#NYR, the 80s, the 90s, going to shows (punk, ska-punk), cycling/modifying my track bike, getting tattoos, spending time with genuine people, making jewelry, watching frasier, visiting filming locations, rad nail art, graffiti (as an observer), dying my hair unnatural colours, ice cold coors light (bottles, plz), graphic design, eargesting music, warm coffee/iced lattes, #NYM, netflix (binging in general), punk stuff, horror, autumn, winter, making t-shirts, watching twin peaks, vinyl toys, bargain shopping, architecture, traveling, making memories, reading, replacing nostalgic relics, philanthropy (whenever possible), wordpress development and coding in general (PHP, XHTML, CSS, SCSS, jQuery)
i hope next year is good to me. it’s been a ROUGH four years. between losing my job, being (mildly) mistreated by my s/o during that time, gaining a job a full year later, my mother moving away, losing family members to death, losing a friend to pride, gaining a friend back, getting finances back on track, oscar being sick, being single all over again, etc. – the ups and downs are killing me.
i just REALLY need some ups.
i tweeted recently that i can’t remember a time i was genuinely happy – esp for a longer period of time. like, not stressed on ANY level, all at one time. love, finances, living situation, family, friends, work, health, etc. – they never line up. i’m sure they don’t for most people… but even if i could just have like half a year in adulthood without any stress, that’d be great.
i just… i feel really lost right now.
i want stability, love, fun – good things. i hope they find me easily in 2023.
don’t be shocked if you find yourself deep in your feelings today, virgo. the moon is hunkered down in your 4th house of home and emotions, so you might be inclined to keep things low-key rather than go all out. the moon will sync up with mars in your private 8th house, so you could find yourself dealing with some rather intense matters. if a family member or roommate treats you rudely, on purpose or not, you may not be able to react lightly.
i have not been in the right mindset for days. i can’t stop crying… and i never cry. i am so fucking overwhelmed, and on so many fronts. please moon, spare me.
okay, i am going through a smol crisis. i have hit the age where i’m like “am i too old to own sanrio stuff?”, lol. i’ve been questioning most of my overly colorful/juvenile and horror themed choice of decor.
first off, i can’t believe i’m 40… it’s disgusting, but like… i’m going to be 50 in 10 years. am i just cringe at this point? do people think i’m a weirdo? i’ve always been so confident in the things i enjoy and how i look, but recently i’ve been feeling like maybe it’s all childish and weird? i fucking hate it and i don’t know why i’m letting it get to me so much.
looking around my room makes me happy. there’s fun, colorful stuff everywhere. from my furniture to hanging art, there’s also a mix of a bunch of toys and lots of kitschy and/or plastic stuff… maybe i should just leave it at that, it makes me happy.
everything is really cute, but i didn’t impulse shop. i have so many baggu bags to begin with – i really don’t need anymore… but if the print is cute enough, i’ll snag it. i was eyeballing the HK lunch bag, but then i realized that my food containers wouldn’t even fit or sit in it properly. i ended up only purchasing the standard size little twin stars bag. first off, little twin stars is one of my faves, but i loved the colorway the most out of the other items.
after looking through the entire line, i realized i disliked the colors of everything, for myself. i think the orange background on the hello kitty items is really cute, but i personally don’t gravitate to orange stuff. i don’t own many items of clothing that are orange. funny enough, one of my favorite everyday use items that IS orange is a baggu fanny pack…? lol :shrug:
the keroppi bag is this gross yellow… i would just never use it. the socks are cute but i wouldn’t wear them. i don’t need another laptop sleeve, so that only left two purse-type bags. one was a salmon-y pink with a pattern of HK’s head and the other was a pea green keroppi bag. the pea green purse was a better color choice than the other yellow that’s on the standard bag, but that shit kicked in where i was like “okay, am i going to look like a cringe 40 year old using this?”
also: i rarely use bags since pandemic happened, if we’re being honest. i use fanny packs, this smol ikea bag (this is one of the handiest things i’ve ever purchased, lol. this is especially amazing for concerts or sports arenas. you can skip the bag line and carry next to nothing!) or i just shove my wallet cards into my pocket.
listen, even though i decided not to purchase a bunch of items from this line, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t! the items are absolutely adorbs, soooooo go check it out!
when i finally moved out of my mom’s house, i moved to midwood, bk. this was back in 2009. it only lasted six months because of my idiot roommate. he decided to just up and leave our place without:
a) putting me on the lease
b) giving me the landlord’s info
c) telling me he was leaving
…i figured once i was on the apartment hunt again, i’d branch out and move someplace different bc i had just survived living in a faraway place. looking back, i don’t think i’d ever do that again – it was a million miles away from my roots (or at least 3 inconvenient mta transfers)… i’m glad i had two friends down there back then, or else i would have been in a worse mental state (oh, being in your 20s). anyways, at that time, i was looking at apartments in brooklyn heights bc i was working in dumbo, i looked up places in the bronx bc why tf not (and there were so many pre-war apt buildings that were cheap and had sunken living rooms – LE SWOON), but i ended up with an apartment plopped right into my lap via missy… in ridgewood, queens.
who knows wtf my life could have been had i moved to either of the other two spots i was eyeballing, but i’m glad it didn’t go that way. my job in dumbo relocated not even a year later and the bronx? who did i think i was? lol.
* * *
it was at a time where you could still get illegal basement spots for under $1000. it was a studio apt, but that’s honestly all i needed at the time. it was just me and oscy. i wanted to get out of the bayside area, i wanted to get away from my family and “friends” and my past life. i wanted a fresh start and an easier commute to my job. ridgewood ended up working out just fine and i thrived creatively in my little basement cave once i got into a friend routine with jes and lauren. i was paying $700 for my little studio and i couldn’t have been happier. i had laundry in the basement, the train was like 4 blocks away, it took 15/20 mins to get into manhattan, lauren and i were always in williamsburg, sophie and i were always in the village… the best times.
* * *
from time to time, i check online to see what the rents are and what apartment availability looks like now, and what a shit show. i just put in $2200 with two caveats: pets allowed and in-unit washer/dryer and THREE apartments came up in queens, lol. as a single woman, if i ventured out on my own at this age, if you think i’m doing anything less than a 1BR, you are out of your mind. why tf are there no apartments available with these two needs for less than $2k a month?! wtf is going on with this idiotic city???????? i can’t.
i took off the cat filter and three more apartments popped up, all in jamaica, queens. if you think i am contributing to gentrification in jamaica, you are also out of your mind. there are a few places as a white person i REFUSE to live for that reason, and jamaica is one of them. i will not partake in this city falling apart, but i digress.
this is like an ongoing, daily struggle with my brain. do i stay in nyc and buy something? do i leave and go west to more relaxing surroundings? i feel so lost. i don’t want the same things as my current partner, and i have to move on. i feel like i don’t know how to be happy. i find life so overwhelming and just want something or someone to ground me, so i can stop feeling like i’m a lost puppy during my mid-life years.
* * *
on a less serious note, i feel stuck for a number of reasons. i know it’s such a stupid thing, but the feral cat we care for in the backyard loves me. i would feel like i’m abandoning her, i’d also be annoyed i’d be losing the cross island for cycling, i love walking around over here – especially when the trees are fully bloomed with green leaves – it’s so damn pretty.
the bad def outweighs the good, but i can’t just up and leave at the moment… so i’m just stuck.
THE BREADMAN DID IT BABY… ONTO ROUND 2 and the canes!!! listen to that garden… i wish i was there.
i can’t believe we came back from a 3-1 series deficit, but we did it… again.
The New York Rangers are the first team in Stanley Cup Playoff history to record three consecutive comeback wins in elimination games within the same series pic.twitter.com/a9MOd1Bkcj
BISSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH they had better play NYC or i am going to be so mad. the academy is… is on my damn near impossible to see list on my life goals page, man!
* * *
(this post title and intro featuring lyrics from the video below ♥)
yesterday, my cousin sent us old movies from the 50s-80s from his parents’ house. it was the first time i’ve ever seen my maternal grandmother in motion. my grandfather, too, but i don’t really care so much about him. he was a terrible human to my aunts and uncle, i’ll leave it at that. seeing my grandma and all of my aunts in their youth… it killed me. my aunts were gorgeous! ♥ i was weeping. i miss my family so much.
once they started edging into the later 1980s, i was watching my aunts and their daughters, who are about 13-15 years older than me. i don’t know exactly how old they were at the time, but my gosh are our lives different. my cousin’s daughter was just a few months old in the one video i was watching, now she’s married with her own kid… and here i sit at age 40 with three shades of unnatural hair dye on my head, lol.
it’s just so odd how different generations are. my mother and her sisters weren’t preoccupied with the same bullshit as i am/was at her ages. sure, my mom was still dating into her 40s – an outcast among her sisters who were mainly married… but mom was younger, from NYC and hipper than the rest of her siblings. she was a rocker, an independent queens chick. i guess it rubbed off on me, as now that’s me… i would like to think that i’m not going to turn into my mother, though. she’s become a paranoid android, but i digress.
the reason i thought to post this was bc i have been under so much stress in the last few years. between moving back to bayside, where i never wanted to be again, losing my job, being in a relationship that’s faulty, getting older, the pandemic, health issues, strenuous friendships/relationships with friends and family, etc. – and i’ve gotten myself in such a weird rut. like, are these common 40 year old probs or just “jess can’t grow up” probs?
like i said, watching those movies – what were my family’s issues back then? i highly doubt it was any of the bullshit running through my brain. i just found out last year that my cousin’s husband is an alcoholic and always has been. they were dating when i was a toddler and he’s in most of my earliest memories. i had no idea… like, good for the adults for keeping issues under wraps for us kiddos, but i wonder what else was going on that i don’t know about, and how it compares to my current bullshit.
i keep sitting here just like “why at 40 am i CHOOSING to deal with the bullshit i am dealing with?”. i am better than this and i shouldn’t be dealing with any dumb ass issues that i was socially dealing with in my late 20s/early 30s. i don’t like how i’m currently feeling and i need to change it all.
every april i’m so annoyed… first off, i hate april. the weather is so annoying – first it’s hot, then it’s cold, then it’s raining, then it’s dreary, the wind won’t die out… like, bitch settle down.
i love seeing all of the trees blossom, though. i hate naked tree branches with a passion – unless they’re covered in gloriously gorgeous snow/ice.
the reason i thought to post about this absolutely pointless and unsolicited opinion, is bc we are almost halfway through the year! this means i just have to get through the stupid gross summer bullshit and i’m nearing my yearly pilgrimage to seattle! 🙂 🙂 🙂
all i want is cool, crisp weather, hockey and strolling around my other favorite city. sure, i could just go for a weekend whenever i want, but i’m lazy and don’t want to go alone. i can’t even seem to solidify getting my friends to go to a local sports game with me lately, nevermind a trip across the country… i also can’t fathom how i don’t have ANY friends in seattle. i have friends all over the damn US!
most of my friends are younger than me, and the ones without kids – why are they not readily available to hang out on weeknights? i don’t understand it. at their ages, i was always down to hang out – hell, even at 40 i’m not so picky that i’m like “I DUNNO GUYS, WEDNESDAYS (and/or any other weeknight) REALLY DON’T WORK FOR ME”… like, we’re not 50 yet, can we please utilize the energy and free time we have now, it only gets worse from here… le sigh.
as if today hasn’t been difficult enough to deal with mentally, due to a very jealousy inducing and muting of an account inducing instagram post in my fucking feed (bc i feel like a totally inadequate piece of shit comparing myself to someone else)… i was just swapping out my 17 year old dresser knobs at 1 AM (bc that’s what normal people do) AND THE FUCKING LAST SCREW GOT STRIPPED AND BROKE OFF AT THE VERY BASE OF THE KNOB.
well, fuck that,
fuck you,
fuck your convenient hookup,
fuck this fucking knob,
fuck that stripped screw,
and most importantly, fuck myself for being so fucking irritated about that post from earlier today.
i am so mad at myself for every ounce of energy of bad energy i have let myself feel today.
i also just got reminded that it’s stupid valentine’s day, not that i give a shit about it regularly, but all i ever want to do on this godforsaken hallmark holiday is go to a ranger game. instead of it being today, there’s a game on TOMORROW. there hasn’t been hockey all week… i just want to check out mentally into sports and i can’t even do that.
i am tempted to gather myself and go to oscar wilde alone and drown myself in fancy/expensive drinks in a corner crying. at least the surroundings would be pretty as i wallow in my own bullshit.
i have so much shit to do this year… big stuff. i always make a bunch of “stress clouds” (write out the probs, cut them out into shapes of clouds) and i put them in a little cluster on one of my walls for perspective. i like to easily see the things i need to do, and tackle them one at a time. i take them down and tear them up into tiny little pieces. it feels great.
one of the biggest things this year is that i have a few health things that i need to sort out – i reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeally want to have my fallopian tubes removed fully, but my healthcare doesn’t cover it. they DO however cover cutting the tubes (i don’t want them tied, i want them separated fully). so i have to call my insurance and see what the deal is with that.
i think dealing with this whole pinched nerve in my neck/spine thing really pushed me directly into “make doctors appointments and go to the appointments”. don’t think – just do. that’s usually my motto for most things i need to do in life, but this pandemic really isn’t helping matters for me in that dept. my focus for most things has been completely OFF for the last two years… esp my health.
one of my procrastination projects is lasering off my freaking armpit hair. i have such a pet peeve for shaving my armpits. i have to do it every other day, and i’m prone to ingrown hairs, so it’s just itchy/painful and so annoying on a regular basis.
i clearly can’t get into the super big shit here, but i really can’t wait to see where my life is at the end of the year. i haven’t felt like myself in a very long time for a number of reasons. looking back, i felt really more comfortable with myself in certain eras – or did i? i feel like sometimes we just romanticize times in our lives. i don’t want to keep doing that, but i also want life to feel like that NOW… not when looking back.
i feel like i don’t belong in nyc anymore. i don’t know what’s here for me. am i waiting for cliche happiness to find me here? how come great things never find me? i’m sick of looking.
i have set a goal for myself for queens/nyc one last time for the next couple of years. if i can’t accomplish those things, i want to hightail it out of here. there has to be more than dodging the past like an obstacle course in bayside, not looking at places my family used to live that have died (it’s so fucking depressing), seeing favorite places that have closed, not being able to see people like i used to, watching my neighborhood change into copy+pasted, ugly orange brick, marble detailed houses nobody asked for, everything being so fucking expensive for no reason (rent, especially), living paycheck to paycheck bc i’m sending money to my 401k and savings just to make sure i can survive later in life, reliving past lives being in certain places…
it’s just all so fucking overwhelming. i need peace, calm vibes, trees, cool weather. i need to look out of my apartment windows and see the leaves of trees – just GREEN lighting up my place. i want nature and a skyline at the same damn time… i can’t have that here.
oh wait, i probably could in my dream areas of manhattan, but i can’t fucking afford it.
* * *
my one beautiful escape here in this adolescent hell hole, is riding my bike. i can’t do that with this windy ass winter, fucked up spine/neck discs and pinched nerve, AND my favorite issue (/s): two dudes i used to date/fuck are always on my route. one i want to avoid like the plague, and he’s always at this one park in the early AM w his big scary pit bull (before kids are around) and the other one is a guy that i will probably never fully get over (not in a psychotic way, just a “bad timing/one that got away” way – i never really think of him/that situation until i see him). every time i see him, he always calls me over, we shoot the shit and i am brought right back to that time it just pisses me off.
this is precisely why i never wanted to live over here again in my life. i wanted to file all of this place under the “K BAIIIIIII” file in the back of my brain, yet here i am, like a big moron. i have noooooooo idea why i agreed to live over here. was i that enamored by a fucking park with a lake? was it bc i was closer to my mom? i guess i didn’t realize how long i’d be here… four years later, i’m ready to tap out.
at any rate, i have the clouds in front of me. there are like 10 of them… here we gooooooooooooo!
sooooooooo, i had my MRI done and apparently my C5-C6 discs in my fuckin neck/spine have bulging and herniated discs, alongside my shitty little bone spur.
of course my orthopedist is out all of this week, so i can’t find out what i need to do for this shit until next monday… so again, i sit here for another damn week in annoyingly, tingly bullshitland. this straight almost month of tingly fingers/hand and forearm is enough to drive one to drink (meanwhile, i’ve been on prednisone, so i haven’t had any drinks… but i did pop an edible last night, which helped).
the prednisone helped my shoulder a bit but didn’t do jackshit for my arm/hand or fingers, so i don’t know if that’s related to the shit with the bone spur or if it’s just a pinched median nerve on top of this bullshit… he had mentioned a surgery, which i think is a laminectomy (which i am DREADING).
: exhale :
so yeah, the first half of january is sucking ass so far. at least i have a lot of good shit lined up for the second half.
we’re in a pandemic and everyone is stressed tf out, so i know now isn’t the time to worry about feeling like others don’t give enough of a shit about me, but i’ve had a TIRED ass decade that has gone by. i’m emotionally tired, and while i am an annoyingly, stubbornly, independent survivalist by nature because of my upbringing, i really just want to be cared for. i don’t want to have to worry about distrust, ulterior motives, drama, shady shit, i just want to fucking be respected, happy, loved and cared for. in a relationship, in my friendships and even with my family.
i constantly just blame this shit on myself and i have been such a hard ass for so long, that i don’t even know where to begin. all i know is that i just need to exhale for a while. i want to be able to just open up and depend on others, instead of me constantly making sure i’m a priority and that things are organized for our relationships to be present.
i know i’m not perfect. i’m a cranky, judgemental shithead sometimes… but i’ve been trying really hard to be overwhelmingly thoughtful, giving and patient to others for a long time. i try to make people feel thought of and special. i try to create these special moments, places, experiences for others and i want that. i do those things so that other people know how i feel about them. i take the time to think of others and i just want to feel like that – appreciated, not miserable, boring or not like a priority to people.
i honestly don’t have high expectations of others, and i don’t do things expecting any type of reciprocation, but it would be nice for a change. if we’re special and important to each other, i need to know that. everyone – not just me – deserves to know that they’re important, loved, thought of, cared for.
i’m truly just trying to take down this wall i built up years ago.
sooooooooo, super fun shit… i have a bone spur in my cervical spine area and it’s pinching a nerve, which is making my forearm and fingers tingly. i have to have an MRI done and take ‘roids this week, and depending on how the steroids go, i might have to look into surgery.
WOO, 2022 is off to a great start!
i have two things to do this month socially and i REALLY am hoping i don’t come across this shite covid variant along the way. i have lundqvist’s retirement ceremony and then i’m going to the rangers/kraken game a couple of days later. i’m still very picky and choosy about what i’m doing socially, and the only things i reeeeeeally bend for are hockey and concerts (aside from the like, four friends i occasionally see within either my home or theirs, and they’re just as cautious as i am).
i was feeling “safer” at shows especially bc you have to have proof of vaccination, and i’d like to think a lot of my like-minded punk community wouldn’t be gross and use fakes (i tested both times after shows where i was in a pit). now, i don’t know anymore. i wish more places would require an actual app and both doses and/or a negative test or booster requirement. isn’t that how we’re going to beat it? fuck those one dose folks for now…
kristen and i have tickets to see cursive/thursday this month but i feel like it might get cancelled. we also have glassjaw in march, which i also think might get pushed.
this is so fucking depressing… but i mean, if i have a busted neck, wtf does it matter anyway?
this is definitely getting worked into a future tattoo, lol.
this has been me all month.
i just finished watching seinfeld straight through. i watched it as a youth, but watching it straight through was great. i know i’ve said this before, but i honestly have no idea how i ever watched tv on a weekly basis. it’s probably the only millennial thing i’m truly guilty of. my focus bc of streaming all of these years has ruined me in that way.
anyway, this scene really hit home. i RARELY cry – especially about anything recent. when i actually cry, it’s bc of something related to the idea of my cat dying, the song that plays in the scene in “dumbo” when the mom is cradling him through her prison bars, the part in “follow that bird” when big bird was blue, that part in “the land before time” when littlefoot is chasing his own shadow thinking it’s his mother or my untouchable past.
for some odd reason this month has been hitting me hard. the last few years haven’t been easy on my mental health, especially the last two years dealing with this fucking pandemic, but for some odd reason i think clarity is finally hitting me at age forty.
i know i still have a lot of life left (going by age expectancy, anyway), but a decade fucking FLIES and turning fifty at the stage i’m at in life, scares me. i realize no one has to follow that societal bullshit of growing up, getting married and having kids… but it’s also hard on my generation that constantly gets shit on by the idiots in the generation before us that DID live that way… i don’t want kids, i just want to own a fucking apartment!
in addition to that struggle, i don’t know if i still want to live in NYC anymore. my family isn’t here anymore, the city is lacking every haunt i ever loved, it’s so expensive…
i also realized that i need to learn how to have emotions again, bc i think i lost track of them so badly that i don’t even care if i’m cared about or loved by anyone anymore. that goes for both my relationships, friends and family. i just feel so fucking lost. i know i have people that care about me – i don’t mean that i don’t, but i am missing something(s). i don’t know what it is, but i have to change it.
i sometimes think about my exes who have moved on (mainly when they post on instagram) and i feel good knowing leaving them was for a fated reason. some are married with families now – vs. being with my miserable ass… i just don’t know where i lost sight of wanting a future alongside another person. not 10 years ago, i was starting a dumb ass pinterest board thinking i was going to be eventually engaged to an italian kid i was dating. i didn’t realize it, but i think i just gave up.
i sometimes think about why things always go so wrong that i am never the one desired in that solid relationship way, and then i’m conflicted bc i don’t even know if i want it.
i think the most confusing part about feeling that way, is that i don’t even have low self-esteem. i have enough confidence and self-esteem that i don’t care to a fault. how sick and dumb is that? it’s a vicious, confusing cycle. i really need therapy, lol.
i was recently having a talk with my friend about how we don’t know how to love properly bc we weren’t raised that way – we were raised to survive vs. being loved (in a very non-dramatic way). i don’t know how to fix that… either way, i should do it before i’m 50 and miserable, like my mother before me.
oh dear satan, this is torture. dan, how could you make me so divisive against myself?! this is so fucking tough because both of those albums were two of the first albums that i ever purchased on my own, while i was coming of age into my own music. both of those albums are tied to so many memories and feelings.
it’s kind of tough to choose also because they are two very different albums and styles of music. when weezer came out, i remember the nerd-core looking initial emos started w the grandpa/dad sweaters, buddy holly framed glasses and airwalks and shit – they weren’t really dressing the same as the green day folks, who then turned into your typical/probably rancid, souls and nofx fans. of course a lot of us listened to both, but i feel like especially in school at the time, you were either one or the other.
i went with the blue album.
i fucking love dookie… but for me, the blue album is a weird, dark, emotional and magical trip. when i hear the intro cords to “only in dreams”, my heart swells up like the grinch’s. that album just feels like a comfortable hug with a blanket or something (i sound like such a weirdo, lol).
i recently realized that i hadn’t listened to dookie fully in a really long time, so i threw it on while i was taking a shower one night and was just like “wow, this is still just so good”. i realize that’s not a very elaborative review, lol. i mean, of course the two MAIN hits are good (#4 and #7), but the rest of that album is really just so fucking good. they were/are so talented and while of course that album is adored, i still find the other tracks underrated. i feel like since green day became GREEN DAY 2.0, normal people only listen to 4 and 7 and MAYBE “when i come around”, but the entire thing front to back is just perfect and seamless popular “punk”.
i especially love “she”, and “coming clean” is my favorite song on dookie, if anyone gives a flying fuck.
there aren’t many albums that i recall listening to for the first time, but the blue album is one of them. i still have the receipt for the cassette and own it in four different formats! it just made me feel a way. ♥
anyways, you can vote if you’d like to… there are 15 hours left on this poll:
i am not happy about it, and i’ve been trying to figure out why it freaks me out so badly. as mentioned in my last post, an aunt of mine died this summer and my uncle passed away last week – my mother’s only brother. mortality just keeps testing me…
my mother is most likely less than 20-30 years away from no longer existing. she’s plagued with rheumatoid arthritis and was a smoker for YEARS (not to mention would sit inside with my family full of smokers and she went out to places when you could still smoke indoors for decades).
i know that is so fucking morbid to think about, but it’s so much more obvious as i’m getting older, and i fucking hate it. it’s hard enough getting through this shit pandemic, but losing family members after not being able to see them, while facing aging is just… a lot. especially 6 days before my birthday.
i feel like i’m being melodramatic about age 40, but i feel like the older we get, the faster time flies. no one in my family makes it out of their 80s. how fucked is that? i’m now halfway there, over a tiny hill.
i imagined turning 30 to feel like this, but it didn’t. i loved my 30s! i was so scared to hit my 30s, but they were good to me. this bullshit didn’t hit me until this ungodly number.
i’m feeling very confused and midlife crisis-y and i can’t wait to go on vacation next month. i need an escape from reality for a bit.
my uncle bob died this morning (not of covid – i feel like it’s just the default thing you need to point out nowadays). he’s the only uncle i’ve ever known – the other one died as a child in an accident. my mother had two brothers and six sisters.
growing up, i had my queens aunts and two upstate aunts/uncle. whenever school was out, we were usually upstate – summer vacation, winter break, spring break, etc. – fishkill, beacon, wappingers and poughkeepsie were my home away from home. we mainly stayed with my aunts, but we’d pop over to my uncle’s for swimming, since he had a big pool.
in the early 80s, he spent more time coming downstate to see us, but towards the late 80s, it kind of dwindled. not sure why, as he didn’t have grand children really until i was in JHS, but whatever. it didn’t make a difference, we saw him enough while we were upstate.
i know people don’t believe me when i say that i remember things from when i was like 2 years old, but i do. i actually remember my 2nd birthday party in my mom’s small apartment in flushing. i remember uncle bobby was coming down for the party – she kept telling me that or it was brought up multiple times during the day in conversation. i specifically remember getting a cabbage patch kids baby carrier as a gift at that party. i can remember broken visuals from the party, too. it’s just my first memory of uncle bobby.
although i wasn’t as close to him as i was to most of my aunts, he was still a person that you just picked up where you left off. he was always trying to get you on a good path, always checked in about how you were doing in school, talked about your future, always gave wise advice. he was funny, sweet, a dedicated family man who didn’t deserve to die with the ailments he obtained towards the end. the damn universe handed him a plate of health shit.
at the end of the day, uncle probably contributed to some of his health isues from smoking for years… if you’re a smoker, please try to stop. my uncle had pulmonary fibrosis, among other issues. no one should go out like that.
i can’t believe both he and my aunt judy both died this year. it’s just so overwhelming thinking about the fact that i only have two aunts left and that my mother is only 1 of 3 siblings left. time is going too fast and my family is dropping like flies… i hate it. it also doesn’t help that it happened during this never ending pandemic. like, i’m so burnt out – i don’t want to deal with anymore death.
while i truly appreciate the bravery of women coming forward and writing articles/tweet threads about their abortions, i find that a lot of the time, the stories are about how their lives were saved because of their abortion(s), and that being why abortion should be legal. the undertone of justification makes me cringe. i know that’s not the intent – i know, i know, i know. i just hate that is the vibe i pick up on a lot of the time when reading these things.
abortion should just be legal.
not just for medical reasons, even if it doesn’t agree with your beliefs system. it’s no one’s business but the woman’s own.
***
it’s so hard to talk about your abortion(s) without having to feel judged, so having done that publicly, i give them a lot of credit. it’s got to be scary – maybe close to the same feeling i got when i was coming out as bi to my mother (LAST YEAR, AT AGE 38, FFS!). it’s like you keep trying to open your mouth, and words just don’t come out because of shame or judgement.
“you don’t have to tell everyone EVERYTHING.” – my uncle, when i told him i came out to my mother. he then followed it up with “what if you had an unhealthy/frail grandmother and you told her that, gave her a heart attack and killed her? then would you be happy just because you had to get that off your chest?”
i instantly replied with “responses like that is why people stay closeted, and in some cases kill themselves.”
this is also why i don’t discuss many seriously personal things online, especially of the abortion nature, and that’s annoys me. i want to be supportive of other women without having to be judged, but i’m skirting my own personal experience.
listen, i’m not anyone that can make a difference here – i’m not a celebrity, i’m not journalist, etc. i’m a blip in this stupid internet universe, and i’m just a dingleberry that talks to who knows who here, in hopes that someone can relate to the same things i do and not feel alone in the actual universe. i’m not going to overshare my own life, but i’ll leave it at this:
you probably know someone who has had an abortion. you probably LOVE someone that’s had an abortion. it doesn’t change ANYTHING.
people that have had abortions aren’t evil or bad people. their reasons are their reasons.
if you’re religious – be religious for yourself, not for others. your beliefs don’t belong on anyone else.
***
at the end of the day, the circumstances surrounding ANY abortion shouldn’t matter. any reason should be valid, and abortion shouldn’t be illegal.
we women don’t need ANYONE – especially the government, politicians and judges telling us whether or not abortion is justified, allowed or looked down upon.
[via WebMD] Summertime SAD.You’ve probably heard about seasonal affective disorder, or SAD, which affects about 4% to 6% of the U.S. population. SAD typically causes depression as the days get shorter and colder. But about 10% of people with SAD get it in the reverse — the onset of summer triggers their depression symptoms. Cook notes that some studies have shown that in countries near the equator – such as India – summer SAD is more common than winter SAD. Why do seasonal changes cause depression? Experts aren’t sure, but the longer days, and increasing heat and humidity may play a role. Specific symptoms of summer depression often include loss of appetite, trouble sleeping, weight loss, and anxiety.
OF COURSE I AM IN THE 10% OF PEOPLE. if you ask me an popular opinion question, i’m usually the 1%, so of course my body would have a 10% opposite reaction to what the rest of the world feels when it comes time to freakin seasonal depression, lol.
i hate this shit.
i hate day time, natural light and sunlight (unless it’s browning my skin).
i hate oppressive humidity and heat.
i want more night time than day time.
i want autumn and winter, stat.
i want to have my new, old northface on (i replaced my old, deadstock one – SCORE!).
i want to wear my hockey hats.
i want to wear BOOTS.
i want to see the leaves changing and snow falling.
i want snow so deep that no one can drive and i can walk on quiet, busy streets w/o being bothered at 2AM.
anyways, i’m starting to get SUPER antsy bc it’s still humid, it won’t stop raining and it’s so hot every day. i want summer to be over. i want to ride my bike and go for walks without feeling like i’m panting after a block. i want to wear my hair down… i would like to cut in my bangs. i want to wear hoodies and pants!
i have actually been sleeping like shit lately, but i didn’t think it was potentially bc of seasonal depression. my bed is against one wall and it’s driving me nuts, but my room is too thin to really turn it the other way. if i do, then i have to do this ridiculous shuffle every time i want to get to the other side of the long room. i don’t know what’s more important, good sleep or not sideways shuffling. i flipped the mattress, but it didn’t do a damn thing. i started sleeping with my head at where my feet should be, and that helped?
i have too much shit on my mind. i need a big fat change and something BIG to look forward to.
…well, in 59 days, i will be in seattle. that’s a start.
have you ever felt a surge of creativity but don’t know where tf to put it?
that’s been me all week.
i have 6 inches of virgin hair i’m trying to grow out for color correction and i’m dying to bleach my entire head and dye it all greens vs my usual split, but i’ll never be able to match up my bum ass hair to my virgin hair. i don’t have the patience to do it all myself.
i have been putting off building or buying a new lightbox for my jewelry, but i have new stuff that i made.
i’ve needed to do my nails for like two weeks, but i keep finding things are getting in the way. working out, hair wash day, going out, watching sports, making jewelry…
i’ve been meaning to make some new wallpapers, and i’ve only churned out like 10 in the last month.
i’ve been looking through my computer at old websites/graphic design and it makes me miss building out those types of layouts/making that type of art. i barely even collage anymore…
i’ve been meaning to start acrylic pouring, and i just don’t, bc do i need ANOTHER hobby?
i’ve also been meaning to hang out/meet up with like 15 of my peoples, and between the stress of oscar’s health and the most disgusting soup bowl summer weather, i’ve been a hermit.
i mean, i don’t really feel like being around most people bc of this damn pandemic not being over. i don’t care if i’m vaccinated, who knows who is bringing this damn delta variant around. i keep having people i know that are traveling… and no offense, but i don’t have an interest with co-mingling with anyone who has gone to florida in the last 6 months [barf].
i really wish public places, venues and arenas kept up with the whole segregating unvaccinated folks. make a universal vaccine app for proof already… when i went to a ranger game this year, they scanned in my excelsior pass and i strolled right in, no prob. it’s not a big deal. it pisses me off that we’re not using it bc i went to my first mets game this year a few weeks ago, and noooooooobody was wearing masks. i don’t believe in this honor system shit. they had vaxed and unvaxed folks mixed – they lifted the segregated area for the unvaxed… like, if you want to act like an ignorant goon, you should be treated like one. the kiddos should have been shoved into a quarantine corner by themselves.
a bunch of my friends and i have tickets to go see dropkick/rancid in a few weeks and i’m like UGH, ew. how am i supposed to wear a mask in a punk pit in the middle of the summer (it’s outside)? i wish they were requiring vaccinations to get in… blegh.
even going to the grocery store/target/etc. people are walking around with no masks on… it’s disgusting. these fucking idiots are making me so anxious. i feel like this shit is never gonna go away.
years ago, i dated a dude whose brother and best friend were obsessed with glassjaw… i soon also became obsessed with glassjaw, and kept following along with other projects that came about via the extremely talented lead singer, daryl.
one of his musical projects ended up being a band called head automatica. i was fucking THRILLED about this in particular, because this mixed up genre of a band was absolutely right up my alley. i am extremely into new wave/80s/dance/electro anything, so this new band fit right into my repertoire of musical interests. like, so right up my alley that it even featured tim armstrong (a dude from one of my favorite punk bands, rancid) on a pop dance track. what in the actual fuck?! (but it worked…)
i grew up in the 80s and have always loved new wave (especially the weird, left of center shit), i love synthy pop dance stuff, i came into various types of punk on my own and went to raves in the 90s. i feel like head automatica sounded like pieces of all of those things. it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what they sound like. i listen to all different types of music/bands and i don’t even know who to compare HA to. when it came out, i guess you could call it some type of indie pop rock, because it (thankfully) wasn’t main stream enough to be straight up pop music, not that daryl would have allowed that shit anyway… that was a genre we kind of what we kept shoving all types of “myspace bands” and indie into at the time.
so now that i’ve professed my love, i am here to profess my frustration.
i was looking around some archived bookmarks i have in my browser and came across this, which i had forgotten about:
first off: i didn’t take this video – it’s just on youtube… but i was at this show at blender theater, and i did get to witness this IRL and it was glorious. i remember while this was happening, i was instantly like “this is going to be my favorite song off of this new album”, and proceeded to shake my fat ass in the crowd.
secondly: this song, nor the album it’s on were ever released. they were performing songs off of the 3rd album live, soon before they were going to release it. it was named “swan damage”.
i googled what i could about the release of that album, and came across a few things and articles regarding swan damage. tl;dr: daryl wanted his projects off of the label they were on, and unfortunately that also affected the album. he talks about it MAYBE being leaked someday, doesn’t say who or how… just kind of eludes to it. unfortunately though, it seems as if he’s put all of this behind him. as a fan waiting for this stuff, well, that selfishly hurts.
to me, head automatica feels like “well, it’s better to have loved and lost”. like, thank you universe for letting us experience it, but we should just be grateful we had it at all? uh, we could still have swan damage probably/maybe/who knows/i dunno/please just do this one last thing.
i dunno how that’s fair, but still we devoted fans still follow DP’s moves and punish ourselves, lol.
* * *
listen, daryl, you sexy bastid, if you ever see this post… please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please (zing!) release the kraken. swan damage does NOT feel old to the people that have been waiting for years now. we haven’t heard it over and over again. this song above, i don’t know what the actual lyrics are bc it’s a bit fuzzy. i want primo quality… i would like to see this in front of me again, when we can go to shows and dance my ass off. the few swan damage tracks you did play during that era sounded so mature in the HA archive. as aforementioned, HA wasn’t like most bands out there. you did what you wanted. i KNOW who inspires you musically (squeeze, elvis costello, the jam, etc.), and i feel like you were finally applying it to this project. don’t get me wrong, i love “beating heart baby”, and fuck the label for wanting 10 of it… but that wasn’t my favorite track. “the razor”, “laughing at you” and “cannibal girl” are probably my favorites, alongside the song above. i don’t even know what it’s called… but i’m sure the mastered version would have been in my top 3, sir.
* * *
it’s so hard being a fan of daryl’s, bc while he’s a musician, he’s also a CREATIVE human being. he moves fluidly between or onto new projects, and for us greedy fans that want more of something, we get the brunt of it and get impatient. as a glassjaw fan, we had to wait 9 years for new EPs and 15 years for a full album.
on the other side of the token, i actually feel guilty having these feelings. it’s not my business to get pissy about having expectations, i guess. it just sucks that he was just kind of over it, when i felt like he was finding himself in such a great, creative place. i feel like a label and it’s expectations killed this shit for all of us.
as for side projects, house of blow, head automatica, SPORTS, color film (bad saint… i melt. ♥)… they’re all so good! i guess as fans we just have to cherish what we get blessed with by him and just be happy with it.
* * *
i got to meet daryl at an album release party via some rapper i used to know. not only did he perform there that night, but we were all in VIP, so once i was drunk enough to actually utter words to him, i thanked him. it was all i wanted to do, honestly, bc you know that whole “never meet your heroes” expectations thing… i was at a loss for many words, but he was sweet when i said that to him, and i hope he knew how much i actually meant it.
we chit chatted about nonsense i’m sure. at that very moment, i was schlepping vinyl records in milk crates for a mutual connection DJ friend, who had also performed there that night. i remember him thanking me for knowing all the words to the house of blow songs (i’m guessing he saw me in the crowd singing along) and then asked me if he could hug me (obviously i said yes, and i remember that his leather jacket was so damn stiff, that it was hard to get a good one, but i still got one ♥).
anyways, my point is… i don’t know if musicians really understand just how much music touches people, but hopefully when we tell them “thank you”, even if that’s all we can get out of our star struck mouths, they understand what we mean. music has always been a massive part of my life, and while i’m not a very emotional person, music always overwhelms me. it powers me, it helps me, it makes me emotional… music is magical.
to have another chapter of head automatica would be amazing for us fans… just putting it out there. maybe our other mutual connection that works at the shitty label will find a way to um, *cough*leak*cough* release it.
i feel like i’m back at my return of saturn again already, maybe it’s a midlife crisis. i dunno, either way, i’ve been getting my shit together so hardcore lately (especially financially), but everything else is bunk. my cat is getting older and it’s starting to show, my 40s are creeping up on me and it’s starting to show, the pandemic isn’t helping…
i miss going out.
i miss having friends without kids or husbands/wives.
i miss being inspired by manhattan, by friends, by creatively vibing with friends, going to shows, just… living. i feel like i’m missing something.
sometimes i yearn for my late 20s, but it was so stressful. sometimes i yearn for my early 30s, but it was so stressful. i really miss those feelings, though. uncertainty brought creativity.
i miss living in a new neighborhood.
i miss taking trains.
i miss taking pictures of things that make me feel things, that inspire me.
i clearly miss a lot of things.
i can’t wait to get back to work and “normal” life in manhattan on weekdays. i know my 40s aren’t the end of the world, but they’re the last young years i have left. i just want to be out doing dumb shit, looking as cute as i can before my skin starts to sag and my knees or hips no longer work.
if you’re not new around here, you know how much i LOATHE domestic transplants that move to my city… the city and borough i came flying out of the womb in, the streets and public schools that raised me, well, i have a lot of pride for all it. i’m annoyingly, possessively protective of her and i know i am obnoxious, and i’m not sorry for it, but i digress. the reason i came here to bitch about domestic transplants today just kind of ties into why i’m here.
two days ago, i came across this article. now, as a native new yorker, i like to think of my insides as an immunity tank. in fact, i usually tip my hat to the city when bringing up my strong immune system. commuting for so many years on the mta and eating processed food for most of my life must have really keith richards’d my insides (nope, taco bell has never and still doesn’t make me instashit). i’m rarely sick, and while that’s great and all, i read articles like that about NYC pollution and i’m just like “fuck, that’s bad/gross” and it snowballs my thoughts from “this city is filthy” (honestly the first thing i said to myself exploring chicago was “holy shit, it’s like being in manhattan but it’s not dirty!”) to “idiots really come here to deal with the disgusting mta and pay high ass rents, just to feel like real new yorkers”.
WWWWOOOWWWWWWW… YOU PROB STRUGGLED LIKE A COLLEGE PERSON, W A ROOMMATE OR TWO IN YOUR LATE 20S AND MAYBE EVEN INTO YOUR 30S AND MANAGED TO SURVIVE SOMEHOW… i guess that feeling of non-rural accomplishment really does a number on people’s dopamine. congrats, you cornballs.
this thought just always brings me back to “why the fuck do they come here, like, really? and why aren’t there more cities like NYC in this country so we can get a break?” there is so much land in this country, why tf are we not building a few more major cities? why aren’t we building something like THIS (we have finally made it to the inspiration of this article) someplace in the middle of spacious, rural states? this seems like what people dream nyc or parts of nyc to eventually become, and it will probably never be – i don’t think it physically can be.
this city is probably unfixable as a whole… everything is basically already setup with no room to grow. we’re literally living on small islands. p.s. – robert moses (the racist shitface) laid out all of the highways like a goon, there are WAY too many vehicles in this city, no one knows how to merge when driving the surplus of said vehicles on the said highways (pissing everyone off as a whole, and adding commute time to our days bc satan forbid there were HOV or bus lanes going into manhattan), there are cemeteries in the middle of boroughs taking up so much space, the MTA can’t be redone and has so many dead zones in the middle of boroughs, LIC built itself up too much and views of the city are being blocked, bike lanes? yeah okay, sorry, no space for them without pissing off drivers, rents aren’t really going down even with this fuckin pandemic happening, and the only solution? BUILD “AFFORDABLE” HOUSING aka ugly/tiny unit buildings with bedrooms the size of king sized beds (y’all are really okay with that?) that we don’t even have room for in this fucking city, etc…
/rant
having a town/city like myTengah would be better for the environment overall. why hasn’t anyone tried to do this in the US? what are urban planners doing in this country? i’m so confused and annoyed. NYC should be this, and now it can’t be. the more people that move here, the less wiggle room there is to even implement things like that. now i understand people come from all over the world to live here, but as i’ve said in the past, i have more respect for people fleeing their countries for good reasons than goons from iowa, that just want to wear paisley and buffalo plaid clothing at the same time, while wearing sunglasses at night and beige yeezy’s just to say they can “finally be themselves”. bruh, go do that shit in iowa.
omg, just give this city a decade or three to fix itself. maybe i missed my calling trying to be an urban planner… i didn’t think this was too shabby of an idea, maybe someone should listen to the people.
i just finished watching cobra kai, and as noted in my summarization:
i really loved it, but it was kind of hard to see these characters older now. i guess it just makes you aware of your own mortality. i grew up watching karate kid and just can’t believe how long ago that was – all of the flashbacks just gave me such a frog in my throat. i can’t believe those guys are in their late 50s. i hate how far away the 80s was, and i guess this was just a constant reminder of it. what i wouldn’t give to be an adult in those times… bleh.
not a lot of things make me have a frog in my throat or make me want to cry. for some reason, seeing people aging, IRL or celebrities really freaks me the fuck out and makes me feel like that. if you know me IRL, i haven’t changed much since i was a teenager on the style front, bedroom decor front, looks front… this is me. my shit was never a phase, this is just me. i’m okay with that, and i’m sort of getting better with aging or the idea of it. it’s not like i can do anything about it, so it is what it is. when i turned 30, i figured i’d have a nervous fucking breakdown, but i was fine (40 is this year, let’s see how that goes).
back in august, i was reminiscing about earlier in the pandemic, and about how stressed/anxious i was and didn’t feel good. well, in addition to those feelings, i also discussed getting shingles. well, guess what?
I GOT SHINGLES PT. 2!
yeah, and while i was getting diagnosed (again), i took an antibodies test for covid… and guess what?
I TESTED POSITIVE!
so i guess i was right in thinking i had it back then, unless that wasn’t covid and then i had it with no symptoms during the summer… which i doubt. who knows?
i honestly didn’t think i would test positive because of how long ago that was, but here we are.
i also wanted to state that when we first started working from home, the weeks before that at work – my commute was filled with almost no one wearing masks, including myself. we were still living normally. i used anti-bacterial EVERY TIME i touched a train pole… so i don’t know exactly where i picked it up from, but since then, i always wear a mask when i leave the house.
since the pandemic started and that happened, i googled, and not much info came up for the symptoms that i was having. so, doctors… if you come across this idiotic blog about a 30-something year old with covid, here was what i went through:
NONE OF THE FOLLOWING:
– no fever
– no coughing
– no respiratory issues at all
– no runny nose
I HAD THE FOLLOWING:
– nausea/upset stomach (a complete loss of appetite from it, i lost almost 10 lbs bc of it)
– anxiety attacks (maybe just because i was working from home/life turned upside down, though)
– things smelled weird and tasted weird (i never lost either sense, though)
– headaches
– fatigue/restlessness
– a LITTLE bit of being winded, but not much
– shingles (TWICE)
– some hair loss (could have been from the shingles, maybe stress)
since then i’ve been super active – working out, biking and i feel fine. rarely out of breath, etc. i ride my bike for 13 miles on average.
so yeah… in closing:
wear a fucking mask, wash your hands and stop being close to people – especially people you don’t know.
i decided to take a week off from twitter, and it turned into two weeks… and it feels great, so i guess i’ll just keep going.
i know i’ve said in previous posts that i don’t really use social media, so you may already know that i only use twitter and instagram… so it kind of sucks that i’m now only using IG, but this year has been rough on everyone on so many levels, and i have to be able to process everything differently so that i don’t crack up.
i have bottled up anxiety because i don’t really ever let things out, and i rarely process emotional things. i just shrug shit off like it doesn’t bother me, or (for the most part) things genuinely just don’t bother me, but they’re still things that SHOULD bother me and still pile up into a corner of my mind.
i was brought up by a person and other family members that didn’t teach me how process emotions. in my adult age here, i should have figured it out by now, but it’s just easier to “serenity now” it away (#insanitylater).
it’s so insane when i actually think about why i don’t like to confront emotions – i think i can pinpoint the problem. i think it’s because i have honestly just been let down my entire life. maybe not in super fucked up, DRAMATIC or abusive ways, but foundational ways. i expect things to just always not work out, so i don’t invest in them properly, and when i do finally get to the point where i have to deal with something, i feel like i seem too sensitive about it because of how emotional i get once i’m at that point.
it’s a terrible cycle and a terrible way to handle things, but i digress…
all of the anxiety i’ve been holding in from all the shit happening this year is enough to deal with, aside from all of the microtweeted news information i take in on a daily basis. while that’s the reason i love twitter, i also needed to take a break from that type of information overload. also in the middle of all of that, there are so many people tweeting the dumbest shit that i don’t care about. like, i love my online friends but when they’re very “matter of fact”, seeking attention or being covid careless, it’s just annoying and stressful for me. it’s probably just as annoying as me complaining about the same shit over and over again (transplants, beards – although i took a break from that, sports, work issues, technology) – sorry, folks.
i know i can make lists and mute accounts or words, etc – i just don’t give enough of a shit. i’ve been using twitter since it came out and it was just a place i could write something quickly and talk to people. i don’t need it to be an entire fucking THING, and if it wants to be a thing, just turn into a thing already. be the next social media site, put fb in the grave… otherwise, just be twitter.
i keep finding myself wanting to share thoughts and info, and twitter is usually something i’ll go to a couple of times an hour for a mental reset… so it’s not super easy to just quit it, but it still feels better mentally to just not be in it for a bit. i also came to the conclusion that well, this is a place i can elaborate on things vs only having a certain number of characters to work with. the problem there is that i don’t actively advertise this website anymore, so i don’t know who even reads it. i can see the traffic flow, but there aren’t usernames attached, a timeline to interact with or a way to @ them unless i turn my comments back on (which i’m not doing).
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