Friday, February 16, 2018
Make a Move
Tuesday February 13th
Two weeks left. Have another small batch ready to move to Lore's or Kris'. A few of my boxes are packed but still open as I use things in them. Down to my 'last-minute-box' and clothes. Trying to coordinate help getting some stuff to my other sister's place where my two-week hiatus will be. Everyone's got small cars and are busy, and I've got three larger pieces to move - plus me. I need my niece Kat's help more than she can be here for, as she is in the middle of moving as well. Lore has her own obstacles. I have to hope I can get Scott to give me a few afternoons as he gets off work. We're heading out tomorrow, anyway, to see if a few shops will have any interest in some of my stuff. I could use the money.
BTW, if you, reader, have not seen Three Billboards I highly recommend it. It's sharp wit and keenly felt humanity leaven a dark observance of anger. Movie's got a humanist streak a mile wide.
Dreamt this morning that while I was fighting to breach the wall between Dana and me, one of her exes made a move and she chose him instead.
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Jesus. The latest mass shooting, the high school in Florida. I don't have the words. 18th mass shooting this year? : ( Seeing those students in shock and grief is heartbreaking.
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Saw the footage of the United fight where the engine fell apart midflight. I'll be on a United. At least it won't be over the ocean.
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Oh - I'm being stupid about the masonite. It's too cold in here for the enamel paints to cure, so I can't start the painting I want now anyway. Still working to finish the small biker skull for John and I practically have to bake it in the oven with each coat of paint on the helmet. And I would rather not take the paints to Kathy's, so that's that: wait for NY before 'Mina'. That will prevent me rushing the thing, so I guess that's good. I can sketch out what I want, do the prep work, play with the flow.
Last night I dreamt - and it was just a dream, no question - that I was preparing to send a package to Dana. Next to the shipping address I drew a triangle and then wondered why that was what I drew...inside it I began to draw a simple image of her but as I went along it was neither as simple nor as small as I'd intended. I think the triangle was a suggestion that I was either casting a spell or warding one off by doing her portrait.
With Lore coming over Sunday, I'll try to use her phone again to get online unless I get to the library sooner. Need to see if Kris left a message through FB, haven't heard from him in a week and I've around a week and a half left. If I'm there long enough I want to see if I find a pose for 'Mina' I like and the right clothes even if I don't follow anything too distinctly.
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"It's a mental health issue, not a gun issue." These are NOT mutually exclusive. Hello?? Wake the fuck up. It is NOT a slippery fucking slope. You're not going to lose the right to own guns. There IS such a thing as reasonable gun restrictions, and yes they WILL hinder these tragedies even if they won't stop all of them. Mental health issues are only part of the problem. You don't solve it by relying on only part of the solution. Do something. You're not a dog, stop letting the NRA be your Pavlov.
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Friday, Feb. 16th.
Something I saw last night, something from half a century ago I think (I can't remember what program it was) had someone opining that the media should make a conscious effort to report the heroes and the comforters, the people who bring help. There's too much focus on the negative, he thought. The world needs to be given hope, he argued. The reason I think this was an older program was because I thought that I always hear the same thing today, have heard it all my life. Thing is, I don't think the media needs to make an effort at this because it's already there if you open your eyes to it. I've been seeing it for years, and telling people to look for it every time there's a catastrophe or an atrocity or act of inhumanity, every time you see the worst in humanity you also see humanity respond with its best - open arms, open hearts, comforting, rescuing, standing or marching defiant against allowing fellow human beings to be abandoned or abused. It's no different anywhere in he world. The response is not an equal one, either, empathy and love overwhelm the cause of loss or offense. The news media cover it as a matter of course without having to manufacture it, and its there beneath whatever spin the more political of them try to give it. It's simply there. It's our nature. You saw it in Florida among the community, the kids, the parents and teachers...battered as their hearts were, they didn't curl up individually closed off but reached out to and for each other. You saw it in every golden flame of their vigil. That is who we are.
Sunday, February 11, 2018
(oof)
February 7th, took some time to watch the next Dracula film I hadn't reviewed yet. I had watched it back around the time I fell away from doing movie reviews, and I had an angle then that's harder to perceive now as the impression was stronger when it was fresh. Too bad I hadn't written it up at the time. 1968, British TV adaptation featuring Denholm Elliott. Pretty decent, too, in spite of its limitations it was quite daring. Brazen, you could say.
Reviews take a while to compose. How long has it been? I'd like to do one or two, and maybe another Kolchak. Will if I have time. Still no screencap capacity but I have snapped a few shots from the TV screen, which will be overly contrasty and lose some detail. (edit: this method sucks. Will have to find a better way. I've done the next Hammer film too, now, written the review but need better shots.)
I will definitely hold off on 'Mina and the Moon'. Once I get to New York I'll get the largest masonite board that will fit Jesseca's car and get some materials. Maybe enamel, as I like what I was doing there, maybe acrylic instead, but definitely crayons to use under the paint. I can almost see the image, and some of the clothing. Casual, warm, long sleeves, maybe a dress and boots (as I recall from scanning her FB page). I have a horde of enamels and acrylics many of which are still good, but it's too much to pack them. I'll just have to build up a reserve from scratch again...expensive, but there it is. I won't be painting the character Mina, just borrowing the name.
I don't have to lose my paints until the last minute, and I wonder if I can manage a portrait in the days I have left here. Time is an obstacle. I would like to do something colorful, otherwise I might as well just do a drawing - and I've got one that needs the attention already. Three, really, that I want to finish and spray with fixative before they ship.
Dreams have all been...eh. Few that are terrible, but none that have held the slightest pleasure or happiness. I had one in which I was talking to mom. I suddenly realized with tremendous joy and relief, mom is still alive after all! And then I woke up. Fuuuuuuuuuuuuck. Really could use a good dream. Something with some human warmth would be welcome, some tenderness. A moment of love.
Haven't heard from Jesseca in too long, I hope she's okay.
Have to see how much money I can afford to spend. Need more packing tape and I really want to hit Five Guys, but then they have those in New York. Foodcarts, OTOH...I had noodles with chicken, onions, peppers, carrots, and broccoli in Thai peanut sauce, and it's a local vendor at Cartlandia, a 20 minute nwalk from here and cost less than I'd spend at 5 Guys. And there's Rimsky Korsakoffee house, still need to go there. Did DeNicola's with Scott. I found a great place for used DVDs, wish I'd known about it sooner! I'd have loved a shopping spree there, they'd have some harder-to-find itles to fill out some of my collections.
Ugh. Valentine's Day is in a week. Excuse my mixing the holidays, but Bah! Humbug!
Damn. Watching the news of the snowstorm in New York. Really wanna hear from Jesseca. It's been too long.
*********
I had a dream wherein I was watching a movie with really juvenile humor, just lowest-common denominator bathroom humor and maybe some racist jokes. Someone thought the jokes were mine. Hafta admit I'm not good at telling jokes, and I'm not big on that type either. So, ummm, I'll fess up to the worst joke that's all mine: What would you call a Pharaoh passing gas? A toot uncommon.
Kill me now. It's okay.
When I post this, I will also post my new movie review at Sinister Simian.
*********
Reviews take a while to compose. How long has it been? I'd like to do one or two, and maybe another Kolchak. Will if I have time. Still no screencap capacity but I have snapped a few shots from the TV screen, which will be overly contrasty and lose some detail. (edit: this method sucks. Will have to find a better way. I've done the next Hammer film too, now, written the review but need better shots.)
I will definitely hold off on 'Mina and the Moon'. Once I get to New York I'll get the largest masonite board that will fit Jesseca's car and get some materials. Maybe enamel, as I like what I was doing there, maybe acrylic instead, but definitely crayons to use under the paint. I can almost see the image, and some of the clothing. Casual, warm, long sleeves, maybe a dress and boots (as I recall from scanning her FB page). I have a horde of enamels and acrylics many of which are still good, but it's too much to pack them. I'll just have to build up a reserve from scratch again...expensive, but there it is. I won't be painting the character Mina, just borrowing the name.
I don't have to lose my paints until the last minute, and I wonder if I can manage a portrait in the days I have left here. Time is an obstacle. I would like to do something colorful, otherwise I might as well just do a drawing - and I've got one that needs the attention already. Three, really, that I want to finish and spray with fixative before they ship.
Dreams have all been...eh. Few that are terrible, but none that have held the slightest pleasure or happiness. I had one in which I was talking to mom. I suddenly realized with tremendous joy and relief, mom is still alive after all! And then I woke up. Fuuuuuuuuuuuuck. Really could use a good dream. Something with some human warmth would be welcome, some tenderness. A moment of love.
Haven't heard from Jesseca in too long, I hope she's okay.
Have to see how much money I can afford to spend. Need more packing tape and I really want to hit Five Guys, but then they have those in New York. Foodcarts, OTOH...I had noodles with chicken, onions, peppers, carrots, and broccoli in Thai peanut sauce, and it's a local vendor at Cartlandia, a 20 minute nwalk from here and cost less than I'd spend at 5 Guys. And there's Rimsky Korsakoffee house, still need to go there. Did DeNicola's with Scott. I found a great place for used DVDs, wish I'd known about it sooner! I'd have loved a shopping spree there, they'd have some harder-to-find itles to fill out some of my collections.
Ugh. Valentine's Day is in a week. Excuse my mixing the holidays, but Bah! Humbug!
Damn. Watching the news of the snowstorm in New York. Really wanna hear from Jesseca. It's been too long.
*********
I had a dream wherein I was watching a movie with really juvenile humor, just lowest-common denominator bathroom humor and maybe some racist jokes. Someone thought the jokes were mine. Hafta admit I'm not good at telling jokes, and I'm not big on that type either. So, ummm, I'll fess up to the worst joke that's all mine: What would you call a Pharaoh passing gas? A toot uncommon.
Kill me now. It's okay.
When I post this, I will also post my new movie review at Sinister Simian.
*********
Sunday, February 4, 2018
Three Weeks
I will be forced to leave this house in about three weeks. Something outside the usual is bothering me.
Karla is in no hurry to take mom's urn to the cemetery, so she has it on a shelf next to a hummingbird feeder. She says the number of birds coming to it has increased. Also, her cat leaps up and sits next to it and watches the birds.
On my first night in mom's room (I moved into it so that what was my room can be repainted) I sat in mom's chair. It's a little uncomfortable at the small of the back. Mom always had a cushion she used there. I didn't have it, and really felt its absence. At the end of the evening I plopped some clothes on the chair, turned off the TV, and went to bed. The next day I discovered that mom's cushion was precisely placed where it ought to be. That's a neat trick if I did it to myself via the pile of clothes I casually plunked down.
After the second night in mom's room I got up to set the locks on the front door so anyone who showed up could get in (undoing the deadbolt and screen door). I found the chain had been drawn across. I have been out of the habit of using that chain for several years now.
Am I gaslighting myself?
Jesseca and I share a lot of vids about the (so-called) supernatural. Given the lore on ghosts, I hate the idea of mom being here and tied to the house. Owning this house was her proudest achievement. If she's here then I dare not let myself think I'm going to be leaving her alone in it. Maybe she's not tied to it, and maybe I'm subconsciously playing tricks on myself. Maybe she's watching birds.
(sudden mental image of a bird sitting on a perch and someone in gym clothes anxiously waiting beneath to catch it: birdspotting)
This is the third morning. No new odd occurrences noticed.
*********
January 30th, nearly 11 PM. Watching a movie about authors and wondering how much of Dana I have invented. If I was so far from the mark she could and should have said so. If not then I am the only one who really knows her, the only one who loves her complete for everything she is.
If I were a writer of fiction the Dana I imagine is someone I would invent.
*********
February 2nd, 1 AM.
Will you marry me, Dana?
I've been wanting to ask you that for 34 years.
Dana, promise me that you will sort out the problem, find your cure, whatever it is that keeps you from talking to me, and then write to me. You promise me that. Anything less is beneath you. I deserve that promise. Step up, Cooper. I'm not giving up on you, don't you fucking give up either. You're not the horrible person you want so desperately to think you are. You're nowhere close to it.
I'm still trying to work that painting in my head. It needs flow and movement. I was thinking forward stride, maybe reaching a hand out but that's not what's missing...the elements need interaction, it's too static and there's a space that is left dead. I was thinking a little while ago that I've never seen you dance and I very much want to. How do you look when you dance? Mind, I never would have gone dancing with you anyway, I have no rhythm...but it's something I wish you'd let me share.
*********
I've spent almost fifty years in this house, I should have been allowed to spend my last few weeks in it in peace. That's not happening. Dammit, I still have a major drawing I need to finish, these people have to let me work on it.
*********
I may never be able to look at Dana's FB page. It's like...I should be able to be happy knowing she's doing well, but I already know she will be. She's a survivor. It hurts to see her happy and know I'm not welcome to share in it. I'm not invited to the party. She's happy because I'm not there. I can't look at that, I can't see that smile. It's like being spat on. Of course I know that's not her intention, she deserves to be happy. But that's how it feels from here.
*********
February 4th. Had to have an estate sale Friday and Saturday. Sold a few things but not enough. Suppose we'll have to try it again in a week or two. A couple of my model buildups sold. Trying today to change gears again back from that.
There's a matched pair of portraits I may do someday. Not in the spirit for it now. From a dream, late Nineties or early Oughts. In the dream someone had graffitoed a brick wall with large portraits of Dana and me. Mine had the top of my head removed just above the browline and capped with a brass lid to an incense decanter. The lid was tipped up to reveal the inside of my head: it was filled with brain-sized pupil, iris, and cornea gazing upward out of the skull. Dana's portrait had two sets of eyes, one above the other, as if she were two beings or personalities in one body. What I would like most to do is to obtain two large sheets of plastic and cover them with sculpted bricks (putty or plastic sheet cutouts I would texture) and paint the portraits over those in enamels and/or acrylics. An alternative would be to do the same with paper and heavy cardstock and use crayons. That latter would be easier and cheaper but the effect would be a mimicry of what I want. I've always avoided self-portraits but I like the details of the inner eye and incense lid. Also, that brick wall is tragically apt.
With sheet styrene I keep running into the same problem, warping. The styrene reacts badly to the chemicals in the very glues and putties designed specifically for them. I've done any number of really nice pieces that were useless within three days. My brother John showed me a bottle of what he calls 'sprue glue', a DIY putty made by melting bits of styrene in a bottle of MEK-type liquid glue (methyl ethyl ketone, works by capillary action) . The resulting paste was much more fluid than I expected, I'd heard about this long ago but had imagined it as a sticky mess. He says there's been no warpage, the assumption being that styrene can't react badly to styrene. So now I'd like to try this stuff out. I hope there's a hobby store I can get to in Oswego.
Karla is in no hurry to take mom's urn to the cemetery, so she has it on a shelf next to a hummingbird feeder. She says the number of birds coming to it has increased. Also, her cat leaps up and sits next to it and watches the birds.
On my first night in mom's room (I moved into it so that what was my room can be repainted) I sat in mom's chair. It's a little uncomfortable at the small of the back. Mom always had a cushion she used there. I didn't have it, and really felt its absence. At the end of the evening I plopped some clothes on the chair, turned off the TV, and went to bed. The next day I discovered that mom's cushion was precisely placed where it ought to be. That's a neat trick if I did it to myself via the pile of clothes I casually plunked down.
After the second night in mom's room I got up to set the locks on the front door so anyone who showed up could get in (undoing the deadbolt and screen door). I found the chain had been drawn across. I have been out of the habit of using that chain for several years now.
Am I gaslighting myself?
Jesseca and I share a lot of vids about the (so-called) supernatural. Given the lore on ghosts, I hate the idea of mom being here and tied to the house. Owning this house was her proudest achievement. If she's here then I dare not let myself think I'm going to be leaving her alone in it. Maybe she's not tied to it, and maybe I'm subconsciously playing tricks on myself. Maybe she's watching birds.
(sudden mental image of a bird sitting on a perch and someone in gym clothes anxiously waiting beneath to catch it: birdspotting)
This is the third morning. No new odd occurrences noticed.
*********
January 30th, nearly 11 PM. Watching a movie about authors and wondering how much of Dana I have invented. If I was so far from the mark she could and should have said so. If not then I am the only one who really knows her, the only one who loves her complete for everything she is.
If I were a writer of fiction the Dana I imagine is someone I would invent.
*********
February 2nd, 1 AM.
Will you marry me, Dana?
I've been wanting to ask you that for 34 years.
Dana, promise me that you will sort out the problem, find your cure, whatever it is that keeps you from talking to me, and then write to me. You promise me that. Anything less is beneath you. I deserve that promise. Step up, Cooper. I'm not giving up on you, don't you fucking give up either. You're not the horrible person you want so desperately to think you are. You're nowhere close to it.
I'm still trying to work that painting in my head. It needs flow and movement. I was thinking forward stride, maybe reaching a hand out but that's not what's missing...the elements need interaction, it's too static and there's a space that is left dead. I was thinking a little while ago that I've never seen you dance and I very much want to. How do you look when you dance? Mind, I never would have gone dancing with you anyway, I have no rhythm...but it's something I wish you'd let me share.
*********
I've spent almost fifty years in this house, I should have been allowed to spend my last few weeks in it in peace. That's not happening. Dammit, I still have a major drawing I need to finish, these people have to let me work on it.
*********
I may never be able to look at Dana's FB page. It's like...I should be able to be happy knowing she's doing well, but I already know she will be. She's a survivor. It hurts to see her happy and know I'm not welcome to share in it. I'm not invited to the party. She's happy because I'm not there. I can't look at that, I can't see that smile. It's like being spat on. Of course I know that's not her intention, she deserves to be happy. But that's how it feels from here.
*********
February 4th. Had to have an estate sale Friday and Saturday. Sold a few things but not enough. Suppose we'll have to try it again in a week or two. A couple of my model buildups sold. Trying today to change gears again back from that.
There's a matched pair of portraits I may do someday. Not in the spirit for it now. From a dream, late Nineties or early Oughts. In the dream someone had graffitoed a brick wall with large portraits of Dana and me. Mine had the top of my head removed just above the browline and capped with a brass lid to an incense decanter. The lid was tipped up to reveal the inside of my head: it was filled with brain-sized pupil, iris, and cornea gazing upward out of the skull. Dana's portrait had two sets of eyes, one above the other, as if she were two beings or personalities in one body. What I would like most to do is to obtain two large sheets of plastic and cover them with sculpted bricks (putty or plastic sheet cutouts I would texture) and paint the portraits over those in enamels and/or acrylics. An alternative would be to do the same with paper and heavy cardstock and use crayons. That latter would be easier and cheaper but the effect would be a mimicry of what I want. I've always avoided self-portraits but I like the details of the inner eye and incense lid. Also, that brick wall is tragically apt.
With sheet styrene I keep running into the same problem, warping. The styrene reacts badly to the chemicals in the very glues and putties designed specifically for them. I've done any number of really nice pieces that were useless within three days. My brother John showed me a bottle of what he calls 'sprue glue', a DIY putty made by melting bits of styrene in a bottle of MEK-type liquid glue (methyl ethyl ketone, works by capillary action) . The resulting paste was much more fluid than I expected, I'd heard about this long ago but had imagined it as a sticky mess. He says there's been no warpage, the assumption being that styrene can't react badly to styrene. So now I'd like to try this stuff out. I hope there's a hobby store I can get to in Oswego.
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