Alfredo = cheese!?

"Gray. The light dimming the asphalt. Steps hollow at the top of a fire-escape. My steps are not ready to be abandoned yet, I think, as they shuffle defeated and timid along the stairwell located conveniently beneath me. The walking...our constant motion in its singular form.

I'm feeling prostrated at the moment, and dumb or powerless--either. And tired, of course. Anyway."

RADICAL CHANGE OF MOOD!!!

[I have to wake up at 4:30 tomorrow morning--hallelujah-amen! (Lemme-tell-ya-Lord-Almighty!!) Et cetera. My crazy dog's having her teeth cleaned, but she doesn't know it yet.]

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (12/26/06)

"We laughed because the world is absurd, and beAutiful, and small." (-Ms. Ani D.)

God, I quit my freakin' job today, lemme tell ya. (Well, one of them.) That's all i hafta say about that. Except: getting paid twice as much is not worth being unrecognizable to yourself.

(...)

That is all. Just recording a bit of a landmark / milestone / headstone. The last six months could look hellish if i wrote them out that way (-.o) but I won't. And anyway, "nothing is ever as sad as it seems." (-Noe Venable) Seriously now.

Seriously.

Farethwell folk,
-Talthea (12/21/06)

She's picky about her conquerers.

We've gotta be all wrong about this notion of "the existence of god". For after all, all "existence is equivalent" here.

[We have to be honest all the time!]

But think about this wall. Its color; its wounds--their origin and all the time until this moment encompassing every other person enough to sit here. And more, it sits here in the dark hours too, every night being slightly altered from the night before.

Are we talking about the physical? No, we're talking about time--seen only through its wear. (Its quality of wearing down.)

So how does existence relate to time, if its state of equivalency seems based on the present? (Meaning that everything here is equally accidental...the whole at any given moment, [she's careful with her destroyers] and only as for instance, this one now.)

Time's breath moves slowly. Possibly the only way we can relate to it is in the monotony of our routines--subtle changes gradually changing everything, and too small to notice more than much.

Bah.

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (12/12/06)

"Fire!" screameth the pilot light.

Humor, or something... Nah.

I saw a coupla kids today with their mothers: one on a bus, the other at the bus stop--I knew them both from daycare at the old women's shelter in town. I saw each on slightly-separate occasions, and then I got to see them recognize each other.

The little girl hummed all the way from the station to her stop, loud enough to serenade a bus-full of early risers. When she saw her friend's mama out the window (instantly known) she got excited and her mama helped her lift both arms up and out to yell out, "Hola-hola!!" before she lost her chance.

That's all. I don't know, it was just pretty nice.

Farethewell folk,
-Talthea (12/11/06)

Humpty Dumpty.

"I don't know how I manage this, but there is so much that I know. While I'm still within the realization that it may as well all be wrong."

(I know that I can convince myself of this, for instance. But I also know what beauty looks like when I can and cannot see it. and I know how silly we're all being, all the time, in everything that we do. And I know that I can change in positive and negative terms alike, but that the line between the two isn't even there.)

[My feet are cold but my pants are soft on my thoughtful thighs.]

Remember something of worth, perhaps--but it's so hard to write about the things in my life seriously, so small and petty and fickle they be. Like my reflection in the mirror, shifting before my eyes from beauty to repulsiveness, caught ever in between, and yet so obviously both at once.

"...Yupyup."

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (12/10/06)

Does anybody in the universe know who sings this damn, freaking, wonderful song!?


"
Everybody said, "My friend let me warn you, there's earthquakes and rattlesnakes and terrible things."

And it's a long, long way from Clinchport to California in the absence of a strong, reliable set of wings.

But Annabelle she came with me, she rode by my side. Sometimes when I got sleepy I'd let Annabelle drive.

We rode across this nation, we rode a long way. We found a radio station in every town that had nothing to say.

Willie Nelson came over the airwaves and I thought, when I heard the refrain, "It's kinda hard to be a red-headed stranger when the whole Christian world knows your name."

I fought and I struggle just to keep myself awake. I pulled over to the side of the freeway and said, "Annabelle I need a break."

She woke up and she asked me, "Where the hell are we at?" I said, "Maybe Oklahoma. Anywhere, somewhere wide and flat."

When I opened the door and stood upright, it's like standing for the very first time. My knees were numb and my eyesight was blurry as I stepped across that yellow line.

I dreamt I was flying through the hills of my home. I dreamt I'd been abandoned, I'd been left out all alone.

I dreamt of a hillside where the sun hits the street. Guess I must have dreamt of my new life, there in that passenger seat.

When the sun came over the horizon, we'd entered the desert as I slept, and its beauty was so overwhelming that I, I hid my face and I wept.

Everybody said, "My friend let me warn you, there's earthquakes and rattlesnakes and terrible things."

And it's a long, long way from Clinchport to California in the absence of a strong, reliable set of wings.
Yeah, but my will was harder than diamonds, and I rode for four straight days and nights.

I was a product of impeccable timing, I guess, but I knew that that trip was my birthright.

My friends, my friends let me warn you, it's a long fucking way from Clinchport to California." -- ???

I'm going insane over this damn song.

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (12/5/06)

Mighty God: Forgive the ethics bowl team.

EXTRAVAGANCE!!!

Restraint should be a trade school skill. There should be professors and courses and majors in temperance: tie it up with the environment, human history, psychology, economics... It's needed galore.

Get this: "our culture is just a roughneck teenage jerk with a bottle of pills, a bottle of booze, a full round of ammunition and nothing to lose." - Ani D. Yupyup.

What is this? Drinking as a lifestyle; shopping as a pastime. Taking pictures of the view, then tossing a coke can out the window. Always going-going-going somewhere in big-big trucks. What the fuck?

I'm not complaining, I'm confused. I don't think that our level of silliness is just as yet common knowledge. I think we need some classes in sobriety.

Farethewell folk,
-Talthea (12/4/06)

"It only *feels* like 2:30. Really it's 2:19."

It's pretty late... I'ma gonna try something new.

Mi hermano y yo were talking about astrological signs and the typical compatibilities that our generally-human, pattern-matching selves seem to catch on about.

For instance, he's an Aquarius and is currently life-filled with Taurians and Virgos. Meanwhile, I'm a Cancer and tend to hang out with Leos.

So I'm curious. Are we being silly? (Moreso...)

Thus, if anyone reads this I'd like to request a response: Your sign? Any common lookieloos hanging around you lately?

That is all.

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (11/28/06)

In the absence of ingenuity, quote shamelessly.

Lots of things. Oh my goodness, but quietly.

I hung out with a homeless man called The Professor some nights ago. (He told me that the 'T' is indeed capitalized.)

I drank decorated black coffee and he smoked other people's cigarettes while we talked. He made me laugh like a madperson and, unrelatedly, he was presently writing a book on a single sheet of paper with a pristine pen. (He wrote out his working title for me on the back cover of my T. Kuhn book: 'Fu Ling's Book of Wisdom And Etiquette'.)

He wore a silver wedding ring but told me he wasn't married. His glasses didn't have lenses in the frames. He continuously joked while looking down and for all the world like he might cry. He'd occasionally fall into profuse apologies for starting our conversation, looking skeptical at my assurances, but he sat down across from me without a hint of hesitation. I didn't believe a word he said, but it was the most interesting conversation I'd had all day.

He told me that women couldn't really be philosophers, and I admitted that I was faking it a little bit--but then I convinced him that solipsism still has a fighting chance. He also told me he was sure that he was a bad person, but absolutely inept at evil deeds. He thought that this was probably true of all men, having forgotten their rage long ago, as ever-sated by violent films and such. Women, on the other hand, he barely believed were human, and thus not privy to human trivialities like morality. He seemed to think we were all closer to goddesses, and anyway, unreal. I wonder what his wife was like?

After a while we were joined by some of his streamline community. Rawn ("Chaos & Destruction"!?) had had his hand shattered and rebuilt in Vietnam, and spoke unceasingly by way of circular breathing; Dennis ("the Menace") was sporting a long, white beard, and carrying a bag of onions and a guitar, both of which he tied into a story about Ezra Pound.

When my mathematician brother got to the coffee shop to pick me up, he looked surprised--so to make sure it was really him, Rawn asked him what the hypotenuse of a circle was. Geez louise, but these three were pretty grand; by the time that I left I was hardly breathing for laughter.

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (11/22/06)

And then came buckets of glorious rain...

Breathe. (Mid-term season too slowly passes... "Up ahead in the distance I saw a shimmering light. My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim, I had to stop for the night." You know how it is.)

On my way out--on my way out, of course. (My dog is looking at me like her heart is broken, but whenever i look at her she looks away. It's tragic and I'm stalling.)

There're lots of things to say--but not to you, I think, and not tonight. (Whatever, I'm gonna go make a damn pot, and walk by the boats while I'm at it.)

Since when is obscenity determined by intent? "We make merry in the gutter where rats like us belong...lalalalalala!" ('Tis Ms. Noe Venable.)

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (11/2/06)

I'm going to be a philosopher when I grow up!

I'm thinking about the Vienna Circle tonight. And MOZART Makes You Smarter. And lotsa-lotsa accidental physics, "Back and more mysterious than ever!!".

I want to say something along the lines of pretending by nature (though it's easier to think of the next word by watching the present one materialize on the screen...no way is this going to help me). Something about either having faith in the "why", or else avoiding it altogether...and not because it doesn't imply us.

Wait a moment--i'ma gonna go comb my hair before it dries... (Just because i oughta. :)

Alright. I don't think that science is most relevant. I don't think that an explicit language is more objective because it is less intuitive. I do think that objectivity is absurd outside of a context of communication.

Speaking of binaries: what of the macro/micro scenario? Have you ever cracked a rock into pieces? They don't really fit together afterwards either. (Ridiculous simplification, darling? Maybe.)

Anyway.

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (10/25/06)

"For the 'meaning' of a word is given either by translation or by definition." *check *check

Imagine distraction this complete, can you just? What about cold hands? What about heavy feet, stamping to believe in their own presence, but can't quite? What about questions being their own answers--where is there space for that?

Consider the weight of a fitful sleep, for instance. Where are we when we're in between? And how is dissatisfaction this complete if what we think we want is the truth? (What else is there!?) Fuck that: where we go has nothing to do with destinations; where we're from has nothing to do with time. Momentary and fleeting truth is not of inherently less worth--its fallback is quarantined in the limits we put on how much value we're willing to expend, as if supply could be just so & not a calculated decree. As if we weren't unequivocally aware of our intentions and ever-willing to deny them, entirely, a voice of distinction.

How do you create the context that will hold yourself still? This isn't about love! Not exactly. It's about willingness. “Oh--but it doesn't have to reflect anything besides itself,” says the mirror of the reflection.

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (10/9/06)

[Hmmm, it's warm today...but i can still afford the coffee.]

Okay, okay, okay! So I can't imagine what it is that I want. Rather, I seem to be infinitely caught up in everything that I have.  (damnit to hell.)  In the mean time: let's talk UNREQUITED!, shall we?

"There are people that come into and leave my life, not gently, moving quickly. They taste unfinished in my eyes--they have neither desire nor chance to distract me, and neither would I allow them to. But it is their theoretical selves that leave me this bewildered; knowing you're at least that real." [How is it that I am the same!?] What do we do with this? These ancient infants, sitting before each other with half-lidded opportunites!?

(look at a person. go ahead.)

Consider a few different perspectives peering at a particular life:
  • What is its shape? How does it build its time around itself? These--the things that we do, and allow done to us.
  • What is its intention? How does it live with itself, knowing so completely why it's doing what-all it does?
  • Where is its height of awareness? How clearly do the lines which join and separate it from everything seem to show up in its own form? How-looks a belief held--and (then) not?

[And which of these are real? What happens when what we deem 'maintenance', starts showing up everywhere?]

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (10/7/06)

"I am Nestor's delicious drinking cup. Whoever drinks from this cup swiftly will the desire of fair-crowned Aphrodite seize him."

Except we are so impressionable! How is this moment not momentarily changing you?

(And you'll carry it now, like it or not--seventy-five years of consciousness, give or take a lifetime. This is what i have (to shape like ivy, perhaps?). I love that the wind brushes leaves on my cheek. ["And know you the end of each joy will come!?" Yup, and more.])

Earlier: "I just untied a hiding necklace from a tree branch and moved it to another lower to the ground. Cuz sometimes you gotta change things up to prove you're paying attention."
Later: "A man sat at a table looking at the necklace for some minutes this evening. Then he stood up, untied it, and rushed away."

But Smiled at me, she did! and whispered to me with urgency, "No! Siéntese! Coma tu comida..." With tiny, ground teeth, so readily showed / with eyes bright and dull and wantingwantingwanting something...her voice was so much!

(Mine is a generation bent on making things out to be less than they are--always with everything that is in fact ours. For an ode to the thoughts behind the words...be it something like static?)

Oh god, you do no justice to this. But you are so impressionable, and moved still. It has to be like this...EXISTENCE!...and the stuff that happens is secondary. Can you believe it!?--how your heart is pumping?

Sometimes.

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (10/5/06)

Bah!? Arrrrgh! & Grrr!!, respectively.

Fucking Jesus Christ!! Wait no! But damnit to hell nonetheless. (Such is the process of useless expression--needfully anonymous so as to keep what's yours intact. Potent.)

Opinions & Opinions. God! they're everywhere. Stated with such assurance -- believed, even! -- as if recounting an experience ever comes close to its presence; as if noticing it always comes afterward.

I'm such a loser, (might we prefer 'carelessly dissatisfied'? - nope!) i don't know what I'm complaining about. (I'm cold, etc.) Whatever, probably writing is no better than talking (everevertalking--incessant! this silly talk) when you get right down to it. But in the mean time, call me gruff.

Gruff - Rough, brusque, or surly: a gruff manner.

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (10/4/06)

As the last person on earth that rollerblades--let come the Nebraska-massive bruising!

[These brackets are to contain an existence-altering sort of banter, wherein a distracted prelude to an extreme alteration of a thusfar skewed-spectacled awareness of life in general will at longlast be made available to you, the masses.]

My right hand is cold; my left hand isn't. I hope I'm not dying. (Probably i'm not.)

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (10/2/06)

EMPATHY!!!

(What is it about cold thoughts or coffee? "I'm freezing," sayeth the extremities of my body.)

I have an altogether insufficient memory that has proven tenacious: this fleeting person, not at all present. Would that i were fickle!--it's gotten to the point that whenever i'm not thinking about him, i feel like i'm forgetting something.

What is this!? I've neither excuse, nor basis. I don't even want anything. And at least I'm writing again...

But I am a ridiculous thing, after all. I wish that i were unhappy--I haven't a chance.

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (10/1/06)

...

I read a book that reminded me of fragility and i don't remember when I stopped crying. A broken boy beats his chained dog with a bat and then gets on his hands and knees just out of reach of the chain. Soon the boy's soft, breaking voice soothes the dog's growls into whimpers and when the boy crawls to it, the dog licks his face weakly. Through sobs, the little boy is whispering to the dog, "I know, I know."

I only know just how fucking powerless I am to prevent such things. But I've started volunteering at a women's shelter anyway. What's the difference?

-Talthea (8/1/06)

"Existence is futile!" (Wait...is that right!?)

"The importance of fixed residence to a complex society explains why missionaries and governments, whenever they make first contact with previously uncontacted nomadic tribes or bands in New Guinea or the Amazon, universally have two immediate goals. One goal, of course, is the obvious one of 'pacifying' the nomads: that is, dissuading them from killing missionaries, bureaucrats, or each other. The other goal is to induce the nomads to settle in villages, so that the missionaries and bureaucrats can find the nomads, bring them services such as medical care and schools, and proselytize and control them." -J.D. Muahahahaha?!?!

(I suppose slitting my wrists would smack of melodrama.)

Faretheewell folk,
-Talthea (7/25/06)