Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

blogathon

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Kate works in an office where she occasionally has a few minutes to burn between projects, and ever since the blogathon she’s been filling all of those moments with a big heaping serving of Krisis. Seeing as i live with Kate and hang out with her on a day-to-day basis, she is definitely the regular reader most entangled in the actual living i’m doing short of Elise. After skimming for entries about her and then reading some random highlights, today she apparently resolved to read me all the way through, from day one on. I warned her that day one was about as long as June 2002, and she replied with a knowing smirk.

I’ve followed Kate’s lead and delved into some CK written from the old apartment, and it’s downright odd. I don’t remember writing like i did then – in constant fits and starts, or even thinking like that. Now every single post either sends me into a fit of laughter or a state of quiet contemplation, and sometimes both consecutively. And, though i’m sure it’s very amusing and thought-provoking on its own (heh), the highlights for me definitely connect to having been there when they were written… remembering how many times i fell to the ground in a fit of hysterical laughter on this night of drinking with Aim, laughing out loud at the nearly psychic advice doled out in this post, and remembering to read the commented out dream in this one, which i easily recollected almost blow for blow.


As much as i love making other people think, or laugh, or sing along, i think the best part of this is often just looking back and seeing exactly what i was like on a certain day nearly two years ago. It’s truly worth the effort.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/08/85376788/

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Listening to 25/24 on loop for the last two days whenever i’ve been in my apartment, and real music at work today seems positively surreal. You mean, there are cds that exist that i wasn’t on CntrlRm-Out headphones for? Totally a shock.

My life is totally a shock sometimes. I raised just shy of $300 for Planned Parenthood, and i’ll probably write a check for the difference; i figure this probably breaks me even for all of the training i got from them for free when i was a Peer Counselor in High School. Leaving the ‘thon page up seems halfways like bronzing a baby’s shoe and half stuffing a dead pet. Did that just make any sense at all? In a way i feel as though it’s memorializing the first step in what will (hopefully) be years of high quality recordings from me, but in another way i feel like i should be getting back to normal.


It doesn’t feel normal right now, i don’t feel normal. To go from a week of all anticipation to a week all of denouement is jarring, and i just feel like i’m standing in a shadow. I had an honest to goodness panic attack last night, which isn’t exactly a common occurrence around these parts, and to this point i’m not sure why. Lindsay has become fairly convinced by this point that i really was locked in my room in a gibbering mess rather than fooling around with my girlfriend, but i feel like everyone else is looking at me strangely sideways. Not that i went around advertising it, you know, billboard: “Total headcase here, please pull around.” But, i like to be able to talk about things once i’ve got them on my chest, lest i suffocate.

I’m not sure how long this layout will remain or what will follow it. I think it’s simple and pretty and white, and i don’t mind that being my virtual impression right now. But, until i figure out what will be happening after it’s gone i definitely feel like a guest on my own blog.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/07/85296632/

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I don’t know when i stopped just writing songs as a hobby and started occasionally referring to myself as a singer-songwriter. How can i really draw a line there? How does someone go from doodling to being an artist? I doodled for a long time, writing good songs that never left my own bedroom – akin to sketches in the margins of a notebook. Now i take myself seriously, constantly revising and re-recording each song until i feel as though it has reached its end point – and even then occasionally pulling it off the shelf to be aired.

I cannot pinpoint the day that i began to take myself serious enough to say so out loud, but i can promise you it had to do with my next song. Earlier this evening i told someone via IM that practicing songs was like sanding down a chunk of wood until it becomes a perfectly smooth sphere, and that i only had one or two songs out of over a hundred that had reached that point. This song, if no other, has gone there… to the point where i can get lost in the nuances of one silly little riff and then forget the lyrics entirely. I have played it so many times, in so many different ways, that it’s as if i have come back around to it being new again and i am now discovering it for the first time.


It takes a big song to fill that void, and it didn’t start out big. It still isn’t, actually: just three chords, three verses, and what was once just some fortuitous ad-libbing. When i sing it, i feel famous. It makes me sweat because i move to it underneath my guitar as my fingers dance back and forth across the riffs i have unearthed, there shape and arrangement changing on every beat. It makes me frustrated when it will not sound out correctly, and it makes me glow when i change something about it only to make it more interesting to perform.


It’s late, and a lot of bloggers are getting a little weepy, but this is how i always feel about song 25/24. Earlier tonight i tried my best to open up a new side of it for you to see, and i encourage you to click through to older audio of it through its lyrics file so that you can hear the differences i am talking about. I’m under no illusion that, as a result, you will take me any more seriously as a musician. But, maybe you’ll just be able to understand how i can feel like this about something so simple that anyone who has performed on it has irrevocably altered.


Thank you for reading, thank you for listening, and goodnight.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/07/85290647/

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There are so many thank you‘s to give out this year, and don’t have a lot of time to get them all straight before my final post is due. I, we, obviously owe a great deal of thanx to Cat Connor and the rest of the official Blogathon team for getting us to and through this point with hardly any significant technical difficulties – not to mention an excess of enthusiasm and cheer. Cat went above and beyond her call of duty by sponsoring me back when it looked as though i might not even make the ‘thon cutoff, and for that i am very grateful. Which naturally leads us to my sponsors: Cat, Rabi, Tony, Courtney, Dave, Tom, Alayna-Renee, Maggie, Amy, and my roommate Kate. In my mind sponsoring someone for blogathon not only includes a donation to a sympathetic charity but also a vote of confidence that the sponsoree will work to the best of their ability for an entire 24hours to create new and worthwhile content. Knowing that the eyes of my sponsors were on me i couldn’t help but want to do my very utmost to show that i’m serious about this event.


I can hardly forget the people who kept me awake, especially Lynne & Benjy, who definitely spent a lot more time talking to me than anyone should ever have to. Next, there are the people who physically showed up to put in time on this project. Lindsay – who is one of the most talented people i have ever known (and a hilarious co-worker); Kate – who brought me humor, granola bars, and support … all unconditionally; Elise – who really shouldn’t have even put up with my sleepless wackiness as much as she did (and whom i will commence cuddling with very shortly); Gina – who continues to inspire and amaze me with every note she exudes; Jack – whose humor and grace at being rescheduled paid off in finally recording one of my all-time favorite songs; Karen and her bemused patience at my insanity over the entire event; and Dante – who didn’t even get to play on all the songs he could have added his talents to.


My final thank you is simple: thank you for listening. It doesn’t really feel like it, but i’ve been playing my heart out now for more than just a couple of years, and today i think my music might have traveled farther than ever before. Thank you for humoring me, and for being patient with me, and for spending your time and bandwidth on me; it means more than i can sing, strum, or even plainly say.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/07/85290612/