equivocality — Jeff Ngan's collection of thoughts, experiences, and projects, inspired by pretty much everything
Viewing entries tagged with "Lisa"
Pages (2): 12
18 Apr 13
3

the distances we travel and yet how far we've still to sail

It’s all a bit of a blur now, espe­cially since we agree it feels like it’s been a year since my respon­si­bil­i­ties as a son and a cousin and a friend in Toronto. I do remem­ber try­ing to bal­ance the caf­feine — so I could be clear-headed and enjoy­ing myself — with the insom­nia that comes from hav­ing so much energy every night. Also, these acts of guer­rilla hap­pi­ness where mes­sages of hope were expressed through posters and spray paint. It would appear that van­dal­ism crosses over into art only in cities with a sky­line worth mentioning.

We ended up at the Ontario Science Centre twice, once as nerds and again as wed­ding guests, which worked out cause the only exhibit we didn’t get a chance to see one day ended up being the only exhibit open to us dur­ing the recep­tion. The high­light is always the plan­e­tar­ium though, in all it’s bean-bag, time-traveling glory, the expe­ri­ence itself worth the price of admis­sion. With the excep­tion of a poor fac­sim­ile of dragon’s beard candy, every­thing worked out.

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tagged with #friendship #Lisa #Toronto / filed under Daily Life Photos
26 Mar 13
0

moulting

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Holy shit how did this song find me in the mid­dle of blan­ket­ing white snow­fall, instead of sum­mer? I’ll take it either way1. I’ve needed a new addic­tion after too many maudlin jazz albums, too often fuelled by hard-living and a woman. This means I’m ready for a taste of warm weather. I miss the wind through my clothes and the smell of girls’ skin when it’s been touched by sweat and sunlight.

cat close-up

Guizmo.

I’m in the process of sim­pli­fy­ing, which has meant fig­ur­ing out my pri­or­i­ties, and truly let­ting go of the things I don’t need, whether it’s a bad habit or rela­tion­ship or thought. Maybe this is why I haven’t been feel­ing my age; it feels like I’m con­stantly start­ing over in var­i­ous parts of my life.

This hasn’t made writ­ing any eas­ier. I’m always wait­ing for a feel­ing to last, but it tends to pass before I have a chance to get it down on paper. Maybe the insta­bil­ity is what I should be writ­ing about. Not about who I am, but how much things are changing.

Audra recently wrote about how frus­trat­ing it is when she can’t get into a state of per­ma­nence. She said it par­tic­u­larly well here: “I know it is not real­is­tic for all progress to be lin­ear, or for things to be able to become con­stant once they become good. But I sure do day­dream about it.” It makes me feel so val­i­dated when some­one is able to put into words the things I’ve been going through with­out hav­ing talked about it with them.

Chinese dinner

My dad asks if I want to get a pic­ture before we start, Lisa says he must know me very well.

In between: Chris finally kisses Angie. It’s a good­night kiss while her creepy col­league is asleep in the same room, yet some­how man­ages to be the sweet­est first-kiss ever. I start to grow my hair out and wear it down, out of bore­dom. People say it fits me. Byron brings me his toys so I’ll toss them again, and I begin to won­der who’s train­ing who. Lisa meets my dad. We finally watch True Romance and Gary Oldman becomes my new favourite actor. I rack up over 150 hours played in Awesomenauts this year, and I’ve made online friends (it’s weird). Assad loses another gen­eral to the rebels, there’s still no end in sight after three years of fight­ing, and oth­er­wise I remain bliss­fully igno­rant to the world.

  1. Also comes in a highly enter­tain­ing music video ver­sion. [↩]
tagged with #father #Lisa #music #reflection #self-evaluation / filed under Daily Life Photos
13 Mar 13
0

stepping into groundlessness

I can tell I’ve had enough of win­ter when I start to enjoy the days above 0 more than the ones below. Those are the days when the air is clear with­out being frigid, and you’re only cold when sun isn’t on your skin. I know I’ll be okay when such her­alds of warm weather appear. Spring is com­ing just in time this year.

Constant plans and new projects are mak­ing the weeks pass as quickly as ever, only now I mark the time by my days with Lisa. We’ve set aside every other Thursday for each other, and it’s the only com­mit­ment I have in my life now, some­thing I haven’t had the plea­sure of shar­ing with some­one in a while.

chicken hearts

Step one in mak­ing cat food: get over the fact that the souls of a mil­lion chick­ens will even­tu­ally haunt you at night for grind­ing up their hearts.

She recently started help­ing me make my own cat food, which involves her schlep­ping a meat grinder, vit­a­min sup­ple­ments, and giant tub1 to my place every time, but she loves tak­ing care of my cats as much as I do. We can both agree it’s well worth the effort when see­ing how much they appre­ci­ate fresh meat and how healthy it makes them.

The rest of our time is spent with Miley Highrus and Zelda Hitzgerald, shar­ing the things we’ve grown to love by our­selves as much as the things we’ve yet to expe­ri­ence together, watch­ing Skins and learn­ing that I like Chris cause Chris likes Angie and I really like Angie. Some weeks, this is the only time we have off from the rest of our respec­tive lives, and the things we can share only in per­son make it all the more special.

Return to Ravnica draft

Slinging card­board.

I can’t help but ques­tion what I know about love and hap­pi­ness and truth and the world and myself. I’ve been try­ing to let go of the things I under­stand and the way I feel, giv­ing myself time to let every­thing set­tle, but embrac­ing the ground­less­ness hasn’t been easy. It often leaves me feel­ing very much out of my ele­ment no mat­ter what I’m doing, and long­ing for some sem­blance of sta­bil­ity. The most I can do is keep in mind that there’s no pres­sure to be a cer­tain way, and that answers will come in their own time.

  1. I don’t have a sin­gle con­tainer in the house that’s large enough to mix the roughly 10kg of chicken parts required for a two-month batch. [↩]
tagged with #Lisa #reflection #self-evaluation #spring #uncertainty / filed under Daily Life Photos
22 Feb 13
7

pulling weeds and planting flowers

Few peo­ple have been able to fill the void lately. The ones who do sing to me the unashamedly erotic songs of John Dowland and help me test new decks.

Through it all, I’ve been try­ing to take five breaths every now and then, inhal­ing and exhal­ing a lit­tle more fully than usual. Trying not to live like it’s a fri­day every day. Trying to fig­ure out if I should apol­o­gize for using your song to score the moments I shared with some­one else. Trying to rec­on­cile my old Taoist beliefs with my new Buddhist views. Trying to be happy with the per­son I am, instead of let­ting dis­con­tent drive self-improvement.

house in the woods

 

Frigid win­ter days are teach­ing me patience and vul­ner­a­bil­ity. Some are eas­ier than oth­ers. I’ve been work­ing with the fickle swings instead of against them. Otherwise, it’s a con­stant strug­gle when try­ing to impose sta­tic order on inher­ently unsta­ble processes. The hard part is mak­ing plans when you don’t know how you’ll feel from one day to the next.

Jesse arranges

Back in the day when we were doing cov­ers of Frank Ocean songs. One of the most rec­og­niz­able things about Jesse’s room are instru­ments strewn about.

The great­est test of my progress so far will be an acoustic show Jesse asked me to play with him on Sunday. Anxiety has been get­ting the bet­ter of me lately, and the prospect of hav­ing only two nights of rehearsal does noth­ing to assuage this.

I’ve been keep­ing in mind that we were able to pull off a decent per­for­mance last time when I didn’t know the show was going to hap­pen until a few hours prior; one of those exer­cises to fos­ter pos­i­tive expe­ri­ences and com­bat neg­a­tiv­ity bias. Fortunately, Jesse is a great front­man to be behind, cause he com­mands the atten­tion of any­one watch­ing, also tak­ing the atten­tion away from ner­vous fin­gers and live jitters.

cat and girl

 

The jour­ney of self-discovery has been dif­fi­cult. When there’s a his­tory of trauma, it’s inevitable that an uncom­fort­able feel­ings get stirred up every now and then. I take care of myself by mak­ing sure I see the impor­tant peo­ple on a con­sis­tent basis and liv­ing in those moments. The lit­tle ways to heal are found in both the expe­ri­ences them­selves and the time one takes to inter­nal­ize those experiences.

This is how I learn that self-compassion isn’t self-pity, and that most peo­ple bring less kind­ness to them­selves than to oth­ers. To get on my own side, I’ve been visu­al­iz­ing myself as a child, just as wor­thy of care as any other. I would wish the best for that lit­tle per­son, and it helps me under­stand that I should wish the best for myself as well.

tagged with #Byron #childhood #Lisa #reflection #self-evaluation #winter / filed under Daily Life Photos Thoughts
09 Dec 12
6

old heroes and new lives

My entries used to be filled with so many details, moments, thoughts, and emo­tions. I used to believe every­thing I wrote was impor­tant. Not that I was ever a par­tic­u­larly good writer, only a per­son try­ing to be hon­est with him­self, and that was the way for me to sort out the things in my head.

Now that need isn’t there any­more. Instead, I write to keep track of where I am, know­ing that in time I’ll be won­der­ing how far I’ve gone, and let my pic­tures fill in the blanks.

Banc Sushi and cleavage

On my birth­day, Lisa treated me to all-you-can-eat sushi at my favourite restau­rant, and cleavage.

The new Leonard Cohen biog­ra­phy is out and Genevieve tells me it’s amaz­ing, or at least a great deal more infor­ma­tive than the course we took last year at Ottawa U about the birth of the roman­tic trou­ba­dour. I used to be com­pletely obsessed with this man, but now I can’t remem­ber the last time I put on one of his albums for a straight lis­ten through. I knew he was com­ing to Ottawa this Friday before tick­ets went on sale, but never both­ered try­ing to get my hands on one, even though it used to be a goal of mine to see him per­form live before the booze and sex took him like a true rock­star. He rep­re­sents a part of my past I hardly relate to now, and it’s left me feel­ing like I need a new hero (who has some very big shoes to fill).

birthday boy

Little boy’s birth­day par­ties involve a lit­tle less sexy and a lot more chaos.

I have so many friends with their paths set out for them over next 20-odd years cause of jobs and kids, yet just as many who’ve arrived at adult­hood and are now won­der­ing what’s next. After find­ing a career, buy­ing a house, and get­ting mar­ried, they’re learn­ing that these were goals they never wanted for them­selves, only things peo­ple have always been telling them they should have. Now they’re won­der­ing where to go from here, and how to find a true sense of fulfilment.

I went through the same cri­sis years ago, but feel no less uncer­tain about future at this point. It’s only nat­ural to go through con­stant cycles of strug­gle and res­o­lu­tion if we’re deter­mined to grow and improve, not to men­tion the curves life tends to throw at us. I’m start­ing to view it with a sense of free­dom instead of doubt.

tagged with #Lisa #reflection #self-evaluation #writing / filed under Photos Thoughts
30 Nov 12
2

creature comforts

Thank you win­ter for mak­ing my cats super cud­dly and slow-falling snow and the chance to wear new cardigan-dress shirt com­bos. You are totally worth the has­sle of hav­ing to warm up my car (for now). It’s because of you that I learn how trust is found in the gen­tle coo­ing of girls who fall asleep on your shoulder.

Mornings are spent upstairs in the break­fast nook, now that I have work I can get done on my MacBook Pro. To be bathed in the cool sun­light reflect­ing off the snow was a change of pace I never knew I needed.

birthday brunch

Jesse’s birth­day brunch at the Lieutenant’s Pump.

I’ve been liv­ing with­out any sort of sched­ule. It’s nice to be able to make my own hours cause I’m far more pro­duc­tive at night, but it also makes my life free of the struc­ture that keeps me paced and bal­anced. The only rea­son I have to keep any sort of reg­u­lar sleep­ing pat­tern is so I can be awake when my friends are.

Still, I tend to stay up past the point of exhaus­tion so I don’t get stuck in an end­less cycle of thought when try­ing to fall asleep. Otherwise, the cider always helps.

sneaky cat

Soon, hunger will over­take the fear of punishment.

It’s one of those weeks where I’m feel­ing antsy cause I don’t know when I’m see­ing Lisa next and I haven’t heard from her in a while. I don’t pur­sue the issue cause she has her own life, and I have so much to do that it works out any­way, but that doesn’t make me miss her any less. Our time is spe­cial cause there are so many things I share only with her, our exclu­sive lit­tle club for Breaking Bad, cat walks, and super hotties.

It feels like I only talk about my friends lately. Probably cause that’s what my life is filled with now. They’re the good that’s come out of the bad, the ones who picked up the ball when oth­ers let it drop. They val­i­date me and notice what I wear and lis­ten to me cause they believe what I’m say­ing mat­ters. And at the very least, they’re a chance for me to care about some­one else.

tagged with #friendship #Lisa #winter / filed under Daily Life Photos
18 Nov 12
0

thoughtful things

I’ve always believed the best gifts are things we would want but wouldn’t buy our­selves cause we couldn’t jus­tify the pur­chase (regard­less of how much it costs), or some­thing hand­made by the giver. Good gifts also hap­pen just because, not nec­es­sar­ily due to a birth­day or hol­i­day. Lisa says this ideal makes me an intim­i­dat­ing gift-giver. John used to call me a pro­fes­sional con­sumer, cause I have a ten­dency to pur­chase what I want with­out hes­i­ta­tion, which I imag­ine makes me even harder to shop for.

Recently, peo­ple have been giv­ing me awe­some things for absolutely no rea­son at all, and each gift is thought­ful, prac­ti­cal, and just my taste. It must be really hard to find presents that will make me happy, but that just makes them all the more spe­cial when they do.

cat stuff

These were in my mail­box one night. The event was actu­ally a strip-spelling com­pe­ti­tion, and Shawn won “best strip­per”, the reward being the CD of cat purring. The other guy won the “best speller” award and got the book. They had to fol­low him out of the cafe and ask him for it, cause it was totally meant for me obvi­ously. Shawn has said I’m a cat for as long as I’ve known him.

double wall mini tea cups

I had tea with Heather in a cafe last win­ter, and we had a con­ver­sa­tion about design and how sat­is­fy­ing it felt to hold these mini teacups. Somehow, she remem­bered and found them and bought me a set. They’re mouth-blown so each one is unique, and insu­lated by double-wall borosil­i­cate glass.

book safe

Lisa got me this book safe, made out of an edi­tion of Ernest Hemingway’s Selected Letters, for secrets big and small. The choice of what book to use in mak­ing a book safe is very impor­tant, as it has to blend in with a library col­lec­tion, but also not be so recent or inter­est­ing as to make some­one pick­ing it up.

It has lit­tle mag­nets embed­ded in the frame and cover to make sure it stays closed even when stored ver­ti­cal. This lit­tle detail was what swayed her deci­sion to go with this par­tic­u­lar crafter, and some­thing you learn is very impor­tant if you ever try to keep your stash hid­den from…uhhh…cats.

tagged with #Lisa #presents #Tiana / filed under Photos
17 Oct 12
2

reduction

Heather made reser­va­tions for us (and Sergey) at the Back Lane Café last week. We hadn’t seen each other since the sum­mer, before they were home­less 1 and I started recov­er­ing. Last time I saw her, she left me with a take­out Hintonburger and a med­i­ta­tion audio­book that she hoped would help me feel bet­ter. It was so sweet that she didn’t under­stand at all what I was going through, but tried so hard to help with very thought­ful gifts anyway.

This time, she wouldn’t let me pay, even though she treated me last time as well, and she said please with such heart­felt intent that I knew she’d be hurt if I didn’t give her the hon­our. We’d been play­ing phone tag for weeks up to that point, and between their careers and camp­ing, they could only spare them­selves for a meal sans tea or dessert. It made me real­ize how pre­cious their time is nowa­days, and the fact that they made the time to see me meant so much more than the two hours we spent catch­ing up over a great food and conversation.

poached shrimp salad

Poached shrimp salad, with Niagara nec­tarines, bibb let­tuce (for it’s ten­der tex­ture), endive, lime, and hazel­nut dress­ing. An appe­tizer good enough for a main.

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  1. They got evicted due to an unsym­pa­thetic land­lord, couldn’t find a suit­able place to stay, and ended up putting as many of their pos­ses­sions as pos­si­ble in stor­age and sell­ing the rest. Luckily, one of their friends needed a house-sitter, and it gave them enough time to find a place. [↩]
tagged with #Aaron #busy #friendship #Lisa #reflection #Tiana / filed under Daily Life Photos
07 Oct 12
1

I'm taking back my weekends

The prob­lem with work­ing from home is that you’re never really off. There’s always some­thing you can be doing, so it’s hard to detach and just relax. The days of the week lose their mean­ing. I haven’t had a vaca­tion in about a year, and I’ve been at home almost that whole time. It’s left me feel­ing burned out. Lisa and I are both going through the same thing at this point in our lives, and we’re try­ing to fig­ure out how to pick our­selves up from prob­lems that seem insur­mount­able when we’re liv­ing them by ourselves.

But baby steps first, and today was back to a greasy break­fast. I watched The English Patient, cause I’ve been in the mood for epics lately, and I’d been deny­ing myself the plea­sure for too long. I dis­cov­ered the part I used to place my kisses is called the supraster­nal notch. Now I won­der if she ever sees the English Patient, whether she’ll think I just stole some idea from some movie, or whether she’ll remem­ber and gen­tly fin­ger the val­ley my lips claimed as their own.

At the end of these movies, I always feel a mix­ture of emo­tions, the same when step­ping out of the Shakespearean plays I saw in high school: dejected from all the tragedy, yet amazed by such pro­found per­for­mances and pro­duc­tions. It was the same after I fin­ished read­ing Doctor Zhivago. Maybe cause I iden­tify with the poet-warriors, the themes of their love, the depths of their emo­tions, and the trap­pings of their fate. No mat­ter what the emo­tion is though, it makes me sit in the dark and write about things the way I used to.

And that’s enough for now.

tagged with #Lisa #memories #reflection / filed under Daily Life
05 Aug 12
5

I want to know do I stay or do I go

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So.

Filmed a great wed­ding yes­ter­day, one that left me tired and sore and much deserv­ing of a break. It’s a hazy Sunday morn­ing, and another day that it’ll feel like it’s above 40°C with the humid­ity. Working nearly 13 hours and turn­ing into a lit­tle pud­dle of Asian man means I’m con­sciously avoid­ing the out­doors today. I’ll be con­tent to sip my cof­fee and peer out the win­dow at the gen­tly sun­lit trees.

cat and drink on a hot day

Majel helps us taste-test cock­tails for the reception.

Even though it’s get­ting ever closer to her wed­ding, and Lisa has an increas­ing num­ber of things to get done, we’ve been able to see each other more lately. I’ve real­ized that it’s not good enough to have her meet my needs. I have to fill a cer­tain role in her life too. That’s what brings mean­ing to the rela­tion­ship, cause it means she appre­ci­ates me the way I want to be appre­ci­ated. So often, it feels like that’s all I’ve ever wanted.

I’m glad to have devel­oped a rit­ual get-together with Aaron too. When we don’t see each other one week, it feels like a year the next time we catch up. Tonight I’m head­ing over to his house for the start of bach­e­lor week, some­thing we’ve been excit­edly plan­ning for a while now. It’s the first time he’s had the house to him­self since the kids were born, so I’ll be stay­ing there for a few days of games, movies, bar­be­cue, and gen­eral guy stuff, com­ing back home to feed the kit­ties every now and then. We’re doing a six per­son Magic tour­ney tomor­row, my first in the Constructed for­mat, and everyone’s mak­ing new decks for the chance to open some M13 boost­ers. I think my deck con­cept is BRILLIANT and I can’t wait to try it out.

Chet Atkins has also been keep­ing me com­pany lately. I’m so glad to have found his instruc­tional DVD, where he talks with his old man charm about what he likes in each song and how to play them, phrase by phrase. I grew my thumb­nail out nice and long for nearly two months, cut it off for practicality’s sake dur­ing wed­ding sea­son, then imme­di­ately regret­ted the deci­sion. The elec­tric strings I’ve been using have a really flat, dull tone in the lower reg­is­ter, and since the bass line is so impor­tant in Chet’s arrange­ments, it’s like an entire part is miss­ing from any song I try to learn. I’m going to try learn­ing with a thumb pick, which is some­thing I’ve been avoid­ing for a while now cause I hate the loss of sen­si­tiv­ity (like a con­dom on your thumb), but hope­fully the com­pro­mise is worth it.

I have things to orga­nize, chores to do, errands to run, and a house to clean before I leave. For now, I’ll enjoy the rest of the morn­ing, wast­ing time.

tagged with #Aaron #cats #friendship #guitar #Lisa / filed under Daily Life Photos
09 Jun 12
6

happy child

The sum­mer started unevent­fully, with a mix of rainy weather and cold nights. I long for after­noons in the bright sun, Lou Reed dur­ing his Velvet Underground years croon­ing to me over small speak­ers, with noth­ing bet­ter to do than wip­ing the con­den­sa­tion off a cold drink. It’s a life that doesn’t seem far away, and yet a life I never imag­ine mak­ing for myself. I always think it’ll just hap­pen some day, that things will fall into place if I can take care of every­thing else.

Friday Night Magic

It’s okay to be OCD about how your cards are orga­nized as long as every­one else is.

Aaron has me over for din­ner every week with Karen and the two kids. It’s a rit­ual he has yet to break, even though he told me he didn’t want it to be a cal­en­dar event when I asked him if we could do some­thing on a reg­u­lar basis1. Every Wednesday he leaves work early to let me in the house, and makes up the time by work­ing longer hours on other days, a sac­ri­fice that means more to me than he’ll ever under­stand, and some­thing I never had to ask him to do. It’s nice to be able to look for­ward to reg­u­lar plans, and some­thing I share only with him that makes me feel like I belong.

About as often are Magic nights with Trolley and Steph, and these invari­ably include some­thing deli­cious for din­ner, when Steph takes the culi­nary arts to a whole new level. They take care of me with food and con­ver­sa­tion and booster packs that they never let me pay for. I’m sure I owe a great deal of my san­ity to them, when Magic was the only thing that took my mind off the fact that every­thing fell apart.

pretty wolf

Nobody fucks Pretty Wolf.

In between are things less fre­quent, but no less impor­tant. Musical projects with Jesse or Seth that give me the kind of goals and pur­pose I’ve been look­ing for. Sessions with Lisa, when we get to share the things we don’t share with any­one else. Hangouts with Tiana to debrief on our ever-changing lives, and to give each other advice or a pair of ears. Dinners with Heather when I need my dose of opti­mism and adven­tur­ism. Not to men­tion the peo­ple who send me mes­sages of check up on how I’m doing when they can’t be here for me physically.

big dog and two girls

HOW ARE YOU SO BIG

It feels strange to be busy again. To be pro­duc­tive, and social, and to need days off when I’m not even employed.

Not that it’s been an attempt to stay occu­pied; more like mak­ing sure my needs are being met. That I have ful­fill­ing rela­tion­ships that pro­vide me with what I need, involv­ing peo­ple who make me feel hope­ful and worth­while and con­nected and nur­tured and pro­tected and sat­is­fied and accepted and under­stood and val­i­dated and loved and con­fi­dent and safe and in control.

  1. Only because it’s some­thing he wanted to keep casual, where nei­ther per­son felt any pres­sure. [↩]
tagged with #Aaron #friends #Lisa #summer #Trolley #weather / filed under Daily Life Photos
30 May 12
3

secret wedding

Lisa and Rolf got mar­ried on the fifth anniver­sary of their first date. It’s a fun lit­tle secret they’re keep­ing from peo­ple (includ­ing their par­ents), and as the actual wed­ding will be a non-traditional cel­e­bra­tion in August, the paper­work was done in advance. I was hon­oured to be the only one to know, as well as their pho­tog­ra­pher, and on Sunday we did the engage­ment pho­tos, fol­lowed by a quick stop at the officiant’s house to sign and wit­ness1, then a trip out to Denny’s for break­fast. Denny’s holds a spe­cial sig­nif­i­cance for them, as it was where Rolf took Lisa after he pro­posed, and ever since, they try to eat at a local Denny’s when­ever they travel.

It’s been a long time since I had a project to work on, and to see how well the pho­tos came out has been a delight.

couch in the woods

In the backyard.

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  1. The paper­work was about 20 min­utes, and the actual “cer­e­mony” only took about four sec­onds. [↩]
tagged with #Lisa / filed under Daily Life Photos
02 Apr 12
4

this is my happy face

All i want to write about lately is sun­sets and awk­ward hugs and redis­cov­er­ing coconut mac­a­roons and under­wear and sec­ondish chances and grow­ing old and jus­tice and my new aware­ness of food indus­try issues and the smell of out­doors no mat­ter what the sea­son and want­ing to see Germany and my new Magic decks and that last date and how hard it is to do Street Fighter IV com­bos and pic­tures like this

golden girl

 

and not hav­ing to wear a coat any­more and hand­shakes after really close games and peo­ple being nice to me and feel­ing more com­fort­able with barre chords and what Geneviève wears and Breaking Bad and Nick Drake’s life and root beer floats and the sound of a melod­ica and pretty cats and open­ing boost­ers and the lux­ury of say­ing no and how weird it feels to drive some­where in your PJs and intro­duc­ing oth­ers to that aloe drink and the same old mem­o­ries that I still cher­ish and mini-Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and walk­ing base­lines and being sur­rounded by such good peo­ple and hav­ing a PS3 and the time com­plex­ity of sort­ing algo­rithms and won­der­ing if it’s too late to call and how excited Ryan gets when I visit and the songs I want to write and my mem­o­ries of America and scented oils from the Body Shop and choco­late beers and the image of a gauzy dress in the sun.

tagged with #food #guitar #Lisa / filed under Daily Life Photos Popular
13 Feb 12
2

sine wave

It’s per­pet­u­ally night in my lit­tle nest. A gui­tar is never more than an arms length away, and two cats are always will­ing to curl up against my body under the sheets (though never together); some days it feels like these are the only things I need in the world. Perhaps I’m lit­tle too com­fort­able here, where I can watch the snow fall out the win­dow, and sel­dom have to ven­ture out of my com­fort zone.

I’m con­stantly start­ing over. Throwing away a page so I can have a blank can­vas. Losing another friend to adult­hood, then find­ing new ones in the most unex­pected places. Riding the oscil­la­tions of a sine wave.

The only thing that’s con­stant is how much Byron is grow­ing, his paws and tail hav­ing sur­passed Dolly’s in girth many months ago, and I can’t wait to see how big he’s going to get once he’s fully into adult­hood. I relate to my friends only when one of the cats is afflicted with acne or her­pes or an upper res­pi­ra­tory infec­tion, and I have to play mother to a kitty who can’t fight the sick­ness by them­selves. Dolly has been espe­cially sen­si­tive lately, and needs a lot more atten­tion and affec­tion, still jeal­ous of the new kit­ten in the house.

cats sleeping butt to butt

Butt to butt.

Lisa keeps me sane nowa­days, a role she’s par­tially taken over from John ever since he became a dad. She’s the voice of female rea­son in my life, the only excuse I use to watch great movies now, and the one who talks me down from drunken e-mails to ex-girlfriends. But some­times I need more than half a Lisa and half a John, cause not every­thing can be solved by a stolen con­ver­sa­tion or bury­ing your face in a cat’s belly.

I’m learn­ing that life goes on, whether you’re ready or not. You can only con­trol so much. This real­iza­tion is the rea­son I don’t worry about the future any­more, even when it feels like I should be worried.

I’ve also dis­cov­ered that my writer’s block hasn’t been due to a lack of things to talk about, but the fact that noth­ing I write is sat­is­fy­ing any­more. I’ve lost my rea­son. The only thing I’ve fallen in love with lately has been my set of extra-light chrome flat­wound strings, cause they have such a crisp sound off the nail, but main­tain a warm, aus­tere overtone.

I used to go to bed and dream, but nowa­days, my mind is empty. I don’t know what to make of it all any­more. Can’t fig­ure out if I’m stand­ing on a crest or trough.

tagged with #Byron #cats #Dolly #friends #friendship #John #Lisa / filed under Daily Life Photos
06 Jan 12
8

is this it

I learned that the mea­sure of a man is his abil­ity to stir-fry bok choi hearts.

That High Fidelity is the new (500) Days of Summer.

That it’s nice to be needed.

That I still won­der if I’m forgotten.

That it’s not so much that I don’t have any­thing to write about, but noth­ing ever seems impor­tant enough to put down on paper nowadays.

That I say oh my god a lot.

That food poi­son­ing is like a lax­a­tive for both ends.

That I’m allowed to miss her.

That it’s okay to think oth­ers are cute too.

That I’m doing the whole Swingers thing with Lisa, where she’s try­ing to con­vince me I’m a big fuck­ing bear.

That I can’t read signals.

That it doesn’t mat­ter whether or not you’re invited, as long as you’re happy where you are.

tagged with #cats #Lisa #pieces of me / filed under Random Video
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