend so much money when i don't thnk that's gonna happen.... i don't know, it's all so WEIRD. it's all so big, these 11 floors of ship. and all the people. and i think of all the water they use, and all the towels they dirty, and all the pineappples cut into garnishes for their drinks- what it takes to keep this ship afloat, let alone move it- my ecological sensibilities can't handle it. i know i don't succeed at living a simple life, but it's something i'm aware of- and this is all a celebration of excess, it seems. we're on vacation. my idea of a good time is just different i guess. sigh. the food was good, beautiful and edible sized portions at dinner, which was so nice, a pleasant surprise. friends of dorothy meet at 8 tnight, so if i need my gay men fix i can head there. but still. the show was AMAZINGLY awful. i'm already of tired of jokes that are tinged with anti-liberalism, homophobia, blatant sexism. it's not funny. and all the service people. it's so important for me to see them as people suck on this boat like i am, i want to know and remember all their names, the countries they come from and be polite. but the waiter was from jamaica and when he saw my hair he wouldn't stop singing bob marley songs, bringing them with every course. my dreads made a big impression on james, our driver to the boat, too. i almost wish i'd shaved them off first.

monday. day two on the ship has gone much better. z and i have been more on our own, and she can't stand all the "plan making" either. we had breakfast with strangers, that was fun. we tried to workout, but alas, we have inappropriate footwear. we then played cards with various family members and this afternoon was my ideal cruise experience- setting out on the deck chairs, cutting apart t shirts for z. i'm making her some nice halters. we were on the 10th level deck all day, playing shuffleboard, sewing, listening to ipods, reading. watching miles and miles of nothing but ocean go by. creepy, kinda- so much water- not just in one direction like the beach, but in all directions. now z's napping while i'm writing. soon we'll be getting together for the formal dinner. you know i'm wearing false eyelashes. you know, i'm embarrassed to admit it, but i fear the reason i feel so much more stable today is discovering i have cell phone coverage and i can text friends in the us.

tuesday. dad called this morning saying land was sighted! we went up to the deck after our room service breakfast and watched the ship dock, the white roofed, pastel houses appear. they're cool, the cream filling creeping out of the rainforest. we went out as soon as they let us, bought our INCREDIBLY expensive bus passes, and waited half an hour for the bus. everything's so tightly packed, the mini compact european cars zoom britishly on the left down these narrow, narrow roads carved out like halways between the pittosporum, hibisicus and morning glory bushes. we fed brightly colored fish and huge sea turtles at a tourist trap, and i was feeling bitter, but we got good directions for hiking up a hill on a busy road and ended up at a quite nice nature preserve. it was good to climb on rocks and look at birds and do the sorts of things i would do with my dad anyway. by now it's three and we still haven't eaten, so they bought some snacks at the grocery store, which kept me alive for the next 30 min. bus wait. we watched a blue lizard climb a tree by the side of the road. luckily they had me and my bahamas transportation map, or they would have been waiting forever at the wrong bus stop. still, the bus karma's been bad. and aquariums are not my cup of tea. i am just not interested in fish and animals. bahamas natural history, sure. watching pam try and pet the monkey or dad feeding granola to the otters just makes me angry. does no one follow posted rules? so tired and hungry- too much sun, too much standing, too many animals. once we got back to the boat, all i wanted was dinner, but it was so hard to co-ordinate. why are plans so HARD for these people? luckily z and dad also find they have to be kind (or pandering) to their STUPIDITY. not to be derogatory. they are kind and fun and nice and family and they love animals and have a just a few annoying habits. however, as z said, i just wanna go to the beach. ate dinner finally, read books, played cards... z and i are skipping the show (surprise surprise!) and spending quiet time. listening to ipods, reading books, and i'm of course writing this. i just want a chance to wear all 4 bathing suits, that's all!

wednesday. we docked in hamilton, bermuda's city, this morning. today is bermuda day, their national holiday. we were worried this would screw up our plans, but busses still running and shops are open till noon. so we went out shopping in hamlilton for pam and melanie, but there were so few things open it kinda degraded into a walk in hamilton, which i enjoyed much more. there were aggapanthus growing in a park, meike's polo, eine kleines blaues "fou ve" was parked on the street. there are sidewalks in the city, whcih makes me happy. it's like a european city, only in english. and overrun with the cruise tourists. the ship is so surreal in the dock. it's like this enormous apartment building, as big as a city block, parks itself on the side of the city. and then the bowels open and we all creep out.... it's awful. they really started bugging me today. maybe because today the bermudians are camped out on the sidewalk en masse all day, waiting for the parades, under their tents with their picnics and so on. i love listening to them talk, esp. the children. they have such a melodious accent, esp. compared to the dottering white hairs, getting on the wrong bus. being so CLOSE to such a cool city and spending so much time on the ship totally creeps me out. it's ok when that is the only reality, but he constant comparison is just too hard for me. i wanna spend more than three hours a day on teh island, goddessdamnit! anyway, after lunch back at the ship we finally went to the beach. it was full of people, but tourist and natives alike, and it WAS beautiful. just like the pictures. fine, fine, pinkish sand, turquoise water, clear as glass for hundreds of feet. dad and z and i swam over to some big rocks, looking for fish. it was probably 100-200 meters, much father than i've swum in a long time. but i stopped thinkign about drowning and just kept moving my arms and legs and i did keep going. but it was so cloudy, with an unhappy wind! the clouding day made such a difference on the beach. i only had gauze coverups + wet bathing suit = cold cold caitlin. so at 4, after some climbing on rocks and walking thorough coves we called it a day and headed back to the boat. again. everyone went right in to shower and stuff, but the parade was going by right in front of our boat, so i stayed outside to watch. i loved it, i felt so free, something totally lifted and i was momentarily my independent self in a city, with a bermudian family i was watching. listening to the music and watching the brightly colored yarn covered dancers- it got me through a night of fancy food and brightly colored drinks and cards and trivia games and postcard writing.

thursday. not a good day- or at least the start was bad. the captain woke us up at like 7 to announce our arrival at the naval yard. then too soon came our wake up call, and i hung up on dad when it happened. i was so tired and everyone was whining and annoying me. i feel like everyone's becoming their true selves-transforming into their worst characteristics, or at least the ones i hate the most. dad's taciturn and silently moody, pam's a twittering idiot who can't keep track of anything, tim's a jock and mel's a snippy bitch (and me, i'm a pessimist with a streak of nasty hyperbole. one really shouldn't write such things on the internet, even if they're gross exagerations.) z either hates me or is angry at the world and blaming it on me. you can imagine how pleasant breakfast was. we went to the touristy shopping places after breakfast. there were glass blowers and there was this hot guy making tiny glass elephants. he was fun to watch, bopping out to his boombox earphones. but it was nasty overpriced hell, in general. z just about explodes, seh wanted to go back to the beach so badly. she and i fought on our way back to the boat. i took flower remedies and we went to read out on the deck till lunch. things were still rocky, i was rude to mel re: her salad, and then when we finally got on the bus the driver didn't tell us where to get off and we went about a mile past our destination. i expected the walk to be more agony, and full of blame, but they were all greatful i got them off where i did (would they have ridden the whole way to hamiltion without me?) and dad totally won by finding the old railroad trail, adn it was a beautiful walk through woods and stuff, with peeks of water through the foliage- really we could have planned it that way. and the resort we were going to did let us in and tim and mel got to do their kyaking. i'm bad at such things and wasn't open to dad's sportsman mocking, so i turned it down. z was pouty, so dad and i swam way out to a floating platform at the edge of the buoys. it was so shallow, we could touch for 35m or so- crazy for the ocean. it was so warm though. much warmer than the air, which was quite windy. dad and z went out in the kayak next, ,and i did a sketch of the rocks on my watercolor pad and they agreed to stay long enough for me to paint it. i got threee out of the four blues right, but the main one is wrong, much too muddy, not showing the underwater grasses, not showing the clearness, blueness, yet shadows on the water. but i was happy cause i'd done everyting i'd originally wanted to in bermuda. whcih was good, cause then we went back to the boat- and the trip ends with a wimper. ate dinner, played cards, trivia, blah blah blah. z got me drunk, while they all were at the show, so that was fun. we spent the evening reading together at the bar and in our room, ordering room service and in general being sisterly. no going out to a bermudian discoteque or anything.

friday. woke up late to the movement of the ship. nice to be moving again, but now all i want is to be HOME. i am sick of activities. i think we must have picked up more people on bermuda. the ship is packed. ugly browning people EVERYWHERE. it's awful. we sun, eat, play cards, eat again. i feel so silly, out on my deck chair with my long tiedyed dress and pink cowgirl hat- but i'm just not a tanning sorta girl. luckily my book is good (Thanks ch!) and i'm almost done with my thankyou notes- 5 left. the extreme generosity overwhelms me sometimes. for instance, my godparents. they deserve more than just a thank you card from me. i think i'm going to come out to them. but i don't think i'm emotionally prepared to do that on the ship. after dinner, everyone else went to see the show and i caught a few precious minutes of time alone. it was so marvelous just to be by myself- it gave me a total rush- a little creepy i guess, that the best part of my day was drinking tea and reading leah's book and listening to pearl. i did go see the comedy show afterwards. they were doing liars club and it was pretty funny. one of the panelists was our cruise director pedro, and he was really the best one. really punny. that was my quintessential text to mom. what are you doing she asked. i replied, "liars club in the stardust lounge, deck 7 fore..."

saturday. woke up throughout the night to increasingly rough seas. serious swaying was going on by the time we got up. z decided to stay in bed and rerad and i got breakfast for both of us- met tim and a very sick mel in the dining room. dad called to say pam was sick, too, so just he and i went to the disembarkment lecture. we were sitting on the side and he kept feeling sicker and sicker, you could tell. but he wouldn't admit it. it totally frustrated me. i was glad to go back to z. we all ventured up for lunch and saw the thunderstorm out the windows. a little scary! i was so pleased to learn i don't get seasick!! i was sure i'd be holed up in bed. after lunch, it cleared up and calmed down, and the adventure was over.

sunday. woke up way too early for breakfast. z and i went back to bed waiting for our disembarkment announcement. (this bit is just written in the margins of my analog blog paper, and those two words are written where it's narrowest- there must be 6 hyphens!) but it came, and we got up, and weren't even blinked at by customs, and eventually our driver came and picked us up, and there was no traffic and mom got us from dad's house and once i got to her place i signed online and wrote to you! fin.

28.5.06

back in the states

i've been keeping my analog blog, and soon i'll type it in here. right now i'm back at mom's house, but i have to finish repacking my suitcase and writing my thank you notes. but i promise to update soon! i just wanted you all to know i'm safely back in pa, and will be in chicago tomorrow!

20.5.06

graduation party and more

so much has happened since my last post. in my last 2 hrs at rachel and leah's house, i just put on le tigre and got out my gummi bears and pulled their complete collection of dykes to watch out for off the bookcase and sat on the couch with my feet under the cat and read comics. then i gathered up my stuff and hauled it to the end of the block, and did the whole trolley, train station, septa thing. it was so wierd because all of the stations had the same names as my chicago neighborhood. bryn mawr, ardmore, berwyn and the end of the line was thorndale. creepy. my dad got a little lost in exton finding the station, but it was warm and dusk, and the trees were green and the mountains were close and i just stood with my island of suitcases along side the road with my hands in my pockets whistling indigo girl's devotion. mountain laurel is pa's state flower, you know.

dad took me to his house and showed me all those apple commercials online- he's so cute, the way he gets when something's so funny he can't stand it. then z came and picked me up and we went to moms to cook. when we woke up this morning we cooked some more, and then mom and z and i went to west reading. we dropped z off at the vf outlets (i'm size 5, i yelled, buy some cute gutchies for me, since that's our grandma's cute word for underwear) and then mom and i went to the keith harring exhibit at the reading museum. he was born in reading, you know, and grew up in kutztown. it was really quite good. they don't have a huge amount of money, so they had to get creative, and i think it was really good- really keeping with the spirit of the art, too. lots of things borrowed from families instead of museums. yeah, they have some of his murals, tarps, canvases. but it's also books he made for children of his friends. his nephew's baby furnature. the chalk drawings he made on old subway blank ad spots that made him famous.

i really love it all, it's so bold and brightly colored. but i also love his ideas about art- that white (or black) spaces are just waiting for art to happen in them. that everyone deserves art, that everyone should have opertunities to be exposed to it. that you can interpret it anyway you want to. that babies and animals- that's all we are. everyone can relate to babies and animals. they had a really funny interview with him in Wi when he did some big murals on a construction sight. mom and i kept laughing at the interveiwers. "was he on a soap opera once- look at her HAIR!" they asked him the funniest questions. "now, this graffiti you did on the subway- was that legal?" well, no, not exactly...

i just feel like it ties in so nicely with what i'd been saying before about beauty. wanting to be surrounded by it, and filling up space, and there being too many advertisments and not enough artistic stimuli in my watching patterns, or just in the world in general. but as we were leaving z called and said pick me up NOW before i spend all my cruise money! so we did. and didn't she buy me 2 camis one of which was a matching set? and she bought herself all sorts of nice undies too, strapless bras and more, this whole bag of stuff for only $26! my grandma would have been so proud.

anyway, we had to get home in time for the graduation party. it was so classic, all the important characters seemed to be there, and i was glad the ones i most wanted to see showed up, my great uncle billy, my great aunt jeanne, my aunt ellen and my godmother anne. and then bernadette came! what a surprise that was! it was so nic e to see her, although it's such a lame setting to catch up with people. but we'll still be myspace buddies. see. i've got a friend in pennsylvania, just like the liscense plates used to say. it was all this traditional family food, too, the baked beans, grandma bricker's potato salad, the mint squares of anne's. but oh, i have a headache from making small talk with all those people, none of whom i know very well, saying the same things over and over about my schooling and my future job. whatever that may be, etc. luckily i had that nice big portfolio, and that speaks for itself. mostly.

anyway, am very tired, and it's late, and i must get up early tomorrow, cause i have to repack and we have to catch a boat....

waking up was so hard this morning, i'd been having a dream about l- me and z et. al. were staying like in this hotel in philly the day before we left so we wouldn't have to drive down early that morning. and i was asleep, (which is always so weird in dreams) and i woke up and l was in bed beside me. and i'm like oh my goddess, you're here, i thought our time in philly wouldn't overlap at all, and she couldn't really explain it but i didn't really care because we were cuddling and it was very warm and nice. but i had to get to the boat on time, so she went downstairs to get us seats at breakfast, and i got dressed in the outfit i had planned for today, but i couldn't manage to get downstairs to eat breakfast with her before i woke up and moms couch was so narrow and lonely in comparison.

so that's all for now- z says we're gonna have wireless on the boat, so i'll see if i can blog from there!

19.5.06

blogging from philly...

ok, so first things first, this memory thing creeps me out. i open this window, i type the b into the title box, and "ben franklin's pink striped penis" popped up. i guess i did write that on this computer, some time ago.

anyway, didn't manage to blog before i left yesterday,obviously. see, the problem is when you go to an island you have to get out your bikinis and sundresses out. and if you're going to do that the end of may, it makes sense to just get out all of those clothes and pack away the sweaters and velvet. and all that is BEFORE packing. and i had no idea what to pack. so i had to take everything.

i really didn't wanna take the big wheely suitcase, because i have the portfolio case too, and that's just too much to haul up the trolley steps. but i wasn't quite able to fit it all in the little wheely suticase, so i added the shoulder bag that fits on top. was going crazy trying to get it all done- cat litter cleaned, dishes washed, keys left for ch, update pearl one more time, etc etc etc. forgot about lunch, so threw the instant indian food in a tupperware to eat on the train. hauled all the luggage downstairs 15 min. late when i realized... i have a broken wheel! i remember it happening, but if forgot how much noise it makes, how hard it is to pull... misery! i ate my lunch, transfered trains, decided to listen to the mix ch made me for my journey on pearl.... and there's nothing there. not a single song. all my library notes, but no music. i don't know what went wrong when i updated, but something terrible happened.

that was my why am i doing this? moment. because i don't need or want a vacation. i wanna stay home and clean my appartment and find a job.

but then i landed and made all those phone calls and plans, and rachel and leah picked me up at 30th st station and we went to a drag show, meeting dana and erin there. they were quite good, much better than the one at annex 3!! fabulous costumes, nach. leah had apparently warned dana it was "interactive" but not me, so i needed to kinda prepare myself. it went basically like this- our hostess liza liza (the girl so nice they named her twice!) haggled a crowd member, hauled them up to the stage, and made them dance for 30sec-1min, after which they got a drink ticket and a t-shirt for their embarassment. liza was hot on dana, who told leah she'd win her a t-shirt. but when liza drug her onto the stage, she only got a drink ticket, no more t-shirts.

then quite late in the night, liza came up to me and said, "honey why you look so scared?" and i said, "uh uh, i only dance for tshirts." and she said she'd find me one- and she did, so i danced.

today i'm just putzing while leah and rachel are out- they have incredibly busy days. i'm really greatful that they're willing to carve out slices of time to spend with me while i'm here! its so nice to have safe places, homes where i can sleep, all over th place. i wonder if i moved to philly if i'd see them any more than i do now- it's kind of nice being an out of state visitor which just puts me on their couch at inopertune times, rather than trying to make plans to come over for dinner or whatever. anyway, i'm eating their applejacks and leftovers, surfing their net, and i plugged pearl into leah's lucious laptop so i could at least have her fabulous music collection, even if i couldn't have my own. well, it told me i had to reinitialize it for a pc, and it would erase all my notes and music. and i wanted to write down my notes first, so i said no and unplugged it... and my music was back! i don't know how i shocked it into reappearing, but i guess it was there all along, and now i can listen more greatfully than normally.

rachel told l a whole list of wonderful things they would do when she came. i was adding things to it, but now that i'm here, there are 2 other magical new things. the first is rachel's new hair, on top all long and spiky and red and cool and punk. the second is diesel, the kitten, a itsy bitsy furball with sharp teeth. she is so cute and soft and playful- the most adorable. she made me realize how big mitzi's gotten, but also made me glad mitzi's getting older and is now into things like petting or sleeping on my legs. but it made me feel at home, having diesel bite my toes when i moved them all last night.

17.5.06

manifest photos...

ok, here's the begining of my spectacle fortuna photos...





mom kept trying to catch david, running all over with his digital camera documenting.

as meg cabot says, more later!

grrrrl...

what 'chu doing blogging when there is so much packing to do? i have no idea what i did last night. made dinner with the last of my veggies in the fridge. talked to dad, talked to mom. paid the bills. i guess those are all important activities... still, there's so much to do! i should clean my desk and write some letters, but i also have to figure out what in the HELL i'm going to pack. ew ew ew. i'm so stressed by bermuda weather. i just have no cruise point of reference. i don't know how i'll be spending my time or what it will be like or...

ugh. this is so terribly banal. i will TRY and spend a paragraph or so on something INTERESTING. this wil be my last (or perhaps 2nd to last if i am useful tomorrow) blog entry until i fly out, so i should try and leave something worthwhile behind for my readers. thinking about the fambly thing, as a said. i'm again struck by the horror at my lack of love- this seems like the most popular theme when i think about my family. i'm such a wuss. i should love them in spite of their problems, like z, like l, like most people. you know, the fambly way. but i don't. i can't. i can only love the money they funnel into me. isn't that sick? if i'm going to say, your hatred or hickness or whatever is so big i can't stand you, i need to come clean, and say fuck it grandma, that statement offends me cause i'm a pagan pussylicker or whatever. and then see where the chips lay.

when reading a's comment about grandmas, i was thinking alot about drinking in particular, and why i make it such a big deal- or how i rate it on the grandma scale or something. (ch took me to boni vino after work for graduation, and i'm a little buzzed, so i'm sorry if i have to many somethings and whatevers- that's how much focus i have right now...) i think i make such a big deal out of drinking because it's safe, and i feel like drinking is easily justified, christians drink, jesus drank, it's in the bible, it's ok. and i pick on this in my grandma because it's so much easier than dealing with things like christianity and homosexuality. and even amongst my hippy dippy bathroom grafitti, if i look deep down in my soul, i still think being a lesbian IS a good enough reason for my grandma to be seriously disappointed, disgusted and appalled in me- not to even mention how jesus feels about me. back when i left the church, i think i was pretty solid in beliving jesus loved the gays, but me, well that was something entirely different. i mean, i left the church because i felt jesus didn't care a fuck about me, but i have to remind myself that i don't think jesus would give a fuck about me if i was straight, either. which then makes me wonder how that's tied to my perpetual lonelyness- like, is feeling loneliness on such a cosmic scale because of jesus's lack of interest in me (i.e. grandma thinks that i won't be lonely if i just trust in my saviour) or is it because my nature is cosmic loneliness that i spend so much time doubting l's love and z's love and j's love and jesus's love for me?

so i gues it comes down to, get some self-esteem bitch, and you won't be so scared of grandma.

and i should focus on a different aspect of the family- namely the relatives coming to my party on saturday (marty's mountain mansion, as ch has been calling it) bearing graduation gifts, or the steps,etc i'll be on the boat with from sunday to sunday. and i need to prepare my portfolio for said party. and i need to pack that suitcase i'll be dragging round airports and up stairs and across the gangplank. dad says it's a freestyle cruise and we only need to dress up one night. he's wearing a sportcoat and tie, and pam's wearing a dress. so what do you think i should take? my suitjacket and tie? or should i take my black velvet mini, corset, fishnets and lepoard print boots? help!

15.5.06

graduationy thoughts

went to work today- so tired. the typical monday morning. nothing really exciting there, although i did get to put together my thoughts on the weekend. i thought alot about comparing the end of college to the end of high school. i was so bitter at the end of high school, even though i wasn't really a high school student (the whole unschooling thing, remember? i only went to school for math and choir.) i remember thinking it was such a farce. they treated us like shit all those years, then the last week they act like it was this magnificent place full of people who you love. yeah right. all of it is lies- it's a hellhole full of people who are only being kind to you cause they're escaping the same thing you are. it doesn't mean anything.

i was afraid i'd have the same feeling in college, but i really haven't. i haven't been good about participating in school activities, but i really feel close to the people in my classes, and i'm going to be friends with them after graduation. it was so nice we were allowed to graduate with our friends- as long as we were in our major, they didn't care what order we were in. i'm really happy i'll remember the ceremony as giving running commentary with christopher and josh the lighting designer.

i'm uploading spectacle pictures after i'm done typing this, you'll see how cool it was. it made me glad to go to an art school. and there i am, in the list of names, under bachelor of FINE arts. beautiful. but back to high school lies, and how college is different, i didn't feel like i was pandering to the man or whatever for the manifest festival, etc, because this is what real life is for me. i go to street festivals, art shows, create with friends. i'd been so mopey friday about doing so little manifesty things, but then when they played the video montage at graduation, i realized i'd seen almost all of it- the master's of interdiciplinary arts (that was jill's exhibit last week), the book and paper center, the bfa fine artists, stage combat finals, the spectacle, etc. it make me feel like a participant, a part of comunity, and an artist in a larger movement.

i've been listening to a's time to move on mix. it's such lovely life-transition music, if a little john denver heavy, if a little colorado-crunchy-granola-hippy-folky, well, that just makes it more a-ish. it's got some classics in my collections, indigo girls get out the map and reunion, michelle shocked's come a long way, dar's traveling again, otr's suitcase and go down easy. and there's some new stuff, tom petty's time to move on and wildflowers, and nick drake's hazey jane. but then there's some very a tracks, like cat stevens and rusted rööt and a denison whitmer song i can't get enough of, called where the river bends. it's got such lovely specific lyrics, him being from lancaster and all. "you don't feel at home, underneath our pennsylvania skies / covered in guitar, deep inside the music there's a place for you / your parents and your friends, you don't think that we know how you feel / wavin' to your car, if we had our choice, we'd go along with you"

i have one more item on my list, but no transition- i think there was one earlier, but i missed the oppertunity. it's more grandma whining. she really got to me this visit. ch said he doesn't really get the relationship, and he didn't come to play cards with us because he'd be so biased knowing how my mom and i feel, and he'd have a hard time not telling it to grandma like it really is. he said he can't figure out if she's so lovelable no one can stand to disapoint her, or if she's this monster we're afraid to come up against. i wasn't sure, myself- niether really fit, but why are we so scared of her? i think it's her narrow worldview- she can't fathom the world any different than hers is. the problem with her in my life is i don't know what she does to have fun- her world seems so very, very small. she was just obsessed with buying ice cream last night for my graduation. we're like grandma, it's 40 degrees out. (yes, that's like 4c) but we bundled up and bought ice cream and came home and scooped it into bowls, and grandma had us clink our bowls together like wine glasses. she giggled and was happy. it made something clear to me, though: the idea that i'm not willing to settle for substitutions. i wanna drink real wine, not grape juice or ice cream, goddessdamit. i wanna really live. i can't believe i bought into the christian substitute for rock music, all those years ago. i don't wanna go to a nice coffee house- i wanna go to bars, to discos. i don't wanna just have deep friendships with girls. i wanna fuck 'em.

one of the hardest things about grandma being here was the whole entertainment factor- what does she do for fun? i guess, ice cream eating and playing cards is the best it gets in her world. not to demean that in any way, but that's just a small portion of the fun to be had in my world, in chicago. you can't take grandma out dancing. she doesn't drink, not in bars, not in kitchens like some people's family, and she's so disapproving of it you can't even take her to bars to, say, hear a concert. she doesn't appriciate modern art, so the staid museum option is out. we were invited to josh's graduation party, but i didn't feel like it was safe to take her, because i'm not sure how wild it would be, our how disaproving she'd be of my friends or their parents from kentucky and kansas. she does have something over my grandfather in that she's a slightly more adventurous eater, but still, there's a pretty big curb on most ethnic foods.

but maybe i'm just being bitchy, because i didn't even do the big thing we have in common, which would be take her to the library. we went to edgewater branch, but not harold washington. and there's always the church thing, which i know she's into and i'm not- so it's more that we don't have fun in common than she doesn't have fun.

anyway, i think that should be enough thoughts that someone should be interested enough to comment (not whining about lack of comments- you all have been fabulous, thank you for your care and interest in my time of transition- but it's made me a bit of an addict, and wish that i had a comment on every entry) and i can get on to the all important photo uploading....

13.5.06

pomp, etc.

so i'm all officially graduated now. sarah saw me heading to the back of the theater line and invited me to stand with them, so i jiped and all of us designers walked together . i was between josh and christopher, right where i wanted to be. we gave running comentary throughout the ceremony, buddy guy played his guitar instead of giving a speach, the valedectorian was a stupid flakey fashion designer, there was pomp, there was cercumstance, and there was my silver gown, with 47 zippers safety pinned to it.

because i'm a costume designer, that's why.

one of those letters

i played with stormy this morning, making me more inclined to enjoy my day. mom and grandma came up, g'ma saw my apartment and i modeled my dress for her. i tried on my cap and gown with my 19th century undergarments, but the gown isn't quite full enough to wear over the hoop. instead, i'm going to safety pin zippers all over it. i'm a costume designer graduating from an art school. there's no way i'm going to go up there wearing the same thing as everyone else.

so mom and g'ma and i walked to the library, and the hardware store, and the healthfood store to run my errands. then we went to devon market, which they both wanted to see. horray for produce! we came home and had tea and played cards, then went to the blue elephant for dinner, where we all had excellent food.

we came home and made lentil cashew burgers for tomorrow's dinner, then they went home because g'ma is early to bed and early to rise. but she left me a graduation card on the table. the inside she wrote "congratulations to our #1 granddaughter- we remember how excited we were when you were born. love, grandma and grandpa."
and then there was this little note inside:

"dear caity,
hope you are following your committment to jesus christ. it is very difficult when there are so many distractions. remember, he doesn't forget you and i pray for you every day- hope you find a very rewarding job.
love,
gram"

and i think, that right there, sums my grandma up to a t. my goddess. i'll be so glad when they're gone and it's all over, and i can concentrate on fitting my island vacation into my smallest wheely suitcase....

12.5.06

manifest this

so lets see... i ended up taking that shower, and heading down town to the theater senior party. i was a little cowed, not really knowing anyone. but actors in shows and classes started to appear over my crudites and potato salad, and the set desinger for the first show i did was there. and i met michelle's roommate, who i've heard many stories about. so all those were good things. but it was such a yucky day, raining and cold cold cold. i went to the costume shop where i said goodbye one more time and gave them the mix i made for the shop, now that i'm gone i don't know what they'll listen to. i'm dj graduate now. tom was leaving as i was, so we walked out together for the last time, but though it's sad i'm not allowed to work in the shop anymore it means i'm now graduated to the level of friends now- he can invite me to parties and we can go out and stuff. so that will be nice.

met up with mom and grandma after they'd checked into their hotel. it was pouring down rain- there was NOTHING in grant park. it was so sad- there were supposed to be all these performance pieces, but there was nothing outside, what could be crammed under tents, was... so instead of laying out in the grass listening to bands, we did the gallery thing. we looked at the bfa fine arts gallery, which was fun but grandma doesn't really appriciate modern art, and she would, like, touch paintings. there were some really cool pieces- these enormous suessian cones made of polyester batting, a textured canvas in blues and pinks and browns, made of fabric scraps, and a thick shellac or polypropelene or something over top all but some big circles, and then swirls painted on that with nail polish... also, a big black canvas with phrases carved out of white, sugar coated styrafoam letters- like, "you're one of the good ones" or "but you don't look like..." there was a pile of sugar at the bottom and it was called sugar coated racisim.

from there we went to see the finals for product design, heard a singer while we made plans. we walked down to 11th st, i stole a manifest poster i wanted from the theater building and then we looked at the fashion gallery, the graphic designer's senior showcase, and the MFA gallery at the book and paper center- totally fabulous. this enormous, illuminated cove built of paper bricks. old circus posters. a geodecent dome covered in indigo dyed paper with silk screened silver stars. the artist's statement was about how constellations and the stories we use to organize them are completely arbetrary, and what if we made up new stories to make our own personal history displayed in the heavens? it was a fabulous concept and beyond beatiful to look at. another was like a lady's bordoir, and there were books made of corsets, of lacy gloves, of socks and garters, restrictive undergarmets turned into books with tantalizing little sexy stories written in them. i'm so glad we wandered down that far, i didn't even care what grandma thought.

still, i was so sad the street festival was not what i had dreamed. i wanted to go out with a bang, not with the plink of rain against concrete. but after dinner at a pub (thanks ch!) we went back to manifest for spectacle fortuna, and the parade was all i had hoped for. christopher did a fabulous job. david was racing around taking photographs so seriously, and christopher was up on stilts leading the parade. there was an amazing marching band- everyone had a different silly uniform on. there were all the normal instruments, but then someone with an acordion, someone with a violin, someone with an electric guitar with a little speaker on his helmet. and they sounded so good- they had def. rehearsed beforehand!! we all crowded in and all was chaos, but the cassarones were broken and confetti rained everywhere. i was separated from mom and grandma, so i grabed eggs for them, but when they found me they had eggs already, and they smashed them on my head and my hair is full of confetti. i gave my eggs to christopher's mom. he was leaning against a street sign on his stilts, all tired, but he bent down for her to smash it on his head.

so after that we walked back to the hotel to play cards, then when they went to bed i went to the senior party. the tent, the throbbing dance beat, the end of something so big, it made me very nostalgic for the michigan womyn's music festival, the last night after the philly dykes left and it was me and laura short and heather and l, and we went to the dance before heather and l left to drive home late late late. so remembering that made me more wistful than i would of otherwise been, packed in this tent with hundreds of people, and not knowing one of them.

but i called a on my way home, it's her birthday today, and she was in the kitchen making sangria for her party, and totally cheered me up. i listened to her "time to move on" mix on the train and it was totally appropriate. so the fun graduation stuff is over! sightseeing tomorrow, and the agony of ceremony sunday morning!

it begins...

so it's friday morning, and i'm online. not at work- day off for manifest. mom just left- she's on her way to pick up grandma from the airport. i need to shower and get down town for the theater department party. it's really cold today, but not raining at the moment. hoepfully there will be warm indoor manifest activities, or the outdoor ones will be so engaging we won't notice how cold we are.

hopefully we'll find a downtown reastaurant for dinner that serves grandma appropriate food.

anyway, am burning a cd for the costume shop, then i'll be off. thank you all so much for the comments- they make me feel so loved. i'm sure throughout the weekend i'll have more and more thoughts about the changes and my future and all that. but i wanted to say thanks for your love and encouragement and acompaniment of me through this current wildness.

and now my photo gallery:
mom showing off her new camera at the flowershop


and the dress at ch's:


tired, busy, etc

wanna blog and keep you all updated, but it's almost one, and there's busier days ahead.

wendnesday was surreal- last day of classes, last day in the costume shop- that was really sad. i cleaned out my cubbie, got my dress together to drag home, etc. mom arrived safely in chicago, and to the costume shop. then everyone in the shop went out for dinner at the pub around the corner. a good goodbye. then mom and i drug all my stuff (costumes, textbooks, the dress) to ch's, where he invited us for wine and desert. hugo came over, too, so mom got to meet him. i tried on my dress for them (with the hoop and the corset and everything) and that was super fun. am uploading pictures now- we'll see how long it takes. i hate iphoto- have i mentioned that before?

anyway, we ended up drinking wine and eating peach cobbler and playing cards- mom and i taught ch and hugo how to play 500. we ended up playing way too long- we didn't leave until after 11! ugh, and it was pouring rain when we were carrying all that stuff home in the midle of the night. and it was SO hard to wake up this morning!

but i did, went to work, and the day slowly past. we're all ready for mother's day- keep the orders coming! mom cleaned my apartment while i was at work -yes- and then she met us at the flowershop. we convinced ch to go out with us, and we all went to boni vino for pizza. then mom and i trudged (still raining..) to school for stage combat finals! we ended up staying for the whole thing- they were truely fabulous. michelle and kim are both in stage combat 2, so it was fun to watch people i knew fighting. and there was such a fun combo of stuff- shakespeare, kung fu movies, totally rediculous movies (i don't remember broadswords in mall rats...) and funny plays. after awhile we could pick up things- ah, there's the unsworded move, there's the headlock-elbow in the chest move... it was a good time.

still raining, though not as hard, but much colder, on the way home.

then i got to see my new shiny apartment (and put away all my junk that had piled up) and fold the laundry and hook up mom's camera. which is the point i'm at now. loading, loading- hopefully soon i'll have everything on flickr. will imbed pics as soon as they're up!

9.5.06

beauty

i've been overwhelmed by beauty alot recently. particularly by art- just the vast quantity of it, and how little space there is for it all. i read the last nick bantock book in his griffin and sabine series last weekend, and i love the postcards and want prints of them. i own three books filled with beautiful postcards and envelopes, but open them so rarely. i have my art postcards hanging up on my front door, but there are so many collaged together it's hard to appriciate them as individual works of art. i can't imagine collecting art- how in the world could you choose? and i want to display some of my fave pieces, but they sit in a portfolio in my closet because i have so little room. there's not enough space in my life for all the color i'd like in it- and i guess it's also frustrating because my world is full of adversitsing, and stupid ugly things are taking up precious visual space where beauty could be displayed.

when i was walking home late last night across the funeral home parking lot, i got this creepy city feeling- and you know, that's one i very rarely get- because the parking lot was all big and empty and dark, and there was all this broken glass shattered into tiny shards all over the place. then i walked a little closer and the motion sensor light came on and i saw that what i thought was broken glass was actually petals from the flowering tree, raining down on the parking lot. it was a very cinematic moment.

after work today i went to the library and to the art supply store to try and find an extra portfolio page and to try and find someting to display my other work in. no luck- my portfolio pages only come in packs of 25 for like, $50. i only need one!! and there was nothing big enough to display my work from figure drawing- the little art portfolios only come in sizes up to 11x17, and to get something big enough for my 18x24 drawings i'd need to buy another real portfolio case and sheets- almost $100. i don't think so- my work doesn't need to be that well preserved!

so i was all grumpy about how hard it is just to organize beauty, and about how my precious upass runs out forever on saturday, and stomped down into the subway and there was a guy with an acoustic guitar and a harmonica playing pachabel's cannon in d. it was really amazing, just the thought of being coordinated enough to finger pick a harmony with my hands while blowing a melody with my mouth was amazing, and the music was beautiful. as joni says, he was playin' real good, for free. i gave him some change, and a suit gave him a bill- nice. so that cheered me up when the train came.

my kitty cried for the entire hour i made dinner. what is she going to do while i'm in bermuda? i leave next thursday and don't come back till the 29th. i can't imagine the havoc it will create in her world.

but right now i need to go write my cover letter. because z is iming me links to jobs i DESPERATELY want. who knew that they were out there?

7.5.06

laundry

all i've done today, so far, is laundry. it's so finicky. it took forever. is it REALLY neccesary to wash socks and undies so frequently?

update: life just got alot better, knowing that at midnight someone somewhere typed "dreadlocked lesbian kissing pictures" into yahoo search, and then clicked on the link to my page. the blurb is a bit tantalizing: "8. unglaubliche caitlin: Mai 2005
... what if i was kissing another girl, and he said ... I would have cute dreadlocked groupies, and i would hate ... you can see actual pictures here. it seems too easy ..."

can you tell how enthustiastic i am to put together my portfolio?

6.5.06

gang activity

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4.5.06

the real music video links

ok, hours of searching for things that i can't even see on my computer has finally resulted in five magical links. i have no way of knowing if they actually work or not, so give me tech support if you think they're broken. otherwise for the complete unglaubliche caitlin/ch video viewing experience, go to:

1. stars- your ex-lover is dead
the best video ever. keep the kleenex handy. i love the violinist in the ice best. ch likes the hand movement that makes amy more dramatic than torque.
2. dixie chicks- i'm not ready to make nice ch and i aren't huge dixie chicks fans, but who could NOT love this video? they're so spunky, they even have smartass eyebrow movements (that's my fave part- ch's is the straightjacket.) we think it fucking ROCKS they're not backing down.
3. goldfrapp-number one so you don't think we're too serious. ch loves the worried face on the dog before he starts surgery. i love the coreography.
4. imogen heap- say goodnight and go this is our current OBESSION song. why'd you have to be so cute? it's impossible to ignore you! we both think she's stunningly beautiful, and i love the shortness of the depth of field... but we both just about wet our pants when she lifted up her skirt, and you see them dancing-ah, it's perfect! we love the dollhouse in the dollhouse! also, when the guy winds her up with the tv dial- classic!
5. aterciopleados- amortiguador ch's fave song- it's what his myspace page plays, it's what cell phone plays, he's addicted. it means like, love shock absorber or transmission or something. like a car part. i love the bouncing heart in the rearview mirror. and andrea with her guitar in her little mechanic's uniform. and the heart shaped exhaust....

so if you'd lost faith in music videos, here are five fabulous reasons why they're still better than ever!

"you should see us- there's gonna be a whole bunch of queers, 'cause the runners also start there."

cause i'm taking off basically the rest of my life, ch took a half day today. in my afternoon while deflating admin ass balloons i read the time out chicago, and in the lgbt section there was a purple triangle by something NOT happening at gerber hart- dykes pedalling bikes. i called to see what time the ride starts- 9am on saturday morning. EEP! so i'm not committed. that's WAY too early for me. but when i asked where they were meeting i got the great quote above.

thanks for your comment, jamie. i guess it's true- that's what spring's for, after all. on my way across the roosevelt bridge yesterday, this nasty industrial corridor, and i smelled something amazing, so i peeked around the metal wall and right into these enormous purple lilac bushes. it was fabulous.

really, that was the most exciting thing that happened so far today. i can't believe i started deflating the balloons after ricky took the trash out. because no one saved their straws on tuesday. so i had to deflate them with a chopstick. MIND NUMBING. between that and the new customer letters (finished those today) it's amazing i have any mind left.

3.5.06

new clothes

blah blah blah. i feel like i have nothing interesting to say.

did i tell you monday was awful? every class was something worse. frances yelling at me for not doing senior showcase. tom telling me he won't pick my accessory for me, i have to do it myself. a sub in fiction writing who reads from everyone's work except mine. figure drawing the professor didn't even wanna grade last weeks project- all that time i spent, hating it, wasted. luckily we got out early so i could come home and go right to bed.

yesterday i felt better, and the sun was out. i don't like to think my mood depends on the weather. it's a really depressing realization about myself- makes me a weak and flat person, i think- like the way i really will like any music if you just play it enough. it's more familiarity than passion. but back to the day- it was spring! the trees in the neighborhood are all blooming, they're dropping these bright neon seed pods everywhere, and the sidewalks are a mess with the fuzzy carpet of them. and there's one amazing pink blossomed tree on my block- it's a dark rich pink, the color of my 1869 dress. there's one in the courtyard of ch's building too, and it's just breathtaking. it nearly brought me to tears on saturday when i went over there. i'm sure i've said this before, but it constantly amazes me how much more connected i am to the outside world now that i live in the city. it's not just working at a flowershop i don't think (it's not like i know the name of the pink trees) it's more of a being present. in the suburbs we just zipped from indoors to indoors in our cars, the streets didn't have sidewalks, even all the windows had awnings. and ah, weather! i love weather. and there are few places in the world with more weather than chicago. dar williams was singing enthusiastically on pearl, i was wearing g's jean jacket which i'd lusted after so long, and life was good.

yesterday i finished up my last nasty project for collaborative seminar. it was meeting with the director again, at the coffee shop. so that was freeing, to have that done, and it was the beatiful day, and i had lemon ginger tea, so that wired me (shut up. i know it doesn't take much.) g called, and she made me feel fabulous too (i will always be in love with her) and then i called l and made her laugh at me and my monologuing self. so that was good too- connections were happening.

but then i had collaborative seminar again this morning. and that pulled me down again. it totally sucked. i just hate how much they're asking me for, the last week of the semester. i'm willing to paint this shit, get to class an hour early next week, no problem. but to be there to set it up on friday? at EIGHT THIRTY in the MORNING? the LAST day of CLASSES? the DAY of MANIFEST? sorry. they were all looking at me, saying you have to work, don't you? can you take off? and i'm like, well... it's the weekend of graduation. my mom's in town. we're going out late the night before. we're spending the day at manifest. my subtext was totally, please don't make me do this. and frances is all, oh, well then, bring your mom. it was all i could do not to start crying. there's really something wrong, isn't there, when the thought of having to wake up early on my day off for the school's graduation festival can move me to tears? hmm.

still felt shitty in the costume shop, but finished early there. so i said, see ya, i'm leaving, i'm going to target, get some retail therapy done, i'll be back eventually. i ate lunch, the LAST of my indian food, and started my new book which was excellent, then spent WAAAY too much money at target. but i'm such a sucker for their shoes. flipflops, sandals. michelle said she'd seen garter belts there, but i couldn't find them. but i ended up buying all this clothing, black pillazo pants (i think that's what they're called) an adorable black cardigan, a tank top i really don't need, lime and very low cut with a lace doily on the front, but i bought it because it looked so good with the.... purple flowered push up bra. yes, i bought a bra. i don't know what inspired me, i guess i just wanted to feel uncomfortable and sexy, and they were so cute hanging on the wall in bright colors. it makes the tank top look awesome. there's no cleavage, sure, but there's an absolute defined SHADDOW, and not just when the light's right. but oh i feel bad spening all that money on clothes. i have so much clothing already. and i have no money. but it did feel good and i like them so much.

as i was leaving target, michelle called to make sure i hadn't been hit by a bus, and that made me feel all loved, like the costume shop was looking out for me and making sure i was ok, and recognized i'd been in a step out in front of a bus sort of mood. i didn't feel guilty at all missing some of my hours at work- it's mostly cleaning up these days, anyway. i told you about the gnome last year, right? well, this year there's this plaster david sculputure someone's taped a fabric grape leaf to. well, apparently last friday kim and michelle transformed david into a cowboy:

that's how you waste time as a costume designer. much more interesting than building paper clip sculptures, i think.

anyway, after work i drug all my target purchases home and i had another package waiting- my bathing suit from shopping with z finally came!! she wanted to see what it looked like, which is practically impossible with a cell phone, but here's the best i could do:


so my life is full of new clothes, which is a good thing, but wil be sad when it gets cold again tomorrow. still spring in my life though- i made cream of asparagus soup for dinner. and finally washed the dishes. yes, all those tupperwares from the indian food. i feel like i deserve a medal. but instead i painted my tonails lime green to match the seed pods so i can wear my new sandals tomorrow. maybe, just maybe i'll do laundry tonight, too. that would give me even more new clothes.

2.5.06

media frenzy

so ch has been saving all these music videos for me to see, songs for me to hear, all sorts of streaming media! because i of course can do nothing with my dial up connection. not hear a single song on myspace, nope. so you know there's no hope of ever, ever watching a music video.

oh my goddess, and they were ALL so FABULOUS. so i'm going to try and get you links to all of them so you can watch them too, and have a ch/caitlin bonding experience with your very own computer.


ugh. but i can't get ANYTHNG to load tonight. i can't even google search them. so links are coming. not that anyone reads here anyway.

sorry, j. you're not no one. it's all the other lurkers that make me lonely.