Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

consume

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So, if you couldn’t tell from those two (very non-lyric) pieces, i spent my weekend intermittently curled up with my collection of Sylvia Plath poems. Lately just about anything i’ve read has impacted upon my writing pretty clearly, and Plath’s ability to gently turn the obscure into the common as well as the other way around is something that makes her my favourite non-lyrical poet by far.

Of course, i didn’t spend the entire 60 hours that i classify as ‘weekend’ curled up with a book and some bottled emotions; my sitting on the floor of the fourth row of the strange auditorium at Shippensburg with a notepad on my lap furiously copying down Plath poems while the fraternity people chirped away endlessly was probably the last thing i intended to talk about upon my return. In fact, i had written a pen-and-paper blog just minutes before then, but reading it now it doesn’t seem to be saying anything at all.


It would be one thing if i were to write you my Bell Jar, but i haven’t read that in nearly a year. Instead you are stuck with poetry, dancing around the things i wasn’t planning to say anyhow. I’m obtuse like that, i suppose.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/11/7260104/

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Today was a cranky day, and yes, that is the sound of me spending an entire 48 hours only departing the apartment once, to take out the trash. We are all a bit cranky tonight, and i decided after intermittently coloring in a coloring book and blankly staring at the teevee for a fourth hour to say “goodnight” and get the hell out of the living room. The thing about living in a threesome of people is that it’s always two on one, and yesterday it was me and Lindsay versus Erika so today was them versus me. Erika and i hardly ever team up against Lindsay so much as we just hang out by ourselves. It actually doesn’t bother me in the least, but the intelligent thing to do was to extract myself before it did bother me. So, i came up here and recorded a suck-ass Trio.


Meanwhile, my cold has kept me substance free all weekend, and don’t think that has anything to do with being in the house, either. The ladies put a sizeable dent into a few bottles in the wet-bar, and i consumed three cartons of orange juice and one of ice cream. Such is a sleepy weekend, solely composed of naps, guitars, musical Buffy episodes that left me gasping and in shock, and blowout Eagles games. Makes me feel real, at least…

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/11/7050450/

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I feel like… i don’t know, Third Rock From the Sun? Do you remember at the very beginning of the show when the four of them didn’t understand anything at all? … Taking coats at parties, kissing, slapping, cheerleaders, and breasts? Lately when i go back and look at the archives i just feel like a visitor in the shape of me trying to emulate the behavior i’m supposed to be representing. Is that circular enough for you? The change happened somewhere around when co-op began, because you can tell the difference between the computer being a constant companion and just something to stare at in-between doing things. And then i started doing a few things and talking about them, instead of just talking about not doing anything. And now i do things all the time and have nothing to talk about afterwards.

What’s so interesting about my life, really? Obviously i do things… last night i went to the movies, i can talk about that. I walked to the movie theatre, which is three blocks from my house. In the lobby Laurel was waiting for me (along with her roommate and Jeff (as if i went on a date with Laurel and didn’t mention it (obviously i only mention Laurel because you know who she is at this point))). She asked if i had gotten my haircut and i responded “Not for almost a month.” We saw Monsters INC, which involved a lot of giggling. Afterwards i bought some sushi and talked about X-Men with Erika, who was reading Carrie.

So, there’s two main theories of journaling that i can discern. The one is that obviously my night was pretty freakin’ boring when it comes to reading about it, so i should either talk about something else or learn to do more interesting things. The other is that it doesn’t matter what i’m doing, just so long as i put my own spin on it people will care about reading. I’m not sure which of the two i subscribe to, but my first journaling connection online was the ever-present Gus, who resides wholly in the second school of thought. Gus basically just writes one post a day, each and every single day, and he weaves it all together so that you’re not only interested in what he has to say, but you honestly want to know what he’s doing with himself. Frankly, Gus is one of the only people who employs this technique who i enjoy, the others being Alison and Meg, though they use their narrative voice a little more pervasively.



The way last year had been going for me, i just merrily trolled along with my own script of things to say and would talk about parties and things if and when i went to them because they were typically unusual and exciting. But, at this point, going to a party is like “wow, another party. i wonder who’ll hook up tonight?”, and afterwards i’m always tearing out my hair thinking “how can i tell an interesting story about that lapdance…?” So, now i have a daily existence and i suppose my big question is whether i’m supposed to talk about it, or me, or some other nebulous thing — because back in the day i was talking about my life, but it was a lack of a life, so it was just me talk about me.

Wow, now i’m dizzy. Tell you what… you sit and stare at the screen for an hour thinking about what i’ll write next, and i’ll go get some ice cream. Cool? Cool.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/11/6976582/

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I was essentially at a loss for words, sitting at the quaint restaurant table with Lindsay and Dante trying to explain. I couldn’t figure out how i felt about New Hope… i felt like we were trapped in one of those quaint tourist trap towns and that it was like walking around in a life-sized dollhouse where nothing was real. It was more than that, though… more surreality like rose flavored ice cream that made me feel like i was in a novel somewhere other than circling around Washington’s Crossing of the Delaware.

So, we were at dinner and Lindsay decided for me that i should have brought a notebook with me, and i’m sure that i should have because i lost everything i had meant to say. I suppose i’m just so obsessed with being in a city and being metropolitan that it seems impossible to me that people live just around the corner from these shops… selling strange musical instruments and fantastical ice cream and ultra-hot salsa only to walk back home and lay down to sleep under those same stars.

Oh yeah, you could see stars. Everywhere. Our trip straddled Pennsylvania and New Jersey and we walked back and forth across a bridge whose wooden foot path was so worn that it seemed just like walking on a dirt road. We all wondered at once where the state lines were drawn… the middle of the river, or the middle of the bridge? I finally figured that they’d probably be indicated on old claimer’s maps, but then it came down to where exactly those hand-drawn maps would set the border in real life and we were back to where we started.

Other things happened too, that i can’t quite put back together into the blog they were meant to be. There was an armor store that was selling arrowheads from 200bc, and i couldn’t fathom how just anybody had the right to own something that old and have it sitting in a display case with a “please inquire” pricetag on it. I kept arguing with Lindsay that nothing could taste like a rose after we first passed the ice cream shop while still in the car, and finally she just replied: “it tastes just like it smells. You can taste anything you can smell!” And that was that until i actually bought my triple scoop and the owner made me try it first because “some people taste it and then just walk out on me.” And it tasted like… rose petals. It was flavored in that subtle way that green tea ice cream is, with the ultra-dark pastel color and the taste that slides off of your tongue while you’re trying to absorb it.

After we had walked around for a while i finally got used to the idea of everything being real, but i still can’t figure it out. It feels like it should be some tiny historical town tucked into Massachusetts because i always forget that Philadelphia is the exception to the rule of Pennsylvania and not the other way around. Everything in New Hope was vivid… all the local teenagers we saw working in the shops were like caricatures of people i know… three times as many piercings or hair twice as outrageous or poise that’s so much more postured. I realize that somehow it’s their reaction to living in a sort of suspended time where all of the shops and streets stay the same and people from outside come in to gawk, but at the same time it felt like i was looking at a catalogue of teenaged stereotypes trying to find the ones that matched my own friends.


Of course, those are all just snippets… glimpses into my surreal afternoon, because i should have bought a notebook instead of the two cds i bought. Live and learn.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/11/6883375/