Tuesday February 2nd, 2010 4:18pm Song I am addicted to today: “Superstar” covered by Sonic Youth Book I am currently reading: “Gnomes” by Rien Poortvliet and Wil Huygen BACK IN ACTION I’m glad 2009 is over with. I can confidently say that it was, hands down, the worst year of my entire life. I got assaulted. I lost my job. My father died. The last thing I wanted to do was write about any of that. I am sure you can understand why. And so a major mind-fucking-depression ensued. Took me several months just to pull myself out of it. All the scars are there, inside, as you can well imagine them being. For better and worse – I am quite changed. But now, here I am, my portfolio re-done from scratch, my resumes being mailed out by the dozens, waiting by the phone, waiting for the interviews, waiting for the rejections, waiting for the next phase of my so-called ‘career’ to present itself. There are prospects. There are flirtations. There are promises. There are let-downs. There are fragmented constants. There is the broken world in front of me, at my feet, and I look down at it with a solid concrete expressionless mask on my solid concrete expressionless face. But I am happy. I am happy for the first time since August. Maybe even before that. I finally started my own blog on BlogSpot. The link is at the top of this page. It has no point yet. I created it with no point being the only point in my mind. It’s very random, much like this journal, but not nearly as personal, unlike this journal, which might be the way I need to go from now on. With these past 6 months being what they were, all of my mind’s words, or most of them, anyway, are best left to the interior of my skull. And perhaps, to the interior of my art. ***

Wednesday May 27th, 2009 3:37pm Song I am addicted to today: “Heads Will Roll” by Yeah Yeah Yeahs Book I am currently reading: “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” by Jane Austen & Seth Graham-Smith LONG TIME NO WRITE After about eight months of ‘indefinite’ silence, I am putting my journal back online. A lot was happening and it was just way too emotional and personal to write about. I suppose that everything is as it should be now, in my personal life. My professional life, however, seems to be the thing that’s bleeding to death at the moment. And whose isn’t? This recession (a depression to many), is pulling everything down. I don’t know what the outcome is going to be. But it will be here before I know it. I’ll wake up, and BOOM!!! Life as I know it will be entirely over. I have started putting a photography book together. As time goes by, I am seeing my photography taking a back seat, same as my poetry. Which makes me laugh, considering that these things are what this website seems to focus on the most. But regardless, I feel it receding to the quieter corners of my head. And so, in honor of the ‘photographer’ in me, and I celebrating it and acknowledging it in the form of a book. Will any publishers want it? God, I hope so. Is it looking good so far? Yes. But I am not as far along as I would like to be, because it’s an expensive and time consuming task, putting together a book. Or rather, the act of photographing & developing new material is expensive and time consuming. But I’m being patient with myself. It will turn out amazing. And if no publishers want it, then I might try to self-publish. Dad’s doing better than ever. Still driving everyone up the wall as he always has in the past. Liliana is growing up, becoming more and more beautiful than ever. I really do live for that little person. And, after years of procrastination, I am finally refurbishing this website! I am on the edge of teaching myself Flash! Just give this a couple weeks and you shall see how fancy I can be! Bit by bit, page by page, stitch by stitch. Will is putting together his own website too, for his fashion line. It’s obvious that his doing so has inspired me to re-do my own- and he can only benefit from my doing so. I am re-learning web design as I work on my own site, and in turn I give what I learn to him, so he can use it and apply it to his. It feels good to have the journal back on. No doubt all I will be writing about week to week is this crappy economy. But…… who knows. Maybe something will happen that will surprise us all? And lastly, I think I am going to start mentoring again. My last mentee moved away about maybe two years ago. So I need someone new.. I’ve already talked to the powers-that-be about it, and it looks like the wheels are going to start turning towards the end of June. ***

Friday September 19th, 2008 11:19am Song I am addicted to today: “Golden Age” by KT Tunstall Book I am currently reading: David Copperfield by Charles Dickens CRAZY CURRENTS The first half of this week was slow, drained, uninspired. I wasn’t in the mood for anything really. Save for alcohol and sleep… but beyond that, nothing. Then suddenly over the second half of this week something changed, or clicked, inside of me. I am crazy. My mind does strange things. I lose control over my mentality sometimes, and I really have no choice but to go with the flow of my thought rivers. I’m just glad that my thought rivers turned a new direction to bring this week to a satisfying close. Last week was really hard on me. I got emotionally skewed over the course of the past two weeks, my trip to California didn’t help my mind out much, and it really wasn’t until the bleeding through of this week that my crazy storms inside of me finally calmed down and moved on. My fury finally settled once more, and again I am the strong, confident, determined, sexy young devil that everyone knows and lusts for. I don’t know why, but suddenly I’ve been hearing from (and running into) men from my past. These are men who should have forgotten me (as I have truly and honestly forgotten them). I don’t know why this is, but it’s happening quite a lot recently, and I told Danny about it yesterday over lunch. He just said, “Hon, they can smell the ‘relationship’ on you. You’re not on the market anymore and the hard-to-getness of you right now is hard to resist!” Of course that’s complete crap, but it’s coming from Danny so I just nod my head and chuckle, as I always do, in this sugar-coated-helium-filled friendship of ours. It’s just weird how things happen. I feel so right with J.D. and nothing / no one could possibly distract me from this amazing relationship I’m in. I have a lot of guy friends, but that’s just what they are- Friends. I’ve never felt so right with someone before. Sometimes it’s overwhelming, and I don’t know what the heck I’m doing or where I’m going with him, but, well, here we are. I am not taking this for granted at all. I’m the luckiest bastard on the planet! It’s getting chilly, it’s getting darker early, but I’m liking the changing of seasons. I’m really looking forward to the leaves changing up north. I want to go drive through the countryside soon to see the spectacular views of color. I want to go to see Fallingwater in PA too. Hopefully I can drag J.D. with me, despite how busy he is. Work your ass off, that’s good- but you also have to force yourself away from the work from time to time to reconnect with your sanity. And a meandering lazy day trip through the Fall foliage is the best way to do it! Next week I’ll be getting myself some necessary recording equipment/software so I can finally, after years of procrastination, start playing around with sonic experiments! This is going to prove to be an expensive hobby, but I have a good feeling about it. It’s just going to be a lot of fun… I hope. If I do discover that I have an ability to make what some people call ‘music’, then I’ll put some snippy little samples here on my website. Well, it’s Friday. I feel amazing. We had a really great run this morning. And I’ve been weight training and swimming too all week long. I feel really good- and maybe, just maybe, I can start doing triathlons in the Spring?! Yikes. Hmm.. who knows. I hate competing. But- it would be nice to actually do just one triathlon, and I can say I did it, and then move on to sky diving. *** Tuesday September 9th, 2008 Song I am addicted to today: [no song- haven’t used my iPod since Wednesday] Book I am currently reading: David Copperfield by Charles Dickens LAME BRAIN I write this from the Sacramento Airport as I await my flight back home to good ol’ Brooklyn. Came out here for a little R&R with friends who live here. Spent the weekend up at their house at Lake Tahoe. Did a lot of hiking, a lot of eating, a lot of drinking, a lot of sleeping. Just what I needed. I think too much. I over-think everything. My brain never cools down. And it kills me sometimes. A sentence can be said, just a sentence, right before a trip, and then suddenly my brain starts spinning its wheels over the entire damn trip. My mind does evil things to me. I can’t focus on things I should be focusing on. Priorities get skewed. I guess it’s not entirely my fault, this mind-fuck. But still, it’s my mind, keeping me spinning this past week. I think I’ve realized just how pathetic I truly am. I can’t wait to get home. Just because I want to sleep forever, and do whatever I can to escape my mind. I think I’m done with these cheap flight deals. What should be a half-day travel event is taking almost 12 hours, just so I can save a couple hundred bucks. Forget it- never again! No more change-over’s in Atlanta between NYC and CA! I’ve had it. I did enjoy my trip. I cannot deny that. I just wish I could have left my brain back in Brooklyn. *** Wednesday August 13th, 2008 9:42am Song I am addicted to today: “Lien On Your Dreams” by Black Rebel Motorcycle Club Book I am currently reading: “Troubled Sleep” by Jean-Paul Sartre SNAIL FEARS We’re finally getting ‘cooler’ weather and scattered thunder storms, which makes me happy. I like this weather. I don’t have a favorite season, but I do favor the transitions between them. My father’s brain cancer has been positively affected by his treatments. The large problem spots have shrunk, and the minor spots have ceased to increase in size (I think I’ve got that right). So he’ll start putting in more hours at work- increasing from three 4-hour days to three full-time days. And mom just started a new job this week too, and Lori and her family are doing well, Ally got a new teaching job, April’s pregnancy is going well, so all-in-all things are looking up for the family right now. My roommate Aaron is moving out in two weeks, and a week after that Genia will be moving in to take his place. I’ve finally reached a threshold in my life where I am seriously considering life without roommates- but I still have bills to pay and I also want to help out Genia with her struggles as well. I think Genia might be my last roommate. We shall see… depends on how long she stays with me. J.D. clearly wants me to live alone, based on his own home-sharing biases. Which I get and understand. But it’s nice having someone around, regardless of the prickly realities that sometimes accompany life with a roommate. I’m trying to learn patience. I’m trying not to over-think everything. I’m trying to fight my obsessive-compulsive tendencies. I’m trying to relearn the meaning of ‘trust’. I’m trying to let go of my insecurities. I’m trying to provide proper breathing room for myself and others around me. I realize that not every day can be amazing and fun and perfect, there’s gonna be a dud here and there and I’m trying as hard as I can to accept that, even if I don’t understand its roots or its inflections. I cannot control everything, and that’s one of the biggest beasts in my head right now. I do have to learn to let go and just let things happen as they will. I went to bed last night with a busy mind, these thoughts fed the few dreams I had and transformed them into nightmares. I woke up with a dry mouth and a chill on my skin, and it was hard trying not to feel paralyzed enough to get myself out of bed and out of these turbulent thoughts. It’s all just a cramp I need to run out. It’s just a snail on my back patio, completely oblivious to the traffic around it, completely unaware of the truer realities right as that human foot drops down, crushing that poor poor beautiful snail to bits. *** Friday August 1st, 2008 1:52pm Song I am addicted to today: “Pineola” by Lucinda Williams Book I am currently reading: “Barrel Fever: Stories and Essays” by David Sedaris Just got my limited edition signed copy of “Comic Book Tattoo”!! Woohoo! Can’t wait to read it! I am a bibliophile in the very worst way. Jesus. I really spend way too much money on books. I am about to try and tackle two things- Flash, and Reason 4. Flash because I want to make this website a little more showy (perhaps even redesign it all from scratch- who knows?) and Reason 4 because I want to see if I can make music. I’m not too old a dog quite yet. I want to get a motorcycle. I need to take a class so I can get my license. Hopefully I can do that sometime before the Fall rolls in. Bikes are expensive, but not as expensive as cars. And bikes are ideal for the city, and for weekend trips out to places like Long Island and upstate NY. It’s so easy to imagine myself on a motorcycle. I’m a biker without even being one. I just am. We’re going to MoMA tonight to see “Home Delivery: Fabricating the Modern Dwelling” after work. Looks quite interesting… Might just re-stimulate my back-burner-dream of one day owning an Airstream trailer somewhere up in the rolling Catskill Mountains. Of course, with my motorcycle parked out front. *** Monday July 28th, 2008 10:16am Song I am addicted to today: “Unsuffer Me” by Lucinda Williams Book I am currently reading: “Barrel Fever: Stories and Essays” by David Sedaris Feeling a bit forgotten, a bit used, a bit ripped. I think about how I was in the past and how I try to be different now, how I try to be a better person. And sometimes I just don’t think I can do it. My tragic downfall might be that I love too much. I’m a great rescuer. I’m a great muse. I’m a great distraction. I’m a lifeguard in the grandest sense. And then when the lifeguard’s drowning, who’s left to dive in and rescue him? Lovers, friends. What does it all amount to? Ask me that today and I’ll look at you and say, “Absolutely nothing”. Ask me that tomorrow? Who knows. I might vanish by then. I’m looking forward to the next change of season. I want the cold cold mornings and the turning leaves. I dreamt a couple nights ago that I came up to New Hampshire and all of a sudden it was Fall and all the trees were autumn rainbows. It was magnificent and it made me smile and breathe deeply. And then of course I woke up. Just spent the weekend in New Hampshire with my family. My dad’s sister came up from Mexico for a couple days, and so dad wanted us all together for it. It was short and sweet, the way it should be. Liliana, as always, was reminding me of why I am alive. I need motivation. I need inspiration. I need a swift kick in the ass. I keep wrestling with insecurity. Why doesn’t he talk to me all weekend long? We left my place early Saturday morning so I could catch my bus. Right on the street corner where we parted ways he looked at me and said, “Call me Monday…” OK. Well, I didn’t wait. I called him later that day. Are we supposed to go a whole weekend without talking? Should we limit ourselves to the occasional text messages? What does that mean? Why do I always have to text him first? Have I become a boyfriend out of convenience? Because I pay for rides at Coney Island? Because I can get the expensive Diva concert tickets? Because I can pack up and drive around a U-Haul truck? What is this all becoming? Am I just as crazy as Danny says I am? What is this “process of loving” someone? Do I wait uncharacteristically or do I drop the axe first as I have always done with my relationships in the past? I’m just crazy. I just keep telling myself that. I can’t stop listening to Lucinda Williams suddenly. She’s totally where I’m feeling things right now. I love it when you can listen to an album of someone in particular and think, “Wow, I’m not the only one who’s going through this thing…” It’s sad, it’s depressing, but at the same time it makes me feel less alone knowing there’s others out there falling down just as far as I am. Alone, but not. Almost like being drunk. I am a certain type of alcoholic. *** Thursday June 12th, 2008 4:06pm Song I am addicted to today: “Beauty of Uncertainty” by KT Tunstall Book I am currently reading: “The Age of Reason” by Jean-Paul Sartre It’s been an interesting week.. a lot of thinking has been going on inside of this head of mine. I’m learning every day, I’m seeing a lot, I’m feeling a lot, and I am starting to outline the volume of ‘me’ in this chaos of my existence. I’m learning what relationships are (or should be) about. I’m learning about selfishness, ego, esteem, principal, trust, honesty, loyalty. I am finding myself. I put myself off to the side for a bit. I was focusing so much on the people around me and how I affect them and how they affect me, and I was completely ignoring and neglecting the root of me. I’ve finally realized that now. It was a bit of an aggravation to reach this point, but I’m here… finally. For the most part. I’ve decided not to go to therapy. I’ve decided to go to yoga. I’ve decided to take risks. I’ve decided that I am an extraordinary individual who is strong enough to deal with his life on his own terms. I’ve decided I want to get some time alone, I want to go to California and I want to go to London, sometime between now and the Fall. I decided to send Sascha an email this morning, apologizing for how I treated him when we got back from out New Year’s trip to California. We talked some today, and it was a good thing. Some might wonder why I did so. I did so because I needed a clear conscious. I did so because we both deserve the closure… and a new beginning. I did so because it’s about respect, and about forgiveness. I did so because I’ve realized I couldn’t move on with anyone else without doing so. *** Saturday May 31st, 2008 10:05pm Song I am addicted to today: “Funnyman” by KT Tunstall Book I am currently reading: “The Age of Reason” by Jean-Paul Sartre Today was a perfect day with all these dramatically beautiful thunder storms. This was a lazy day. A day for haircuts and grocery shopping. I made myself some pasta tonight, which I realized I hadn’t made in at least 3 months. I hit the gym today, which felt amazing! The last time I went to work out was probably two or three days before dropping J.D. off at the airport one and a half weeks ago. I don’t know why I put off my workout for so long, since I always get manically depressed when I don’t exercise. I guess today was about going through the motions of life like a person who doesn't have his own private thunderstorm carrying on inside of his head. My mind’s been doing some funny things over the past week or so. At first I thought it was all J.D.’s fault, as he went home to North Carolina for two weeks after the college graduation. I do miss him drastically, but I don’t think that’s all it. I feel like I am waiting for something that is just about to happen. But I don’t know what it is. I am a little down, a little lonely (now, that part is J.D.’s fault!), but I am also feeling like I am mourning something. I feel a bit of a “so what” towards everything around me- good or bad. I took Sara to see KT Tunstall on Thursday night up at Town Hall. It was probably one of the best KT shows I’ve seen so far (which is not saying much since this is the third time I’ve seen her perform). She’s funny, she’s energetic, she’s sexy, she’s your cut-down, basic, intense and honest song writer. The kind of artist I have a whole ton of respect for. I spent about five days up in New Hampshire last weekend. I basically spent the whole time stuffing my face, drinking endless amounts of rum, and babysitting (usually all at the same time). It was restful. It was fun. And a bit emotional. One night my sister and I had a beautiful little bonfire going in her backyard. It was just her and me, our drinks, the flames, and a lot of conversation. Our lives are complex. They involve a lot of people and a lot of activities and responsibilities. But somehow, someway, we always manage to have these little moments, where everything about us just falls away, everything pulls back into the wings, and it’s just her and me and nothing else, and we are free to be just Brother and Sister, like it was in the beginning of it all, and probably how it will be in the end of it all, and we were free to talk unabridgedly about life, family, obligation, death, the future, our aggravations, our worries and our wishes. That was a good night. It always feels weird leaving NH after a visit like that. I’ve been going up there so often that it’s starting to become an habitual event in my regular lifestyle – which I am not exactly sure is the best of things. I cannot split all my free time between two places like this. Eventually it’s going to have to be one or the other. But right now I am just sitting back and letting the future unfold as it wants to. Another weekend already half over and all I’ve done is get a haircut and hit the gym. What is wrong with me??? Hopefully tomorrow will be more productive. I wrote a poem last week called “Cutter”. I think I’m not done with it yet. It’s not exactly a happy poem, it’s based on a night I don’t like remembering, and it’s probably a poem I will never share with anyone. Writing it is the only way I know how to deal with those feelings. It’s like a painting of a moan that needed to fine peace with its maker. J.D. flies back to NYC on Thursday, which is good. I’m starting to believe I just imagined him all this time... I miss him in a way that’s embarrassing and aggravating, and I want him back like an addict needing his fix of something way too good to be true. Maybe I’ll actually get something useful done tomorrow. *** Tuesday May 20th, 2008 10:37am Song I am addicted to today: “Letter To Memphis” by Pixies Book I am currently reading: “The Age of Reason” by Jean-Paul Sartre This has been a great couple of days. On Saturday I spent the whole day with my boyfriend getting his tattoo done at Fly Rite in Williamsburg. It took a good 5 hours or so to get it done, and it looks absolutely amazing! J.D. designed it himself, and he’s totally raised my tattoo standards to a whole new level. Yesterday was J.D.’s last day of college, and we celebrated it by getting high and going for drinks and dinner at Crispo. The food was incredible, as always, but they sat us next to an obscene party of blonde dumbass NYU chicks and their ridiculous boyfriends. They were entertaining up to a bit, but towards the end it just got to be a bit too much. After a while they caught on to our condescending remarks and sideways glances, but maybe that was all for the better. Sometimes you gotta hurt a blonde valley girl’s feelings in order to feel just a little bit better about the world around you. I finally got around to buying Reason 4. Now I have to figure it all out… it looks pretty complicated, but everything new always is until you figure out how to get into first gear. I can’t wait to start recording sounds and fucking around with my voice and other things. I don’t know if I’ll actually make ‘music’, or just a shit load of noise, but in any case as long as I have fun with it, that’s all I’m really aiming to achieve. I can’t wait to sit down with it and get started! I’ve put it off for so long. Nothing’s more satisfying than working through an old back-burner project to completion (or to aggravation). I’m heading up north this weekend to get away from the city and spend some time with my family. I’m looking forward to all the greens and blues and leaving all these greys and browns behind. I daydream about escaping all these towers and living on an old farm somewhere in the country. Either up north, or down south, it really doesn’t matter to me. As long as there’s love, inspiration, and a few friendly animals, I’d be right with it all. This hasn’t been the most exciting entry, but who cares. My mind’s still in last night’s clouds… *** Saturday April 19th, 2008 1:34pm Song I am addicted to today: "Electric Feel" by MGMT Book I am currently reading: "Woods and Chalices" by Tomaz Salamun I've allowed myself to fall into a trance over the past couple of years. I've fallen into Habit, which happens to so many people once they finish college and start working in the real world, 9-5 jobs five days a week. I've fallen into Habit, and it's been infecting me and ruining me. My brain has been turning slowly into Jello-O. So slowly I almost didn't notice until now, and hopefully it's not too late to stir the muck up again and bring some intelligence back to my head. All previous intelligence has settled to make muck at the bottom of my fluidic head. Can I de-muck my mind? Obviously I never INTENDED this to happen. I moved to NYC specifically so this would never happen. College really did a number on me. I became stripped down and unhinged. I was becoming depressed and hazardous to myself. I wasn't heading anywhere good. For a while I knew I just had to drop into a short, temporary coma. I had to get the hell out of New England. I had to lay low and restructure my life, become my own person, pay my bills, and grow up. I did all that, which is great, but then I never awoke from the coma. In effect, I became a normal person. Somewhat. My professor Mr. Wiggins at college warned us about this during our fifth year. He said this happens to people, and he was right. It sneaks into you like a virus or like a weed and it secretly grows and spreads and numbs you and dumbs you. I'm like a statue covered in vines. Cracked. Not yet broken, but definitely cracked. Spending so much time with J.D. has helped me realize the extent of my muckiness. I was aware of it before I met him, I really was. But I just didn't know how bad I had let it become. It's good. He's good. He's good for me. I don't need people. I never have and I never will. But that aside, J.D. came into my life at just the right moment. Exactly as if he was meant to. And I really cannot imagine it any other way now. He's immediately become a part of my life, and it's really, really good. So, I am resolving now to cut myself free from this cobweb cell I'm in. I need to get a little crazy again, as I was 6 or 7 years ago. Time to bring back the old-school freak. Time to take on a new medium, and find a completely new reinvented form of "artist" within me. I'm dying now, I've been dying, in this trance, I've been fading in Habit, and it's time to save myself. Or, as might be entirely possible, die trying. Either way, whatever the outcome, it will be worth it. *** Saturday April 12th, 2008 7:14pm Song I am addicted to today: “Nothing Came Out” by The Moldy Peaches Book I am currently reading: “Twilight” by Stephenie Meyer I’m up here in New Hampshire for another weekend with my family. My sister and I went out to lunch today with an old childhood mentor. It brought back a lot of memories that I normally would have thought would make me feel weird and awkward, reminding me of the person I used to be, but in actuality it was really quite nice. This goes into a long story, one much too long for this journal, but in a nutshell while I was in college I went through a bad phase and I tried desperately to become a new person and completely forget where I came from and what kind of kid I was. But, strangely, once my sister had Liliana, my childhood memories have all come flooding back at full-force, linking me again to everything in my pre-college life. And then today, meeting Phyllis again for the first time in maybe over 10 years… brought me back in time again to a person I used to be. But like I said, not in a bad way. It was good. It was really, really good. So good it shocked the heck out of me. This past week back home in Brooklyn I’ve been helping J.D. with his project at school (he’s got a real name but for the sake of our privacy I am calling him ‘J.D.’ for reasons which should be obvious to him and anyone who’s ever been to his apartment). He’s making this dress which is really more of a work of art than a garment… I’ve been helping him cut out his pattern pieces until the wee hours of the morning. And next week I might help him finish cutting out the fabric, if he doesn’t get that all done while I am up here in NH. I’m a different person around him. I feel so… selfless. It’s the weirdest thing! I bend over backwards for that guy, and I don’t even hesitate. It’s so hard to explain what’s going on, so maybe I’m just better off not trying to explain at all. I just never thought I could actually achieve this state of mind with another person. J.D. is unlike any other person I have ever known. This whole thing is different than anything I have ever known. And yet, there’s that evil little dark spot in the corner of my brain that whispers nasty thoughts into my ear- Telling me, “It’s not gonna last!” And, “It will be like all the others…” and, of course, “He will get sooooo bored of you… you’re way too average for a beautiful genius like him…” These voices get so loud sometimes I feel like using a gun to get rid of them. But of course, that’s just not sensible. Instead, I have to try and think, “If this lasts forever, then I am by far the #1 luckiest person on the entire freakin planet.” And, yes, I also try to think, “Well, if this doesn’t last (God forbid) then at least it was amazing while it lasted and I’ve learned some great things and felt some even greater things.” But, alas, I really hope this never ends. “Ah,… Banuch.” J.D., you really are driving my insane. And I like it. *** Tuesday March 11th, 2008 1:55pm Song I am addicted to today: “Cause And Effect” by Shy Child Book I am currently reading: “Twilight" by Stephanie Meyer I’m feeling unhinged. I’m feeling drugged up. I’m feeling displaced and electrocuted. I’m feeling shocked, angry, sad, defensive, mean, insecure, doubtful, careless, selfish, confused. I’m abusing friends. I’m negligent to strangers. I'm snapping at coworkers. I don’t care if my train wrecks or not. I don’t care if I stay here or move to some far-away place. I don’t care if I get thrown on the curb by the guy who has currently caught my attention. I also don’t care if he marries me and makes me his domestic property for the rest of my life. I just don’t care. I’ve become addicted to endorphins. I go to the gym before work and after work every day and also several times on the weekends. I fake my well-being and convince myself that I am ok. But then the endorphin level drops and I plunge back down into reality. Or some fucked of version of what reality apparently is. So, I drag my ass back to the gym and get myself another fix. Indeed, it has become an addiction. *** Monday March 10th, 2008 11:50pm Song I am addicted to today: “Little Bird” by Goldfrapp Book I am currently reading: “The Man Who Would Marry Susan Sontag” by Edward Field Spent last week in Santa Barbara. It was beautiful and perfect, of course. I tried to bottle the weather and take it back to NYC with me, but I couldn’t get it past security. If CA let that weather leave the state, there wouldn’t be any reason for anyone to come back to CA! I’m having bi-polar reactions to my family circumstance. One day I’m on Cloud Nine, the next day I’m bitchy and have a taste for blood. ‘Normal’ doesn’t exist for my mind’s state anymore. This whole experience is scary, in the ways in which it is changing the person I am. I finally saw “There Will Be Blood” last night. Boy, was I blown away! This is now definitely my number 1 all-time favorite movie! Just brilliant. Just… fucking… brilliant! Daniel Day-Lewis- I worship you! I get down on my hands and knees and I kiss your feet!! And- hats off to Jonny Greenwood for creating one of the most genius scores a film has ever had. You should have taken home an Oscar for that. Heck, the entire movie really ought to have won Best Picture. Will came along to see the movie with me. He’s a new friend. I like him. He’s proving worthy so far… Tomorrow. Which end of the pole will I wake up on? Nice or mean? I hope, for my co-workers’ sakes, it’s nice Kurt tomorrow. *** Tuesday February 26th, 2008 5:06pm Song I am addicted to today: “Lit Up” by Buckcherry Book I am currently reading: “The Man Who Would Marry Susan Sontag” by Edward Field I am a very tired person today. I’m tired of people asking me on a daily basis how my father is doing. He’s got cancer. How the fuck do you think he’s doing?? Please, please, please stop asking me that question. You’re just rubbing salt in the wound. I’m tired of deadbeat relatives who aren’t there for each other. Don’t get me started on that one. Don’t even go there. Just don’t. I’m tired of people who say they’re your “friend” - but when I say something like, “I think I might need to get some Prozac,” they respond with a dumb ass comment like “Why don’t you just go drink a Red Bull?” Oh yea. Same thing. Great idea. Funny to see just how many of these “friends” have tried to be here for me over these past two weeks. So I’m making cuts to my list of friends. It’s fun, like doing the laundry. If I haven’t told you “I love you” at least once over the past two weeks, chances are you’ve been cut. Sorry. I’m tired of seeing David Beckham all over the media. His face bothers me. Everything he represents, every idea and concept he lives and breathes and bleeds makes me want to puke. The guy is shallower than a pond in the Mojave Desert. The guy is stupid. He’s got “the biggest carbon footprint in the world” and “the largest carbon footprint in human history.” His wife is from the same bimbo planet as Paris Hilton. Yea, it’s true, his face makes my stomach revolt. They actually call that prick a roll model. I can easily think of at least 5 big-time celebrities who SHOULD overdose and die, and he’s one of them. (Heath, I miss you so much, come back to us) I’m tired of the fact that I can’t afford to buy something as small as a studio apartment anywhere in New York City. If I want to ever own my own home, I’d have to move back up north to New Hampshire or someplace just as… not NYC. New York, I give you so, so, so much. SO much. Why can’t you at least give me affordable housing in return??? I mean, really, come on. I’m tired of trying to find models to photograph for free. Why do all of you expect to get paid so much money??? I am not hiring you to think. I am not hiring you to build something. I am not hiring you to save lives. I am not hiring you to do my taxes. I am not hiring you to do any physical labor whatsoever. You didn’t go to college for that face. You were born with it. You didn’t work your ass off for it. You were born with it. You aren’t paying off over $500,000 in student loans for that face. You look pretty. That’s it. It’s not a talent. Its genes. You shouldn’t have an agent, because it’s not a talent. Sewing is a talent. Playing the guitar is a talent. Dancing is a talent. And I hate to toot my own horn, BUT – being a photographer… is a talent! Holding still while someone clicks a picture of your genetically-gifted beautiful face is not a talent. If anything, you should be paying ME to take your stupid pictures. I’m tired of people who litter. Did your mother teach you nothing? Why must you stand 10 feet away from a trash can and toss your candy bar wrapper on the sidewalk or on the subway track? What the heck is wrong with you??? You’re about as smart as a model when you do something as stupid and as lazy as that. Be responsible for your trash. It’s your planet. You only have one, so why go try so hard to fuck it up? Why be so lazy? Walk a few extra feet towards the trash can and put your trash where it belongs!! It’s really not that hard. I do it all the time. If your mother raised you to litter, give me her address so I can go slap her. I’m tired. *** Thursday January 17th, 2008 9:52pm Song I am addicted to today: “Fireflies” by Rhett Miller (featuring Rachael Yamagata) Book I am currently reading: “The Magic Mountain” by Thomas Mann Just finished a three week vacation from work. Which is an absurd amount of time for a vacation. One week was spent here in NYC, and two weeks were spent journeying down the coast of California. All three weeks were spent with someone else, 24/7, day and night. I think I got a fraction of a taste of what it might be like to be married. And let me tell you, it ain’t pretty. But enough about my vacation. I’ve been talking about it to friends constantly since I got back on Monday, and I just want to put it all behind me now. Kurt is a lone ranger, and happy to be one. I am enjoying a brand new computer now! I couldn’t turn down an awesome holiday deal from Dell, and I saved almost $800 on a sleek shiny new XPS M1530. This thing is HOT! By far the most beautiful laptop I have seen to date. Eat your heart out, Apple… cuz now Dell is singing, “My raps - is better than yours…” One thing I will say about California- as we were there for New Years, one evening we were walking across the Golden Gate Bridge. On our way back to the starting side, I looked up at the stars and at the cityscape, and I had a revelation- This year is going to be a great, fantastic, brilliant year! Don’t ask me how I got that revelation, or why I had it, but I had it and I believe it. There’s something in the air… This is gonna be a year to remember. ***

Sunday December 9th, 2007 4:06pm Song I am addicted to today: “Siren” by Tori Amos Book I am currently reading: “Steppenwolf” by Hermann Hesse I finally reconfigured my ‘restored’ computer to edit & access my website once again. This time I won’t be fucking up my computer until it’s time to buy a brand new one. I promise! It’s good to be able to write here again. By the way- this journal page looks horrible in Firefox! It shows correctly in Internet Explorer, so I shall investigate a way to correct how it appears in Firefox. There is always a never-ending list of maintenance tasks when it comes to maintaining websites. Last time I wrote was before Thanksgiving. So… Thanksgiving was, overall, good. Sascha wanted to see New Hampshire, so I brought him home with me to spend the long weekend with me and my family. Which, actually, turned out to be not such a good experience, because every single person (besides Sascha and I, fortunately) came down with the stomach flu. We left a day early, and spent the remainder of the weekend at Tufts down near Boston, where Sascha currently resides and studies. My mom’s home-cooked dinner was amazing, as always. I hate that I forgot to bring home a bunch of left-overs with me. But what can I do besides wait another year for the next Thanksgiving to come around? I head to California briefly next week for work. I won’t be there very long, but enough to get a nice little dose of one of my favorite US states. And I’ll also get to see Tori Amos again! Her final performance of her American Doll Posse Tour is in LA while I am there. What a spectacular coincidence! Jim is also actually flying over from NYC for the show as well, so we’ll be going together, just like we have for all the Tori tours in the past. Jim is worrying over the freakish-stalker-obsessive-fan-implications of flying all the way to LA just for her concert, but I’ve reminded him that he’s only paying $5 for his round trip flight (God bless frequent flier miles), and he would be stupid not to go! He doesn’t even have to pay for a hotel, so, really, there is nothing weird or freakish about him flying all the way out there just for this one concert. (But I won’t mention a certain somebody who flew all the way out to San Jose a couple years ago just to see a Madonna concert…) And then- I celebrated my 31st birthday last week. It fell on a Wednesday this time around, and it’s always hard to get people out on a Wednesday night. But I had a decent amount of people out with me. We started out at Death & Co. in the lower east side, and ended the evening at Bowery Bar. It was my first time going to Death & Co., which was a mistake. I should have scoped it out before the evening. It really was horrible- the host was this tall cold mega bitch from Hell. Luckily our waitress was a cute smiley little fragile thing, but she was constantly overshadowed by the monstrous mega bitch. So, we finished our drinks and our appetizers and abandoned ship and headed over to Bowery Bar, which is always a safe Plan B for just about any occasion/outing. We wound up closing the place. We, a group of young cute single boys and men, loud and vibrant, intense and flirtatious, without any care in the world, with drinks in the air, and arms around shoulders, it was a good way to say farewell to 30. I am looking forward to the upcoming several weeks, as I have a lot of time off scheduled. I have almost one whole month off, from Christmas Eve until the 14th of January. It will be very ‘European’ of me to have this much time off all at once. I do need the break. I need rest. I need to get away from the office and other obligations. I need to focus on being an artist again, and creating things that are meaningful to the justification of my life and principals. I am looking forward to spending some of that time alone, some of that time with family and friends, and some of that time with kindred souls. I wrote a poem yesterday. It was my first poem in about 6 months. And it was the first poem in about a year or so that I think is actually worth half a crap. My old way of writing is broken- it doesn’t work anymore. I realized that quite a while ago. The pen was out of ink, so to speak. Nothing good was coming out. So I put the pen down for a long time, convinced it might actually be for ever. It was around the time that “Ghost on the Highway” was published that I ironically thought that I was done writing. I thought to myself, “Well, this is suitable, this book with themes about death and endings, how suitable that I might be done writing poems forever.” But on a whim yesterday I decided to try to reinvent how I write. If the old way is broken, then naturally, a new way must be discovered. And I think I may have found a way yesterday. This poem I wrote, called “Ink to Bleed”, may in fact be one of the strongest poems I have ever written. It is not in any way complex. It does not have gigantic concepts or ideas. It is about a very simple thing, a very simple experience- but I will not say what that thing is. It is a thing which must be left to the flesh of the poem. It is in the description of this simple thing that makes the poem work so well. Anyway, I let the poem cool off over night. I have read it again and again since yesterday- I do not feel the need to make any more edits or changes, and I have not decided yet that it is trash, and so this is a good sign. It feels so very good to have this thing here that I have created, a creation, an act, a practice that makes me feel like myself again, which is a ‘myself’ I have not been feeling for a very long time. I am curious to try my new reinvented way of writing again very soon, perhaps today, perhaps tomorrow… *** Monday November 13th, 2007 9:30am Song I am addicted to today: “When Your Mind’s Made Up” by Glen Hansard Book I am currently reading: “Steppenwolf” by Hermann Hesse I just spent the weekend with my new friend, Sascha, and one of his best friends, Sabina, both from Germany. This was my first time spending time with Sascha since meeting him at South Station in Boston a week ago. I have to say, Sascha has definitely made an amazing first impression... I suspect this will become a unique kind of friendship. I haven’t been up-keeping this journal on a regular basis only because over the past couple months I’ve been having some technical problems with my computer, but it all resolved now, thanks in part to a delightful woman in India who fixed all my problems via remote control a few days ago. So good to have a reliable system again. Just a reminder of how dependent we all are on technology these days. Even a poet needs his fancy laptop! So now I can once again concoct silly journal entries on a weekly basis. Hoorah. *** Monday October 9th, 2007 Book I am currently reading: “The Road” by Cormac McCarthy Song I am addicted to today: “1963” by Rachael Yamagata I’m getting very upset with this horrible summer weather we’re having in the beginning of October. It’s so wrong it makes me sick. This is it, our new world we’re creating with all our technologies and appliances and cars and computers and selfish needs. This is it, the human race committing suicide. Liliana just turned one year old over the weekend. Hard to believe it. This past year went by so fast, seems like just a few months ago we were gathering around her little form in the hospital up in Manchester, New Hampshire. Now she’s a whole new baby, unrecognizable from the one we were all introduced to 12 months ago. Now she crawls, now she has teeth and hair, now she has the hints and beginnings of a beauty sure to make her a stunning woman to behold when she grows up. Life is getting faster, and I’m trying to find ways of slowing it down. There’s too much stimulus. There’s too much to do, too much to achieve, too much to learn, too much to acquire. I miss the slower days I had growing up in a small town in New Hampshire. I miss not having the internet and not having cell phones and not having a big city with way too much temptation for every single sense and desire within me. *** Thursday September 13th, 2007 Song I am addicted to today: “Miracle” by Tori Amos. Book I am currently reading: “Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln” by Doris Kearns Goodwin. Jim and I are going to see Tori Amos play two nights in a row next month! It’s gonna be sweeeeet! Liliana was baptized last weekend up in New Hampshire, with Heather and me as her godparents. I thought I would cry during the ceremony, but luckily I didn’t. I’d do anything for that little girl, so I guess that’s one of the reasons why I’m her godfather. It’s going to be amazing to watch her grow up and become her own person. She’s so beautiful, so beautiful, there are times I feel close to tears just by watching her do every little thing that she does. Two weeks ago I flew out to California to spend much-needed time with my friends Cynthia and Gordon, and their family. I flew out on a Thursday to Sacramento, where Cynthia and Gordon now live. And on the weekend we drove to Lake Tahoe and met up with their family at their vacation home on Lake Tahoe. California amazes me every time I go by its natural perfection and beauty. If my family wasn’t rooted here on the east coast I’d move to California in a heartbeat. And I am very fortunate to have friends there, so it is very easy to go visit California whenever my time allows. I never realized how big Lake Tahoe was until I saw it with my own eyes! It’s so large, at times I thought I was looking at an ocean and not a lake. It was a religious experience! And luckily, on the last morning there, I even saw a BEAR! Right in the front yard, right in front of my bedroom window! The bear and I bonded and now I feel as though I have part of a bear heart beating inside of me. Ha! Just kidding. But really, suddenly, now bears are one of my favorite creatures. I’m looking forward to the entrance of the fall season. I hope Sara and I will be able to do a road trip out to New Hope, PA, to see the leaves turn and spend a night or two in a cute little bed & breakfast. As I get older I appreciate the changing seasons more. And now I realize I might not have a favorite season. It might actually be the transitions themselves, between each season, that are my favorite parts of the year. Life so far is good with Aaron, the new roommate. He’s not around much, which many people think is a great thing. But I happen to like to know my roommates, and so I’d like it if he was around more often than not. He’s a good kid… hopefully we can become good friends. Saw the movie “Once” last week with Thang. A very good story… and amazing music! I have the soundtrack on my iPod and have been listening to it constantly. I’m trying to encourage as many people as I can to go see it. Sometimes the most simple, the most basic storylines are the most moving, and, boldly, the most realistic. *** Monday July 16th, 2007 12:31am Book I am currently reading: “Stardust” by Neil Gaiman & Charles Vess. Song I am addicted to today: “Confession Of A Murderess“ by J.C. Sone. I woke up about a hour ago and found myself in the midst of a major panic attack. Genia called me. It’s actually the phone ringing that woke me. I nodded off to sleep here in bed quite easily after reading a bit of “Stardust”. She called to tell me of a firefly that had come into her apartment upstairs. She says she has never seen that happen before. I guess she’s right, fireflies don’t enter homes. So I said, “It’s good luck”, and we said goodnight and hung up. Then I laid back down, my mind started wandering to the coming weekend. I am alone. It’s not often I have any problems with that. It’s actually quite nice. Sort of like being on some sort of vacation from an annoying spouse that lasts forever. But then, I know nothing of spouses. But one time I told my sister that I am not sure if being alone is really right, if it’s ok for someone to be alone. She said, “But you’re happy. I can see that you’re ok being alone.” She’s absolutely right to a certain degree. But then, during times of sickness, and then during times like tonight, I wake up, lying in bed, dreading my own thoughts, my own heart, and I turn to my side to wake up someone, to talk, but there’s no one there. I am left alone with myself and with my thoughts, and I can’t even talk about it. I lay, by myself, and I suffer the storm until the morning comes. It’s quite nice, being alone, but sometimes I would just kill for some sweet soul to wake up in the middle of the night like this, someone to wake up and share with him my thoughts, my fears. Someone who could turn and face me, and hear my words, and say, “Listen to me, it’s all going to be ok.” Anyway, I’m wrestling with time. I’m thinking that death is not something you can come to terms with. I don’t think anyone can really truly come to terms with death. There is giving in to it, dealing with it, there is fighting it, there is denying it, and there is running away from it. But there is never any coming to terms with it. At least, that’s what I’m thinking tonight. And look, there’s no one here to disagree with me. So I might as well be right. My Oma died roughly seven years ago. My Opa died about ten years before that. I thought all this time that I had come to terms with their deaths. But in reality, I realize, I haven’t. You would think that you would be over with the drudgery of a death, if it occurred seventeen years ago, when you were on the edge of 13 years old. But it can sit there, in the back of your soul, biding time. Another thing I’ve discovered, here in this empty bed tonight, that a death of a loved one can happen more than once. I don’t mean more than one loved one dying. That is obvious. I mean that the same death of the same loved one can and does happen over and over and over and over again in your mind, in your memory, in your history, in your soul, whatever the fuck you want to call it. It’s like someone just pulled that person away from you, put them in a room on the other side of a wall from you and said “You are not allowed to see this person ever ever again.” That is exactly what death seems to me. It seems that the person is still alive, but they were hidden away and I am told that I am not allowed to see them. Not again, not ever. And it’s torture. It’s the worst kind of torture. I want to talk to them, I want to hear their voices. I want their advice, their answers, their laughs, I want their faces and their smells and the textures of their skin. It’s all right here in my memory, but that’s the part that makes it so tough. I can remember someone so well, they’re right there in front of me in my mind, but no matter how much my heart aches for it, I can’t just extend my hand out and fucking touch them. All I want is to touch them. And this is why we hang on to the material things. This is why we grab out for the photographs, for the hand-written letters, the objects, the plates, the silverware, the pens, the furniture, the clothes, this is why we don’t throw away tattered things that don’t even work anymore. These things are the last remaining physical link we have to the people we are forbidden to see ever, ever again. To the things, to the objects that they loved so much, to the substance that holds so much memory and history, this is as close as we get to being able to hold their living flesh and blood ever again. This is as close I can press my self to that wall separating me from them. I press my ear to it, hoping for a voice. It’s all I can do. There is a wall between me and them, and I am forbidden to see them ever again. Growing old is not the hard part. Growing old is not the thing that sucks. The thing that sucks is the fact that you have no choice but to let go of your childhood, your history, you have no choice but to go forth stark naked into the future, alone, whether you live like me or you live like someone married with five children. You walk on alone, naked, not knowing what the fuck you’re doing with yourself. One by one they go away, it’s like some nasty trick, some nasty predator following you around. You can never go backwards, you can never rewind just to that one point where there was nothing but you and that one person, nothing but that moment when you felt loved so much. It’s all about that moment, isn’t it? It’s about being loved. Someone was watching you grow, was watching you become your own person. You were being loved, and that love made you feel validated, it made you rise up and explode and burn like the sun. I understand why people have children. I understand that none of us chose this. No one chose this at all. We were all, each of us, forced into this. It was thrust upon us. Yes, there are things so amazingly perfect and beautiful about having children. There is something amazingly perfect and beautiful about being alive. I just wish we didn’t have to grow up. I wish time was a thing we could control, instead of it controlling us. You think of those persons, each, one by one, and the way they make you burn like the sun. Each of them, one by one, and indeed yourself, will eventually be claimed by time, forced into a room and forbidden forever again, and all you will have left of them will be memories. It is like all we can really do to keep us all alive is to keep passing love from one to the next. You love someone, watch them grow, and they in turn, hopefully, love you, and when time takes you away, the very closest they then will have to touching you ever again will be by way of memory. I’m still in the midst of my panic attack, by the way. I thought writing about this would help. But it hasn’t. It has simply delayed the unavoidable. But at least I’ve finally finished the drink I started as I came to bed reading “Stardust”. *** Wednesday June 27th, 2007 11:07pm Song I am addicted to today: "Salvation" by Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. Book I am currently reading: "Hitler Made Me A Jew" by Nadia Gould. It is my extreme pleasure to let you know that a new book that my friend Ed Walters put together, "Ghost On The Highway", has just been published. It features the verse & tales of myself, Ed Walters, Heather Hutsell, and Roxanne Nihiline, and also cover artwork by the amazing Bede Murphy. Since we're publishing this all on our own, we need the help of you, our friends, to get the word around. Also, once a certain amount of copies get sold, our book will become available on www.amazon.com and www.bn.com which would really help get our book out there! But that's not why you should buy a copy. You should buy a copy because we're brilliant writers, you love us, we've put our flesh & blood into this project, and we want to share it with you. This is the direct link to the book- http://www.lulu.com/content/860426 Over the next several months we will be getting together here and there around the Boston area and the New York City area to promote the book as much as possible, until we sell out our inventory (or until we die trying and really do become ghosts on the highway!). So, climb on in, buckle your seatbelt, and come ride the highway with us! http://www.lulu.com/content/860426 *** Tuesday June 12th, 2007 5:12pm Song I am addicted to today: “Jeremiah” by Starsailor. Books I am currently reading: “The Sandman” series by Neil Gaiman. Can family be more than people? Can it be a mountain? Can it be a view? Can it be a cool summer breeze under a cloudless summer sky? Can it be the rhythmic throaty language of bullfrogs in a hillside pond? Or a time-worn path through a forest thick with elder birch trees? Can childhood be contained, preserved, memorized, rooted & cultivated in the very Earth itself? In the rocks, in the trees, in the passage of cows grazing in poetic fields of green? When you let go of a land that is itself a family member, is it right and respectful to mourn it as though it were passing away, not only in the history but also into the heart? Is it right to try to hang on to bits and pieces of it, as though they could all be reconstructed into a minor replica of a land years away down the road, as you try, unsuccessfully, to communicate, to share, to give your own long-gone childhood to the future children of your ever-changing family? Is it possible to find the essence of the connection between physical objects and the memories you tie to them? Is there a scientific code? Is there a formula? A recipe? A magical spell that binds it all together? An ancient chant that gives you your pain when it all gets ripped apart? How can a person walk away from this land, these trees, these hills, these valleys and pastures, these crumbling stone walls, without mourning, or wailing out loud, knowing it will forever be gone, away, invisible, untouchable, like the death of a beloved person? It is just land. But somewhere deep down inside you know it has a beating heart, you know that it remembers you as though it had a mind all its own, and you know, as you walk away, that it is crying now for your passing as well. *** Sunday May 20th, 2007 7:25pm Song I am addicted to today: "Fat Slut" by Tori Amos. Book I am currently reading: "Good Omens" by Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman. I don't know what was wrong with me last week, I don't think I was sick at all, and I thought I got about eight hours of sleep each night, but when Friday came around I felt as drained as anything. The whole day I felt as if I could fall asleep simply by resting my head down on my desk. Dana invited me over to her place around 10:00 for drinks, so I figured I would take a cat-nap first. I got home from work around 6:00, immediately put my bag down, went into my room, undressed, crawled under the sheets, and I would guess within twenty seconds of putting my head down on my pillow I was asleep. I didn't wake up until about 10:30pm. I still felt tired, so I read for almost an hour and went right back to sleep again. I didn't wake up again until perhaps 8:00 Saturday morning. Whatever was wrong with me, I guess my body needed to drop into a coma to fight it off. In any case, I felt absolutely excellent for the remainder of the weekend! I didn't really plan to do much this weekend, but the moment I got out of bed Saturday morning I immediately started some major, MAJOR spring cleaning and purging of my bedroom and closets. At the end of the day, I had maybe 100 more square feet of free space in my room, and I had three full trash bags of old clothes I dropped off at the Salvation Army bins down the street. And my crowning achievement was uncovering my secret hiding space of my collection of all the poems I've written in my entire life (the secret hiding space was SO secret that for the longest time even I didn't remember where it was)! Then after the long day I took a break and rewarded myself with a couple Smirnoff Ice's and a Margaret Cho DVD. After my second drink Genia called down from upstairs, asking to go for a bike ride. While I listened to her question with my phone to my ear, I considered it- I thought about my present state of intoxication, the twinkly tingly feeling in my legs & feet, and I looked out the window at the rain (which maybe Genia hadn't noticed yet??) and I answered, "Sure, why the hell not?" So, Genia came downstairs and I helped her to some Smirnoff, so I wouldn't be the only buzzed one on a bike, and then we took off out onto the streets of Brooklyn. Intoxicated. Swervy. Soaking wet. And laughing our asses off. Today I spent about six hours straight going through my "hidden vault" of life-long poetry, purging it of double copies & indiscernible note scribblings, etc. etc. and now I have a fully complete, fully organized, fully purged, fully alphabetized catalogue of every poem I've ever written in my entire life. It feels so sweet to say that! Now I truly do feel as though I am finally on top of my world. I thought I had lost the majority of these poems forever. Turns out I just needed to lose them for a bit, and rediscover them as one rediscovers a time capsule filled with notes, pictures, tapes, toys, love letters, hair trimmings, and much, much more. I almost feel motivated to go through this catalogue of at least a couple hundred of poems and pull out the 50 strongest ones and publish a book. I did say almost. Speaking of publishing, Ed tells me he is -THIS CLOSE!- to getting his book published! This is a book featuring the brilliant scramblings and dribblings (otherwise known as "poetry and a short story") of Ed, myself, and one or two other writers, as well as artwork from our fabulous artist friend Matt. Ed's publishing this book all on his own, and with all his own money, and it's an honor and a privilege and a dream come true to have my own poetry woven into his creation. One book featuring the creations of crazy people from Massachusetts, New York, and Alaska. It's just gonna be crazy. Either that, or the combination is going to make it come out completely normal. I think Ed said once it is published it will come up in searches on websites like Amazon, Barnes & Noble, etc., and if so then when the time comes I will have links to it posted all over this website of mine. I take pictures. I write poems. I draw things. I share my thoughts. I expose myself with all these random things I do. I completely expose myself, with no apologies. I do this shamelessly. I do this for one reason and one reason only. Life, as everyone knows, is short. My life is short. My life is short. In a blink, this party will all soon be over. After I die, my essence, my memory, my immortality, my ingredients, my humanity, my honesty, whatever you wish to call it, shall remain in my expressions. In all of my strengths, and in all of my weaknesses, in all of my talents, and in all of my faults, I want to be remembered. Perhaps I would be more subdued if I actually believed in the afterlife. But everyone knows I don't. If so inclined, you may call all of these things, these efforts, my Children. You may love them, you may hate them, you may not even notice them at all. But they are mine. ***
Thursday May 17th, 2007 3:23pm Song I am addicted to today: “Innocence” by Björk. Book I am currently reading: “Good Omens” by Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman. I’m doing everything I possibly can to stop using plastic shopping bags. On practically a daily basis I pick up my lunches & snacks at the Whole Foods market at 24th & 7th near my office. I am so used to the habit of accepting my purchases in plastic bags, that I never really stopped to think about it until now, that I really don’t ever need to use plastic bags in those circumstances. I almost always have my backpack with me, and if not, I am usually buying an amount of stuff I can just carry in my hands anyway. I am also progressively replacing all the incandescent bulbs in my house, one bulb at a time. Small step by small step I am trying to break my bad habits, small step by small step I am trying to become more “green”. When I grew up in good ol’ Merrimack, New Hampshire, I spent most of my time roller skating over at the Good Times Roller Skating Center. For better or worse, I grew up in that place. For better or worse, the owners of that place were my role models. I actually grew up wanting to be just like them. And I was a “competitive skater”. That’s not something I often admit to anymore; not that I am ashamed of it, per say, but it’s not exactly like saying I was on the local swim team or the soccer team or gymnastics or anything like that. Also- it was a period thing. A trend. It was cool back then, and back then it was a cool thing to brag about. But sadly, it went out of style. And I suppose that’s why Good Times is up for sale now. Who will buy it? A roller skating fanatic? A Developer? Someone who might turn it into a personal storage facility? Going back through all my childhood memories, reliving all those days spent roller skating, has placed me in a somber mood. To think of that childhood place being sold, torn down, never again used as it was, makes me very sad. I always imagined my sister and I would go back for old time’s sake, put on a pair of skates, and fly around in circles on the rink, bopping to our favorite pop songs. Heck, I was even looking forward to the possibility of bringing my niece there once she got to a good age, bringing her to experience the kind of thing her mom and I experienced when we were little kids. But it looks like that isn’t going to happen. I even fantasized about buying the place myself, but they want something outrageous like $1.4M, plus or minus, and where is a little nobody like me going to come up with that kind of money?? Who would even care to invest in a roller skating rink these days?? Yea, I would make it cool again, I would do things that would bring the masses back to the rink (I even already have a business plan in my head, complete with theme nights, group specials, multi-use shares, etc.), but really, who in their right mind would back a poor starving artist like me, a hopeless daydreamer? I guess I’m just going to have to finally let go of that childhood memory. The good news is, the Bedford pool, where I spent my summers learning how to swim, and where I eventually become a certified lifeguard for the first time ever, has been completely refurbished and renewed, and is once again beautiful! I do indeed plan to take Liliana there, to teach her how to swim. At least that is one childhood memory I can relive with her! *** Sunday May 13th, 2007 11:08pm Song I am addicted to today: “Code Red” by Tori Amos. Book I am currently reading: “Coraline” by Neil Gaiman. I finally put up the “Designer” portion of this site. I threw it together in just a couple of hours today. It’s there, it’s fair… it’s bare. I’ll be updating it more over the next several months, as it presently does not cover any architectural projects I’ve been involved with from 2001 to today. Basically, it’s just a scanned version of my portfolio from 2001. Nothing more, nothing less. I cannot stop listening to Tori Amos’ new album, “American Doll Posse”. It may be the finest album of her career. If not her finest, definitely among the top 3. I’m already getting butterflies in my stomach for her tour! She better tour with a full band this time around. The dolls deserve that much, don’t they? I did an amazing photoshoot yesterday for Eric’s next book review on the previously mentioned blog site. I shot too models together with the book, and it was very intense. Who knew book reading could be so much fun!! I’ll get the photos to Eric over the next couple of days for his review. That’s it for now. It’s late (for me). And I have a book waiting for me in bed. Tomorrow’s Monday. Kurt needs his beauty sleep. G’night! *** Sunday May 6th, 2007 2:58pm Book I am currently reading: “American Gods” by Neil Gaiman. Song I am addicted to today: “Big Wheel” by Tori Amos. It's so nasty that I never got the 'Designer' portion of this website up and running. BUT... that shall come to end towards the end of this week! I've been working on it, and working, and working, and working... anyway, just a few days and it'll finally be here. Then I can wait another 4 years before updating it yet again! (hey, just kidding). Jim and I went to Björk’s concert at Radio City Music Hall. It was my first Björk concert, and it was amazing! I’m convinced Björk is from another planet. I like her new album, but it’s one of those albums that take several listening-to’s to get into. I have a lot of respect for artists like Björk. How can I not?? A fun little occurrence at the concert was almost running right smack into Elijah Wood in the lobby beforehand. He’s not as short as I was expecting him to me, because I guess all anyone ever says about him when they see him in public is “how short” he is! Maybe he was wearing platforms. I don’t know, I wasn’t exactly checking out his feet, if you know what I mean. I hung out in Soho yesterday afternoon with Jefferson (I picked up an awesome Affliction t-shirt at Yellow Rat Bastard). It was beautiful weather, a great day for shopping and people watching, but Soho gets on my nerves when it gets that busy. Why do people flock to Soho? Because it’s one great shopping hub. All designer and all corporate and all trendy, all things it wasn’t when it was really coooooooool way back in the day when it was all starving artists who lived and worked there. I wish I was here for that part of Soho’s history. But I wasn’t. I can only imagine it was something like Williamsburg, perhaps? Also makes me wonder- will Williamsburg become the next Eurotrash watering hole of NYC? My friend Eric in London wrote a review for an amazing new work of fiction called “Skin Lane” by Neil Bartlett, and he asked me to make some photos to go along with his review. So, I did. My friend Sebastian was more than willing to pose for me, with the book, for Eric’s review. The review & said photos can be found in the ‘fiction’ section of one of the world's most popular gay-themed blog sites. Hopefully to be the start of a long fantastic collaboration between Eric and myself! I can’t wait for it to get a bit warmer so I can start heading to the beach on weekends! I’m so happy that spring is finally here. Nothing is better than a backyard full of grass that needs cutting once a week! Nothing better than green things growing and colorful things blooming and fresh new things smelling so fantastic! My roommate Tara moves out at the end of this month, and Rafael shall be moving in. I can't imagine ever living alone. Friends of mine do it, and I just don't know how it's done. I would drive myself madder hatter than I already am. The sunsets these days, I feel like I can dive right into them... *** Saturday March 17th, 2007 1:14pm Song I am addicted to today: “There There (The Boney King Of Nowhere)” by Radiohead. Book I am currently reading: “The Pale Blue Eye” by Louis Bayard. I haven’t added anything to this journal over the past two weeks because I was going through a long process of revamping my computer. I just posted this entry as well as the one preceding it. My sister keeps sending me these little videos of Liliana over the cell phone. Each new video captures a new aspect of her ever-evolving and ever-expending personality. I love it! Thankfully I will see her two weeks from now at April’s wedding out on Long Island. She’s my angel… my sparkling little fire. Three days ago it was seventy degrees outside. Now, it’s in the thirties, and snowing all over the place. We’re mid-way through March, and it’s snowing. Actually- I don’t mind the snow. But I do absolutely mind the inconsistency of this weather. I wonder what this slinky weather (up and down it goes like a little toy slinky) will do to the overall system of nature? What shall our near future become? I find it laughable that we consider our race to be the most intelligent on the planet. We’re smarter than plants, smarter than all other animals, smarter than rocks, even. So then, why are we the only race that’s destroying the planet? How smart are we now? We’re smart enough to know what we’re doing is wrong, and yet… WE KEEP ON DOING IT. That is not smart. It is the exact opposite- it is really quite dumb. If the degree of a race’s intelligence is scaled off of how the environment is treated, then, by god, even the rocks and plants themselves are smarter than the grand Human Race. We are worse than roaches. We are worse than the deadliest virus. We are worse because we have a conscious and an awareness about what we do; we have the power of choice and the power of action. We know how to right our wrongs, and we CHOOSE NOT to do it. We instead choose ignorance. For that alone our hands shall forever be stained red by the blood of the Earth. The most intelligent… Yeah, right. *** Thursday March 8th, 2007 2:28pm Music I am addicted to today: “Civil Wars: A Tree Is The Best Measured When It Is Down” by Philip Glass/Robert Wilson. Book I am currently reading: “300” by Frank Miller. The brain, the organ for making dreams. The body, the organ for making dreams become reality. The heart, the organ for loving, for hating, for all the flaws and blessings that make us want to dream. I was born in the wrong century. I hate the modern world. Don’t be confused by my meaning here- I love technology. I love technology with a passion. But I hate the modern world. If I could take today’s computers, the Internet, and medicine back to the days of King Arthur, I would. Back to the days when art held a supreme seat in the design and creation of society, craftsmanship was a thing of the hand, and when the land, the very Earth was respected, admired and worshiped. Back to the day when horses carried you from city to city, when knights battled it out on fields of glory, hand-to-hand, and fires were lit each night around which great stories would be told and told and told. I am looking forward to the summer. I am looking forward to spending days on the beach, with friends, and I am looking forward to the moments during which new friends will be made from strangers. My time out on the planes with my Pegasus was a good time, but Pegasus has gone to pasture, and I am left to roam about this jubilant forest alone and happy, until my next Pegasus arrives to fly me away. I am looking forward to a summer Pegasus! I am looking forward to the summer nights with my family, with Liliana, seeing the summer for the first time ever through her eyes. I look forward to cousins growing older and getting married, I am looking forward to those fresh air New England breezes that smell like sun-made perfume, I am looking forward to the happy faces of flowers that show themselves in my backyard, those blood-red rose bushes that I planted there myself, in that earthy soil, my bare hands connecting with the bare earth of medieval times in my mind’s eye… *** Thursday March 1st, 2007 11:03am Song I am addicted to today: “Summer In The City” by Regina Spektor. Book I am currently reading: "Eldest” by Christopher Paolini MySpace. Oh, MySpace. What a strange little device you are! It’s getting to the point where the only people who aren’t on MySpace are either over the age of 40, or are dead, or have absolutely no life and live way out in the middle of the Sahara. MySpace made me sad today. Why? Because I went to look at the Merrimack High page on MySpace. Good ol’ class of 1995. What happened to everyone? They all grew up. A lot of them got fat. Some of them got thin. Most of them got married and became parents. And most likely 90% of them still live up there in New Hampshire somewhere. Most of the pretty girls stayed pretty, even some of the ugly ones managed to blossom somewhere along the road of life. But the guys… the guys all grew up, have facial hair and chest hair, weigh over 165 pounds, and all of them, all of them except for one (me) turned out to be completely heterosexual. And the funny thing is, the funny thing that is really the most depressing thing in the entire world, is that all the pretty boys became ugly men. All my old high school crushes… man how I would secretly swoon over them… they all lost their beauty. So I guess it’s a good thing I’m the only fag out of the bunch. All of these ugly 30 year old men, they were the most BEAUTIFUL creatures on the earth when they were 18! Amazing what consequence of sexuality can do to a man. But high school crushes aside- browsing through all these MySpace profiles made me long for those never-ending years when I was growing up in Merrimack, New Hampshire. I look back to who I was then, and I look at who I am now, and all the crap that played out in between like so many suicidal plays between two cast iron book ends. I miss the innocence, I guess. Even the crushes back then… those high school crushes were the most intense feelings that ever existed for me. You know it was great when a crush on a man could make you feel suicidal! So intense- like the world would just stop rotating if anything actually HAPPENED with any of those crushes. But nothing ever did. I guess those could have been among the loneliest years of my life. If anything, I would write something down on a piece of paper, write down my feelings and desires in black and white, which would for some strange reason make it all the more real for me. But all those words got crumpled up and torn up and tossed away in the end. Those feelings becoming words were the most real things that ever happened to me back then. All these kids who I graduated with in 1995 have grown up and have become different people. Everyone I knew back then, everyone I liked, everyone I hated, everyone I swooned over, all those kids are gone and will never come back. But me? Some major parts of me are still the same as they were back then. My heart is the same. My mind is the same. And most importantly, I guess, my longing and my angst are still the same. Oh, MySpace. What have you done… *** Saturday February 24th, 2007 1:10pm Song I am addicted to today: “Terrible Lie” performed by Mercury Falls. Book I am currently reading: “Eldest” by Christopher Paolini. My dreams are extremely vivid whenever Pegasus spends the night with me. We don’t ever get much sleep together, but when I do sleep, I have dream after dream that are as clear and as focused as conscious reality. It’s quite strange. And then when he’s gone, it’s the usual fragmented, delayed remembrance. Lately I’ve been dreaming of past lovers, coworkers, family members, but surprisingly I seem to have stopped dreaming about monsters, violence and fear that I used to dream about all the time in years past. I don’t know where this is all heading, this thing I have with Pegasus. It’s becoming clear to me that we both are seeking a lot of things, some of them the same, many of them different, in this relationship. I know it is not as simple as saying it is all due to the twelve year age difference between him and me. It is more than that, even though that is a major factor. It is also due to drastically different upbringings. Myself, I know I didn’t come into my own until after I moved out of my parents’ house permanently during my college years. I am curious to see how he blossoms and evolves once he experiences many of the same things that I already had in my past. I have finally reached a point in my life where I have enough experience to look back upon and learn great things from. For example, if this relationship were to happen two or more years ago, I definitely would have done what was my usual thing at the time and I would have run away from it by now. But instead of running, I stop and I compare him to people like Eddie and Sebastian, and I try to be less critical and less paranoid as I always have been before. I am learning to just relax and go with the flow. I am trying very hard to be less demanding and more forgiving of things that normally would send me on an emotional rampage. I suppose I am learning, quite slowly, how to be more… normal. If I can do that, then maybe for once in my life a relationship would actually last long enough so that I can call it a relationship without feeling like I am lying to myself. Jason told me the other day that the only way I will ever have a long-term relationship with someone is if I find someone who offers me something that I actually need. And I suppose that is what my problem is. I’ve never NEEDED anything from anyone. Or if I do actually need something, I will have no idea what that thing is until someone offers it to me. It’s an interesting idea, but I pretty much shot it down the moment Jason said it to me. I shot it down, but I kept its bloody form close to mind. He may be right. But Dr. Ruth Jason definitely is not. I spent Presidents Day up in New Hampshire. Liliana is getting so big! She’s being more vocal, she’s kicking a lot and grabbing onto everything that comes within fingers’ reach! She’s discovering she can actually DO things and MAKE things happen. It’s a fascinating process to observe! She’s the most perfect little being I’ve ever seen in my entire life. I know I keep saying that, but it’s true. She’s sheer brilliance. My goal is to buy a house within the next five years. Somewhere outside of the city, closer to my family. But that’s all I’ve decided so far. There’s a lot I need to figure out. I know I’ll still stay here in NYC on a full-time basis, and I want to buy an old farm house I can fix up and add to gradually, someplace I can get to once or twice a month. And then, in time, perhaps even as far ahead as ‘retirement’, live there permanently. I have quite a few states to choose from – New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Vermont, and New Hampshire. Many people buy an apartment. But that’s not for me. I can’t own a part of a thing. I must own a whole thing, independent from any other things. I need to own an entire building, on an entire lot. I need to own a house. An apartment is what you rent. A house is what you own. The idea of owning something like a house is such an awesome one! Especially if it’s a house you know could potentially be a part of the rest of your life. Of course, I could be jumping the gun with that sentiment. And I am thinking out loud here in this journal. All I really know is this: I am going to buy a house in the next 5 years. That is it. My new favorite television series is “24”. That is the only show I watch right now. I was into “Lost”, but I am convinced the writers are just as lost as their characters are. And I was also into “Grey’s Anatomy”, but the writers had Meredith drowned in a river for, what was it? Two or three whole episodes? I’ve lost count! AND they somehow managed to bring her back to life! Anyone dumb enough to buy that as a realistic situation should go take a CRP & lifeguarding course and find out just how long the human brain can survive without oxygen. So anyway, yes, “24”. One of the best-made shows ever made. That’s no exaggeration! I didn’t get into that show until a couple months ago, and they are currently on the sixth season which means I’ve had to buy the prior seasons on DVD’s to get all caught up. That’s basically what I’ve done with all my free time… I am almost embarrassed to admit that. My life for several weeks was basically one long “24” marathon. But I am so addicted… I want to be Jack Bauer! He’s by far the best hero ever imagined. I am in complete awe of his strength, his will, his sacrifice, and his conviction to do what is right. *** Thursday February 15th, 2007 10:30am Song I am addicted to today: "Arrest Yourself" by Hot Chip Buried in snow. We are all buried in snow. It’s cold, it’s windy, I hate it I hate it I hate it I hate it. Went to dinner and a movie last night with Pegasus (my nickname for the one who shall remain unnamed in this journal) for Valentine’s Day. The restaurant was dead. We went to Chumley’s down in the village, one of my favorites. Actually, it was dead when we got there around 5:45 but by the time 7:00 came around it was pretty busy. We sat at a small table right next to the roaring fireplace, warm and cozy. After dinner we went and saw “Hannibal Rising”. I expected to not be crazy about it, but I was actually quite entertained, and very impressed by Gaspard Ulliel’s acting ability. I’ve never seen any of his movies before, but he could very well become one of my new favorite actors. Also, Li Gong, I’ve realized finally, is just simply one of the most beautiful women alive. I can watch her forever. I’m heading up to New Hampshire this weekend to see my family. For once I am avoiding the Chinatown bus by hitching a ride with Jason, since he’s driving to Boston Friday afternoon. Liliana is growing so quickly and I really try hard not to miss any of it. Also, dad seems to be doing well with the cancer treatments, and I am looking forward to seeing him. Ed is very close to getting the book published. He showed me the cover last week and it’s amazing. I’m really excited about this project! Hopefully it will peak some interest and will motivate us to do a second book… We shall see. Or, maybe I will try self-publishing my own book, combining photography with poetry. Who knows. It’s fun to think about at least. *** Tuesday January 31th, 2007 11:32am Song I am addicted to today: "A Prayer For England" by Massive Attack Nothing to write about today. Just a little poem I wrote last week: THE BUILDING Graceful ruin graceful death graceful birth graceful face A pillar to the sky high holding high on the top of your upstretched hands Lies my heart. A beautiful ruin, I shall name you Acropolis. Inside of you lives my breath, filling you Drawing you one stone at a time, building you By loving you- by wanting to... I want to fly within you. Pillars raising me so high without you I would die. If you let me draw you, what will you, what will you? Your will... like hewn stones on a plinthe. You are becoming the story of me. But you ask me, Why? An architect draws buildings because he wishes to fly. That's why. *** Saturday January 27th, 2007 4:21pm Song I am obsessed with today: "Precious Things" by Tori Amos Not a whole lot to report this week. Which I guess is a good thing. Well, I’ve seen some pretty good movies lately, my top favorites so far being: Children of Men, Pan’s Labyrinth, and Perfume. Next week I will go see The Queen with my friend Annie. Also, last night I saw a preview for “300”, which looks simply AMAZING!!!! Can’t wait to see that one!! The winter has caught up with us these couple of weeks, so there’s really not much to do besides go watch movies. So, things seem to be going remarkably well with the guy I started dating a few weeks ago. Things are moving so very quickly, which we are trying to control. But we’ve examined it and have discussed it from all possible angles and we’ve decided to give a relationship a try. So far, so good. His birthday is Monday, so we’re spending this whole weekend celebrating it. I can’t say what exactly we’ll be doing, because he may be reading this. But it will be fun, and I also think he will appreciate his gifts which were very carefully contemplated and selected by moi. I’m purposefully not saying much about him, his name, or what he does, out of respect for his (and my) privacy. I know I’ve always been very outspoken in this journal in the past. But things are changing now. This is something very special, and I intend to be very selfish about it and not share it with anyone who is not directly involved in my life. I got a jury summons for Monday morning. I really hope they don’t select me… I can’t afford to take time off from work for a potentially long case lasting several days. If it turns out to be a day or two, I suppose that would be ok. I’ve never done jury duty before, and I kind of would like to keep it that way. Call me a prude. What a dull entry! Well, I said there wasn’t much going on, didn’t I? So, here we are. *** Wednesday January 11th, 2007 5:27pm Song I am obsessed with today: “Silent Shout” by The Knife Book I am currently reading: “Eragon” by Christopher Paolini Here’s a lengthy entry to make up for a long gap of innocent silence- I spent the holidays up in New Hampshire with my parents, my sister, her husband, and my baby niece Liliana. I was there for a little over a week. It was the first time in god knows how many years we’ve exchanged gifts, which was actually a nice habit to return to, despite the mobbed malls, traffic, and parking battles. All week long all I did was eat & sleep, read, watch 2 whole seasons of “24”, and help my sister take care of the baby. My parents flew off to Saint Martin to celebrate their 35th wedding anniversary. I house sat for them while they were away. They left the day after Christmas and returned New Year ’s Eve. They seemed to have a really great time. I’m glad they went- they hadn’t been anywhere since Lori and Andy’s wedding in Barbados back in 2004. I was planning to spend a lot of time training while I was up there, but I injured myself somehow (and will refrain from saying exactly what was injured, as that is rather personal- having to do with ‘manly’ things), and couldn’t run or swim, much less walk comfortably. So I am sure I managed to put on a few pounds of holiday snacking, but I frankly don’t give a damn. But of course, I fully recovered by the end of my vacation, and have resumed my training the day after I returned to NYC. I haven’t been writing any poetry in quite some time, but today I finally managed to put pen to paper, so to speak. My friend Ed up in Massachusetts is working on a project involving a few different writers, myself included. He is using a wide spectrum of poems I have written since High School, all previously unpublished work, and he would like me to write 3 or 4 more poems specifically for this project, which I feel quite honored to do. But since I haven’t written in so long, a part of me wasn’t sure if I could come up with anything worth anyone’s attention. But I wrote 2 poems earlier today, and I kinda like how they came out. We’ll see if Ed also likes them. For the record- I am not posting any more new poetry on my site, aside from what is already there, because my involvement in Ed’s project has made me realize that I should pursue more publishing endeavors, and therefore need to keep all future poems secret & untouched for potential publishers (many, if not all, publishers consider website poetry to be ‘published’ poetry). So- if you somehow like what I write, and want to read more, you’re gonna have to wait for me to get published elsewhere in the future… if it ever comes to that. I will also give details about Ed’s project when it is very close to becoming a finished product. I’m a little scared- I met someone a week ago who I quite suddenly got really intense feelings for. We’ve only hung out a few times, but he’s constantly on my mind. So, now I am trying hard not to smother him or annoy him or bore him with constant phone calls, emails, etc. It’s not often I feel so intensely for someone (I can count on less than one hand’s worth of fingers how many times in the past my crushes have had this level of intensity). I have absolutely no idea if this thing will last a week, a month, or a year. I guess I could compare it to a pregnancy- the first 4 months could mean anything, and it’s best not to announce the pregnancy until after the 4th month, because by that point it’s pretty definite that it’s gonna happen. And so I feel as though I must protect this crush, this man who is the recent focus of my daily thoughts (and who also happens to be the core inspiration of today’s 2 new poems). I feel like with the slightest move, I could lose him, or keep him forever. I’m trying not to let past experiences discourage me. Trying not to remember a certain palm reader’s prediction of my life. It’s amazing how you can meet one person, and suddenly feel as though that one person is the only thing you could possibly need in your life to truly be happy. Blah... Why do crushes always make me so incredibly cheesy?????? I wish I was better at coping with this kind of shit. I was perfectly content before you wandered into my life. But you busted through, made me fall for you, and look at me now! You’re all I can think of… If this thing isn’t gonna last, please do what you must, just promise me you’ll be gentle with me in the end... or, forever. ***

Wednesday December 20th, 2006 2:53pm Song I am addicted to today: “Back To Black” by Amy Winehouse Book I am currently reading: “Send Me” by Patrick Ryan The doctors told him he has one to five years left. This idea, this concept, this prediction is tumbling round and round inside of my head constantly without rest without pause without mercy. I designed a crematorium in architecture school around my fears of the future of me and him. But I thought I was creating a fiction. Who knew it would linger around in my mind to haunt me and taunt me. I was foolish to think I could escape it. It makes me want to call someone. Or maybe just hurt someone. Makes me want to jump on a plane and fly to Canada. One to five years. I need to stop that crematorium from becoming my life. It's not about me. It's not about me. *** Wednesday December 6th, 2006 12:51pm Song I am addicted to today: “Break Your Neck” by Shy Child OK- for a brief moment I must write about my three favorite television shows: Gilmore Girls, Grey’s Anatomy and Lost. I am so pissed off that Gilmore Girls has gone to hell in a handbag because the lame ass CW thought they could handle it without Amy Sherman Palladino. Stupid! Stupid! Stupid network!!! It went from being the #1 best show on television to being one of the worst. Thankfully, my cousin Ally got me hooked on Grey’s Anatomy. Thankfully, there are other brilliant writers out there (and other smarter networks for that matter), like Shonda Rhimes, and Damon Lindelof, who do fantastic work and help prevent me from committing suicide over the absence of someone like Amy Sherman Palladino. OK. TV talk is done. My birthday was yesterday, but I’ve decided to take 30 days to celebrate turning 30 years. I started celebrating Friday night, all throughout the weekend, and I will continue every day until the end of this month when I will have a final celebration with my family. Turning 30 seems to be a bigger deal for everyone around me than it is for me. It’s very strange. It’s a landmark year, and the last landmark year I had before this one was 21. So in a way, I feel like I am turning 21 again. I do actually feel younger, but I also feel a whole lot more comfortable with myself, which is definitely not how I felt when I really was younger. This has been a major year for me, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that this year has landed on this age. My grandfather passed away. My father was diagnosed with lung cancer. My sister gave birth to her first child, my beautiful niece Liliana. I’ve started questioning my professional reality. On top of all that, I am reevaluating all of my friendships, and I am also trying to examine why I have absolutely no desire to be involved in a relationship. On the mention of my late grandfather- one of the things I got for my birthday was a tattoo. The tattoo artist combined the Sagittarius (me) and the Taurus (my grandfather) astrological symbols into one and I had him put it on my left shoulder. It basically resembles a bull’s head with horns that turn into arrows. The bull’s face also sort of resembles a heart. I did this in honor of my love for my Pop-Pop. Truthfully, growing up I never pictured myself turning 30. 30 was for other people, not me. Or maybe just the state of mind of 30. I spent the better half of my twenties worrying about reaching 30, worrying about never being in my 20’s ever, ever again. Feeling like something major and dark happens when you exit the 20’s. But nothing happens. You get closer and closer to 30 and you realize that it’s really nothing more than just another stupid little number, nothing more than just another day. Nothing changed. Big things happened to Jesus when he was my age, but normal people? Normal people make a choice. They choose to either grow old or to stay young. Myself? I’m choosing to stay young. *** Monday November 20, 2006 10:19pm Song I am addicted to today: Regina Spektor’s “Us” Dad’s in the hospital again. I’ve tried dating again but guys these days in this city they all act like they want you to like them but none of them ever act like they like you. It all seems backwards. The bosses suddenly now think yelling’s a good communication tool. At first I thought it was just me but the walls are thin and it’s all of us, almost like they’re trying to yell us all into resignation. Dad’s in the hospital again, my sister calls and says "This is all growing old is about." Whenever I go home I’m mean to my parents. I argue and scowl and then I run back down to NYC and feel bad for acting the way I do. When will I stop being so selfish? Is it fair for my sister to be up there with them while I live down here and fantasize about dreaming when my sister’s shoulders bear all the weight of my parents’ aging? When siblings grow up, there’s the one who stays and there’s the one who flees. I can’t even bring myself to write three poems. I live for my niece. I'd die just to watch her grow. My friend needs three more poems to finish the job but I just can’t do it. I can’t open the door. I’m afraid. Just two more weeks until I turn 30 and I'm believing I am one of those people who's meant to be something, anything other than the norm. Liliana's got to be the most perfect little being I've ever been able to behold. Simply thinking about the miracle of the life of her just makes me want to cry. All I want is to make something beautiful. A poem, a picture, a drawing, a song, a love affair, but I can’t ever seem to make any of it work. I’m dating a guy and I want him to act like he likes me but all he does is act like he wants me to like him. The one before him was like that too, as will be the one after this one. I can’t bring myself to be the son I should be. I distance myself and argue with my dad and I can’t even be myself at work anymore because suddenly I get emails and meetings instead of feeling and trust. I don’t even sleep anymore. I run and I swim and I bike and I push myself harder and harder until I cannot physically move anymore, like this past weekend I swear I thought I was going to pass out somewhere. I kept my ID in my front pocket to make it easier for the EMT guys to find out who I was. If it even mattered. I can’t even make something of beauty. Not even three poems. I starve and run my body into the ground. I can’t even make a thing of beauty. And he can’t even act like he likes me. I’ve stopped sleeping but my mentors can’t stop the yelling. My dad's in the hospital again. I need to give him a call tomorrow. *** Friday October 20th, 2006 9:20pm Song I am addicted to today: Evanescence’s “Lacrymosa” Books I am currently reading: “Walden” and “War & Peace” (it’s gonna take a while!) Tonight, I put down a group of names I have never actually put together before on “paper”. I just want to see how big a group of names it actually is, for my own sake. Adam, Russell, Doug, Derek, Marshall, Eric, Some skater punk in college who’s name escapes me at the moment, Some Canadian exchange student who’s name also escapes me, Marc, Christian, Mark, Andy, Nick, another Adam (funny coincidence that they were both swimmers), Scott, Fabio, Richard, Tobias, Billy. Nineteen names. I figure that list probably grows one or two names a year since middle school, at most. This has been one of those days where it all went wrong from the moment I got out of bed, literally. Not one thing has gone as it was supposed to today. So I came home early tonight and threw a load of laundry into the machine. I figure I can’t fuck THAT up. I am so glad this day is over with. I’m done! *** Wednesday October 18th, 2006 4:35pm Song I am addicted to today: Starsailor's "In The Crossfire" Book I am currently reading: Neil Gaiman's "Fragile Things" OK, if I put off writing this another day, Jason's gonna come limping over and will beat my ass into a bloody pulp! Here's the big news: There's a new girl in my life! I am, for the first time ever.............. an uncle!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WOOO HOOOOO!!!!! My NIECE, Liliana (the most beautiful name for the most beautiful girl) was born on Saturday October 7th. I got the call at 12:30am Saturday night and took the first bus out of Chinatown Sunday morning. I spent the whole week with my family and got back down here late three nights ago. Liliana is the most beautiful, the most perfect little baby I have ever seen in my entire life. Even just a few days after her birth I could already sense her character developing. She's my new princess! I took hundreds of pictures of her, and helped my sister and her husband out at their house- I put together Liliana's stroller, her playpen, and her swing. I held her, smelled her, talked to her, watched her sleep, and listened to her breathe. When her eyes opened and looked at me, I smiled the warmest smile I feel I have ever smiled since I was a young boy. I'll see her again soon, and before I do I plan on doing some serious damage up at FAO Schwartz! Of course, one of the first things this uncle thinks about is her future. Where she grows up, the kinds of friends she will have, the role she will play in my family, the role she will play in the world around us. I can remember a couple years ago, my sister's husband telling me he wasn't sure if he wanted to raise a child in today's world. That's a thought everyone probably thinks, when weighing the mental pros and cons to having children. My argument to that is this: Perhaps the only way to make this downward-spiraling world any better is by having children and RAISING THEM TO BE AMAZING HUMAN BEINGS. It blows my mind to consider the effect one decent human being can have on the world. Perhaps it is an easier concept to grasp if we regard people as butterflies. After all, a butterfly flaps it's wings... a hurricane strikes miles away. I'm dying in anticipation for the hurricanes Liliana will bring forth onto the world! I will call her birth the Liliana Effect. I wonder about the version of Iraq Liliana will know when she becomes a young adult. How will that hurricane play out? What will she read in the history books about a family named Bush? The world today makes me nervous, I admit. Soldiers raping children, nuclear tests, controlling media... And it's interesting to take notice of the moments during which you can actually understand what would make someone a so-called "terrorist". I myself have a slowly growing list of targets. Were I to start an underground movement, my bomb list (so far) would be: 1. Banks (not all banks, only certain Goliathesque banks with profane & obnoxious fees) 2. Credit card companies (I have to say, I would bomb them all) 3. Cell phone companies (indeed, they're all each and every one of them completely criminal) 4. Insurance companies (only the ones who don't ever pay or are easily scared off by potential tsunamis) But instead of bombing the true criminal entities of America, I find my comfort and satisfaction in simple things. Like a certain book named "Walden". On the subway into work this morning the last paragraph of chapter 8 I read before closing the book made me gitty (for lack of a smarter word). It goes as follows: "You who govern public affairs, what need have you to employ punishments? Love virtue, and the people will be virtuous. The virtues of a superior man are like the wind; the virtues of a common man are like the grass; the grass, when the wind passes over it, bends." If words like those can still be read and comprehended by the minds of today's people, then perhaps times are not yet all that bad. Perhaps there is still hope for a better world. I've got small butterflies on my mind. Little things of beauty... flapping their wings. The birth of butterflies is ever such a miraculous event. Indeed, I actually feel the wise influence of a Creator some have nicknamed 'God'. *** Thursday September 28th, 2006 5:48pm Song I am addicted to today: Pete Yorn’s “Vampyre” Books I am currently reading: Walden, and War & Peace My dad finished his first (and hopefully his only) round of chemo, and continues with his radiation treatments for another couple of weeks. Then they scan him again to see if his lung cancer has gone into remission or not. And also just another couple weeks until my sister goes into labor! Perfect timing on behalf of nature, no? I just spent a week and California and then the next week after that in New Hampshire. My friends Mandy and Erika own and run their own motorcycle academy in Santa Monica. Next time I go out to visit them I will take their course and get my California motorcycle driver’s license. It would be so fun to ride along the coast of Cali on a bike! That would be a divine feeling of ultimate freedom. Jason moves back from Saudi Arabia this week. At first he was just coming back for a few days to get his working visa in order, but he’s decided to come back for good now. Apparently, the experience over there wasn’t all he was assuming it would be. But I hope he remains optimistic and views it as a valuable learning experience, if nothing else. I broke it off with Jason a couple weeks ago, for two big reasons- the distance, and my family circumstances. Now he’s taking care of the distance thing by moving back to NYC, but there is still my family… It’s hard to explain, but I need to be single through all this. I hope Jason isn’t moving back for me. My devotion right now is to my family, nothing else. I don’t have the time for any other kinds of relationships in addition to the one I have with my family at this point in my life. Besides, Jason really needs to get his career path in order. So, we both have our own transitions to tackle. My neighbor Genia and I have started a morning routine of going running on the McCarren Park track over in Williamsburg. So far so good, and I hope we can keep it up. I have always ran solo in the past, but it’s good to have a partner on the track. If there’s two of you getting up at 6:00am to go for a run together, you’re less likely to hit the snooze button and go back to sleep (you don’t want to let your running buddy down!). I’ve also picked up on my cycling more too. It’d be great to compete in some triathlons within the next two to three years. But I need a new bike, which is going to set me back a couple grand. Anyway, baby steps. I’ll get to my ideal training level eventually. Tonight Jim is taking me to see Regina Spektor at Town Hall. I’m looking forward to it. The girl’s got talent! I’m very happy right now. Usually I would call this a Beginning-Of-Spring Gitty Gitty feeling (this feeling has a similar effect to listening to Donna Summer’s “I Feel Love”), but hey, if I feel like this now, at the start of fall, I’m not gonna complain! I’ll take it any time I can, baby! *** Tuesday September 12th, 2006 10:27am Song I am addicted to today: Madonna’s “Erotica/You Thrill Me” Remix Books I am currently reading: Walden, War & Peace, and Mysterious Skin. Last week was the first week in many months that I’ve actually felt back to normal, back to my 100% self since all this family stuff started happening. I don’t know what it was that finally clicked back into place, but whatever it was, I am glad it finally happened. Now I am full of energy, feeling like I am ten years younger than I am, very happy, almost like I am on a drug or something. The clouds have lifted. I’ve become a major groupie to Circus Contraption. My roommate Tara works for their show in the East Village, called “Circus Contraption’s Grand American Traveling Dime Museum”. I’ve seen their show 3 times now over the past month, and I’ve seen them perform as a band in Williamsburg twice as well. I just can’t get enough! I stuck around after their variety show the other night to attend the wedding of two of their people who are in love. I even developed a little crush on one of their tech boys, but he doesn’t seem to have any interest in me. Boo hoo! I want to quit my job, quit NYC all together, and go run away with their Circus! But I can’t- I just don’t have the talent. I can’t climb ropes, I can’t do flips or acrobatics, I can’t swallow swords, I can’t juggle… Either you’re born to be with the circus, or you’re not. Or, in my case, you’re born to follow them around everywhere and obsess over them. Circus Contraption’s website is www.circuscontraption.com. I’m going to see their last show on September 23rd, and then after that, when they go back to Seattle, I’m gonna be one very sad, sad little boy. Just four weeks left until my sister has her baby! I’ve been spending as much time up in New Hampshire as possible lately, to be with my dad while he battles his cancer, and to be with my sis while she gets bigger, bigger and bigger. I am so anxious and excited to become an uncle! I’m gonna spoil that baby like no other baby has ever been spoilt before!!! I just cannot wait!!! My friend Jason wants to take me on a trip for my birthday. He gave me three choices- Istanbul, Cairo or Paris. I said I’d prefer Paris. I don’t want him spending that kind of money for me on my birthday (he’ll make all my other friends look bad!), but he’s not letting me back down from this. So- we’ll see if it happens… just another thing to be looking forward to in a month or so! OK, my boss just walked through the door, time to get some work done. *** Thursday August 17, 2006 9:50pm Well, today is the first day in I don’t know how many weeks that I actually feel good and awake and energetic and content and not so dark and depressed. I actually feel like myself again. I don’t know what brought on the sudden change. Maybe it was my supportive friends. Maybe it was me finally subconsciously deciding to wake up. Maybe it was Time. Losing my grandfather was amazingly difficult. More so than I thought it would be. I brought out all the letters he’s written to me over the years and relived each and every one of them. I brought two letters to his memorial service, but there was no chance I would have been able to stand up there and read them in front of my family. I wouldn’t have been able to keep myself together. He always said more in letters than he ever did in person, so I am very lucky that I have these letters, these parts of him, for life. My dad starts his cancer treatments on Monday. I’ll be going up there in a couple weeks to visit him again, as well as my sister and my mom. My dad isn’t the first in this family to have dealings with cancer. And he won’t be the last. I think about my cousin Debbie a lot, and how strong she is; it was because of her perseverance that she overcame it, even though the odds were not exactly comfortable odds. I hope my dad can fight his with the intensity that she fought hers with. He’s overcome plenty in the past. I’m trying to think of this as simply another obstacle in his life that he will get over. I’ve been thinking so much about family during these last several months. Thinking also about new family members and old family members. The timing lately is provoking- my grandfather’s passing and my sister’s first newborn both occurring within a two month period of each other. It definitely puts a lot in perspective. Life will never stop to surprise me, I am in complete awe of the wonder and brilliance and magnificence of it all. Jason took me out for drinks last night, which totally cheered me up. We talked about all the stuff I’m writing about here because he’s had more than his share of it all- the family dealings with the death situations, the cancer situations, etc. etc. When I talk to him about it has a bit more weight because he’s not some random acquaintance who doesn’t really have a very good idea of what I’m going through. My family is my wealth. As it was my grandfather’s. My family is the most important thing I have. Always has been, always will be. There will be death, there will be birth. And everything in between. I can only imagine what the rest of my life will be like from here on out. *** Monday August 7, 2006 8:38pm My grandfather passed away last Tuesday evening. I spent this past weekend up in New Hampshire, with my parents and my sister. The memorial service will be this coming Saturday, out on Long Island. I am only looking forward to it because of closure. This has been a very long period of time for my grandfather, and I am sorry that he didn’t find his peace sooner than he did. Parkinson’s Disease took over his life, and claimed him. Now he can rest in a version of heaven that may very well be some sort of golden version of Walden Pond. I haven’t taken much time off from work since his passing. I find myself being snappy and quick-tempered around my coworkers, and I feel bad because of that. But in the heat of the moment, I just can’t help myself. I hope I’ll be better after this coming weekend is through. I want to write a lot about my grandfather, and why I will miss him so much, but I’ve been talking about him for so much over the past week or two that I honestly can’t do it here right now. Maybe in a day or two. Or next week sometime. Jason calls me almost daily from Saudi Arabia, which is a difficult thing for him to do, given the amount of time he spends at work every single day of the week. I can tell he is trying as hard as possible to be here for me from afar. I wish I had the strength to give him back what he deserves. I actually smile, and even occasionally laugh, when I lean back and think of how trying life is at the moment. I hung out with Eddie when I went up to New England a couple days ago. I haven’t seen him in a year or so, and he was exactly what I needed that day, up there in New Hampshire. Hard to believe I’ve known him now for four years, hard to believe certain feelings have never changed. He gave me the support I needed at the moment, to deal with certain immediate family circumstances, and regardless of whatever the future holds for him and I, I will forever be in debt for his support in times like these. I don’t know what to write right now. So I’m just gonna sign off. *** Saturday July 29, 2006 11:14pm You will always wind up alone. That is one of life’s lessons. Friends, they fade away. Lovers, they fade away. And yes, family, even they fade away. At the end of the road, when all else fades away, the only person you have is yourself. You are your own friend. You are your own lover. You are your own family. You are your own. That’s it. Can you live with yourself as a person? At the end of the day, the only one you will have will be yourself. No matter how many friends you have, no matter how many people say they love you. Do you love yourself? At the end of it all you will need to face the ultimate test all by yourself, and you will only survive it if you can hold yourself in your own arms and take yourself, without anyone else, to a whole new higher level. The strange thing about being aware of my own isolation is actually realizing also how much I am connected to everyone around me. Ironically, the things that set us all apart, our differences, are actually the very things that also link us all together. This is a very difficult thing to understand, but once you do understand it, even when you are aware of your isolation, this realization makes you more at ease. All you have is yourself, and yet at the same time you are connected to everyone around you. You ARE everyone around you. The people you like, and even the people you don’t like. You are them and they are you. Knowing that, is it now easier or harder to love yourself? I went to New Orleans back in 2000. I went to Jackson Square and had a palm reader take my hands in his and tell me what he could read. One of the many things he told me was that I would spend my whole life alone, because I am constantly seeking the truth, constantly seeking something new, constantly seeking that higher level, and that I would never be able to settle down or be with one companion forever. It’s drunken nights like this one that make me stop and think of him, and think of how right he was. And there are many other things he said to me on that day that I dare not write about here, but which I know to also be true. *** Saturday July 15th, 2006 4:39pm I guess one of the reasons why I stop writing a lot in this journal is because I just don't know how to put into words how I feel anymore. There's so much going on, life keeps getting more and more intense as I grow older, more and more weight is felt on my shoulders, and at times when I stop running around and think, and pause, I wonder how the heck I ever keep from breaking. Maybe my saving grace is the idea that this is my life, and I get just one, and so I must savor every aspect of it. I am alive. I am Kurt. And one day I will be no more. My grandfather has Parkinson's Disease, and is in a downward spiral. He's in and out of the hospital, and I visit him as often as I can. They are saying he doesn't remember anymore if you were there at all five minutes after you leave, but I still go anyway. Tomorrow I will go, and I am bringing a copy of "Walden" along, because I think it is one of his favorite books. He gave it to me as a child to read. We even took a trip to Walden Pond. He's the one who encouraged me to become the major book worm that I am today. So I will bring it along tomorrow and read it to him. Whether he's with it or not, I will read to him. Somewhere in his mind I am convinced he will hear me reading, and at that special little place in his mind he will once again be at Walden Pond. My mom has something as well that she is suffering from. A few things, actually. I am trying very hard to be there for her and to help her through it. As if all that isn't enough, I just found out two days ago that my dad has lung cancer. He's a trooper. He's keeping up a great attitude about the situation. But it's very hard to deal with. He told me two days ago, and during those two days I was fine. But this morning I broke down. I'm fine now, but this is just the beginning. It's going to be a very, very long road. I met an amazing guy six weeks ago. We hit it off instantly. He told me at day one that our time would be short because he had moving plans. The company that he works for here in NYC was relocating him to Saudi Arabia, at his request. So, I knew from the start he'd be moving. But it never felt real.... until Thursday night, when I took him to the airport and watched him board the plane and fly away into the sky. As misfortune would have it, he flew away the day right after I found out about my dad's cancer. Add to that, my dear friend Cynthia is also moving. She's going back to California next week. Two amazing people in my life- my spiritual and moral compasses, my confidantes, my friends, my supporters, are both moving away from me. Now, this is when I remind myself of all the wonderful friends I still have here in NYC! But I am sad, nonetheless, at these two departures. That on top of these family issues. I've had better summers, you could say. The bright beacon for my family right now is my pregnant sister. She's due in October, right around the same time as my dad's birthday. I look forward to that happy time! And how does Kurt cope with times like these? He drowns himself in literature. Since finishing "Les Miserables" I've been aching for another great heavy classic to dive into. So I went out and picked up a copy of "War and Peace". Jason comes back from Saudi Arabia in two months for a few days to get his working visa in order. I told him this book will keep me occupied until then... I hide in books. I become fictional characters. I live in different eras and in different times. I am a hero and I am a villain. I am immortal, I am reincarnated. I am born, and I die. And from book to book I keep on surviving. ***
Wednesday May 10th, 2006 9:35pm Just uploaded a few nex photos to the "People" section of the Photography portion of this site. Go check them out. Tuesday May 2nd, 2006 8:55pm Jesus, it’s been ages since I’ve last written… Time’s flying like the pages of a really great book. But great books can either make you laugh or cry or happy or depressed, and right now I’m trying to figure out exactly which genre my life is fitting into best. The best news in my life right now is that my sister is pregnant! I’m going to be an uncle!! I’m so excited… and I think all my friends are getting tired of hearing it. Seriously though, I cannot wait. She’s due October 13th, and I’ve already set aside a week of vacation time so I can be there for it. What else is going on? We had a big party here Friday night to welcome my new roommate, Tara, and to say farewell to Cameron, who is finally moving out after living with my crazy self for two years. The party had a good turnout. We even had a fire going in the backyard, in my new fire bowl. I was totally ready for the neighbors to call the fire department on my ass, but amazingly to my surprise, no one did. So- “Thank you, Kind Neighbors!!” What else… hmm… I really want to take a blind stab at writing some music- my friend Jim even said he’d be willing to help me make a fool of myself, but I have yet to gain the courage to even go over to his house and just sit and pluck away on a guitar or a keyboard. Singing is very personal. I think I’d choose being naked in front of people over singing in front of people in a heart beat. But the part of me that has always written poetry has snapped the pen in two, and is sitting there like a stubborn child, saying, “Enough- I ain’t budging until you get me some music to glue my words to!” Whatever. I’m crazy. I’m unfocused. I’m always trying to become someone new. I am a Sagittarius. I am always a nomad that travels from personality to personality, from action to action. Forever hunting the one person I am supposed to be. I think it’s safe to say I’ve started dating someone, but I think he’s shying away from me. I am a Traditionalist when it comes to dating. I need to gain someone’s trust before putting out. But these days, everyone wants you to put out on the first one or two dates. And that just ain’t my style. I dunno. He’s a great guy, maybe above my league? I suck at this stuff. Many things I am good at, but dating etc. is not one of them [yet]. I still need more practice at that. Anyway, I like him a lot, and usually that’s the first sign that he’s not gonna stick around. I wish he would, though. I like to think I have a lot to offer. I finally caved in and read “The Da Vinci Code”. It seems to be all anyone is talking about these days, in the world of literature, so I won’t mention anything about it here, other than I fully understand WHY it is the topic of so many conversations today. Totally opened up my mind to a lot of possibilities that never really interested me before… it may even inspire me to venture back to church on Sundays???? Who knows. I’ve done shocking things before. *** Saturday March 18th, 2006 3:35pm The answer is: Talk about it. If the foundation beneath it all is love, then talk must happen, even if it hurts. Now it is just a question of when. Talk, talk, talk. Talking makes relationships between all people- lovers, friends, relatives- stronger. I just watched the entire first season of “Lost” on dvd. I have completely gotten myself… um… lost… (ha) in that show! It is nothing less than brilliant, the writing, the directing, the acting, the overall concept… Just completely brilliant. Now I must wait in agony and suspense for the next season to come out on dvd. I am looking forward to Easter, my favorite of all holidays. I’ll be heading up to New Hampshire again to be with my parents, and my sister and her husband. Whenever I am up there, I am secretly keeping my eyes moving from side to side scanning for any decrepit little farm houses that might be for sale. Just a dream… pulling on my pant leg like a child wanting some candy… Hah! Just a few more years… just a few more years… I’ll be up there quite often, looking for that worn out crippled old house, just sitting there in wait, quite patiently, wallowing in history, for me to come along and claim it and remake it into a palace, and grant it a fresh future. I want to grow old and live like Jean Valjean, hiding from the rusty jaws of society, up in that old farm house, prospering in its secret gardens, nurturing pure innocence, a girl named Cosette, who sits in wait for her lover Marius to come and grant her endless happiness. I just want to be strong- I want to live life as an artist and protect those I love. Is that too much to wish for? I don’t think so. *** Tuesday March 14th, 2006 10:41pm What do you do when you find out something about someone you love, something they don’t want you to know? Do you confront them about it? Do you respect their privacy and let it be? Wait for them to decide when the time is right to talk about it? And if that time never comes……? How can you help someone who doesn’t want to be helped? Even though the help they don’t want may be the only thing that brings them some happiness again? Do you put your relationship on the line by taking that risk? What if it all backfires and they never talk to you ever again? If it was your best friend? Your child? Your mother? If you found out one of their secrets? That they have cancer, or diabetes, or Parkinson’s disease? What do you do if you know that by confronting them about it, you run the risk of being shut out of their life forever, and by not confronting them about it, you run the risk of something far worse happening- an accident of some sort? Would you rather this secret find the light of day by the person in question telling you, or by some EMT or doctor telling you against their wishes? If they had known for years and years without telling you, what do you do?????? What would I do if it was me who had the secret? *** Sunday March 5th, 2006 12:34pm Sebastian, if you’re reading this, you will be very pleased to read that I am finally, after all these months, getting my heart tested. We know, you and I, that a murmur is nothing to be worried about. But the dentist needs to do work on my teeth, and he will not do anything until my doctor signs off a statement saying that my heart would be at no risk during the use of any drugs/medication in relation to dental work. I will go get my heart tested, nothing serious will turn up, and you can finally, after about a year or more of this concern, rest. I dreamt last night that I suddenly decided to go to London for the weekend. I’ve had this dream before. I simply pack a bag, hop on a plane, and go to London and show up on my friend Eric’s doorstep and surprise him and Stuart with another visit (the best part about this dream is that the flight takes absolutely no time at all). I miss London. I was supposed to fly to China for a week, with some coworkers, but because of certain issues the trip was cancelled. When at first they asked me if I could go, I was ecstatic about the idea of venturing to China, and since then I’ve been thinking about traveling a lot, and thus, of course, London pops into my mind again. I really need to go somewhere- anywhere- soon. Lisa is taking me on a road trip in a couple weeks to her hometown in Indiana. OK, so it ain’t Europe, (heck it ain’t even the west coast), but it’s something. It’s new territory. And I am a huge sucker for road trips! In fact, sometime over the next couple of years, I will take a month off from everything, rent or buy a crappy car or truck, and drive straight across the country, photographing factories along the way. Such an exciting idea… I’ve been photographing a lot of people lately, some nice stuff is coming out of it, and so I need to do a major revamp of the people section of this site very soon. Free time is a myth these days. Or rather, free time is a unicorn. It’s been so long since last time I had free time, I am starting to doubt my own belief in its existence. But I will lose sleep, I will skip social obligations, I will do what it takes to get some new material on this site. I bore easily, and I need to keep my own interest in myself by producing new art as often as I possibly can. When I don’t, I start to lose faith in myself. And that is a bad thing. But now I am rambling. There is a lot in my head right now, and sometimes the head is the best place to keep certain things. And so the journal starves… For the meantime. *** Wednesday February 15th, 2006 11:26am I think I am becoming more and more obsessed with performing artists because the world is becoming less and less human... Less humanly warm and more technologically cold. I am interested in the actual live muscles, tendons, and flesh of a ballet dancer. I am interested in the actual live emotional sound and texture of a rock singer’s voice. I go out of my way to find objects made by the human hand, as opposed to industrial products. I stay up at night thinking about how I can affect matter with thought. I am interested more in science and religion as well… when I say that, what I mean is I am interested in the one unnamed thing that is the combination of, the embodiment of the both of them. I am interested very much in the ideas discussed in “What The Bleep Do We Know!?”, ideas that talk about religion and science coming back together again, ideas about how mind and matter are one, that thoughts and emotions have actual substance, that what you think really does affect reality, that there is no difference in size between a mountain and a pebble… or between a galaxy and an atom… that the only way to save our world right now is to stop adding to the negative energy/matter, the only way to save our world (and ourselves) is to love, love, love, love, and love. Sounds hokey pokey to some people, but it ain’t. (As Gandhi said, "Nonviolence is the greatest force at the disposal of mankind. It is mightier than the mightiest weapon of destruction devised by the ingenuity of man.") The one thing they say over and over again in “What The Bleep...” is, “You make your day.” You make your reality. You choose what to do. You choose what to feel. You choose what to think. You have complete control. We only become victims when we choose not to take responsibility for our own lives, when we choose to give up our control. The thing that is “God” is inside of your fiber. It’s an actual force that you control. It connects all of us together. If you hurt or hate someone else, you are also hating and hurting yourself. What you put out WILL come back to you. The only way for you to be loved is to love all around you. I normally read tons of fiction (presently I am still reading “Les Misérables”, my own bible which I live by, which I have been reading on and off for the past 3 years), but I will now switch to nonfiction books that discuss the thing that science and religion are all about. That unnamed thing… that has been broken up and fragmented between all our sciences and religions… that is my new focus right now. *** Saturday February 11th, 2006 1:03pm I need to whip my ass into shape for a swim meet at the end of March. I haven’t been swimming more than once or twice a week lately, because the ballet has sort of taken over as my primary form of exercise… but I want to do well in the meet, so I need to get a lot more wet between now and then. As the years go by I keep becoming more and more physical, and I’m not sure why that is. Maybe it has something to do with sitting at a desk eight hours a day… I’d much rather be jumping up and down and running all around than sitting in one place for hours and hours at a time. I see people around me neglecting their bodies, gaining weight, aging quickly, getting slower, and that observation just motivates me to push my body harder and harder to prevent that from happening to me. I’m getting older but I feel like I am getting younger, with swimming and running and ballet and cycling I become stronger and more flexible and more energetic now than I ever was as a kid. And maybe that’s how aging is really supposed to be? Tara’s gonna move in on the 20th, and sublet with us until Cam moves out on June 1st. It’s a good thing, as we all will save tons of money because of it. I was planning to go home to New Hampshire for that weekend, but since Tara asked to move in on the 20th I think I should stay here that weekend and get the place cleaned up, etc. so her move in can be as efficient as possible. I’m excited- and sad at the same time. Sad because Cam is such a great guy, a great roommate, a wonderful personality… and excited that he is being replaced by someone equally as dear to me. This should be my last year in a roommate situation. I think I’ve outgrown it, the living with friends scenario, the moving to a new apartment every 2 years scenario. I’m ready to stay in one place for a long time, and to live alone. After this year with Tara, it’ll be time to only share an apartment with someone I am also “sharing my bed with” (quoting my pal Nick there). We’re supposed to get hit with a blizzard tomorrow, so I may get stranded at the pool after swim practice in the morning… but honestly, I can’t think of a better place to get stranded at. There’s a hot tub, steamy showers, plenty of restaurants and cafes within walking distance… Lisa lives 5 minutes away, we could watch dvd’s all day long… I kinda hope we do get snowed in! *** Thursday January 26th, 2006 2:31pm I am thoroughly convinced that one of these days I will inevitably blow my head off. It's scary, but I think that's the way I'm going when I finally go. I'm just that kind of person. The thought is a funny thought though, I do not intend to be dramatic by declaring such a thought. I'm writing this with an internal chuckle. And it really does not matter; dying is dying, it doesn't matter how you die. The fact is, you die. Some people get hit by trucks, others slip off the subway platform. Me? I'm blowing my brains out. Not now. Not soon. But eventually. I just know. It'll be when I am convinced that my life has no more importance or relevance or influence at all whatsoever. I get these moments, these periods, these episodes, when I get so so low and depressed that I can't bear to get out of bed in the morning. It doesn't happen that frequently. The worst episodes I ever had, the ones during which I thought there would be no return, were 1) senior year of High School, 2) my final year of college, and 3) just a couple weeks ago. They all lasted a lengthy month or so. They are dark dark periods, and I actually just realized I don't want to go on describing them. It's ugly, and it's an ugly I don't want to give a face to here in my words. All I will say is I am well again now, I am very happy, and very intensely involved in life. I've decided that I will get a new roommate in June, when Cameron moves out. I need one more lease period of money-saving and bill-paying before I can handle the full rent on my own. I could do that this June, but it would really be a massive stretch. So- one more year with a roommate! The main idea is to keep my apartment, my home, for as long as I can, simply because I love living there. I felt a connection to that apartment the first moment I stepped foot in it. It was a destiny that I knew belonged to me, and I fought long and hard to get the lease (me and Cameron were up against a few others who also wanted the apartment as strongly as we did). That apartment is meant to have a history with me. I'm trying to get my hands on a church pew for the apartment. My upstairs neighbor has one, and it really looks and works great in her space. My friend Bill said he might be able to get me one from his church... so we'll see if it happens. I don't know why, but I am very drawn to religion lately. I've admittedly been reading a lot of fiction written by outspoken christians, and even the decor of my house (a numerous rosary collection, the intentional acquisition of church pews, etc.) and the recent discussions I am having with individuals who are practicing christians make this renewed fascination obvious to me. I even agreed to go to church with a coworker and his wife, who together live a creative/artistic life that is very much directly tied into catholicism. Where is all this taking me? And why is it happening now? *** Monday January 16th, 2006 12:12am It’s 16° out as I type this. I tried to go to bed but it didn’t work. For some unexplainable reason lately I can’t go to sleep quite as easily as I should. Insomnia. Sometimes it can be inspirational, but not tonight. Weeks I’ve been like this. I remember as a child some mornings I would wake up and look out the late morning window and I’d be blinded by the sun reflecting off a fresh virgin surface of white snow. It was always so silent, up in New Hampshire. And warm, here in my bed, still under the covers, still in my p.j.’s. I would smile at the thought of the eternal day ahead of me, a day of snow wet soaked clothes but happy kind of soaked like a well-earned soaked, the hours in the snow, concluded with the moments in the basement in front of a hot hot wood burning stove peeling of layers upon layers of wet wool and cotton, and then the putting on of fresh clean dry clothes and the running upstairs to all the milk and cookies in the world. Friends were a lot easier back then. You clicked just because you clicked. There wasn’t any sort of complicated game or ulterior motives. Just snow, the virgin white snow on a Sunday morning, just the sharing of that morning with someone else your age. Didn’t even matter if it was a boy or a girl with whom you shared it with. It was all about the subconscious desire to share and have fun. I remember the times as a child when I’d be so happy playing with my toys, and how as I would play with my toys, I would think about growing up and growing old, and how one day somehow someway I would inevitably become an adult, a grown person with responsibility, a person who would no longer play with toys. I couldn’t imagine, no matter how much I tried, what it would actually be like to not play with toys. I always thought, How boring that will be! To not play with toys, what would be the point to life?? How could it be to not use your imagination? How could it be to not live in made-up universes? But I still do it, secretly. I still live in all those made-up universes of my childhood. I still harbor my fantasies and I still harbor my dreams, regardless of how ridiculous I know them to be. There’s a part of that… Sunday morning waking up and seeing the blankets of snow out the window, seeing the beckoning untouched canvas of endless possibilities and adventures!… that I can’t let go of. We used to run laughing through those forests painted over white with snow; we used to run through them as though it was our own Narnia. The forests were all cut down. But they’re still alive and flourishing inside my head, covered in snow. I keep them alive inside myself. And that is why I am the way I am now, the way I was all those years ago waking up and looking out that bright bright Sunday morning window. I don’t dare let go of any of it. OK, I’m relaxed. I’m gonna see if I can sleep now. *** Friday January 13th, 2006 1:51pm Friday the 13th is upon us! Lisa and I are having a movie night tonight at my place. I thought of renting the “Friday The 13th” movies, but I’m not that cheesy. The countdown to June has begun… the month my roommate will move out of my place and move in with his boyfriend. I think I would like to try living alone for once in my life, but I crunched the numbers and it really doesn’t look like I can afford to do that yet. Actually, my ideal situation would be to be in a relationship with someone, and ask that person to move in when Cameron moves out. But I’m still single so I highly doubt that kind of scenario would arise between now and June. So I’ll be hunting for a new roommate in a couple months. I might sublet our spare room to someone now, so Cam and I can save some money before June. But I dunno. I gotta talk to Cam about it. We really only sublet to friends, and at the moment I am not sure if any of my friends are looking to sublet, small-term or long-term. And yes, I could move out in June too, but this apartment is very special to me. It’s more than an apartment. For the first time in my life I took an apartment and made it a home. It’s one-of-a-kind, and I wouldn’t be able to afford anything comparable to it anywhere else in New York. What else is going on? I’ve shot a few new people recently. So I think it’s time to revamp the “people” section on this site with a ton of new pictures. The new pictures I’ve taken are more impressive than the old ones on the site… So maybe I’ll get that done within a week or so, depending on when I get around to scanning all the new photos. My friend Annie gave me a birthday present the other night, a copy of Anne Rice’s “Christ The Lord: Out Of Egypt.” I was surprised to open it to the title page and read, “For Kurt, Happy Birthday, Anne Rice, 2005” written by Rice herself below the title. It made me smile! Such a thoughtful gift. I started reading it the night she gave it to me, and I honestly have to say that I cannot put it down. I’m only about 70 pages into it right now, but I want to say that it is her most daring novel since “Memnoch The Devil”. I am not by any means a religious person, not in the traditional sense of the term. I think I have more in common with atheists, even though I would never label myself one. Anyway, I was always curious to know why no one ever talked about what Jesus might have been like as a child, so I am glad to see someone like Rice exploring that. Yes, this is a book of fiction that she has written, but so is the Bible. Like the Bible, “Christ The Lord” will probably become a very useful tool for many people who are looking for spiritual guidance, etc. If anything, it makes a good read in bed at night… and on the subway… on the lunch break… in the airport waiting room… in the backyard… in any case it’s definitely worth making the time for. Cheers to Anne Rice for putting out another fabulous contribution for all our libraries! I went and saw “Memoirs of a Geisha” last weekend. I haven’t read the book yet but I really liked the movie a lot- So I have my next book on cue after I finish “Christ The Lord”. I have seen a lot of movies lately, actually (what else to do during the wintertime??). The best ones so far were “Memoirs of a Geisha”, “Brokeback Mountain”, “Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe”, and “Family Stone”. I think the next one I will see is “Mrs. Henderson Presents”. Ah, Judy Dench… Gotta love her! *** Tuesday January 10th, 2006 8:06pm Christmas was great. We all met up in Long Island to be together with my grandparents. One of my cousins got engaged on Christmas morning. Very romantic! New Years was also fun, from what I can remember. I went out with Lisa and two of her friends. Went to a few bars in the West Village and Chelsea, drank too much, laughed too much, and spent the following 5 days in bed with the flu. I’ve been back at work for a week now and for some reason it’s really taking me a while to get back into it. Usually I feel energized after a small break from it all, but this time it’s the exact opposite. I feel drained, fatigued, I count the minutes to 5:30pm every day. I can’t figure it out. My big resolution this year is to pay off all my debts so I can start saving money for a house. My dream is to buy an old farm house up north in New Hampshire somewhere, close to my family- so I can be there if/when my sister starts having kids. I’ll still live and work here in New York City… rent a small studio somewhere cheap… and buy an old beat-up pickup truck and head up to NH every couple of weeks or so to work on the farm house. I’m totally aiming to buy a ruin of a house, a project that would take me many years to fix up. Something I could possibly wind up retiring in. Put in new hardwood floors, roll out oriental carpets and cover them all with heavy antique furniture, refurbish all the interior walls with built-in bookshelves, reinforce the original stone foundations, strip and repaint the peeling wood clapboard siding, fix up the barn and turn it into an art studio, pave the dirt driveway, add a new wing on the side or the back, put in a pool, landscape the hell out of the yard, plant trees... basically turn a ruin into a small palace. And finally finish it all by the time my hair turns gray. That’s what I want to do. *** Friday December 23, 2005 9:27pm I’ve had the second half of this week off from work, and it is driving me nuts! I’m a workaholic. No deadlines, no meetings, no pressure, no stress???? I can’t cope!!! So I spent today house cleaning. My roommate’s parents and boyfriend are coming here to our apartment for Christmas weekend and New Year’s. So I had a lot of catching up to do, chore-wise. I’m not necessarily a dirty person. I am actually quite sanitary and neat. But I am also a spot duster. I throw blankets over stains. If I were painting walls, I’d only be painting as high as my arms could reach. Forget ladders. Too much work. But my roomie, on the other hand… it’s against his religion to clean. (just kidding Cam, love ya!) So here I sit. I finished cleaning, for the most part. All the rooms his parents will be in are done, I’ll put it that way. Just stay out of the bedroom! And my parents come tomorrow too. But just to pick me up. We’re all heading out to Long Island for the weekend. My travel plans changed as soon as my grandfather fell and broke his collar bone. Instead of going to New Hampshire, we’re going out to the good ol’ Island. Hey, easier for me. So my parents come and pick me up on their way… Saves me a train ticket! Woo hoo! Picked up Fiona Apple’s new cd today. Love it! I saw her play at the Nokia Theater on my birthday (thanks, Jim, for the best birthday present I got this year!) I was kinda in a down mood last night and today (understatement) but this awesome cd totally picked me up and turned me around. See, you really don’t need Prozac. You need good music. Feeling slow? Pick up Madonna’s new album. Feeling depressed? Pick up Fiona’s. You’ll be all set! No need for drugs! I might go to Rhode Island for new years. Haven’t decided yet. God I hate these holiday vacations… give Kurt a bunch of free time and nothing to do, and he’ll go insane in the membrane! Vacation time spent at home here is torture. Can’t wait to get back to work. ***

Thursday December 22, 2005 11:19pm Remember when I said I’m out of the poetry phase? And why? Forget it, it’s coming back, it’s here, right now, breathing down my neck like a wild beast would… sitting next to me here in bed. Hello. I think I made an empty bottle in the kitchen. It’s like that guy when he comes back after the silence of a year or so, coming back to remind me that I did in fact actually love someone (him) for several years in a row… again and again, over and over, never learning my lesson (and to think I came THIS close to calling him last night) god, what was his name?? Eddie? Nah, can’t be. It’s just me. In the mirror. Mocking myself. Foolish me. This time is the first time it is different. This time he is not the one making the call first. Or the letter. Or the email. This time it is me, and I can’t even do it. I just had a birthday (the only one who came close enough to me for body contact was the dumb door man at a dumb bar escorting me out for being the only honest person in the sad, sad place) and Christmas and New Years are around the corner and the years come whipping by faster and faster now every single year. Friendships… friends… strangers… why call yourself a friend if you can’t even recognize my call for help? Names that start with an “M” (ok, hint: one name but either ends with a “c” or a “k” depending on the person, him or him, and that phase of my life or this one…). I can’t go there. I can’t. I can’t even talk to him. No, my lady, I am sorry, but I cannot call on him for that favor. I feel sorry for you for thinking I can. It’s kind of funny, amusing in a way, how well you think you know me. I am not even welcome in my own apartment. There’s a first. And I thought I had done it all already. Isn’t life just full of surprises. Everyone is selfish and no one ever tries to consider anyone else’s point of view. I can’t see yours and you can’t see mine. What else is there to say? If you want to find me a couple days from now, I’ll be crashing illegally at the pool. At the pool? Well, yes. I actually don’t have anywhere else to go. But only at night. I am sick of this journal. I am not your entertainment. One night, two beds, a stupid goddamn magazine (ok so I was the stupid thing in the room, I had you to point it out to me) and you can’t even call me. Yes I think I know crazy. Look, I just wrote it. All of the above. If I know anything I know crazy. Now would you please stop reading my journal? Thanks. I’m moving away from New York. I am moving away from the U.S. I am moving away from Earth. I am moving away from the Milky Way. Stop asking me, “Are you OK?” I am not writing this for you anymore, darling. From here on I only write for myself. Be warned. I’m writing poetry again. *** Tuesday November 29, 2005 11:14pm I haven't been writing much lately- my apologies for that. It's not that I have nothing to write about. It is the exact opposite- but I'm not quite always in the mood to sit down and write when I'm getting home past 10:00pm on almost a daily basis. Sleep is worth gold these days, and sharing thoughts seems like a luxury... or maybe I'm just getting lazy?? I also need to do a ton of updates to the content of this website. I'm ashamed at how far behind I've fallen. I'll try to change my wicked ways soon... My 29th birthday is Monday. Cameron managed to get me an invitation to the cast & crew screening of "The Producers" (he plays a Nazi in it). So I invited Sebastian to come along with me. Then Friday night me and maybe 10 or so friends are going to see 'The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe'. I can't wait! As of right now I am almost done reading all 7 books in the Narnia series. I'm maybe 3/4 of the way through the last book. I really could write more, but it's late, and my achy body needs some series sleep! *** Wednesday November 23, 2005 11:24am [written on the bus from New York to New Hampshire] Last night I was walking home late at night from the subway, under a black cold fall sky on a tree lined street in Brooklyn, stately brownstones protecting me on my left and on my right, trees framing the perspective path in front of me. The moon caught my eye, a dusty moon, an elderly moon, a sleepy moon. And the stars around it like children, or distant relatives. Suddenly the sky opens wide and pushes my head back, vertigo pressing against my forehead, I resist the urge to cry. And deeper yet, I resist the urge to scream. Then and there I realize that there is a thin layer of nothing that separates us from the cosmic vacuum above and beyond, nothing but air and gas and space between Us and It. The books can call it a few thousands of feet, but really in comparison to the depth of the cosmos there is an absolute closeness between everything and nothing. There is nothing keeping me on this cold leafy sidewalk but gravity. Nothing else preventing me from being sucked or launched or delivered to the wide deep space above me, beneath me, around me, a wide deep space so empty that it can contain all the stars in the midnight sky. It is this extreme void and the miracle of gravity and gas that keeps me alive and in contact with pebble Earth that then turns my thoughts once again (and always) to my family. We are, after all, discussing forces and forces and little else. Nothing in my life means as much to me as Family. Staring up at the starry void above, much like (if you think about it) staring your death in the face. What do I have holding me in life? I have gravity, and I have family. There is nothing else, no other force, working in my favor. My family is gravity. Nature abhors and I love. It is two of the same. *** Friday October 28, 2005 10:46pm Check out the new "London" photos in the Series section of the Photography. *** Thursday October 27, 2005 3:00pm I want to make myself break. There’s a pressure all around a pressure that makes you 2-dimensional, a pressure that makes you almost invisible a pressure that makes you inadequate a pressure that makes you homely, a pressure that makes you talentless, a pressure that makes you inexperienced, a pressure that makes you inflexible. How can you love yourself when there’s no one else there to prove to you that you’re worth loving? How can you be sure of it? How can you reach inward and claim hold of something that has no definable value on the outside? How can you see something when no one around you sees it? How can you make it bend when everyone else is convinced it will break? You ask, “Why do you do so much? What do you think you’ll prove? Where do you think you’ll go? Who do you think will care? How far do you think you can go? Who do you think you are?” I want to do as much as I can to push my boundaries as far as they can go and farther, I want to set my life on fire, I want to set you on fire, I want to push myself I want to bend myself and I want to twist myself backwards I want to pull myself in all directions I want to explode in flames so you’ll finally see me and recognize me and love me and cry about my ashes, I want to make myself rise up I want to make myself turn the black sky orange and yellow I want to make myself sing out loud I want to push myself farther back push farther and farther back until I scream in pain. I want to make myself break. *** Thursday October 6, 2005 11:12am I realize I’ve become overcome with reinvention. I keep becoming different people. I think maybe I should be scared with this, but I’m not. I am not aware of the demands or preconceptions associate with age. I am still becoming. I am still a child, even though I live as a man. I am still exiting the womb. London was amazing. I want to live there for a small period of time, perhaps a year, so that I can use that period of time to get to know Europe. I think it would be better to use London as a home base for traveling instead of using New York as a home base. I don’t know exactly when I’ll do it though. Maybe after I pay off some debts. I wouldn’t want to live there and have to worry about paying old debts back in the homeland. So maybe a year from now I’ll move to London? Or maybe when I turn 30? It is interesting to compare London with New York. London has by far the better architecture, old and new. They respect and take care of their history, instead of tearing it down and erasing it like we do with ours. And the new architecture is made of high quality materials and craftsmanship and talent. They know that when they build a building it instantly becomes a part of the past, of the history, and so they build to contribute something meaningful and beautiful to that rich history (Trump should watch and learn). But the people are more fun in New York. You can’t just walk up to a stranger in a museum in London and strike up a conversation. You can’t make eye contact with someone on the tube and smile. If you step on someone’s toe and very politely say, “Excuse me!” they will pretend like you don’t even exist. New Yorkers, conversely, are in your face. We speak our minds, even when you don’t want to hear it. If you look lost, we’ll stop and ask if you’d like some help. We’ll approach you in the museum and ask you why the painting startled you when you walked around the corner and saw it unexpectedly. If you’re beautiful, we’ll whistle and tell you you’re beautiful, and if you’re being an asshole… we’ll tell you you’re being an asshole. And the food sucks in London (but you already knew that), with the exception of the curry restaurants, and of course, Eric’s homemade dinners. I was glad to come back to NYC. But there is definitely a period of my future in London. If I have to live in a major city other than New York, it will most definitely be London. I am beginning to grow away from my poetry. I think I may be retiring from the quill. My suicidal years may be over, which is not good, because the suicide years are when the writing was at its best. However, something else is coming through, as part of my present reinvention of Self. I am hearing music. I am hearing songs. My mind is a dark purple swirling blue smoky globe, a crystal glass glowing from somewhere deep within… press your ear up to it now, and you will hear it too. *** Tuesday September 20, 2005 1:11pm I just got back from London yesterday afternoon. I was preparing a rather large journal entry about my week there, but I just learned a few moments ago that a beloved family member passed away while I was overseas. The wake and funeral are later this week. Therefore, I will write about London sometime next week, probably, when my head is back in the right place for it. *** Friday September 9, 2005 3:48pm This is my last entry before heading to London next week for a small vacation. I can’t even say how excited I am to be going… And I am very curious to find out how, in what ways, the visit will change me, and inspire me. I’ve started a new photography project, one that seems quite noble in my mind. I just hope I can pull it off- I’ve always found it difficult to make certain points/ideas come across in photographs. In a poem, no sweat. In a painting or collage, even easier. But photographing, the way I like to photograph, is a bit of a challenge to express ideas, for I prefer to work with bare-bone conditions- one camera (film), one lens, natural light, “real” locations (as opposed to studios, backdrops, etc), and simple subjects- people, landscapes, architecture. This new project I’ve just barely begun focuses on the very flesh, blood and bone of the human animal. I abandon technology. I abandon intellect. I abandon all things artificial. I return to the very root of being. No computers, no automobiles, no clothes, no processed media, no medicine, no tools. Muscle, skin, hair, blood, spit, texture, feeling, breath, pulse. What exactly it means to be a living creature. Anyway, the idea of this is an endless idea, perhaps impossible to write about. Or I just don’t have the patience to try. But for certain reasons I feel so immensely passionate about this idea. Perhaps one of the most important ideas worth exploring and expressing right now. Lastly, I am deeply bothered by this whole Hurricane Katrina situation. I am bothered that every crisis or social circumstance over the past four or five years has outlined a country that once was the “United” States, which has now become the “Divided” States. I’m upset that people are and always have been blindly devoted to political figures and political parties regardless of how poorly these political figures and parties act (or don’t act). I am bothered by the fact that there are people who believe that the victims of Hurricane Katrina actually deserved the blow that was dealt to them, that they don’t deserve any one else’s help, that they, being innocent people, should just be left there to die. It makes my blood run cold to think that if I moved to New Orleans instead of New York four years ago (which was actually a very likely possibility at the time), these family members in question wouldn’t want help sent to me. My family tree doesn’t have any branches in New Orleans. But if it did, would these family members still think the same things? Does it have to do with DNA? Is it about race? Is it about class? What is it? What makes those people less deserving than yourself? I direct this question to those people who I am butting heads with, you know who you are. What is it that sets you above the poor souls bleeding under the dark grey hands of Katrina? *** Friday August 26, 2005 4:24pm Just 17 days until I fly to London for a week. This will be my first time going to Europe, which is a bit embarrassing to admit. But better late than never, right? I am so very excited about going, it’s all I’ve been thinking about lately! I have this funny feeling that I will fall in love with it and will not come back… Or that I will come back just so I can pack up and get all my things shipped over there… Anything is possible these days, and I am still unwilling to be tied down to any one particular place for any long-term base of time. I think I am going to start photographing dancers. I am obsessed with nature, animal instinct, passion, and the human form. And I see dance as being something directly connected to the natural roots of what a person is… there is something carnal here I am looking for… something that is most apparent among dancers… and perhaps more specifically among dancers who focus on ballet and perhaps even modern dance. So right now I’m on the hunt for dancers to photograph. Being here in New York I doubt I’ll have any trouble finding enough people to work with to create something special. My annual BBQ party is this Sunday. I invited most of my local friends, but I had not expected most of them to say they’d be able to come to it. As of right now I am expecting over 20 people to arrive on Sunday! I’m somewhere between excitement and panic! I totally love hosting parties in my house, but I equally dread preparing for such parties. So much to get done, so little time between now and Sunday. I hope it will be a lot of fun. I am half way through “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix ”. This world created by J.K. Rowling has completely consumed me! I didn’t have any idea what I was in store for when I first started these books a year ago. Now I cancel plans, skip swim practices, stay in on Friday nights just to read these books! I can’t put them down! It’s like there’s some sort of magical spell on me… How am I going to force these books down in enough time to read Peter Ackroyd ’s “Hawksmoor” before I go to London?? *** Saturday August 20, 2005 8:35pm Cooled off a bit. Looking forward to my London trip in less than 20 days. Missing my family up in New Hampshire. Missing old friendships from my college theatre days. Missing student-teacher crushes. Missing Bogart and childhood kingdoms in neighborhood forests, before they went and cut down all the trees. Trying to figure out how much I can get done before I hit 30. Trying to figure out why I keep pushing away all the cute young chums who keep at this silly game called love. Trying to figure out why New Yorkers hate Californians so much and why Californians hate New Yorkers so much. I feel like my debts are an endless immortal curse. I’m making a dent, true, but youth shouldn’t be all spent on paying off debts. I’ve found my twin in a great anthology, his name is Harry Potter. My new obsession. Why? Because he is me and I am him. My thunderbolt is throbbing tonight. I have an extra ticket to Black Rebel Motorcycle Club in September. Just one of the best bands out there- who will I ask to go with me? Will that person I’m thinking of as of late say yes? I don’t know why I don’t write as much as I used to. Perhaps there’s an evolution underway. Perhaps a revolution. Adulthood is all about Justice. Some blindfolded woman… On one side happiness, the other, sadness. In less than 20 days I shall be in a car on my way to a place called Avebury. *** Wednesday August 3, 2005 1:47pm Just started adding more poems to the site, go read em... *** Sunday July 31, 2005 6:47pm I have made it possible now to acquire prints of mine online at e-bay. There is a new link in the 'Photographer' section of this website that will take you directly there. More of my prints will be added to e-bay as time goes by... If there are any specific photographs you'd like me to put on e-bay, please let me know! *** Friday July 29, 2005 10:33am I have become totally obsessed with Elizabeth Kostova’s “The Historian”. It is of course a work of fiction, but underneath that it’s probably the most complete biography of Vlad the Impaler around today (keep in mind I am saying this- me, who is by no means an expert on the topic). Of course, this is also a great imaginative story of fictional vampire hunters, and the historic Dracula’s transformation into the fictional vampire Dracula we all know and love, but all in all it’s one of the most fun and horrifying history lessons I’ve ever had. Vlad Dracula, the historical figure, is probably one of the most evil and terrifying figures in world history. To try and get inside of his head, and to try and understand what motivated him to do all that he did, is an uncompromising glimpse deep into the eyes of the Devil himself. The real Dracula was more evil and scary and horrible than the fictional one invented by Bram Stoker ever was. The cool thing is, Kostova is such a talented writer that she totally convinces you that Dracula’s transformation into the world’s most ferocious vampire lord is totally plausible! I love it! I guess that’s it for now. Just had to sing my praises for Elizabeth Kostova! *** Monday July 25, 2005 1:23pm I am now a golden boy! I spent yesterday at Fire Island with Bill and Miguel. The weather was the best beach weather so far this summer! Warm high 80’s, dry, cool breeze, few cotton clouds here and there. We left Penn Station on an 11:26 train and landed on the beach around 1:30pm, missing the killer hour of sun from noon to 1:00. Spent most of the time on the beach, listening to music and throwing around random thoughts of urban philosophy. The grand finale was one last and final run into the warm water, leaving my suit behind on the sand, shocking my friends. Every now and then Kurt must go crazy. Or else he’ll just become a dull, dull fella. And who wants to be dull? I’m going to start auctioning off some of my photo prints on e-bay. At this point I am not sure if I’ll be able to get another show up his summer, so at least getting on e-bay will help get my work out there while I am not showing here in the city. I’ll make a direct link to e-bay on the photo section of this site after it is all set up. I’m heading up to Boston on the weekend of August 13th for Jen Parrish’s annual summer BBQ out in Stoneham, MA. Can’t wait! I wrote about it here a year ago, after the last BBQ, so if you go back far enough in the entries you can read it. And you will read why I always look forward to her BBQ with bated breath… I wrote a few weeks ago about spending my vacation this year in Peru, getting lost in the ruins of Machu Picchu. Well, there’s been a slight change of plans. Originally I was to go in August with my friend Guillermo, and stay with his family. Well, turns out Guillermo is not going home anymore, so instead of going to Peru I am going to London, in September. My fried Eric lives there, who is a young talented writer. You can learn a bit about his first published book “Enough” here: http://www.pearlstreetpublishing.com/Enough.htm I will stay with Eric for the week, which is the thing that makes it possible for me to go- fuel prices have gone sky high, and that has directly affected flight ticket prices; if I were to go there and have to spend my nights in a hotel, there’s no way I would have been able to afford that. Plus, and more importantly, staying with Eric will give us a chance to do 4 years worth of catching up. Eric and I met doing theater in college in Boston, and after graduation we sort of lost touch… besides the occasional email back and forth. He was one of my best friends in college, and I hold immense respect and adoration for him. If you’re a bookworm like me, go online and order his book- I guarantee you will fall in love with him! That’s it for now. Want to say hello? Just look for me at the beach! *** Tuesday July 12, 2005 6:19pm I haven’t written too many entries in a while, it's been almost a month since my last entry. With good reason. I’ve been too busy living and thinking and trying to sort out a few things. But there are two important messages I want to get out tonight, which I should have gotten out a lot sooner. First: “WE BELIEVE that in the best American tradition of helping others help themselves, now is the time to join with other countries in a historic pact for compassion and justice to help the poorest people of the world overcome AIDS and extreme poverty. WE RECOGNIZE that a pact including such measures as fair trade, debt relief, fighting corruption and directing additional resources for basic needs – education, health, clean water, food, and care for orphans – would transform the futures and hopes of an entire generation in the poorest countries, at a cost equal to just one percent more of the US budget. WE COMMIT ourselves - one person, one voice, one vote at a time - to make a better, safer world for all.” Sign The ONE Declaration at www.one.org Second: I include here a Publishers Weekly book review, only because I lack the time right now to write my own personal review of an amazing book I just finished reading. The book is “Specimen Days”, written by Michael Cunningham. From Publishers Weekly Starred Review. “Engaging Walt Whitman as his muse (and borrowing the name of Whitman's 1882 autobiography for his title), Cunningham weaves a captivating, strange and extravagant novel of human progress and social decline. Like his Pulitzer Prize–winning The Hours, the novel tells three stories separated in time. But here, the stage is the same (the "glittering, blighted" city of Manhattan), the actors mirror each other (a deformed, Whitman-quoting boy, Luke, is a terrorist in one story and a teenage prophet in another; a world-weary woman, Catherine, is a would-be bride and an alien; and a handsome young man, Simon, is a ghost, a business man and an artificial human) and weighty themes (of love and fear, loss and connection, violence and poetry) reverberate with increasing power. "In the Machine," set during the Industrial Revolution, tells the story of 12-year-old Luke as he falls in love with his dead brother's girlfriend, Catherine, and becomes convinced that the ghost of his brother, Simon, lives inside the iron works machine that killed him. The suspenseful "The Children's Crusade" explores love and maternal instinct via a thrilleresque plot, as Cat, a black forensic psychologist, draws away from her rich, white and younger lover, Simon, and toward a spooky, deformed boy who's also a member of a global network committed to random acts of terror. And in "Like Beauty," Simon, a "simulo"; Catareen, a lizard-like alien; and Luke, an adolescent prophet, strike out for a new life in a postapocalyptic world. With its narrative leaps and self-conscious flights into the transcendent, Cunningham's fourth novel sometimes seems ready to collapse under the weight of its lavishness and ambition—but thrillingly, it never does. This is daring, memorable fiction.” This may be one of the most profound modern books I have ever read. It moved me… maybe it will move you too. OK that’s it for tonight, but I will write again very soon… I have lots on my mind. *** Sunday June 19, 2005 1:13am What am I? I am a horologist. I am given a tall chamber to gaze at the long flat world from. I bore the needle in the cold white room for him, just watching the red time flow from my left arm. “You have good veins,” a stranger man says, I think of a smart reply but I hold it in like gold and smile… I am selling myself to someone I don’t even know. It’s time to make the rain. I’m in the red. I’m in the shadow. I’m under the heavy. Another one came to me once, someone I thought I knew quite well, The Betrayer, saying, “…we’ve broken up…” like it was supposed to mean something to me. More than once. But not at all. I wear my poker face. My perfect poker face. I am a horologist in my own private observatory, I remember all in the past and the future and I witness the merging of the two, the free will is The making of the rain. *** Wednesday June 15, 2005 2:11pm Annie and I went to the midnight show of “Batman Begins” last night… this is by far the #1 best Batman movie ever made to date! Totally blows all the others away! Go see it! Go see it! Go see it! I’m heading back up to New Hampshire for the 4th of July. My sister’s best friend Heather, who lives up the street from her, is going to have a party, and since she has a pool in the back I said I’d teach her husband and my sister’s husband how to swim better. We’ll probably do it drunk, or heavily buzzed, so it will be a lot of fun, and *safe* because I am a certified lifeguard! I might be doing a second art show with my friend Victor down in Soho in one or two weeks… all depends on the state of his studio, as he is remodeling all on his own. We should have perhaps a dozen different artists in this show, so there will be a great deal of variety, and most likely a much larger turnout than the last show, which was also a great success. I have a feeling my artist block might be coming to an end… I feel creative energies within myself, after being empty for several months. I’m itching to start writing some stuff, and I also have a handful of new models lined up to shoot for one or two series I am working on. Also I might be going to Peru in August with Guillermo. I desperately need to save money for the airfare. Luckily I am staying with his family, so my only expense will be the plane tickets (if you’ve ever flown to Peru and back before, you know it’s more than double the amount of flying to places like London, Paris, etc.). My big plan is to visit the ruins at Machu Picchu. And of course, to take hundreds of photos. What else? What else? I may be having a summer barbeque party soon at my house. Now that the flowers are blooming and the grass is lush and thick, and the two cats and two sublets are out (love them dearly but nice to have the space back for parties etc.), I really want to have people over. Lots of people. Music, food, laughter, games, movies, whatever. I think that’s about it for now. Going to do some big time updates to the website, adding a lot more poems, and finally, after all this time, adding some material (woo hoo!) to the “designer” section! Also started training again- running, swimming, cycling… and spending a lot of time at the park, at the beach, soaking in the sun… trying to lose my vampire complexion… I mean Christ, even Lestat has a tan! ***
Monday May 30, 2005 10:38pm My annoying 3-week cough has finally left me! Time to start swimming/running/cycling again! Since my last entry, my mentee and I have hung out twice more- we went swimming together at my pool, and then a few days later we went roller skating. He's awesome, and I hope he thinks I am too... or at least, cool enough to hang out with and be friends with. Just got back from spending the long weekend up in New England. I helped my sister and her husband finish moving from Rhode Island to their new house in New Hampshire. This is it- the house where they will start a family in. Twenty minutes from my parents’ house. Five hours away from me… What happens when that first baby gets born? Do I stay here and be “that cool artsy uncle from New York” or do I move back north and be “that cool artsy uncle from right around the corner”? Guess it all depends on how big a role I want to play in my niece’s / nephew’s life. I’ve been dating someone now for over a week. These past 3 days was our first 3 days not seeing each other since this thing began, and I feel like that is it. Tomorrow we’ll meet for lunch and I’ll be told that I am not quite the person I was supposed to be, and it was fun, but “I just don’t think we’re right for each other.” The whole weekend through I observed the awesome rain clouds from the passenger seat of my sister’s car, back and forth from NH to RI, I observed the affair of the sunlight and the rain, and the wondrous dance of the heavy grey clouds, and I thought of myself and of my past. And I thought of what I would be coming back to tonight, here in New York City. Under those ethereal clouds I thought of lovers, of babies, of cities and country sides. And the thought process of the entire weekend has left me quite the insomniac in my wonderings. I am completely psycho thinking such thoughts after just a week of seeing someone. But your history makes you who you are, or at least, it makes you think you know who you are, and my past never lets me forget what happened the last time I had big feelings for someone. My history shakes me awake in the middle of the night, screaming, “Remember, Kurt, remember me…” And that is what I have become very good at doing lately. Remembering. Something there in the dark is telling me that I am broken goods. We went for breakfast yesterday at a small neighborhood diner in Goffstown, down the street from my sister’s new house. There was a family there with a little baby boy, and as they were leaving, the boy looked over his father’s shoulder right at my sister and her husband and I, and I turned and looked at them, and I could totally read on their faces the look of a man and a woman who definitely see something they want in their lives, something that they are now ready for. It gave me such a marvelous feeling to see that in their faces, to see them together and in love. I can look at them, and when I do, I do get this private sense, an inner feeling of what true love is. I am glad I am in their lives and that I can observe such an amazing evolution of “family.” *** Wednesday May 18, 2005 10:15am I still have this really annoying cough, going on two weeks now. But otherwise, life is good. Where to start? I finally officially met my mentee last night. I went to the Chelsea Foyer and signed my contract and then the two of us went out for coffee and chatted for a while, just to form that initial acquaintanceship. But then my cough got bad, so we cut it short and I went home. We’re going to hang out again Saturday at the pool. I have a great feeling about this kid- I think we’re really going to become good friends. Jen and Nathan came down from Boston Saturday. I met up with them after I worked at the pool, and we hung out around the East Village for the rest of the day, people watching and haunting old stomping grounds. Then, of course, my cough got bad again, and I went home. And, as luck would have it, after I left Jen and Nathan went walking by a café and saw Voltaire, of all people, sitting alone, writing in his journal (if you don’t know of my interest in Voltaire, please read past entries). But I am glad I was not there, because I am not fond of the image of Kurt trying to talk to Voltaire again, only to find himself coughing grotesquely all over the poor guy! Speaking of past entries, I also wrote an entry a month or so ago about my old High School friend Doug up in New Hampshire who I had lost touch with. Turns out his uncle came across my entry while “googling” Doug, and he very kindly sent me an email with Doug’s current phone number. That totally made my week! See, there is good value in having this website after all! I’ll give Doug a call today. And lastly, if you go back one or two entries, I mention a bar I go to in the West Village… specifically in hopes of running into someone I keep seeing there. Well, I went last night with my friend Bill. And yes, the one in question was there. Along with the usual eye contact and smile, and the usual Kurt’s-a-big-chicken silence. Standing right there, 6 inches away, and I couldn’t bring myself to speak a single word. I am lame. Yes folks, it’s true. The secret’s out. Kurt, the one who can say anything to anyone in any situation, with no inhibitions at all, can’t even say “Hey, what’s up!” to a certain person in a certain bar on a certain Tuesday night. Shame. Damn shame. But Bill tried to help out and proved his coolness and chatted up with the one in question, briefly but nicely, and managed to get a name. So I have a name with a face now! A name with a face I cannot manage to utter a single word to. I eventually left, and as I walked along the cold sidewalk towards the subway station, I threw my arms up, looked up to the moonlit sky and sighed a deep, hearty sound of complete disappointment. For I should add that the person in question, for the first time, didn’t appear to be single… *** Thursday May 12, 2005 10:42pm Couples annoy me. There, I said it. Lazy people also annoy me. While I’m at it, so do people who talk only about themselves when talking to you. Also, people who throw trash on the street or subway platform while standing within ten feet of a garbage can. Those people deserve a good shove onto the tracks and into traffic. But mostly, it’s the couples that push me over the edge. That whole dependence thing… and the way couples act like they’re in their own little bubble and nothing outside of that bubble is real or important, including other people. And how when you see one half of the couple somewhere without the other half, that one half looks pathetically lost and helpless, and… well… incomplete. Weak. So as you can very well imagine, I strongly detest Valentine’s Day. The custom makes me literally nauseous. And why am I writing about this now? It’s May! Lord only knows, all I know is I am in a rant mood this evening. And tonight’s rant goes out to all the couples in the world. I am a loner and I like it. I am a gunslinger. Just me and the horizon. Occasionally my path crosses with the path of another and I may travel a bit with a companion, but it is never more than temporary, never ever assumed to be a permanent habit. I am a strong person and stronger yet for being an independent person. I have family who I can trust and rely on. I have a few friends who I can hang out with and have fun with whenever I am in the mood for it. And, like I said, occasionally my path crosses with someone else… usually another gunslinger like me… I do what I want when I want. I make decisions quickly and don’t need to wait around for someone else to make up their mind about anything. I can get drunk and stay up all night long talking to a beautiful traveling stranger and not have to worry about someone else getting jealous. I can choose to have a party at my house and get drunk and do crazy things without having to apologize for any of it, or I can go out on a moment’s notice and not come back home until the next evening, or I can stay in all alone with a bottle of good wine and a good book. Oh, and the best part? The best part is I don’t need to spend my money on anyone but myself. Am I a selfish Brat Prince? You bet! All my free time goes towards my art or my athletics. Just about every accountable percent of my free time goes towards being productive, towards one noble goal or other. What more could I want or need? *** Wednesday May 11, 2005 8:33pm Caught a cold this night exactly one week ago. Haven’t been swimming or running or cycling because of it. Very annoying!! Among the few fun things I did since the last entry was go see Fischerspooner perform last Thursday night at the Canal Room. It was really good music, so I might go again with Mark in a couple of weeks, depending on which night he decides to go on. I have to pick up their newest cd, the only song I know is “Emerge”. I’ve been playing it nonstop since the show! They are awesome, awesome performers, and I just have to say, for the record, that my Fischerspooner experience was wholly and completely more enjoyable and fulfilling than my Garbage experience a couple weeks ago… I like Garbage’s music, but I can’t stand the obnoxious fans who were in front of the stage with me, who were completely ruining my very first live Garbage experience (All the die hard Garbage fans out there can just GET A LIFE!). So… I’ve been experiencing a rather daunting stretch of artist’s block. It’s kind of scaring me. I haven’t been able to write a poem worth saving in over a month or so, and I have also been canceling photo shoots left and right with people who want their pictures taken. I just don’t have any creative energy in me for right now, and normally that wouldn’t bother me, but a block has never lasted this long before. Maybe I’m supposed to let the writing and the photography rest for a while? Or Permanently? Maybe I’m supposed to move on to another new form of expression? Who knows. I went out last night and sat alone in a village bar, waiting for someone to show up who I’ve seen there over the past two Tuesday nights, someone who I’ve made eye contact with but haven’t yet had courage to approach. I sat there all alone nursing rum & cokes for about two hours, and of course the person in question never arrived. So, after the second drink (which was more than enough to get me completely drunk), I scribbled down a quick poem on a few scraps of bar paper, and I got up and went home. How pathetic is that?!? Colds make me do weird things like that. Here’s what I wrote on those few scraps of paper, completely drunk, mind you: LOOKING FOR INSPIRATION Will work for inspiration. Will fuck for inspiration. Will lie for inspiration. Will kill for inspiration. Will steal for inspiration. Will love for inspiration. Will jump high for inspiration. Will pay for inspiration. Will sing for inspiration. Will travel for inspiration. Will clean for inspiration. Will cut grass for inspiration. Will give massage for inspiration. Will give head for inspiration. Will marry for inspiration. Will give advice for inspiration. Will walk dog for inspiration. Will move for inspiration. Will pray for inspiration. Will strip for inspiration. Will swim 10,000 yards for inspiration. Will take out trash for inspiration. Will tell jokes for inspiration. Will go commando for inspiration. Will write lists for inspiration. *** Saturday April 30, 2005 9:51pm So I unofficially met my mentee two weeks ago at the Chelsea Foyer’s one year anniversary party. They can’t let me start mentoring until all my background checks come back, so I was simply introduced to this young man as “someone who is on his way to becoming a mentor”, and he was simply introduced to me as “someone who is on his way to getting a mentor.” Turns out he’s the Foyer’s flagship resident- perfect in every way, the best young role model you can possibly find. He’s putting himself through college, has a great job, he’s smart, good-looking, mature, basically flawless. I sat there that night, watching him talk about his life and his history, and all I could think of was, What does someone like me possibly have to offer someone like him?? Have they made some mistake pairing me up with him? I don’t have enough fingers and toes to count my flaws on, while he can probably sum his up on less than half of one hand’s worth of fingers. And speaking of fingers, I heard last night that I have to get fingerprinted yet again, because the original prints they took weren’t done properly and cannot be used for a thorough background check. Apparently, they’re only good enough to tell that I am not one of America’s most wanted criminals. But I have a feeling they might finally let me start mentoring this kid soon, possibly before the new prints go out into the world to get checked. One thing is certain- our roles will switch and he will become my mentor instead. I am certain of this. I wasn’t expecting my mentee to be such a ‘together’ individual… seemingly flawless… What on earth am I getting myself into here?? While they’re at it, perhaps they should get him fingerprinted too. Only fair, right? Speaking of crime… Last night I met up with my friends Michael and Guy and rode for my first time in the monthly New York City Critical Mass bike ride. It was one of the funnest (yeah I know that’s not a real word) things I have done in a very long time! Critical Mass is when hundreds of people on bicycles take to the street all at once and take over Manhattan. We block traffic, holler and shout and sing on the tops of our lungs, and lead the local cops in cars, scooters, paddy wagons and helicopters through a cat-and-mouse chase that usually lasts for the better part of two or three hours straight… resulting in dozens of arrests (if you’re unlucky and a slow peddler) and a higher sense of social/economic awareness for all who experience the ride (whether actively riding or passively watching it all go by from the sidewalk). The police try to stop the ride from happening every month because they see the ride as a form of protest, and since they never have (and most likely never will) issue us a permit for our monthly “protest”, they have every right to make arrests and hold riders overnight. But if you believe in the ride, then one night locked up is totally worth the cause. I came close to getting caught in the end, but luckily my peddling on my 1980-something silver Soma road bike was just a bit faster than some cop’s motor scooter and I saved my ass, as did most of the other riders, by splitting up in hundreds of individual directions when the cops finally caught up with us (in various motor vehicles and helicopters- quite funny, isn’t it, what it actually takes to track down and stop a handful of punks on peddle bikes in Manhattan!!!!). It was so much fun and I cannot wait to do it again next month. It was totally exhausting (I rolled into my Brooklyn brownstone around 10:45pm last night). Today I have been pretty much chair/bedridden. But four weeks is more than enough recover time for the next Critical Mass. Eddie called me today from Boston. Made me smile. A lot… Time to go to bed. Getting up early for swim practice tomorrow. *** Monday April 18, 2005 5:25pm Victor and I have started talking about doing another art show soon at his Soho studio, perhaps some time in May. Now that nice warm weather is finally here, we can use his roof deck too this time around. Maybe we’ll go all out and get a dj and a bartender. All depends on costs. We want to involve a lot more artists for this show, possibly over 20 different artists. But the thing is, we’ve discovered that we don’t really know a lot of artists here in NYC. So, we’ve begun the tedious process of finding new artists to join us in our summer show. I’ve already found a few over the weekend, so if I aim to find a few new artists every weekend between now and say a month from now, we should have plenty to ride with. My friend Patrick and I saw a new movie yesterday after swim practice, called “Palindromes”, by Todd Solondz, down at the Angelika Theater. I haven’t seen any of Todd’s earlier work, but I was very intrigued by this film. Tomorrow night I’m going to see Garbage play at the Hammerstein. I’ve heard mixed things about their new album, so I’m looking forward to the show and hearing the new songs. Hey Mrs. Robinson, thanks entering my life and for becoming my new muse, I think I may just pick up a pen tonight and write a poem or two… feelings of desire and warmth come to mind whenever we talk on the phone… and I’m waiting for you to enter my dreams once again… Nothing else to write about. Plenty going on, but I’m keeping it to myself for a change… I think I’m in a private kind of mood lately. All I’ll say is, Spring is in the air, and the heat is on. *** Saturday April 9, 2005 10:56pm (started) Sunday April 10, 2005 9:27pm (revised & finished) Jim got me into Tori Amos’ concert in NYC last night, third row seats!!! I tried so hard over the past months unsuccessfully to buy tickets via Ticketmaster, and was so afraid I wouldn’t be able to see her perform. But I made it! I got in! Tori is some sort of mythical Greek creature with that voice, that awesome delicate unique explosive voice and that brilliant piano playing. I was tired, I had not slept much since the daylight savings hour change, so I admit I was struggling towards the end to keep my pulse in synch with Tori, as she took each song slowly and delicately from beginning to end. But that is my own fault, my own problem, not hers. Her voice was just so amazing, I’d die a happy man if I had her voice to sooth me all the way through. I finally got back in the pool last week after taking about a month off. When it rains, it pours, and life was sort of hectic for a bit, what with the Soho photo show and all. But it’s great to be back in the water again, great to be getting back in shape again. When I am not physically active on a daily basis, and by that I mean intensely physically active, not just walking to the subway station and walking around the block on my lunch break, but actually either swimming 3,000-5,000 yards or running 5k or cycling back and forth between Brooklyn, Manhattan and New Jersey. I’m happy now because of it, I am clear headed and clear spirited. And on top of that, spring is finally here!! I’ve survived yet another winter without ending up in a mental institution! The sun is out, I can walk outside without a jacket on, and life is once again wonderful! Jim, if you’re reading this, are you still jealous that I’m the one who has a life-size Tori Amos in his apartment? Because if you’re over it already, I have something else to make you jealous yet again- My birthday is in a Tori song! Is yours??? “… There at the seaside, fifth of December We chased the tide as the treasures were gathered…” *** Saturday April 3, 2005 1:43am I donated a photograph to the silent auction in the annual Imperial Court’s “Night Of A Thousand Gowns” ball this evening. All proceeds go to helping people with HIV and AIDS live better lives, so I hope my piece goes home with an obnoxiously high bidder! OK, now the rest of this entry is full of random, silly thoughts. Kinda boring… if you don’t know me, save yourself wasted time and skip over this one… So. Random thoughts start here: I find it hard to believe that my high school 10th year reunion is in a couple short months. I really don’t feel old enough for this to be happening! My high school class has its own website as well as a yahoo group, so it’s become very easy to find out what everyone has been doing, what they look like now, who they married, and what their babies and houses and white picked fences look like. However, it does not seem that any of the people I was friends with in high school are going. I doubt I will go. The people that are going are all the popular kids, all the jocks, cheer leaders, overachievers and preppy kids I never really related to. There’s one person I’d look forward to seeing again, Eric Woodard, but he enlisted after we graduated, and a few small rumors made it sound like he may have wound up in Iraq. I really hope that’s not the case. One of my very good friends from my senior year of high school, sort of like the brother I would have always liked to have, Doug Wiltz, has also done another disappearing act. The latest phone number I have belongs to someone else now, and I never got his new address after he moved out of his parent’s house a couple years ago. He’s one of those people you cannot get any information about by doing a name search online, and that annoys me like nothing else ever could! Doug- if you’re reading this, please send me a message. Let me know you’re alive & keeping out of trouble (without sacrificing your quick wit and charm). Lately a lot of ghosts are popping back into my head, into my life. Marc, someone I used to look up to as a mentor, emailed me a couple months ago- getting an email from him knocked the wind out of me. He was one of my professors at college, and also became a friend, and helped me get a job when I graduated. Things happened, we stopped being friends, and I moved to NYC. He only emailed me because he needed student samples for his portfolio, but it was still nice to hear from him. He seems to be doing well. Lots of buried memories came struggling back like zombies. Pretty zombies. Zombies reminding me of a certain person I was five years ago. Like high school classmates with beer bellies and missing hair and wedding bands and compromised potential that remind me of who I was ten years ago. It’s amazing how much I change as I get older. I keep discovering new people inside my head. Unbelievable some of the people I’ve been, unbelievable some of the things I’ve said and done to others who called themselves “friend.” I went to NH on Easter weekend, and while there I saw Eddie. All these ghosts were in my head, rattling their chains, flailing about their feather boas. Lying on his bed, I asked Eddie to marry me. He thought I was kidding, I thought I was serious. I’ve been alone for the longest time, happy with the freedom I have to focus on my art and my work. Freedom to hide again a new mask called “Kurt”. I am very happy, there is no mistaking that. But a part of me broke last summer, and I acquired a rather long and wide scar, which has not faded in the least. A part of me broke and I think I may be alone for quite some time to come, but I am quite happy. I am protected, I am free. I asked him, he said he needs to think about it. It’s kind of scary, knowing you’re a certain age, knowing you want a family, knowing you want the same thing all those annoying people from High School also want, knowing you’re alone and that you may be alone forever. I asked him, but I wasn’t serious. He’s not the one that question is meant for. My sister and her husband just bought a house in New Hampshire, a house to start a family in. I cannot wait to become an uncle. I think when that happens, I’ll be up there all the time… maybe when that happens I’ll be done with what I need to do here in NYC, and I’ll move back up there. Maybe my sister having a family will be the thing that starts the fading of the scar, and something will click, and I’ll stop writing cheesy melodramatic poetry & nonsense journal entries. Doug, where the hell are you? I could use a brother right about now. *** Sunday March 20, 2005 8:50am I just had my first photography show here in New York City, with two other artist friends of mine, Victor Carnuccio and Greg Zukowski. I learned the values, pros and cons to group shows, and of course, I was reminded again of the pros and cons of team work. All in all it was a great, positive experience. And I would do it again anytime, anywhere. (At the time of this entry, my work is still up in Soho. To arrange a viewing, simply send me an email at Kurt@bonescribe.com). I have also finally managed, after months of crazy living and intense soul searching, to take on the task of updating and maintaining this website all on my own. At first I was interviewing several freelance designers, but ultimately I reminded myself of the type of person I am. And way back in October I relearned the age-old quote by someone who had initially helped me get this site up that, “If you want something done right, you gotta do it yourself!” I almost abandoned an internet existence all together, but then of course I realized that (duh) this website would be a hundred times better if I dive in head first and just learn as I go. So, here we are. Easter is right around the corner. I am going up to New Hampshire to be with my parents, and my sister and her husband are coming up from Rhode Island. The holiday is early this year, but I am glad, for it is my favorite of all religious holidays, and is seen as the gateway to Spring, my favorite season of the year. Currently I am reading “Great Expectations” for the first time since Middle School. So basically, it’s like reading it for the first time. I love it! It’s such an easy read, and I don’t know why I didn’t really enjoy reading it in grade school? Prior to reading this book, I reread Anne Rice’s “The Witching Hour”. The first time I read it, I think I was a freshman at college. So it’s been a while. It remains one of my favorite stories, and when I finish Dickens I’ll go and pick up a first edition copy of “Lasher” at Strand (lately I am all about picking up first editions of all my favorite books). Words cannot say how happy I am that Winter is finally over and done with. The past four months have been a twisted, deformed set of shy months, the sort that you’re never quite sure why they ever happened in the first place, if they might vanish like ash in the wind, or if they might come back as ghosts to haunt you for the rest of your life. Whatever, the past four months are all said and done, but I do not write about such months. Winter is out, Spring is in! “The world is not against you.” How right you are. How very, very right. *** Wednesday March 09, 2005 9:20pm The day I hit twenty-eight back in December I knew this was going to be a year of decision, change and finality. A turning point. From here on, I either rise to greatness or recede to nothingness. It’s either one or the other. Don’t ask me how or why, it’s just what I know. A lot has happened to me. A lot has happened to each of us. I sit here tonight in my living room, with no lights on, only white candles lit randomly about. Two cats are on the floor, playing like children. Otherwise I am alone. Silence all around, moving about invisibly like water, and I here on the ocean floor, the only sound on the air a song called “Garlands”, playing in the black background of this moment. I sip occasionally from a glass of wine, as I pause to gather my thoughts. A few weeks ago I sat on stone steps deep inside a large museum, together with another man, born in Russia, perhaps one of the most striking and intelligent men I have ever met. We came here on this day to practice our sketching. As we sat side by side with our sketch pads in our hands, drawing a complicated sculpture of a naked boy, we talked about our lives, what we’re doing, where we want to go, et cetera. I spoke of the little things I like doing, the things that bring me joy and pleasure, and gradually he asked why some people must focus on so many things, why can’t a person just focus on one thing and do it better than anything else? “What is beauty?” he asked, finally. I wanted to embrace him. Brother to brother, I wanted to embrace him, as my answer. Words left me alone there on those steps. All I could think of in response was of embrace. But I shrugged, managed to speak some empty sentences about nothing, and continued my sketching. The perfect meaning of that moment missed, and wholly and completely defining my life up to that question, those three words escaping from his lips. What do I see when I walk outside every day? I see the beginnings of humans disappearing. I see love becoming myth. I see selfishness and addiction taking over all. Humanity is becoming the food of the very thing it is giving birth to. I dream of the past. I dream of a time when a person’s flesh and blood hands designed and built the bodies of our history, our future, our hopes and our beliefs, of a time when the artist was a saint, when the poet wrote the structure of Eden. I see humans disappearing, or worse yet, becoming slaves to a newer race, or even worse still, becoming obsolete artifacts all together. I do so much because I struggle to find the combination of expression to outline myself, the person I have become. I struggle to discover if I have a place in all of this. I am desperate to give life to the human in my blood. I am desperate to give my humanity justice while there is still time to the acts of birth and death. I am desperate to justify this life, and I am desperate to understand, and finally, to forgive, the receding humanity around me. Something in the planes of our being is receding, and I feel as though I am left alone. Even the candles are one by one burning out. I must find a way to keep at least one of them alive. I think there is a secret in beauty, perhaps the very secret that keeps us… That keeps us searching for something. ***

Monday October 25, 2004 9:40am I have not made any entries in quite some time, due to a couple big issues, some of which are personal issues, and others which are not. But all of them are not issues I have much control over. Which is, of course, aggravating. This entry serves to prove that I am still alive and around. Hanging on by a single string at times, but nonetheless alive. Given the choice of either vanishing or living on, you can see which I've chosen to do. I had a breakdown. It's that simple. I'm still having it, in some ways, but the eye of the storm as it were has passed. And as with prior breakdowns, one of which occurred in college, and one following sporadically after college graduation, I have emerged a new person. For better AND worse, I am a new man. I've cut off friends who I no longer regard as friends. I've cut off certain ways of behaving because they no longer seem valuable in the effect they've had on others. I've stopped lying to myself and lying to those around me in order to maintain a bad habit of false comfort. I've cut off all my hair. That last fact may seem unimportant to you. But it has huge importance. My long hair represented much of who I was for a hefty period of time. It became a sort of trademark. Certain people said they'd kill me if I ever cut it off. Well guys, time to bring out the knives. It's gone. The guy in the mirror was someone who wasn't around anymore, and I couldn't stand looking like him anymore. So Steven did as asked and cut it all without a moment's hesitation. And with it also went bits of personality some of you might also have valued. So beware. The Kurt you knew is gone. For better AND worse, I am a new man. May the remains of the storm pass with grace. If this entry never gets posted, it's not my fault. ********** Thursday October 14th, 2004 Walking home last night after getting off the subway after getting hit in the head by one of my Jeckle & Hyde mood swings after talking to a friend (which is really nothing more than listening) who is really nothing more than a constant reminder of failed house wrecking movie rental sessions, I decided I wanted to go walking down That Road. My roommate and I avoid That Road all the time, especially at night, because of its single flickering halogen lamp post, because of the broken glass on the sidewalks, because of the whispering shadows and the moving monsters in human clothes with knives and guns and swaggering choreography, because of my desire for the worst to happen to me, because of my familiar suicidal antics of an aging single poetic starving mentally imbalanced and weak heart and dizzy spells I-don't-know-what-I-am. In other words, I went down That Road wanting someone to do something terrible to me. I had to walk past my house to get to That Road. I could have left my bag and my money and my valued junk at home to play it safe, but I wasn't in the safe kind of mood. With my money in a shallow pocket and my bag unsecured, I dragged my feet and lifted my head and I went down That Road. I eventually made a long loop and came home, disappointed. Not even the shadow dwellers on That Street wanted me. They didn't want my money, or my cell phone, or even my house keys. They didn't want my bank card or my check book. They didn't so much as want a thigh to push a blade into and an ear to whisper raspy threats into. In times like these I become a dangerous man. Anyone pushed beyond desperation, beyond compassion, beyond a healthy heartbeat, regardless how thick that wad of cash might be in his pocket, will not get touched by the most dangerous beast on the darkest street in the edgiest neighborhood in Brooklyn. No matter how hard I WILLED it to be, no one bit the bait. Their sixth sense warned them, "Beware... for there walks a heartbroken Gunslinger." The judgment of That Street sentenced me to continue. And so I have. ********** Thursday October 7, 2004 12:25pm I almost never do this entry thing two days in a row, but I have to comment on PJ Harvey's show last night while it's still fresh in my head (I've learned that lesson by not writing about the Susanna Clarke book signing the day after it happened, and now that awesome event will never see the light of internet day). On the one hand, there's Madonna, who, in the orderly madness of her life, deploys an army of dancers and large imaging screens and lighting effects, to deliver an intense show live. And on the other hand, on the entire opposite side of the spectrum, is PJ Harvey, who, equally as mad as Madge, delivers a show equally as intense, if not more so. But she goes the minimalist (dare I say Traditionalist) route. In fact, I cannot say more than that Madonna and PJ Harvey are both women who rock and have a LOT to say and expose their inner selves, for that is where the similarities end. And why even sit here and compare the two? Well, because they're both deities in my eyes. I can't help it. But I never said I was a critic by profession. Anyway, back to PJ. Two drummers, a bass player, and an electric guitar player (who doubles as one of the two drummers). And PJ, who is singer, guitarist, and dancer all wrapped into one tiny little body wearing what appears to be a homemade white dress with Animal (from the Muppets) silk-screened to the front, and white cowgirl boots. Her straight black hair cut in what looks seems to me to be a sort of tribute to Karen O of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs (who is also a big fan of Harvey). No movable floors, no fancy special effects, no sets, nothing more than a few stage lights and a smoke machine. With this simple setup she blows you away to Kingdom Come. The most intense few minutes of the show (which is the case every time she performs this song) was during one of the THREE (yes, three) encores, when it's just her alone on stage, the mic, her guitar, and a song called "Rid Of Me." The majority of the audience in New York's Hammerstein Ballroom last night seemed to be other guys like me- slender builds, intense expressions, miss-matched artsy urban hipster clothes and longish disheveled hair. I looked around making eye contact with many guys who were doing the same, and the thing that was so un-New York was that we were all smiling at each other upon making eye contact! Leave it to PJ to make me feel like I'm not all alone after all! Leave it to PJ to make a bunch of drama queen sweatshirt under sports jacket midnight coffee pot smoker poets come together and rock back and forth in complete unison and ear/heaven-and-earth cracking bliss! Oh yeah, and I think I even saw Lestat in there standing not too far away from me... smiling those white glass sharp cunning teeth of his. ********** Wednesday October 6th, 2004 2:52pm I quote from the book I am currently reading, "The Dark Tower", by Stephen King (no one ever quite hits the nail on the head as King does): "'Because talent won't be quiet, doesn't know how to be quiet," he said. "Whether it's a talent for safe-cracking, thought-reading, or dividing ten-digit numbers in your head, it screams to be used. It never shuts up. It'll wake you in the middle of your tiredest night, screaming, 'Use me, use me, use me! I'm tired of just sitting here! Use me, fuckhead, use me!'" I am literally not sleeping much lately because of this very thing screaming inside my head. There's so much I need to do and I just know there is not enough time to do ALL of it. I feel offensively obscured by the fact that I only have one lifetime to work with here. What the hell do you do with only one lifetime?!?!?! It's driving me nuts! But all this aside, I am in a remarkably good mood these days. It has to do a lot with the people I surround myself with, I think. I feel refreshed in many ways, and inspired. I 'ran into' Voltaire last week in the Big Cup café in Chelsea. He came in with his son to get a coffee... I went up and said hi (it was my first time ever seeing him in public- anyone who's talked to him before face to face knows the power contained in that face, that smile, sort of like how I'd imagine meeting Lestat out on the street, there's this little devil on your shoulder, telling you to throw yourself at his feet, screaming, "Take me! Just take me, I'm yours!"). To make a short story even shorter, we swapped emails over the following week... and I think one of the reasons why I like him so much is that he reminds me a lot of my friend Chris... so much in fact that I'll have to take Chris to one of his shows in the future and introduce the two of them. Anyway, he just finished a bunch of shows in NYC, and now he's traveling, but he'll be back in NY in a few months. Keep tabs on him at his website, www.voltaire.net and do try to go see him perform. You will NOT be disappointed! This evening I am going to see PJ Harvey perform at the Hammerstein Ballroom, I cannot wait! I haven't seen her perform since 2001, I think. I'm tempted to say she's my favorite female rocker. Maybe it's just because I relate on so many different levels with her music. Anyway, I am really looking forward to the concert! Breathless with anticipation! If you don't know who she is, go to www.pjharvey.net And while I'm on the topic of musicians, I am very annoyed with Elton John. Apparently he's one of the few queens on earth who does not like our Divine Mother, Madonna. If you can't say nice things about other recording artists, don't say anything at ALL! (but yeah like he's gonna read this). It's beautiful and cool outside this week. The beginning of this year's Fall is nothing short of majestic. I wish I was back home right now, up in New Hampshire, getting drunk off of the brilliantly poetic multi-colored tree kingdoms surrounding my childhood house... ********** Saturday October 2nd, 2004 11:41am OK so Jason reminded me yesterday that I have not written in a while... (gee and I really thought no one was reading these!). I guess I haven't written because I'm not presently in the mood to write about negative things. What happened? Well, Eddie turns out to be the same 19 year old he was back in 2002 (when he still WAS 19), and my Mom turns out to be disappointed with my life (yet again). Or maybe she's just racist. I honestly can't tell. It's hard to call members of her generation racist without knowing if that's an accurate term to use, while feeling sorry for them for not being able to break free of certain kinds of thinking. Anyone familiar with the stories of Eddie and my Mom (both entirely separate stories from one another and in no real way related) would know that I might prefer not to write about or even THINK about that kind of negativity for the time being. And anyone who does not know of their stories will just have to deal with it. Optimistic thinking- Eddie introduced me to his remarkable roommate Michelle; perhaps Eddie's uncomfortable presence in my life simply served to bring me to Michelle. Maybe she has a bigger role to play in my future? This is the only kind of thinking that keeps me sane and gentle. I really want to go to California for Christmas. I mean, what I really want to do is LIVE there, but truly my ambition still belongs to New York, and it just is not time for that kind of change yet. Also, I sort of feel a need to be away from my family for this holiday. If I do go to California, it will be my first time being away from my family for Christmas, which to me, and more so to them, would be a big deal. I am going to start writing short stories again. The first one is a story that is inspired by recent trips to Washington D.C. I will create a whole new section in this website for my short stories. Also, I am trying to get a photography show together later this month in Soho. I have "photographer block", in that I have absolutely no way of deciding which pieces or series to use in this show. But I am sure it will all come together at the last minute. I read about Anne Rice's dealings with Amazon.com lately. The whole thing gives me a funny feeling under my skin. In many ways the Internet does things I think it shouldn't. But let's not get into that now. I'm reading the final book in Stephen King's "The Dark Tower" series. I am sad. It is all coming to an end!!! www.stephenking.com/DarkTower Any bookworms out there who have not given this series a chance, you're making a major mistake! I'll go more into it at a later date- right now I must return to the pool... There Jason. You have your entry! :) ********** Tuesday September 21, 2004 10:58am I wanted to write this entry a lot sooner, but I needed the past day or so to catch the sleep that never occurred since Saturday evening. Saturday's barbeque was sooooo much fun!!!!! My grandmother came with my aunt and uncle from Long Island, my sister Lori, her husband Andy and his brother Joe came from Rhode Island, my parents came from New Hampshire, my roommate Cameron's boyfriend Ty came with his friends, and included with the rest were my coworkers, fellow swimmers, my swim coach Mark, Sebastian came and his friends, Eddie came down with his roommate Michelle from Boston (and who thankfully spent the remainder of the weekend with me and left Monday morning), my goth friends, my photography friends, Chris and his daughter Lua, young kids, old adults, straight people, gay people, stoned people, drunk people, laughing people, beautiful people, ferocious people, intelligent people, soft-spoken people, intense people and any other interesting type unlisted. My house and backyard was totally busting at the seams with laughter and conversation and music and grill smoke and candle light and nighttime magic moonshine in a dark green-perfumed mediaeval garden on a wide quite tree-lined avenue in historic Brooklyn. The pitcher of sangria I made was totally consumed before it was even seen by half the people who came. Now the party's over and the house is empty and I am longing for occupancy again... Thanks to Eddie for keeping me awake in bed the entire weekend, who made me pass the nighttime hours speaking of secret fears and desires, who reacquainted me with the cobwebbed corners of my heart that had turned to stone months ago... Indeed, these corners exist in chambers still standing chilled as stone, but those few nights in bed together talking and talking and talking and measuring the weight of breathful silence in dark glowing conversations of past kindling love affairs have restored perhaps a small bit of faith in what I have completely abandoned since those desperate late April moments... Over the last couple nights after the party we explored the stone together. Perhaps these cobwebs can come down and perhaps the passage of glowing blood can once again pulsate and throb and flourish inside this stone in my chest. A stone upon a first glace can actually be an egg upon further exploration. I never would have thought. I want to have people over again very soon. ********** Monday September 13th, 2004 3:47pm Yesterday I spent the day in D.C. for the grand opening of the National Museum of the American Indian (www.nmai.si.edu). My boss designed the theatre inside it (before I started working with him unfortunately- I wish I could clame a stake with such an awesome piece of architecture!). Seeing such a great building helped restore a little bit of faith I had long lost in present-day architecture. Actually, it also restored my faith in modern American people who still possess a passion and love of great spaces, the kinds of clients who understand and are willing to put out the money in order to allow such great architecture to be created. Also, to see the presence and significance/symbolism of the NMAI living practically right across the street from our nation's Capital is such a strong comment, for both sides of the line. This is what I fell in love with about architecture back in my college days- its ability to make social change and commentary, an ability to even speak words like 'Revolution!' and the like, a tool with which to open up peoples' heads to history and to reality and to the passions of people and cultures most of us know little or nothing about- simply by the curve of a stone wall or the the direct decision of a domed sunlit white space... We need greater architects in our culture, we need a greater public awareness of what makes average buildings Architecture. We need to have more respect with the surroundings we create for ourselves, we need to be more aware of our direct and indirect influence on creation and what our architecture says of us. I really need to find a doctor. I promised I'd get checked up a few months ago when I was experiencing dizzy spells, but I never did because the spells went away. Well, now they're back. Had one last night, as I was driving us back up to NYC on the speedy highway. Not a good time for a dizzy spell. Also had two so far today. Also have had a major lack of energy for the past month or so, but I only equated it with growing older and approaching thirty (I've got another 2.25 years left during which to come to terms with that strange fact), and besides a daily good swim always makes me feel eighteen again (in several little fun ways). But maybe the dizziness is related to the dizzy spells as well. Ugh. I hate doctors. My fellow Wentworth alumnus Jason seems to think the dizzy spells has something to do with my 'personal' life (his direct words are hereby censored from this entry)... C'mon Jason, you have to do better than that. I mean, ugh. Well I ain't gonna touch that one with a ten foot pole!! So shut up and give up. My big housewarming/end-of-summer barbaque is Saturday!!!!! I am shocked at the amount of people who are supposed to come over! Should be interesting to say the least- Two ex boyfriends, several I-don't-know-what-they-are, a few really good friends, my roommate Cameron, his boyfriend and his friends, my fellow coworkers, lifeguards, swimmers, coaches, family (including perhaps my grandparents, of all party-goers)... I guess it's a good thing I put it off to the end of the summer. I'd hate to do this more than once a year. Should be fun! I'll write about it next week. ********** Saturday September 11th, 2004 1:09pm The first major architecture project I worked on here in NYC just opened, an underground Off-Broadway complex containing 5 theatres. It is called Dodger Stages. (www.dodgerstages.com) I went with my bosses to the grand opening celebration Thursday night. And was it crowded! You'd think everyone who was anyone in the theatre industry was there! Luckily Sebastian was able to come with me- usually I do not do well in large crowds of people, but because of him, my mind was too preoccupied with showing him all around and explaining how everything was designed, why certain finishes were used, what makes these theatres the best theatres of their kind in New York, etc. etc. I am not accustomed to mixing my personal life with my professional life, and so it is not often my friends meet my employers and vise versa. My bosses, a married couple who have kids my age, are sort of like my adopted NY parents. They look out for me at times in such a way that only parents do. They are my mentors, my family, and I love them. And I loved how they met Sebastian and took him in as if I had brought a friend from school home for dinner. It is not often I take a friend into this other world and show him what kind of work I do and why I do it. I'm having trouble writing about this evening... feelings that are difficult to put into words. But to see such a large project, one that took a major amount of time and effort, come to a close and open up to the world with such greatness, and for me not only in a professional way, but in a deeply personal way as well. I have the great fortune to have incredible people as friends, like Sebastian, and I am immensely blessed to work with such brilliant geniuses like my boss. Everyone has different orbs in their lives, and every now and then those orbs come into contact with each other and the effects can be dazzling. Of course, none of this makes sense in this entry, but hey, at least I know what I mean. HAH! ********** Wednesday September 9th, 2004 2:59pm OK, so I haven't written in two weeks.... Mostly because work has been so busy and I've been traveling and blah blah. So. This has to be a quickie... Book recommendations! Just read two awesome books and have started a third, which I am recommending even before I have finished it. The first two I just read are: "Life of Pi" by Yann Martel, and "Memoirs of Elizabeth Frankenstein" by Theodore Roszak. I do not have enough time right now to say WHY they're great books, but they are!!! If you're itching for a good book to read, any of these will do! I promise! And the third which I've just started is "Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell" by Susanna Clarke (www.jonathanstrange.com). All I can say is, AMAZING!!! It's her first book and it's almost 800 pages long!!!! She's doing a book signing here in NYC next week, I'm gonna try to go meet her. I haven't read a book like this since Anne Rice's "The Witching Hour" (by this I mean any book published in the last thirty or so years). This Susanna Clarke is definitely destined to leave a rather large mark in literature history. Can't wait to see what she will write in the future. Maybe in my next entry I'll have more time to write why all these books are so wonderful... I hate beginning praise without justifying it! hahahaha! Music recommendations! Bjork's new album, "Medulla" is fascinating!!!!! Very very very good!!!! (www.bjork.com) I can't describe it, you just need to get a hold of it and listen to it. She's endless brilliance. Pure genius. What else? Well, the Republicans have left town. It was an interesting week, to say the least. Nothing bad happened, but several immensely good protests did occur, and most peacefully. If anything, like 9/11, the National Republican Convention brought the citizens of NYC together yet again in amazing love & unity! Truly inspiring to see. The only downside to the whole week that I could really note is the great loss financially of many local businesses... but hey, it's over, and the businesses shall survive and recover! Also, getting ready for my housewarming BBQ next weekend. Am a bit nervous, as it will be the first time my parents are coming down from New Hampshire to a 'party' that I've held, where they will be exposed for the first time to a great quantity of friends & acquaintances I've acquired here in NYC over the past two and a half years. No doubt they'll see me in a new light... Hopefully a positive light! My friends make me nervous sometimes, but all in all they're a good crew. Troublemakers, at times, but they're all worth it. *NOTE TO FRIENDS- PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE BEHAVE WHEN YOU MEET MY PARENTS NEXT WEEKEND!!!!!* thanks. Oh, a good thing happened when I got home late last night- a great guy (who I really need to take the time to get to know better) by the name of Nathan up in Boston sent me a box completely overflowing with rosaries!!! My god! I haven't had a chance to count yet, but I bet there's close to a dozen of them!!! All shapes, colors, materials, etc. Needless to say I slept well last night. Thanks Nathan, if you read this! It must seem strange, and surely anyone who enters my home will question me- what is an atheist like me doing with so many rosaries??? OK, this is the end of this one. I could go on but my lunch break is over and my boss will be back momentarily. My, how I long for a life of independence!!! *sigh* Oh god, the summer's over. ********** Friday August 27, 2004 9:59am/3:44pm PART I So this is it- the end of the world as we know it here in NYC. Well, at least for the next week, that is. The republicans are coming. That's fine. I have lots of friends who are republicans. I think I used to be one. The thing that's not fine is that Mr. Bush is coming as well, which presents all the obvious issues. The office I work at is staying open, despite the fact it's one block directly south of Madison Square Garden. I plan to use a couple personal days in order to avoid the peak moments of the convention, for whatever good it will do. It's amazing this is actually happening HERE. Of all places to have this convention... Of all places! It's borderline insulting is what it is (Yeah I'm opinionated, I know it). The road blocks are in place. Helicopters are hovering all around. More cops than pedestrians, all with big guns. Protestors are preparing to waltz. Most citizens of New York are fleeing in fear, frustration and anger. A few people like me are staying because they have to. Others stay simply because this is Home, and you never abandon it for no one no how, no matter who's coming. LIGHTS. CAMERAS. ACTION. Who knows what's going to happen. Hopefully, nothing. Hopefully, everything. Maybe I'll witness a Divine Democratic Miracle sometime soon. If there's some God-like thing out there somewhere, may it help us through this next week. Sunday I go to Long Island to spend time with my grand parents, which is the only good thing that's going happen over the next seven days. Monday night I fly to D.C. for a business meeting Tuesday morning, then I come back Tuesday night to work the rest of the week here in the office (ok, how did I let myself get stuck flying between NYC and D.C. during the NRC?!?!?!?). Will I be working or will I be watching? Breathing or screaming? The President's coming back to New York. Should be a lot of fun, don't you think? PART II OK, have to throw in a few positive words to balance off the first part of this journal entry. Just had lunch with Sebastian, a very good soul, one of my dearest and trustiest of friends- who is in fact the wizard behind this Narcissistic webpage of mine. He gave me a very special gift, it's lying against my chest as I write this. I now have a grand total of four rosaries!!! Thanks babe! Totally made my week! Sometimes the cosmos works for you instead of against- Turns out I will (or might) be part of a photography show down in Soho at the end of September. All the details have yet to be finalized, but I am now running around like the usual madman I am getting all my materials ready for it. What to show????? What not to show???? Jesus! Also I photographed a couple last night, a man and woman deeply in love with one another. Is it possible to capture love on film like a fingerprint? Like sound on a record? Of course! And I cannot wait to see how the pictures come out... Life is so amazing, just so amazing that I cannot help but smile sometimes for no reason at all! You don't need to be in love to recognize it when it's laying naked right in front of you. ********** Monday August 23, 2004 9:26am We threw a surprise birthday party for my sister up in Rhode Island Friday night. Which meant that I had to leave work around noon to catch Greyhound up to Providence to make it there on time. Also had to lifeguard the next day, so after we partied hard (VERY hard) and got back to her house around 3:30am, I crashed, got up two and a half hours later, shaved, brushed my teeth, woke up my poor poor dad (I don't have a car), barely made it in time to catch the 7:00am bus, and made it back down in time to get my ass to the pool on time at 12:30pm. I felt like I somehow managed to squeeze one whole weekend worth of life into twelve hours! I am amazed I was able to show up to my office this morning. Luckily I took Sunday to recuperate. Didn't see anyone, didn't make any phone calls, didn't even talk much to myself. Just spent the whole day in the garden doing the usual wrestling match with the tough local weeds, also went out and bought a bunch of candles for the house. Oh yeah, and I added another rosary to my collection! Also stopped by the weekly flea market in Chelsea and picked up a cool little jade fish for the bathroom (jade is another of my vices, like the rosaries, but luckily a hell of a lot cheaper), as well as a nifty copper bracelet from Japan, upon which is a prayer, supposedly keeping away evil spirits and encourages peace and well-being. All in all it was a very good weekend, filled with positive energy. The only low part (if it can be called a low) is when we were at the birthday party, my father and I got into our usual political debate (after each of these debates I always promise myself never to talk politics to the man ever again for as long as I live, but this is one of the few promises I make myself I just can NOT ever live up to). I was totally discouraged by how he's been influenced by the media and by fear. I always speak my mind, I am quite blunt, especially when talking about Mr. President. Soon after I got up on my soap box about the matter, my dad said, "Kurt! Watch what you say! You might get in trouble!!" He was totally serious. That single phrase pushed me back and pinned me to the wall. Apparently, according to my father, I do not have freedom of speech!! What the hell, I thought I was in the United States! Right?? Sorry dad, you're right- I should just keep my mouth shut, and like you, not even vote at all. What WAS I thinking? I left that party fearing the damage done to the minds of people like my dad cannot be undone. There are people who have given in. There are words like these I cannot tell my dad, because they would hurt him. But this is our country, it was made to be influenced by its people, not the other way around. Sitting back and not voting at ALL (even though Kerry ain't no super hero) is I feel worse than voting for Bush. Ugh. It's all so frustrating!! Monday August 16, 2004 9:09am "I have no time for hate or love Hey child, you're so full of woe I have no time for hate or lying Hey child, you're no child of mine" -P.J. Harvey, "No Child Of Mine" I just got back home from a weekend up in Boston. Went to spend a few days with my friend Donald out in Jamaica Plain, and to drop in on my friends Jen & Ed's annual summer barbeque out in Stoneham, MA. It's really so easy to surround yourself with amazing people, artists, musicians and free thinkers who's youth has nothing to do with age, who's intelligence and wisdom have nothing to do with ego, who's timeless beauty has nothing to do with superficiality. It's so easy and yet whenever I introduce new friends to these ancient fairies of mine, it's always a sort of euphoric/ metaphysical shock to those who've never encountered this far reaching unexplored corner of the island of my world. If mythology were reality, then these are authentic creatures, like Greek Gods, Jen's purple Victorian house in Stoneham the Acropolis of a unique array of intersecting souls that come and ago like strange dreams, the kind that wake you in the middle of the night gasping in ecstasy, lit dramatically by flickering hidden lightning storms in secret backyard gardens. Bohemia is the hidden name behind Utopia. Otherwise known as the backyard at Jen and Ed's house. ********** Monday August 9, 2004 2:56pm Summer's back as our 80 degree weather returns this week and I feel the sun on my hair and my hands in my soil and I smile because new friends are around a lot lately and so are others... Yeah this is gonna be a good week, I can just tell, I knew it Sunday morning shooting a stranger in my house for my next time-consuming photo series, I knew it when I dropped off the film for development earlier today, and I'll know it later when I go home to plant some flowers in the backyard. It's been a long time since I last felt the contentness and completeness of working with soil and things that grow. Amazingly, gardening is a lot like spending time with a stranger, like I did with my camera Sunday morning, with nothing between you but skin and words. Something so utterly pure about it all. About soil and things that grow. Like the feeling you get when you hold your breath and swim underwater and look at the affected sun in the wavering space above. I think I am on a search for pureness. I'm having a barbeque next week for all the lifeguards I work with on the weekends- I'm having this party for them before the majority leave to go back to college in a few weeks, I'm having a party for them because some of them have become very good friends of mine, and I am going to miss them very much after they leave. Even though it sucks having two jobs, I've come to realize that I really need this lifeguarding gig. I'm in a tough place with my 'real' job (the architect thing) because everyone in my office is older, married, and I am the only one going out at night and struggling with friends and dates and trying to find someone worth wasting time away with. So the lifeguarding exposes me to the entire other end of the spectrum- high school kids and college kids who still itch to go out and party after a long day at work, they're people who're still able stimulate the one half of me that the grown-ups at my real job can never touch. Which reminds me- my high school graduating class is having its 10 year reunion next summer! Good heavens!!! I've done some research, and almost everyone I graduated with is married and has kids, and I'd bet that 88% of them still live up in Merrimack New Hampshire!!!!! I mean, not that there's anything wrong with that... But god, just the idea of growing up... becoming what you never foresaw yourself becoming... I actually like the fact that I still lack genuine focus and still wear jeans and t-shirts that are too small for me and have long unkept hair and still have friends who need to carry around fake ID's and still have no money and still think it's cool to go run into celebrities at after-parties and still get drunk in seedy bars and wake up sometimes next to strange tan beauties in pure white beds. I feel a good wave coming on, and I am getting up on my board right now and I am gonna try to ride it all the way to next week! ********** Friday August 6, 2004 12:51pm One of these days after I pay off my debts I will buy a car, preferably a convertible, an affordable and reliable used one, pack a few bags, my camera, my guitar, and I'll drive across country until I reach California. Then I'll gradually turn around and drive back to the east coast. I plan to take up at least six weeks, maybe more, for this trip. I want to go it alone, but I want to meet people along the way, in different states, so I can leave behind a trail of memories in the fresh heads of complete strangers. Maybe I want to run into some guy in Kansas who will make me want to buy a house and live there forever. Maybe I want to call my parents late one night from a cheap hotel room in Louisiana and say something like, "Dad, I met a girl last night in the French Quarter and tomorrow morning we're flying to Prague," and then never be seen or heard from ever again. Maybe I just want to vanish into thin air. At my sister's wedding in Barbados things happened that made me view my parents in a different way. They disappointed me I think for the first real time in my whole life. I hate myself for that disappointment, I hate myself for having expectations. I hate them sometimes for not seeing what they do to the people around them. The first time anyone realizes their parent's supposed "happy" marriage is entirely different than you thought it was for the first twenty-something years of your life is the first time you start doubting everything around you, especially your own capacity to love and to be loved. For me, anyway, this is how it is. The moment I started feeling completely helpless was the moment I realized nothing I could say or do would possibly make them any happier with life. Time for a drive. ********** Tuesday July 27, 2004 11:07am I watched a DVD of "Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes" piece by piece over the past five days. Is it too comic to actually say I relate to the poor fellow? At least he got back to his jungle. Will I ever even find mine? In any case, it's an amazing movie. The last time I saw it was when I was way too young to understand the story. It may now actually be one of my favorites. I should pick up the book. Kind of reminds me of the movie "Nell." Makes me want to get more natural. Makes me want to get a little wild. Makes me want to let down my hair go climb trees in Central Park in a loin cloth. Well... maybe not. I hate the hustle and bustle of white business man rush hour. I am house sitting for a friend up near the U.N. for two weeks, and so for these two weeks I go through Grand Central in order to take the subways down to my office. Every morning and evening I am overwhelmed by the amount of people rushing around between point A and point B. Like schools of fish forced to swim through deep sea trenches that are really too tight to be accommodating them, fish that... no, not fish. Androids. Androids that have a single focus, a single program, a single line of temper and motivation, androids who push and shove each other out of the way when the trajectories of intent cross one another in moments of flash hatred. This morning, while soaring down between androids to the 7 train I thought what would happen if I suddenly grabbed one of these speeding androids and forced her to tango, or better yet, to waltz across the subway platform? Would she laugh? Would she push me into the tracks, and then forget me three seconds later, original trajectory reassumed? Or better yet, would the bursting cry of a semiautomatic cause the entire android rush hour population to suddenly freeze and then turn to each other and waltz the greatest waltz New York City has ever seen? I am looking forward to the end of this week, when I return home to Brooklyn. No androids there. Just people, kids, grandparents, babies, hustlers, vendors, musicians. People on their stoops 24/7 playing jump rope, cooking BBQ's, singing, playing cards & chess. I didn't realize how much I missed it until I went home briefly a few days ago to fetch some clean clothes and my guitar. I was leaving and heading back to the A train when someone from across my avenue, a boy from a group of teenagers out on their front steps just chillin, yelled across to me, "Hey man, come play for us!" I don't play my guitar for anyone, EVER, but for him I yelled back, "Can't right now, but I'll drop by when I come back home!" And I meant it. This weekend I'll go back to Brooklyn and I'll cross the street and hang out with those kids, and I'll bring out my guitar. The morning of 9/11 I was still living in Boston. Before the first plane hit I had just finished my morning swim. I got out of the shower and was getting dressed in the locker room, and as I was gazing at my reflection I explored my eyes and thought, "Something is going to happen today. Maybe one of the principals at the office passed away. Or maybe my mom will call me and say one of my relatives died. I don't know exactly what, but today will bring sad news." Maybe thirty minutes later I was at my office, getting started on my work when my friend and coworker John called out from a few desks behind me (he always listens to the radio on his headset when immersed in CAD), "A plane just flew into the World Trade Center..." And the rest, well, the rest is history. I am thinking about that morning a lot lately because I've been getting that feeling again. I've always had a strong sixth sense and do not ignore it when these winds of premonition blow up against me. Yesterday morning sort of felt like it did in the locker room up in Boston. But the only thing that happened yesterday was some sort of bomb scare (which was either a false call or a NYPD drill) down on 23rd Street and 8th Avenue, which I walked past on my lunch break. I felt a hint of panic for about 5 minutes, as I made myself keep walking back up to my office on 30th. I am hoping that morning was a false call on my sixth sense as well. The upcoming Republican Convention that will be (across the street from my office) in Madison Square Garden is a week I am definitely not looking forward to. But I am trying not to think too much about it... Mayhap it will just be a death in my family. Or better yet, maybe just another NYPD drill. ********** Monday July 19, 2004 10:11am I am going through a period right now that might actually be classified as a mid-life crisis (the first of 3 or 4 that people tend to have these days). I'm kind of panicking... what the heck am I doing??? I've become so occupied with my art and my newfound friendships I've been building up lately. In this world I am living in right now, it seems to be the only good I can find, the only sort of security I can wrap around myself. I had dinner last night with my close friend Chris, an amazing guy who's a swimming instructor at the pool I spend my weekends at (I've been life guarding on the weekends for the past year now for extra dough). He's become sort of like the brother I never had (who by the way has the most gorgeous little daughter I've ever seen clinging to the leg of a father, a father with a Mohawk and big arms covered with tattoos, the kind of father you don't want to run into in a dark alley). We'd bend over backwards for each other, we'd do whatever needs to be done to protect one another. It's that kind of a friendship. Anyway, we'd been talking about relationships non stop over the course of our dinner, the focus being him and the woman he's fallen for. And at almost the last moment, Chris knocks me out of my seat with the question: "What about you, Kurt? Aren't you seeing anyone???" I took the train out to New Jersey Friday morning to spend the day shooting a model. While riding the train across the beautiful countryside of New Jersey (and I don't mean that as a joke anything, it does get absolutely gorgeous out there, once you get inland from all the factories) I wrote a poem called "The Setting Motions." When the poem was finished, I was actually shocked at how personal it was. I mean, when I write them they're always personal, of course, but this one really hit me back at a disturbing angle. It's sitting here on my desk right now, staring up at me, daring me. By the way, when I write it's not me writing. It's some other spirit, one who's possessed the very bones of my body (hence the name "Bonescribe" I've given myself), a spirit who sees me and my life from a perspective different from any other. A spirit that finds life in channeling words through my hands onto paper, a spirit who guides me and forces me to look at myself every now and then. A spirit that might suddenly come forward whenever he sees fit, whether it be while I am riding a train, sitting on the toilet, at my office working on a deadline, or in bed in the middle of the night. "Now is time to write!" It says, and I can concentrate on nothing else but watching someone else move my hands and see words become solid on a blank scrap of paper in front of me. Back to story. The poem I wrote on the train is about my heart shutting down. It's different than a broken heart. A broken heart heals and grows stronger. When your heart shuts down, it's for good. So I guess it's different than a mid-life crisis. It's different and far more serious. This poem has been haunting me ever since it became visible. I went to a bar Thursday night. It was the first time in a long time I went out to a gay bar. I'm finding I just can't do it anymore. I'm tired of all the little games guys play in those places. It's impossible for me to meet people that way. Even to make friends. Forget it! I mean, Jesus... I left swim practice that night, walking towards this bar, and on the way there I pass by a couple girls who used to live above me in the building I just moved out of in Hoboken. They were sitting outside at a restaurant, with a couple of their guy friends. They yelled out my name when they saw me walking by, and I went over briefly to chat them up. They asked me how I like Brooklyn so far. And suddenly one of their guy friends starts talking to me about Brooklyn. It wasn't a very long conversation, because I cut it short since I was on my way. But for those few moments I was talking to him, I instantly saw what I always see in a non-gay context: The possibility of a new friendship. Something I am still exploring and still trying to find ways of explaining is one of the strange realities of my life- I feel more like myself among straight people. The best friends I ever had and have now to this day are straight men. And women, of course. Straight and gay women. I actually relate more with straight men than I do with gay men. I get along with them a hell of a lot more. So I regretted not staying there in that conversation instead of continuing onward to the gay bar. It was a bad move. When I left that damn gay bar around 1:00am to get home, I left in a panic. I fled. I was cornered by gay men who like to make eye contact but don't like to approach. By gay men who pretend to talk to my close-by acquaintances all the while trying to listen to the twisted & slurred conversation I am having with one of my chums. Basically, surrounded by superficial guys too damn afraid to take a chance at something real. Perhaps my shutting down heart will harden and become a smooth shell, from which something entirely different will hatch. Or maybe it will harden to rough stone and sink down into nothing. Who knows. Right now, I am not even sure if I care. I just want to swim. I just want to take my pictures and write my poems. I just want to love and shelter those who love and shelter me (like Chris, my new brother). I just want to be left alone by ball-less men in sketchy bars. ********** Wednesday July 7, 2004 9:25am I saw Fahrenheit 9/11 on the 4th of July. Right after doing a long and rather intense photo shoot in Brooklyn (which should make a few nice additions to this webpage in a week or so). When everyone else was out on the city’s edge watching fireworks, a friend and I (and a whole theatre completely filled with other people, surprisingly) were huddled in a cool dark underground room down by Union Square, watching one of the most moving documentaries ever made. I laughed, I cried, I twisted with anger and pain, and I learned a lot I never knew before. But I am not going to write about it all here. Maybe in a poem, but not here. I am telling everyone to go see it. It’s mandatory. It’s about our country. It’s about our president. And it’s about our future. It needs to be seen and thought about. So many people I know are trying to turn away from the current state of our nation, trying to ignore the crimes being committed (and there's plenty saying the film is a load of lies-- and yet they can't prove any part of the film false as of yet). Please do not ignore the world you’re living in. Whether you like it or not, you’re playing a role in it. You have no choice in the matter. Might as well play it well, right? Start with a good movie like this one, then go back out into the world and act on your thoughts and feelings. That’s all I ask. DON'T LIVE DEAD. Now that I’ve written my bloated film review, I'll write about the rest of the weekend. I went to Fire Island on Monday and ran into a few friends, one of whom is my pal Guy. Guy’s one of those guys (weird wording, I know) who always always always manages to have a good time, who actually manages to dissolve the line between work and play 24/7. He's a lighting designer, it comes with the territory. He's actually sort of like a character right out of The Great Gatsby. I just realized that this moment! Anyway, I was trying to find the house he was staying at, and I was having trouble finding the “street” names (the streets on Fire Island are really nothing more than elevated board walks that appear like they're magically held off the ground by bamboo trees and such, and there's hardly ever a street sign to be found)… to make a long story short, I walked by this one large house in particular with loud music playing, and the sounds of water splashing and guys laughing and yelling. Before I saw the street name and the house number, I thought, “Now this is totally the type of place that Guy would be staying at.” And sure enough, it was. I went in through the entry gate, found Guy, and when someone passed me a drink, I went back out onto the terrace, undressed, jumped in the pool... and the rest, as they say, is history! Why do I love people like Guy so much? Because he’s one of those people who whenever they’re around somehow makes you totally forget the rest of the world… All the problems go away, and all you can think of is how sweet life is when there’s music playing and beautiful people partying. Guy teaches you just by being himself that you can't take life too seriously ALL the time. After all, living life toooooo seriously can be dangerously close to living dead. Right? It's all about balance. So yes, it was a holiday well spent. A perfect 4th of July… one sweet arc of a weekend- Start out with a movie like Fahrenheit 9/11, and finish off with a cool, suave fella like Guy. So perfect. Now, back to my life. ********** Thursday July 1, 2004 1:39PM I just moved to Brooklyn 4 weeks ago, and this is the first week I've rode my bike into work. I've ridden across both the Brooklyn Bridge, and the Manhattan Bridge. To all bike riders: The Brooklyn Bridge is by far the nicer ride of the two! The other one is just way too irregular and bumpy. If you do ride across the Manhattan Bridge, don't go fast, at least don't go as fast as I do (which is pretty damn fast) or else you'll hit one of the speed bump-like expansion joints and go air born like the Dukes of Hazard! If you like your bike, you'll take it slow. Oh and always wear a helmet. I yell at cyclists who don't. Then I knock them over to prove my point. My new home has a garden in the back, which is the first garden I've ever had in my life (since moving out of my parent's house when I graduated High School). As of right now it is overrun with weeds, but this weekend I will finally get the chance to tear it all up and learn the hard way how beautiful gardens are created! There is also a local gang of stray cats who like to come and visit me whenever I leave the kitchen door open... They're cute, tough and absolutely filthy creatures! It'd be interesting to see what else comes wandering into the backyard once it's the most beautiful lot on the block. I might have to erect electric fences around my tomatoes when they start growing. For some reason no one in this area gives any sort of TLC to their back yards. It's a shame when you see little pieces of nature being taken for granted. OK so where is this entry going?? A lot's been going on lately but not any one thing stands out by itself. Nothing really to focus on this week. Let's see... yesterday I bought my first rosary. I marched into Saint Patrick's Cathedral on my lunch break and bought a beautiful jade rosary. And I've been wearing it constantly since I got it. Why? Good question. A couple weeks ago, a realization hit me over the head like a grand piano: "I must start collecting rosaries." I have absolutely no idea why. I am NOT catholic. I am not even religious. If anything, I am atheist. But suddenly I am totally obsessed with rosaries. So, there goes my attempt to save more money. Some of these suckers are really pricy!! Have you shopped around for rosaries??? Go take a look. They're freakin expensive! The nice ones, anyway (Note- if anyone stumbles upon little shops in NYC that sell rosaries, please please let me know! So far the only store I've found is the one in Saint Patrick's). What else to report? I think I need to see my doctor. I've always had an annoying little heart murmur ever since I was born, but it's never been anything to worry about. Well, lately, over the past couple weeks (and hopefully in no relation to my hunger for rosaries), my heart's been giving me these slight pains from time to time. So, maybe it's time for a checkup. It can't be anything serious. I am only 27! So what if my dad just had a triple aneurysm operated on... so what if his side of the family has a dark history of heart problems... So what! This weekend is the 4th of July, and will be my first time heading out an east coast beach this year (the only other two beach trips were my week in Barbados back in April, and my trip to California last month). So I finally agree with everyone else and I know now from my own personal experience that northeast American beaches are quite lame. But I'll go, I'll take some pictures, I'll see some fireworks, and I'll come home sunburned. Another 4th of July well spent! ********** Saturday June 12, 2004 1:35pm This is my first entry for my web page that I just finally, after years of procrastination, have gotten together. I suppose it's more of an experiment more than anything else. Anyone who knows me knows how private and reclusive I am, and if my family and friends have any single common criticism of me and my life, that would be it. I don't open up. I don't share what's going on inside. So I guess this web page is an attempt to change that. Over the past three or so years I've sort of become obsessed with finding good uses of my life. My dad, who is now in his 60's said to me while I was still in college (which was not too many years ago), "…I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up…" Somehow I took that as a comforting statement. What do I want to be when I grow up? I went to college to become an architect. Right now I work with one of New York's most prominent theatre designers. Do I have any desire to get my license as an architect? No. I am also a poet, and a photographer, and those two things are technically the main focus of this web page. Do I want to make my living as a photographer or as a writer? I don't think about the answers to those kinds of questions at this moment. I think all the time about the questions, but not about the answers. I am gathering all the pieces of myself. I've spent the past couple months visiting California, as well as Washington D.C. I've been gathering pieces. I believe that who we are is scattered throughout the world. We were only born with the necessary tools that make it possible to spend our whole lives moving about and searching for all the pieces of us. The pieces of you are places, people, objects, moments, feelings, sights, sounds, etc. You must use your physical body, your tool, to inventory the pieces of you that you discover through life. The only way to make an inventory, since most of the pieces of you are intangible things, is by expressing these pieces in art. Why else have the ability to create art, and why else have the need to share it with others? The poems and photography you see here are not the best of their kind. Not in style, quality or presentation. They are merely samples of the pieces of me. They're not even the best pieces of me, but they're a few of my favorites. Stepping into this web page is not representative of stepping into an art gallery downtown. But rather, it is like stepping into my bedroom. This is a casual, if not slightly and permissively voyeuristic, glance of me. If it is not too tacky to make a web page dedication, then I would like to dedicate this web page to: Nick Zinner (one of the best guitarists of this day), Patrick Daughters, (I am completely obsessed with watching the Yeah Yeah Yeah's video for "Maps" over and over and over again), PJ Harvey, who has the awesome ability to write a song as simple as "The Desperate Kingdom of Love" (the story of my life at the moment), and lastly, to my sister, who is by far the most beautiful woman I've ever known.

All materials on this site are ©2010 Kurt Wehmann. All rights reserved.