Yearly Archives: 2008

Defining Myself Through Others, Revisited

A deep­er look at an old top­ic

Some time when I was a child, I asked my moth­er if she loved her nails more than she loved me. She had this kit full of nail tools — clip­pers, files made of met­al and emery, toe sep­a­ra­tors, fake nails sep­a­rat­ed in lit­tle box­es, even a small hand-held, bat­tery-oper­at­ed dremel with dif­fer­ent attach­ments used to grind, sand, and pol­ish — that she would car­ry with her around the house. When I asked her this ques­tion, she picked me up in her arms, and vehe­ment­ly denied it. I did­n’t believe her though, not in my heart. She had always paid more atten­tion to her nails than to me.

My dad was no bet­ter. One time I googled his name to find his work num­ber, and came across an audio/visual site where he had writ­ten a small para­graph as a review on a pro­jec­tor he had. I was crushed. It was more effort than he had ever put into my life, sit­ting in a cou­ple of short sen­tences in front of me. It would have been okay if he had been so unin­ter­est­ed in every­thing, but he was­n’t. He loved his car, he loved his home the­atre, he loved his karaoke, but me he had no inter­est in.

So, before I had become a teenag­er, I start­ed to look for some kind of approval from oth­er peo­ple. At that point, it was Andrew and Alex. They were my best friends in grade 3 and 4, but I changed schools in grade 5. Even after this, I tried to hang out with them but they seemed to be more inter­est­ed in school, and we lost touch.

Pretty soon, I real­ized that I was­n’t any­one’s “best friend”. I cried and I cried and I cried. I felt like I need­ed this to define myself. I need­ed be a pri­or­i­ty to some­one because I cer­tain­ly was­n’t a pri­or­i­ty to my par­ents. Without being some­one’s best friend, I was worth­less.

As an adult, you may feel inse­cure about cer­tain aspects of your life. You lack self-con­fi­dence in areas where you feel vul­ner­a­ble — inti­mate rela­tion­ships, social sit­u­a­tions, or work. Within your vul­ner­a­ble areas, you feel infe­ri­or to oth­er peo­ple. You are hyper­sen­si­tive to crit­i­cism or rejec­tion.

I still feel this way now. The prob­lem is that the need isn’t being met. Everyone puts oth­er peo­ple first, and the one foun­da­tion I believed I had in my life has crum­bled. I’m nev­er impor­tant enough.

Two things keep me from killing myself.

The thought that one day, I may mean some­thing to some­one. Or the thought that one day, I’ll be able to stop defin­ing myself through oth­ers, and sim­ply be con­tent with who I am.

Either way, some­thing’s got­ta give.

Drive To Nowhere

I put on my most com­fort­able hood­ie, grab a cam­era and a tri­pod. Pass by the mir­ror and see my eyes are swollen. A base­ball cap’ll hide my face.

I put on The Alchemy Index. First is Fire. An anthem of rage, and burn­ing, and fury in the night.

I had Firebreather by Thrice play­ing here.

The flames will rise and devour me.
Oh, to breathe in fire, and know I’m free.

Honda Civic Coupe at night

I find a qui­et, wind­ing road, alter­nat­ing between 60 and 30 max. About eight kilo­me­tres down, there’s a small fer­ry load­ing dock, with a place to park on the side of the road. I get out and take a pic­ture of the car. Other cars keep pass­ing by, their head­lights leav­ing streaks across my cam­era sen­sor.

The road slopes upwards around a bend, and I dri­ve off again to find out where it goes.

Quebec at night

There’s a look­out point on a cliff, sur­round­ed by a rail. Across the waves of the Ottawa riv­er is Quebec. People come and go. Three types of peo­ple.

The cou­ples here for a roman­tic view. They park, walk up to the rail­ing, and talk to each oth­er about noth­ing in par­tic­u­lar. The girl­friends get cold and short­ly want to leave.

The kids in their par­en­t’s cars, already high or drunk. They sit in the car with all the lights on, talk­ing through their music, obliv­i­ous to the seren­i­ty around them oth­er­wise.

The men here by them­selves, aban­doned and alone on a Friday night. They sit in their cars with the lights out, and come out to lean on the rail­ing every now and then. I’m one of them.

Ottawa Rockcliffe parkway at night

On my way back, I skip Water and put on Air. A song about a boy who could fly, about falling upwards and away.

I had A Song for Milly Michaelson by Thrice play­ing here.

So, here we go.
Hold on tight and don’t let go.
I won’t ever let you fall.
I love the night.
Flying o’er these city lights.
But I love you most of all.

I miss a turn, and find a smooth pave­ment road that winds through the for­est. My eyes are dry and tired. I put on the high beams and cruise con­trol, dis­cov­er­ing anoth­er way home.

The Profits of Art

I’ve sold 10 of my fruit and body prints so far. Officially, I’ve made a small prof­it, with the mon­ey being used to pay off the debt incurred from the pur­chase of much pho­to gear.

When Dan did my read­ing two years ago, he men­tioned that I see colours dif­fer­ent­ly from oth­er peo­ple, and that I should try mak­ing mon­ey off my art.

Back then, I was far from con­sid­er­ing myself an “artist”. I used my cam­era to express myself in cap­tur­ing mem­o­ries, not in deliv­er­ing mes­sages. At the first Emergence Exposition, Nisha would intro­duce me to peo­ple as a pho­tog­ra­ph­er. I would add the word ama­teur as a pre­fix, but Nisha would cor­rect me and say aspir­ing. I sup­pose I’m more inclined to agree with her now. Being able to sup­port myself like this (albeit in a small way) makes a big dif­fer­ence.

It’s a great feel­ing when some­one hands me a cheque, and on the lit­tle memo line is writ­ten “art”.

The best part of the entire process though, is meet­ing peo­ple. Not just meet­ing peo­ple I ask to mod­el for me, but when I’m deliv­er­ing prints as well. I get to see where they’re going to hang the pic­tures, and I get to meet their kids, their par­ents, their pets, their friends.

Most recent­ly, it was Tiana, who has two dogs, a cat, and a hus­band. I did­n’t get to meet Brent (or the cat) but I’m sure the oppor­tu­ni­ty will present itself at some time in the future.

No solicitors sign

Tiana feeds her dogs some treats.

Tyrone

Bernie

Bernie roots

I just want fucking makeouts

I drove home from class tonight with the win­dows down and the music cranked. It’s not the songs, it’s not the singing, it’s not the speed, it’s the air that affects you. That smell.

The Operation by Charlotte Gainsbourg is the ulti­mate night-time dri­ving track when you’re feel­ing sin­gle and elec­tri­fied.1 The base­line dri­ves you.

I had The Operation by Charlotte Gainsbourg play­ing here.

i want to explore you
i’m gonna get under your skin
so you can feel me run­ning through your veins

i want to exam­ine
every inch of your frame
the pres­sure points that cause your joy and pain

When I got home, I show­ered, got into in my PJs, took Dolly in my arms, and stood out on the patio. I want­ed her to feel what I was feel­ing under that night sky. She clung to my arms, but did­n’t make a sound. It was unlike her, because any time Dolly gets picked up she imme­di­ate­ly begins purring. The night was too much for her.

I think it’s too much for me some­times.

For now, I’ll live vic­ar­i­ous­ly through Maggie. Except I won’t be get­ting drunk on Sparks (the orange kind), I won’t be going danc­ing, I’ll just keep run­ning into my crush­es at every turn, and I’ll keep meet­ing the ass­hole, idiot guys they go out with. And like Maggie, I’ll refuse to be that guy. The one who talks shit about oth­er guys, the one who floss­es his cash mon­ey, the one who dri­ves fast to prove he’s got a dick.

Yes, I’m break­ing my post order because of Maggie. It’s like she made me write this. I would total­ly hoola­hoop and make Dragon Ball Z pos­es with her. I just found out that I don’t know how to spell hoola­hoop. Hula hoop. There we go.

Maybe this dry spell is mak­ing me loopy.

I think I’ll sleep with the win­dows open tonight.

  1. This song won’t be up for long; I’m tak­ing it down in a cou­ple days. [↩]