Hi!

Sometimes I don't know if I should be typing on this or writing in my oh so pretty journal that is sitting to the right of me on my desk. I've written in it a lot the past few nights and I probably will end this night doing the same. The paper smell is too irresistible.

So? Stuff.

Miranda July is coming out with a new film, yay! From what I've read there is already plenty of bad commentary, which probably means I will gush over it even harder! She is magical. I've yet to find an artist such as her that can make every waking moment of life beautiful even it when it's not. BUT IT IS. Does that make sense? She encompasses all of the awkward reality and transforms it into pure beauty. I love her brain.

I LOVE BRAINZ.

I'm insanely sore from hot yoga yesterday, such a lovely sore though. My muscles are thanking me for working them so vigorously.

What else?

This song, One More Mouth, by Josh Ritter, is phenomenal:

Sing along with it!!

Honey how you gonna make it on your own?
Honey how you gonna make it on your own?
When you wake up in the night
And see the stars just city lights
And you can't find home?

You act like you don't need nobody else
And you dance like you don't need nobody else
And all the other moths need light
To circle round while you just fly
Around yourself

Oh I stir my sugar with a spoon
And watch your white dress float around the room
I try to see what you're about
But even my candles are down and out

Honey why you gotta hide your face from me?
Honey why you gotta hide your face from me?
Will I starve in this eclipse while you treat every hungry kiss
Like one more mouth to feed?


(This is a super cheesy video made by a fan).

This song has served as a huge inspiration for me.

Speaking of which, I've been doing a lot of writing lately. I go through stages. If you read my previous entries, you can see that very thing. One of my dear friends who used to keep up with my writings pretty often asked why I didn't get into lyric writing. Well, guess what?! Now I am! I've transformed a few things. It's fun.

I always wonder if writing is a good or bad thing for me though. Even though, deep down, I always know the answer. Writing puts things into perspective for me, it can make real what I want to (unconsciously) avoid. Why should anyone ever want to avoid anything?! Let's just progress and learn from it all, eh?! Easier said than done, I know. But you have to try.

I miss a couple of people. Maybe I miss the illusions. I don't know.

I'm delighted to say that Niki Metzger and I have a new project coming out!! I'm not giving away any details except you'll know more on Monday. :) It's nice distracting myself with what I really want to be doing; being creatively productive. Certain people have inspired me. :)

I wanted to tell you something else. Don't hold back. Go for what you want.

THAT'S A FAMILY!

I've been wanting to tell some of my parental friends about this film I watched a couple of weeks ago in class. Non-parental friends, you can know about this too. EVERYONE should know about it. It's called, "That's A Family!" (every time I say that in my head I say it with an Italian accent). It was simple, informative, and encompassed all types of families. This is a film that all young children should watch beginning in Kindergarten or 1st grade. I totally am buying this for my 7 year old nephew. It's inexpensive too! You can order the film from respectforall.org.

Here is a glimpse:



Basically, it mentions how any combination of family is "normal" ranging from various ethnic backgrounds, sexual orientation, and (non) biological families. It is done in a very elementary way and is just simply beautiful. There is a lifetime of information to be taught in this 30 minute film. Help people progress and share it with others. See, look, you can learn what I pay a fortune for right here for freeeeeee! ;)

I had an interesting chat with my neighbor the other night. I like him. He's a few decades older than me and was raised here in Brooklyn. I guess you could say he lived a "hard knock" life. He has 4 biological kids I think and 4 others that he and his wife adopted? Ehhh, I think I have that right. Basically, he has a lot of kids to take care of. So he came over the other night to hang with my roomies and he wanted my opinion on a situation that happened in his 11 year old's 5th grade class. He told me that his son brought home a book that was assigned by the teacher about an adolescent gay boy. I want to say it was called The Rainbow Way? Well, my neighbor's son started asking him about being gay. My neighbor was HEATED that the school gave this to his son to read. My neighbor basically wanted me to agree that what the school did was wrong. I understood where my neighbor was coming from and just really his upbringing which would make him feel the way that he did. My neighbor was also more concerned with the fact that the book would turn his son gay. hahahahahahahaha. I had to laugh at that and politely shared my view with him that reading a book wasn't going to turn his son gay. I know there are lots of argumentative views on this topic but personally I think being gay has more to do with a biological predisposition. Anywho, I was able to break down to him that if anything the book was just going to teach his son how to be more receptive and appreciative to people who are "different" from him and stressed that I thought that was what the teacher's motives were too. Not only with gay people but different ethnicities, socioeconomic backgrounds, etc. I mean his son is growing up in NYC; land of misfits. The only part I agreed that I would have been upset with is if there was explicit sexual content in the book and the parent's were never notified of that. His son is in 5th grade. I think that's when Sex Ed class started for me? Parents had to approve of the education though. Kids are developing so much younger these days though and having sexual encounters from ridiculously young ages, especially here. I know it happens everywhere but there is something different about growing up in Brooklyn I think that I'm learning. It's amazing and terrifying what my Landlord's 4 year old daughter already knows about city life. I went on longer than I intended to about that. ;)

What else should you know?

Ummmmm... Dancing is fun. Go do it if you haven't today.

I'm trying to narrow down my thesis topic. It's going to be biofeedback related; I just can't decide which medium I want to relate it to. Music? Images? Illusions? We'll see. I guarantee you it will be awesome though.

BUY THE FILM!

Big ol' hugs,
Shells

Ryan Adams - Somehow Someday(Live)

mmmmm... these lyrics.... mmmmmmmmmmm.

I want to tell you something
That I should've, long ago
I wish that you and I had those kids
Maybe bought us that home
I wish that we were stumbling fast
Down on Irving and 14th Street
I wish that we were still in your room
In your bed and you were holding me

'Cause there ain't no way I'll ever stop from lovin' you now
There ain't no way I'll ever stop from lovin' you now
No there ain't no way and I'm gonna try and show you somehow
Somehow, and I'm gonna someday

I dreamt that you and I were still young
Laughing like little kids
I'll never know just how bad it hurt
Or what I did
I wish that we were stumbling fast
Down on Irving and 6th
I wish we were still making plans
But now, there's nothing to fix

But there ain't no way I'll ever stop from lovin' you now
There ain't no way I'll ever stop from lovin' you now
No, there ain't no way and I'm gonna try and show you somehow
Somehow, and I'm gonna someday

Someday...Someday
Ah honey, someday

Atypical.

Great excerpt shared with me by a good friend:

If it wasn't the reason kaleidoscopes were invented, it was certainly the reason funhouse mirrors were. Prisms, too, if you hold one to your eye and see how they change the view. Atypical, yes, atypical. It's the way an image can surprise. It's the way a thought can change. Atypical, it's the foundation of humor. And the architecture of a smile, question mark and exclamation point. Atypical has a mission- to change the world. Look at what it's done for ice cream. First there was vanilla. Then there was chocolate. Then the vanilla and chocolate swirl. Atypical. Clouds were the original high priests of the atypical. Most people think snowflakes are the ultimate atypical but they're insecure about their differences. An army of ants marching against the picnic of the predictable. A collage of syntax rebelling in the middle of a grammar textbook. Atypical has an aroma all it's own. Typical stinks, but of what? Atypical is a jazz bass player in a club on a side street. It's almost midnight. The moon is howling in the window. Atypical is water that walks upstream, if it wants, won't let gravity bully it. Atypical is you. Oops, we're being presumptuous, but if you've tagged along with atypical this far it's at least something you want to be. So where do you start. You can't enroll in the University of the Atypical. It's something you have to live. Atypical is a learn-as-you-go education. Step one. Break old habits. Make new ones. Then break them, too. Can you dance? When a dance is successful it's a delicate balance of the typical and atypical. When music moves you it's atypical pushing the predictable to the side of the road, page, brain, room, river or mountain. That's where the typical belongs on the side, out of the way, creativity is calling. Don't bother answering the phone or door, you answer creativity with your heart. Your make a promise, an atypical promise. Start looking for the atypical right now. Tattoo your imagination with it. You'll sleep better.

I'm not really sure where it came from because my friend wasn't either but I love it.

LEARN IT.