2.27.2004

'crushed yet again, rocco decides to wear his kidney on his sleeve for a change.'

-----Original Message-----
From: Erik Kang [mailto:erikkang1@hotmail.com]
Sent: Friday, February 27, 2004 3:35 PM
To: Soto, Vanessa B
Subject: YOU YES YOU!


Love cards for people like us.....

Robert's wisdom for today:

Be reconciled with the whole universe. When you are so reconciled the whole
universe is your friend. When the whole universe is your friend nothing
whatever can harm you. To be hurt by something or attacked by bacteria or an
evil spirit is proof that you are not reconciled with everything in the
universe. Therefore reflect upon yourself and be reconciled.

To be reconciled with the whole universe means to be grateful to everything
in the universe. True reconciliaction cannot be achieved by patience or
forbearance with one another.

To be patient or forbearing is not to be reconciled from the bottom of your
heart. When you are grateful to one another, true reconciliaction is
achieved.
Those who are grateful to God but cannot be grateful to everything in the
universe are not reconciled with the whole universe.

If you are not reconciled with the whole universe, although God wishes to
save you, your thought waves of strife will hinder you from receiving God's waves
of salvation.

2.26.2004

i should never write another word again.

Inscription for a Gravestone
Robinson Jeffers

I am not dead, I have only become inhuman:
That is to say,
Undressed myself of laughable prides and infirmities,
But not as a man
Undresses to creep into bed, but like an athlete
Stripping for the race.

The delicate ravel of nerves that made me a measurer
Of certain fictions
Called good and evil; that made me contract with pain
And expand with pleasure;
Fussily adjusted like a little electroscope:
That's gone, it is true;
(I never miss it; if the universe does,
How easily replaced!)
But all the rest is heightened, widened, set free.


I admired the beauty
While I was human, now I am part of the beauty.
I wander in the air,
Being mostly gas and water, and flow in the ocean;
Touch you and Asia
At the same moment; have a hand in the sunrises
And the glow of this grass.

I left the light precipitate of ashes to earth
For a love-token.
lord, it's a zero-sum game with you.
even the harmless are armed,
and I
am armored, and alarmed.
it's late to figure out
who is a sitting target
with a hole like a bullseye,
having none of it,
that keeps coughing up arrows,
though I have plenty.
i'll keep walking around like this, instead,
with my arms over my head
and over my eyes, my hands.
i'm sick to death of hearing of it.
no amount of prayer will clean out the wounds,
where breaths congeal
and blood runs hot and cold,
where the sweat wells up between midnight and five-
when it's always dark.

i take my comfort in flesh instead.
unafraid in blackness,
beneath your hair, beside your neck, behind my eyelids,
hiding straining skins, violet and red.

2.25.2004

Pentagon report predicts some very, very bad news.
you know who you are:

don't worry, i think i'll probably not get felled like a fragile young birch sapling by a runaway bus, crossfire from illicit mafiose Russian wholesale cigarette dealers, treesharks, the black plague, cancer of the bones, unhinged exboyfriends banding together on drug-induced rampage, raging fire started by spiritualist-recommended eternal flame karma-candle, massive stroke as brain tries to escape from the monotony of *company name deleted due to wage paranoia* by exploding from my skull and hopping away under it's own power, skin failure, electric eel attack whilst sitting on toilet, injudicious slip of the tongue during interface negotiations with TechnoCore A.I.

did i mention i love you?
cheer up, buttercup.

Elegy for Jane
(My student, thrown by a horse)

I remember the neckcurls, limp and damp as tendrils;
And her quick look, a sidelong pickerel smile;
And how, once startled into talk, the light syllables leaped for her,
And she balanced in the delight of her thought,

A wren, happy, tail into the wind,
Her song trembling the twigs and small branches.
The shade sang with her;
The leaves, their whispers turned to kissing,
And the mould sang in the bleached valleys under the rose.

Oh, when she was sad, she cast herself down into such a pure depth,
Even a father could not find her:
Scraping her cheek against straw,
Stirring the clearest water.

My sparrow, you are not here,
Waiting like a fern, making a spiney shadow.
The sides of wet stones cannot console me,
Nor the moss, wound with the last light.

If only I could nudge you from this sleep,
My maimed darling, my skittery pigeon.
Over this damp grave I speak the words of my love:
I, with no rights in this matter,
Neither father nor lover.


T. Roethke
Save Scott McPartland from ridiculous NYU politics.

He is my ex
He made jokes about sex
Some kids skipped the texts
And they got his ass fired.

It's a shitty world sometimes.


Check out The Minor Fall, The Major Lift for fun things like
this, and because TMF, TML is such a great name for a blog.

*singing to self*
I thought love was only true in fairytales WHUMP WHUMP WHUMP WHUMP!
Meant for someone else but not for me WHUMP WHUMP!

wow, i am such a dweebie
Gawker.com! Because my subscription to US Weekly Magazine just isn't enough sometimes.

also, thanks to Erik for the poop cube!


poop cube!

2.24.2004

build your own

this is mine

What is the Federal Marriage Amendment?

Write to your representative

Sign the Million for Marriage Petition

"I never cease to be amazed that anyone would actively oppose the marriage of any two people who want to make a legal commitment to love, honor and support each other"
-Kim Gandy, President, National Organization for Women

"Washington has permitted interracial marriage since 1868, even though most states at the time barred it. It was nearly a hundred years before the United States Supreme Court, based on fundamental principles of equality, declared those laws unconstitutional. But in the meantime, Washington was free to decide this question locally, based on the views of its own citizens, rather than succumbing either to peer pressure from other states or direct orders from the federal government.

The marriage amendment flies in the face of this ideal. It shifts power to the federal government at the expense of local control. Historically, our nation has benefited from the independence of its states, allowing regional and local solutions to problems instead of insisting on one-size-fits-all approaches. In a nation that is increasingly diverse, this preference for local variation is crucial."

-Julie Shapiro and Kellye Testy, The Seattle Times

2.23.2004

Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head [grown slightly bald] brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet—and here’s no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.

And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”—
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say: “That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all.”


Eliot, The Love Song of Alfred J. Prufrock


i will bring water.

This was waiting in my inbox from Robert this morning:

"Beginning today, treat everyone you meet as if he or she were going to be
dead by midnight. Extend to them all the care, kindness, and understanding you
can muster, and do so with no thought of any reward. Your life will never be
the same again."

-Og Mandino




It's not just me:

Fantasy suite in D minor
Those who studied "Structural Elements of Reality TV" in college already know that there's a crucial juncture in the life of every reality show. It's that moment when the conflict between a show's characters either shifts into high gear, reflecting larger human themes and universal archetypes, or it gets predictable and repetitive and you switch to a "Seinfeld" rerun.

- Heather Havrilesky, "I Love to Watch"
Salon.com
-----Original Message-----
From: McPartland
Sent: Saturday, February 21, 2004 10:27 AM
To: Soto, Vanessa B
Subject: Saving Angel


I expected a post from you to your blog about this. What can people do to protest the cancellation of Angel? I've gone to the WB website, but there's really no place to protest, only an Angel chat. Any ideas?


----Original Message-----
From: Soto, Vanessa B
Sent: Monday, February 23, 2004 9:02 AM
To: 'McPartland@aol.com'
Subject: RE: Saving Angel


Here's the petition

I'll post it to my blog, too

2.20.2004

the pain will cleanse you ??


joss says:
(Sat Feb 14 22:31:16 2004)

Some of you may have heard the hilarious news. I thought this would be a good time to weigh in. to answer some obvious questions: No, we had no idea this was coming. Yes, we will finish out the season. No, I don't think the WB is doing the right thing. Yes, I'm grateful they did it early enough for my people to find other jobs.

Yes, my heart is breaking.

When Buffy ended, I was tapped out and ready to send it off. When Firefly got the axe, I went into a state of denial so huge it may very well cause a movie. But Angel... we really were starting to feel like we were on top, hitting our stride -- and then we strode right into the Pit of Snakes 'n' Lava. I'm so into these characters, these actors, the situations we're building... you wanna know how I feel? Watch the first act of "The Body."

As far as TV movies or whatever, I'm not thinking that far ahead. I actually hope my actors and writers are all too busy. We always planned this season finale to be a great capper to the season and the show in general. (And a great platform for a new season, of course.) We'll proceed ahead as planned.

I've never made mainstream TV very well. I like surprises, and TV isn't about surprises, unless the surprise is who gets voted off of something. I've been lucky to sneak this strange, strange show over the airwaves for as long as I have. I don't FEEL lucky, but I understand that I am.

Thanks all for your support, your community, and your perfectly sane devotion. It's meant a lot. I regret nothing (except the string of grisly murders in the 80's -- what was THAT all about?) Remember the words of the poet:

"Two roads diverged in a wood, and I took the road less traveled by and they CANCELLED MY FRIKKIN' SHOW. I totally shoulda took the road that had all those people on it. Damn."

See you soon.



-j.
New Buffy shirts from Slayage.com

i think they're so cool that i'm making myself nauseous

In Loving Memory - Buffy The Vampire Slayer
Slayage.com honours our favourite show, 'Buffy,' with this range of items.













and more!


I love my dead gay show

here's a toast to the dark side. heh.


2.19.2004

my horoscope

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): You will wake up one morning and realize
you're more free than you've been in a long time. Nagging ghosts will have
lost their power to bug you. Stale traditions will have faded. You will have
made your last payment on an old karmic debt. Through an act of grace you
don't fully understand, mind-forged manacles will have vanished. So what
should you do next? I suggest you celebrate. Throw a "Get Out of Jail"
party for yourself. Then run wild for a couple of days. When you're good
and ready to harness your adorable new independence, ask yourself, "In
what area of my life is it most important that I start fresh?"

fuck, can anyone believe that anyone cares about this Ken-Barbie breakup thing?

Dear Lord: So far today, I'm doing all right. I have not gossiped, lost my temper, been greedy, grumpy, nasty, selfish, or self-indulgent. I have not whined, complained, cursed, or eaten any chocolate. I have charged nothing on my credit card.

But I will be getting out of bed in a minute, and I think I will really need your help then.


***
To this prefab affirmation, I may need to add, "And I have not read any BTVS Willow/Giles facfic."




2.10.2004

The Introvert's Lexicon

Last night I dreamt that I was walking around a snowy college town with my parents. Every once in a while, perspective would switch to that of another person, a woman, who was also walking accompanied by a man and another woman. I was trying to take my parents to a nice restaurant for lunch, but the snow was very thick, and the village was on a steep slope, and the streets were paved with neckties. There were skiers skimming down the flanks of the mountain, and from the perspective of the other group of three in my dream, I stood on the stage where they were awarding the medals to the winners. Back in my own body, my parents and I were still climbing the winding main street with some difficulty, when I looked into a gallery and saw my ex, JR, with his father inside. They saw me, and J's dad put his arm protectively around his son, as they turned away from me together. I walked towards him to say hello, nervous to think I might be rebuffed, but glad of the opportunity to mend fences. We ended up walking together, JR telling me about the microclimate that caused the unusual cold weather in the town. Our walk led us back to the awards stage, where I switched back to the perspective of the woman in the other group. They went into a welcoming, dark, Gothic-looking wood and glass bar. I was interviewing a beautiful quadroon girl in a long red woolen dress with an apron when her father burst in angrily. Instead of leaving her to her fate, I chose to run off with my notebook, in which I had made notes regarding her story- the loss of her virginity. Her father chased me through the icy streets of the town as I struggled to tear out the damning pages and dispose of them.

"The contents of the collective unconscious are represented in consciousness in the form of pronounced preferences and definite ways of looking at things. These subjective tendencies and views are generally regarded by the individual as being determined by the object -- incorrectly, since they have their source in the unconscious structure of the psyche and are merely released by the effect of the object. They are stronger than the object's influence, their psychic value is higher, so that they superimpose themselves on all impressions. Thus, just as it seems incomprehensible to the introvert that the object should always be the decisive factor, it remains an enigma to the extravert how a subjective standpoint can be superior to the objective situation. He inevitably comes to the conclusion that the introvert is either a conceited egoist or crack-brained bigot. Today he would be suspected of harbouring an unconscious power-complex. The introvert certainly lays himself open to these suspicions, for his positive, highly generalizing manner of expression, which appears to rule out every other opinion from the start, lends countenance to all the extravert's prejudices. Moreover, the inflexibility of his subjective judgment, setting itself above all objective data, is sufficient in itself to create the impression of marked egocentricity. Faced with this prejudice the introvert is usually at a loss for the right argument, for he is quite unaware of the unconscious but generally quite valid assumptions on which his subjective judgment and his subjective perceptions are based. In the fashion of the times he looks outside for an answer, instead of seeking it behind his own consciousness."
Jung, "General Description of the Types."

2.06.2004

Last night I dreamt I was a production assistant on The Ring. The movie was being filmed in a haunted subway station and surroundings here in NYC. The only way to get to the shoot was on a creepy haunted bleached-out old white subway train, and the whole cast and crew were staying in leaky, paint-peely tunnels on cots and bunk beds. No one wanted to share a bunk with Evil Dunnowhatkindabeastie Samara, who lurked threateningly around the set trailing long wet hair and leaving puddles everywhere. Also, no one wanted to watch the dailies of the movie, because everyone was scared that someone from Props had left the Evil Videotape lying around. Gore Verbinski was very depressed about the situation and would not get out of bed, so I tried to cheer him up with some coffee.