non lyrical

hello blog,
i am new but you all know me.

I left my long time unfortunate home of chicagoland 2 days ago,
and find myself in a whole foods outside of seattle, WA right now after crossing the flat fields of corn, soybeans, wheat and alfalfa; the rocks of prehistory jutting out of the earth, dry dry deserts of sagebush and not much else; beige lands for hundreds of miles, and then conifer mountains and soonly the sea!
made a new buddy-- karen from michigan. tons of good food filling our little turtle of a minivan. she just had a job interview here at whole foods-- she'll be a health counselor here in about six weeks, so good for her and good for the internet where we found another buddy to let us stay in his house in bismarck! and my mom's cousin in post falls, idaho.

anyway. going to indulge in some celebratory hemp milk ice "cream" now-- karen's fave.
more thoughts on leaving and goodbyes and modern life later.
-zee.

also happy 23rd birthday to my big sista becci
and to me on the occasions that I am harry potter

we will bare our toes for the revolution

great post, nautilus--i like imagining myself hanging from the inside of your eyelid, too.

i returned yesterday from a michigonian woodlands adventure--a mobilizing weekend hosted by the transformative justice law project talking about prison abolition and transformative justice as well as workshops on privilege, trans prisoners, the prison-industrial complex, great squid hotspots in the midwest...

most of those things, though. (+ a horse and some geese and a cat named carlisle.)

imagine these words squirted by a great great squid: improving prisons is not enough! down with the prison-industrial complex! no more corrupt judges and money-driven manipulation of truth! the state does not have the right to pass out arbitrary and cruel punishments! prisons are poisonous loci of social control and abuse! and then that squid divides into a thousand tiny squids and they crawl through ideological cracks and seep ink and fight the arm of bioluminescent crabs that crawl and oppress....

i did a lot of thinking about class privilege (how to be "poor" and a student and in hyde park and all of these things) and how relative privilege is--for instance, i think being female-born makes it easier for me to dress genderfluidly than if i had been born a man. and for the identities that are not granted privileged access in/to the mainstream (like trans people to safe bathrooms), there are often amazing communities of support that form--like queer community, which operates on a plane of privilege itself. or voguing....mmm mmm.

so my brain did some flips, learned some shit, and mostly i met these 10 people who are doing cool shit in the midwest and many of them have love affairs with chicago, which was intriguing. and also i did not wear shoes all weekend. that was a plus.

upon my return i showered (oh did i shower) and mixed up some sea salt and a little olive oil and lavender oil and rubbed it all over myself and now i think i will shower all the time because it was so so good.

Further Adventures in Sleeping

So last night in an attempt to quiet the whirly-gig of my brian, I tried on what I thought might be some helpful imaginings to lull myself to sleep. First I imagined that the inside of my head was a gigantic library with all contours and bumps of my skull, with nice little recesses where my ears, nose, and mouth are. And all along the inside were books. I imagined tiny versions of myself rolling down my eyelids like they were window-shades. I was, however, still awake. So the tiny-me maintence crew began rolling the walls away like they were wall-paper, which gave way to darkness. "Ah", I thought, "Here is Sleep!" Instead, I found myself terribly confused about whether I was looking at the back of my eyelids or whether I was imagining darkness. Compounding this problem were other imaginings poking at the corners of my eyes as if I were acutally seeing them. I was trapped in this seeing/imaging place until the secondary layer of imaginings took over. And then streams of pictures just sped past me for what felt like a very long time (though as these things go, it may have only been a few minutes). This never happens to me. The time before I fall asleep is almost never silent in that way, there are always words and speeches and ditties to go along with whatever else pops up as I drift away.

What does the time before you fall asleep look and sound like? Do you find that you have to shut off your brain to sleep or does it wind down on its own?

spooning

I spent the previous week in Spooner, Wisconsin, in a tiny log cabin that serves as the vessel of my most vivid childhood memories.  Unlike my previous visits to the cabin with my cousins, I had only the company of my parents.  Thus, I embarked on many solitary adventures hoping to grasp the clingy, spiderweb trails of my childhood innocence. 

I went for long bike rides down winding, wooded paths, following the deer and sandhill cranes who make the north woods their home.  I drew faces on the trees with bits of charred wood from the fire. I canoed out to an island and walked along the shore, allowing the seaweed to wrap around my ankles and affix itself to my calves in intricate swirling patterns.  These delicate swirls contrasted with the sharp, straight marks on my arms, products of last Friday’s escapades in a basement bubbling with sweat, saliva, and explorers.  That evening literally left its mark on me, as the scratches have turned into the most satisfying scars.  Oh, what stories my skin can tell!

I climbed up on the roof of the cabin most evenings to marvel at the stars and process the events of the previous year.  Those nights were particularly fulfilling, yet all of this isolated thinking and writing has made me long for my squids friends in the city with whom I can share my thoughts and dreams.

Dreams seemed to crawl into my ears like insects during the my days in the woods, and they uncoiled in the most bizarre configurations at night.  The first night I dreamt that I was sitting in a room with hedgehogs dangling from the ceiling while a woman from my past read me loveletters in multiple languages.  The next night I dreamt that I was fucking an unknown female-bodied person whose clitoris was long and thin like a tentacle.  Rather than reacting with disgust, I found her unique anatomy to be absurdly seductive.  I wound her clitoris around my fingers for what seemed like hours before I awoke in a curious sweat.  Considering that I was sleeping beneath the roof of my childhood vacation spot, the provocation of these strangely erotic dreams remains completely unknown to me.

My dear squids, I will soon live in the city where we will reunite on the shores of Lake Michigan.  I look forward to your company and the revelry that will most surely take place.

Emerging from the depthssss

I've been sort of laying low for a while. Lots of work and thinking. Here's some words that possibly vaguely describe what I've been up to: art, biking, Boston, fantasy novels, sex.

ON TO THE EXCITING BIT.

This isn't something I plan to do right now, but I'm going to start feeling my friends out in about a week and then actually get this brilliant plan EXECUTED.

Basically, my dad is pretty lonely when I'm not around here, and I've been trying to convince him to get a cat! Why a cat, you ask? Well, for those that know my father, they may also know that he's completely into cats, and often asks me for pictures of Baby, the adorable terror that haunts the halls of 5491. He also constantly sends me pictures, youtube videos, and articles about felines.

But he won't get one!

My PLAN is this... and the more people who help me out on it, the better. Basically, I'd love it if people sent my dad letters encouraging him to get a cat, but the key is, they should be written as though by cats. That can really mean whatever you want, I just want to make my dad feel a bit less lonely. Whether that is by getting pictures of adorable cats or getting a cat himself, I do not know!

I will work out a much more... uh, better, explanation when I actually ask people though...

and a challenge

to enliven this space.

do you think your experience of life differs from that of the average squid?

please explain.

additionally

does anyone know how to add contributors to the blog?

(it might possibly involve signing in as "squids everywhere" since i can't seem to do it as myself)

both malic and z are eager and well-qualified squid-loving beings to join this strange and diverse collective.

update:

never mind, i figured it out.

mr. malic and z are invited and welcomed into this strange and pleasantly smelly niche.

you are all now administrative squiddies; if there is a cephalopod friend whose existence demands addition to this very foucauldian friendspace, feel free to do so; or, you can fuck with settings and change shit to your liking (for instance, see poll at right).

and when i come it will be on your face (book)

fellows, friends, fish,

my first post has been long in coming.

some of us are -- the point is that coming is not the point.

so here i am. long and unstructured.

i will begin with a few disasters, since that seems an appropriately low starting point from which to soar, tentacles flying and jelly shivering:

a few days ago the noble 5491 residents (five bodies with about 1818 tentacles apiece, give or take) awoke from greener pastures to realize that gabriel had been MIA for several days. our distress was manyfold, as gabriel was not well-equipped for his adventures. rolly and i mournfully inquired at open produce and steven, sleepless by mysterious mewing, referred us to his apartment complex where a lone cat mewed for nights. gabriel has now been located in a holding chamber full of cats at someone's mom's house. his re-arrival is greatly anticipated.

earlier this week i went to homewood to breathe the suburban air but my reverie was interrupted by the firecrackered burning of four cars in the vicinity of z's house. what oddities do not make it to the news! a family van, a much-loved corvette, a garaged car...haphazard destruction that did not have the trappings of heartfelt ecoterrorism. many people were sad and confused.

a few other miscellaneous small tragedies include the crippling of innocent bicycles (a streak of unluck that has plagued both rolly and i, winknight) and several small dead animals on the road. also, many bug bites.

but bug bites are the marks of more pleasing things and as i itch the clusters of angry bugkisses behind my ears, i am reminded of rolly & nautilus & my epic venture into the indiana dunes national park, a headlong tripping into a very boggy middle earth. we snuck easily into the park and refused to submit to a confusing system of marked paths until we found ourselves deep in an orc-ridden area and subject to millions of unwanted advances by amorous insects. then with unexpected significance nautilus said, and i quoth, "i wish we had a flying car" and within moments, a small cart zoomed down the path toward us. we begged and pleaded and plunked in the bed of the cart-car and accompanied the confused (and stoned?) park garbage-collectors on their adventurous route. we found ourselves at the opposite end of the park with dusk (the fateful hour of car-towing) fast approaching. hitching was mostly unsuccessful and saddening but then our cart-driving friend picked us up laughing at our absurdity (hikers who've hiked too adventurously! strange maps! middle earth is not for humans!) and the homeward trek was most satisfying.

i decided to spend this summer in chicago, hoping my grumbling disaffection for the city would flower and transform itself. i have had many adventures thusfar, most of them not of my own making--that is, i grew into the impression that i had to create projects and adventures and objects for my passion. but this summer has been explorations of new scenes (burning man, anarchist, wicker park, kinky) and tentacular beings, experiences had and wormholes into greater adventures. i have not fallen in love with chicago, but that is not for lack of potential adventures. and i am tired tired of wicker park, though the person at quimby's winks at me sometimes.

a few other brief notes that are determining (though not overdetermining) my current existence.

yesterday i created the prototype for my new, d.i.y., multi-step, gorgeous dildofriend. it has a star on it. as i stroked the clay to remove my fingerprints, i wondered what to put in the core of my wand. any ideas? what would you put in the core of your wand?

on tuesday z & justin are heading westward to shock their lives into living and in pursuit of the enigmatic spiritual answers available only (in limited quantity) in india and mexico (and peru). they will be missed.

i went to the next generation "kink munch" at ambrosia cafe in lincoln park. apparently the kink scene is a) entirely in lincoln park b) full of tentative and math-loving uchicagoans c) bougie/expensive/overpriced/capitalism-entrenched as can be. i learned about fireplay and fire floggers and fire cupping and was intrigued.

last night from the front porch i yelled a revolutionary cry seeping with passion and loneliness, love and despair, confusion and straightforward insistence:

BAO

BAOBAO

BAO?

BAO BAO BAO BAO BAO.

BAoooooooooooo!

awaken, arise, unburden

Not much action round here. Where's the coffee? someone throw some coffee on everything. There. Much better. mmmmm that's boiling.
Seriously, this blog is too empty.
A personal update: a few nights ago I decided to sleep on the beach in tel aviv which was a beautiful idea as it turned out because the waves were a sweet, sweet lullaby and I fell right asleep which for me is pretty uncommon well but anyway I would've slept like a baby all night and at one point for sure I was definitely sleeping like a baby but then by some vague, subconscious inuition I was suddenly awakened and thus awake I noticed that my backpack was conspicously not, despite my utter certainty that it indeed had been.
I was forced to realize that it was simply in a different place than when I went to sleep and also to realize that I would likely never know the location of this other, more mysterious place. So now I have a lot less stuff.

If you know me at all, you won't be surprised that I feel more relieved than anything else. I have my passport and wallet and cash, and ukulele goddamn if they'd gotten the uke that would be different but luckily it's still here, along with Ali's sweater cuz losing two friends' favorite articles of clothing in 1 year would have been too much to bare, and yesterday I played ukulele in the street near a tel aviv mall and some people must have just gotten lucky or something, because I made $5 in around 40 minutes. whew!

Becoming ten foggy plateaus

Bod-mod day (yesterday). Four piercings, a button tattoo, scissors, peroxide. A total of six deflowering holes. (Elliot met a seven foot tall black bear, wrestled with it, and extracted the leaves and sticks from its asshole that it uses to keep out bugs while hibernating). Deflowering. A claim that your body is your own as well as an alienation from it, as the metal instantaneously crunches through cartilage. You become yourself at the same time as yourself becomes something else. Infiltration.

If I were to tattoo myself I would want a swarm of cicadas and/or bees set to engulf my back. I want to stop identifying with discrete people, images, and symbols and instead become part of a swarm. Become infiltrated by a swarm. All we see of a cicada is it reproducing and dying, becoming something else. Death, birth, drugs, music and drag (sometimes), castration? (think of the castrati's voices!), how else do we become?

An apology

Apologies, proud squids, cephalophods and sea creatures for the prolonged period of estrangement. I have been rolling by land (terra inCOGnito) most times, though infrequently by the flimsy hairstrings of my Armadillium vulgare body, the legs of a terrestrial crustacean (oh! to be a penguin, and supply zoom through waves!). My wanderings and wheelings have, however, not been free of squids and their close relatives the octopi. One appeared on my arm, black, blue, swirling white for half a day, though it slowly flaked off (amazing how skin is a material that can never be completely stained!) and eventually disappeared completely in the waters of Lake Michigan, perhaps gliding on its currents from Southern Michigan to Illinois, to a less sandy crowded shore. (Elliot had a similar tattoo, though part of her painted swirls did not wash off and sheltered a curlicue of her natural pallor from the sun, a swirling sunburn that returned with us to Illinois). Another squid appeared in a Michigan night, when the black night was literally set ablaze with the flaming effigy of a ship (we burners danced around it, fucking heathens, soaking the heat and smoke into our nostrils), and after the ship's skeleton had been burned to ashes all that remained was the light of glowsticks, stars, and a giant green squid, moving through the campsite and dancing in the air with the aid of fourteen hands. Another squid: different setting. White white walls, dusting dirt off of the chairs, "art" (Bukaka says that institutionalized art is shit HAHAHA, so excuse me for the quotation marks), and suddenly a mosaic! A SQUID of red and blue pebbles! She sits on my wall now.

Many squids for a short period. The spirit has remained. I plead with you, forgive me, baptize me with your ink.