I'm growing queer in my old age.

Wow.

2012-05-04T04:54:00Z

Someone sent me a message and reminded me of this space.

Hello.

My last entry was sad. I do not remember where I was, emotionally, when I wrote that.

In general, however, I am much happier than I ever have been when considering the tumult that was my life when this journal was a part of it. I had to take major steps backward but I am ever so much closer to making progress. I have gotten over not being who I was, which allowed me to finally grow up.

Sitting in one of my last academic classes while in Baton Rouge, I decided I needed to get involved in healthcare, not health. So I plan to become a family nurse practitioner and nurse midwife. I plan to travel the United States. I plan to travel the world. I plan to write novels about revolutions and stories with dead bodies and worlds contained in humans and escapism in them. I started to wear make-up. I started loving pictures of women with guns. I planned a trip to Europe. I became much more progressive.

I feel like there is so much more I could tell you, but I am not sure how or where I should begin, or even if this space is the right place for it. But, I understand now, I do not need to know everything at all times. All I need is to say hello.

phenomenologic @ 2010-09-01T00:23:00

2010-09-01T05:24:04Z

Hello.

[Zero]

2009-10-06T11:47:40Z

Night over France, and a giant shadow, a monstrous backdrop, is forming itself in the sky as the 747 approaches 17,000 feet, climbing to cruising altitude. The camera moves in on an airmail parcel bearing a Georgetown address, in which a Toshiba cassette player has been packed. The device will be activated as the opening piano notes to the song "1985" by Paul McCartney and Wings (Band on the Run; Apple Records; 1973) start playing. The bomb will detonate on the final crashing cymbal of the song--five minutes and eleven seconds after it began. A relatively simple microchip timer and strips of Remform equaling twenty ounces are in the Toshiba cassette player, and the parcel has been placed near the skin of the plane, where it will break through the fuselage, weakening the frame, causing the plane to break apart with greater ease. The plane is traveling at 350 miles an hour and is now at an altitude of 14,500 feet.

A giant crunching sound interrupts the pilot's conversation over the cockpit recording.

A violent noise, a distinct crashing sound, is followed by massive creaking, which rapidly starts repeating itself.

Smoke immediately starts pouring into the main cabin.

The front end of the 747--including the cockpit and part of the first-class cabin--breaks away, plunging toward earth as the rest of the plane hurtles forward, propelled by the still intact engines. A complete row near the explosion--the people strapped in those seats screaming--is sucked out of the aircraft.

This goes on for thirty seconds, until the plane starts breaking apart, a huge section of ceiling ripping away to reveal a wide vista of black sky.

And with its engines still running, the plane keeps flying but then drops three thousand feet.

The noise the air makes is like a siren.

Bottles of liquor, utensils, food from the kitchen--all fly backward into the business-class and coach cabins.

And the dying comes in waves.

People are rammed backward, bent in half, pulled up out of their seats, teeth are knocked out of heads, people are blinded, their bodies thrown through the air into the ceiling and then hurled into the back of the plane, smashing into other screaming passengers, as shards of aluminum keep breaking off the fuselage, spinning into the packed plane and shearing off limbs, and blood's whirling everywhere, people getting soaked with it, spitting it out of their mouths, trying to blink it out of their eyes, and then a huge chunk of metal flies into the cabin and scalps an entire row of passengers, shearing off the tops of their skulls, as another shard flies into the face of a young woman, halving her head but not killing her yet.

The problem is that so many people are not ready to die, and they start vomiting with panic and fear as the plane drops another thousand feet.

Something else within the plane breaks.

In the next moment, another roar as the plane starts breaking up more rapidly and the dying comes in waves.

Someone is spun around frantically before being sucked out of the hull of the craft, twirling into the air, his body hitting the frame and tearing in two, but he's still able to reach out his hands for help as he's sucked screaming from the plane. Another young man keeps shouting "Mom Mom Mom" until part of the fuselage flies backward, pinning him to his seat and ripping him in half, but he just goes into shock and doesn't die until the plane smashing haphazardly into the forest below and the dying comes in waves.

In the business section everyone is soaked with blood, someone's head is completely encased with intestines that flew out of what's left of the woman sitting two rows in front of him and people are screaming and crying uncontrollably, wailing with grief.

The dying are lashed with jet fuel as it starts spraying into the cabin.

One row is sprayed with the blood and viscera of the passengers in the row before them, who have been sliced in two.

Another row is decapitated by a huge sheet of flying aluminum, and blood keeps whirling throughout the cabin everywhere, mixing in with the jet fuel.

The fuel unleashes something, forces the passengers to comprehend a simple fact: that they have to let people go--mothers and sons, parents and children, brothers and sisters, husbands and wives--and that dying is inevitable in what could be a matter of seconds. They realize there is no hope. But understanding this horrible death just stretches the seconds out longer as they try to prepare for it--people still alive being flung around the aircraft falling to earth, screaming and vomiting and crying involuntarily, bodies contorted while they brace themselves, heads bowed down.

"Why me?" someone wonders uselessly.

A leg is caught in a tangle of metal and wires and it waves wildly in the air as the plane continues to drop.

Of the three Camden graduates aboard the 747--Amanda Taylor ('86), Stephanie Meyers ('87) and Susan Goldman ('86)--Amanda is killed first when she's struck by a beam that crashes through the ceiling of the plane, her son reaching out to her as he's lifted out of his seat into the air, his arms outstretched as his head mercifully smashes again an overhead bin in the craft, killing him instantly.

Susan Goldman, who has cervical cancer, is partly thankful as she braces herself but changes her mind as she's sprayed with burning jet fuel.

The plan ignites and a huge wave of people die by inhaling flames, their mouths and throats and lungs charred black.

For some, a minute of falling while still conscious.

Onto a forest situated just seventy miles outside Paris.

The soft sounds of bodies imploding, torn apart on impact.

A massive section of the fuselage lands and because of an emergency backup system, all the lights in the plane continue flickering as a hail of glowing ash rains down.

A long pause.

The bodies lie clustered in clumps. Some--but very few--of the passengers have no marks on them, even though all their bones have been broken. Some passengers have been crushed to half or a third or even a quarter of their normal size. One man has been so compressed he resembles some kind of human bag, a shape with a vague head attached to it, the face pushed in and stark white. Other passengers have been mutilated by shrapnel, some so mangled that men with women become indistinguishable, all of them naked, their clothes blown off on the downward fall, some of them flash-burned.

And the smell of rot is everywhere--coming off dismembered feet and arms and legs and torsos propped upright, off piles of intestines and crushed skulls, and the heads that are intact have screams etched across their faces. And the trees that don't burn will have to be felled to extract airplane piece and to recover the body parts that ornament them, yellow strings of fatty tissue draped over branches, a macabre tinsel. Stephanie Meyers is still strapped in her seat, which hangs from one of those trees, her eyeballs burned out of their sockets. And since a cargo of party confetti and gold glitter--two tons of it--were being transported to America, millions of tiny dots of purple and green and pink and orange paper cascade over the carnage.

This is what makes up the forest now: thousands of steel rivets, the unbroken door of the plane, a row of cabin windows, huge sheets of insulation, life jackets, giant clumps of wiring, rows of empty seat cushions--belts still fastened--shredded and covered with blood and matted with viscera, and some of the seat backs have passengers' impressions burned into them. Dogs and cats lie crushed in their kennels.

For some reason the majority of the passengers on this flight were under thirty, and the debris reflects this: cell phones and laptops and Ray-Ban sunglasses and baseball caps and pairs of Rollerblades tied together and camcorders and mangled guitars and hundreds of CDs and fashion magazines (including the YouthQuake with Victor Ward on the cover) and entire wardrobes of Calvin Klein and Armani and Ralph Lauren hang from burning trees and there's a teddy bear soaked with blood and a Bible and various Nintendo games along with rolls of toilet paper and shoulder bags and engagement rings and pens and belts whipped off waists and Prada purses still clasped and boxes of Calvin Klein boxer-briefs and so many clothes from the Gap contaminated with blood and other body fluids and everything reeks of aviation fuel.

The only things that suggest living: a wind billows across the wreckage, the moon rises into an expanse of sky so dark it's almost abstract, confetti and glitter continue raining down. Aviation fuel starts burning the trees in the forest, the word CANCELED appears on a big black arrival board at JFK airport in New York, and the next morning, as the sun rises gently over cleanup crews, church bells start ringing and psychics start calling in with tips and then the gossip begins.

--originally written by Bret Easton Ellis

phenomenologic @ 2009-05-08T22:14:00

2009-05-09T03:15:45Z

How are you?

For Katelyn's eyes only. (Not really.)

2004-11-20T02:09:31Z

Man: Well, I've never seen you here before!
Penny: That's 'cause I'm new. My name's Penny.
Man: Penny, eh? Is that your real name, Penny?
Penny: Yes.
Man: Well, I'll bet it is! So, can you--can you see me, Penny, or is this a one-way mirror?
Penny: I can see you, sir.
Man: Good, heh. That's the way I like it. You--you a Portland girl, Penny?
Penny: No, I'm from California.
Man: Oh, Cali! I lived in Frisco for a while. San Fran. They call that the city that never sleeps!
Penny: Oh...Um, did you want me to take my shirt off or anything, sir?
Man: Oh no, you're just perfect like that, Penny. So what part of Cali did you live in? SoCal?

Hahaha...hahahaha...haha--GASP!

Woman 1: Did you want to mail that...First Class?
Woman 2: Oh no, bookrate.
Woman 1: Really? Feels a little light to be books. Are you sure it isn't cloth or clothing?
Woman 2: Ohhhh...it is a cloth book. I make washable art books--for--children--ah--
Woman 1: You have a child! Well then, you know what I'm talking about.
Woman 2: D--Do I have a child? Yes, her name is--Penny.
Woman 1: H--how old is she?
Woman 2: S....She's twelve. Oh...I thought you meant how many children do I have. Have--twelve--children... Um...I adopted them all last year. It's part of a program for--for bookmakers LIKE MYSELF. So that--that would be bookrate on that.
Sorry I couldn't really transcribe all the orgasmic noises?

Hahahaha...haha--GASP!

Penny: How am I driving so far? I first started ly--I mean, driving--when I was five s--five years old. And since I was just a little girl, I just told little--drove short distances in a little car. It was a kiddie car. My mom would say to me, "Penny...you need to stop driving and start playing." She wanted me to play with a ball or swing on a swing. We had a little swing hanging off of the big tree in the yard, it was a kiddie swing. She would say, "Penny...if you don't stop driving, you're gonna end up armless and legless. And then what will you do?" And I would say, "Mom...you should know. I am alert. I am very, very careful."

Man: So what part of Cali did you say you were from?
Penny: Um...I'm from the Bay Area.
Man: Oh, really! Whereabouts?
Penny: I'm from Berkeley.
Man: Oh, small world! I graduated UC Berkeley! What street did you live on?
Penny: Um...did you--did you want me to bend over or anything, sir?
Man: Oh no, you're just perfect like that, princess. So what street did you say you lived on?
Penny Um, I--I didn't, heh. What street did you live on, sir?

Penny: The thing about walking as compared to driving is that when you're walking you really don't know what's going to happen to you. You can trip and fall, or get hit by a rock! Or like this one time, when I was walking to the store to get a soda, I saw this kid up ahead of me on a tricycle. I didn't think anything. I just thought, "Kid on a trike." And then the kid turns around and it's oh no...I knew I'd see this someday, but why today? I just wanted a soda! The kid has no face! He's FACELESS! It's just smooth and bald, like a blank space to fill in, like--like learn to draw a face! I knew I'd see it someday, the kid with no face on a trike, but why today? I just wanted a soda! And somehow I can tell that he is laughing at me, even with no mouth and no sound and no eyes...it is his chin. His chin is shaking in the rhythm of laughter: "Hahahahahaha!"

It is terrifying.

But I know exactly what to do. If he is the kid with no face on a trike, then I know who I am. He IS the kid with no face on a trike, I know who I am. If he is the kid with no face on a trike, then I must be...the terrified person! And I know exactly what to do. I turn around and ran back down the block. I got in my car and started driving. And...well...as you can can see...I never stopped! Here I am...driving along...lying my ass off.

Penny: So what street did you live on?
Man: I lived on...Blake Street.
Penny: That's my street! I grew up on that street. Wh...How--how do you know about me?
Man: Whoa there, princess! I don't know anything about you. I just came in for a show.
Penny: Well...did you live in a house or an apartment on Blake Street?
Man: Who, me? ...Why don't you bend over now, Penny, I'd like to see the rear view.
Penny: Okay... Did you live in a house or an apartment?

Penny: H--How am I driving so far? (Hahahaha--GASP!) The thing about walking as compared to driving is that when you're walking you don't know what's going to happen to you. You can trip, or fall, or you can get hit by a rock, or a car or a person can hit you, can yell at your ass? But while I am driving, I always know that I am going to die in a car crash. And that is so simple. It just makes me feel relaxed, like I can be myself. Me? I am going blind, but I am holding with drugs. You see me? I see fine. You see? I seem fine. You say, "How is your 'medical condition'? Did the doctors ever 'clear that up'?"

I say, "B-b-bell a as clear, yourself for s--no. Bell a as clear, yourself f--no."

I say, "SEE FOR YOURSELF, CLEAR AS A BELL!" But...you should know! I am...going blind! I am...ALERT! And I am...withholding drugs! No...I am holding...with drugs, like...Dexamethasone, Sulfacetamide, Prednisolone, Tobramiacin, Ciprofloxacin, Eurithromyacin, triceratops, Dexamethasone and all the dinosaurs, Apollo 13, Sulfacetamide, sky-and-telescope, Sasquatch-in-the-snow, NASA cover-up, stegosaurus, tyrannosaurus rex, Dexamethasone...

Bell, a, as clear, yourself for see. H...h...how am I driving?

Penny: Did you live in a house or an apartment on Blake Street?
Man: Who...me? I lived in a house. Did you live in a house, Penny?
Penny: I...can't answer any more questions, sir. What colour was the house?
Man: The...house was... What colour was your house, Penny?
Penny: No, I can't answer questions. Coul--Could you please go first?
Man: The house was...blue and white.

Penny: People ask me, they say, "Penny, don't you think it's a little unhealthy driving all the time? I mean, you drive to everyone, even strangers. You could be driving to me right now and I wouldn't even know it!" And I say, "You are right. I'm gonna pull over right now and get out of the car and start walking. And I'm gonna walk, and walk, and walk, and walk..."

Man: The house was blue and white, with a big tree in the front yard and a little swing hanging off the tree. Hahahaha. It was a kiddie swing.
Penny: Yeah, that was my swing! I lived in that house. If you're the man who lived in the blue-and-white house, then I must be... If you're the man who lived in the blue-and-white house then I must be hahahahaha...
Man: It's a small, small world, Penny.
Penny: Don't call me Penny. You know who I am. And you are way too close, sir. Could you please step away from the glass?

Penny: ...and walk, and walk. And I'm gonna keep on walking until I find myself. Hahahahaha. Just kidding. But seriously, I've been driving for so long now that I am armless and legless. But you should know. I am alert. And I am very, very careful. Every second of every hour of every day of my life. And you can be, too! Clowns never lie. And I don't, either.

Man: Are you interested in a live fantasy show, sir?
Penny: Why, yes I am interested. I've never seen you here before.
Man: That's 'cause I'm new. My name's Penny.
Penny: Penny, eh? Is that your real name, Penny?
Man: Yes.
Penny: Well, I'll bet it is. So, can you see me, Penny, or is this a one-way mirror?
Man: I can see you, sir.
Penny: Good. That's the way I like it. You a Portland girl, Penny?
Man: Yes, I am...born and raised.

'Kay, now I'm blind and my arms want to fall off.