to buy or not to buy....a house....

So I had a reading last night at Most Wanted Fine Arts Gallery in Garfield (Pittsburgh). They recorded the reading, and then had me get up again to do an official recording of one of my newer "hits" which is in itself a strange and awkward concept. The request from people was "Things Ive Left" which was actually a blog entry posted on here a while back, if you feel like scrolling. Here's a link to the video if you want to see it. I think it's less energetic and entertaining than the original performance, since I was out of the groove, but I also think I'm probably trying to talk myself up and pretend that I'm a better performer when, actually, I'm probably pretty lousy at it. Mike Simms was there, founder/editor/publisher of Autumn House Press, for whom I used to work until last week when I was finally begrudgingly but inevitably laid off. He gave me astounding praise afterwards, which I wasn't expecting. He must have seen the look on my face because he added, "I don't think you even realize how gifted you are. Please, I mean it, send me your work as you can, I'd like to stay in your loop." That doesn't mean I will be an Autumn House poet, in fact I think that by working for them I am guaranteed to never be published by them, but it is nice to know that someone out there who knows poetry thinks I'm something, even if I can't get published. Later, he also wrote me an email to reiterate that sentiment. I believe this is at least partially because I was so recently let go that it's important to keep the lines of communication open and positive - like a break up when people are still trying "to be friends." Oh well.


I also got my first real fan mail today, from someone who's read my thesis all the way through and isn't a friend of mine past that I got tipsy on Belgiums and moulles with him when he was in town for a reading at my school a while back. I'd read his manuscript and gave my opinion and some tips, and he graciously paid me the same attention. The letter remarked how I reminded him of an old whimsical friend from whom he'd been estranged due to a jealous wife, how he never got to grab a final beer with her and how reading my manuscript was like sharing that final beer and final laugh. It was the nicest letter I've ever received, except perhaps for a letter Anastasia Dubrowsky wrote me in high school that I still have saved at my parents house in a drawer. Certainly the nicest regarding my poetry, if only because he has no reason at all to stroke my ego He said to let him know with some lead-time when I will next be in New York, because he will set up a reading for me. The Big Time! I am heading to Massachusetts in September for my cousin's wedding - maybe I can do a reading en route, or while Evan heads north to visit cyclocross heartthrob Adam Myerson.



While on the topic, I still have chapbooks (or, Glass Key Press does, as I left all mine at the art gallery to be purchased) so if anyone would like one, as if anyone reads this thing, let me know! It's good I promise!



In other news, Evan and I are still in search of a house. We lost one bid on a perfect house in Regent Square, but that's all over and done with. Now there is a new perfect house, that is beautiful on the inside, and about $20k cheaper than the first house. It is in Greenfield in the Hollow, which means our back yard would literally be Schenly Park - there's even single-track that goes right from our yard, and an 8-point buck stared at us while we were checking the place out the other day. The only thing, though, is that I am getting cold feet because I am bad at decisions and if there's anything I'm worse at, it's commitment. Maybe to me they are the same thing. Once a decision is made, commitment to that decision is involved. I don't like the idea of having to say I like vanilla or I like chocolate, I want to live in the desert or by the ocean, I am a poet or a punk. I don't want to "other" any part of my personality, and I feel that any decision, in general really, has that effect. Purchasing a house certainly does. By saying, "I will own property here, with someone else," I am also saying, "I will live here, and not 'there' wherever that is; with this person, and not 'that' person, whoever that is." The great thing about this house is that it is in the middle of the city, generally speaking, but also in the woods. It is relatively cheap, so the financial burden isn't so great. It's only one bedroom, so we can't take on another roommate, but Evan assured me that if I freak out and have to move - for any of the billion reasons why I may freak out and have to move, almost all of which have to do with the eternal internal struggle of the poetpunk, he can build a wall so the master bedroom is more sealed off and someone can live in the office space. That does make me feel ions better about it all.

It's hard because this is the first house where I've really pictured myself living, and enjoying the space, and having a wonderful life. But for how long? That is always the question. It's like I am an optimist on a circular graph almost to the point of being a pessimist. Perhaps its my struggle with paranoia that swings it into that foggy and uncomfortable territory. But anyway, really, look at it - isn't it darling?



The other day, I went to see the Subhumans at Altar Bar in the Strip District. This band has been a favorite of mine for probably 13 years now, and I've seen them probably five times and it's always been incredible. I haven't even spent so much time watching them, because I go nuts and dance and laugh and rekindle friendships and release energy and agression and refind myself. This band makes me feel punk, makes me remember why I was punk and why I am punk. They cause me to question the directions I take in life, whether they are because they are easy, or because they are what I truly want, or because what I've learned I ought to want. I talked extensively with my good friend Ted about it (amongst other things) and it helped sort things out in my head about. How a lot of songs that are still anthemic to me are by/about/for teenagers, and how I'm not a teen anymore by almost ten years, but still can relate deeply - then it flips the coin a bit on why I still hold punk dear, whether it's because it's something I've conditioned myself to love, or whether it's something that still reigns true despite so much change in my life, that still forces me to answer back to myself and remember what I know to be bullshit and unacceptible.



Anyway, it's bedtime now and I've decided to buy the house, hang out with the turkeyfriends I will make in the new yard in the woods, and roam freely wherever I want/need. At least my rent will be paying off my own mortgage, not someone else's. I am putting my punk foot forward. Plus, of course, this place has plenty of writing space.

funk is bubbling

I've been having stomach problems lately. Lots of burning/stinging feels in the general abdominal region. Sore ribs have gotten more sore. Heart burn. Etc. Waxes and wanes between hardly noticeably to manageable to keeling over in pain. Lots of weird dreams (friends as 9-year-olds getting raped, living in a boarding house, stuck in weird vortexes, etc.). Also, lots of general aches as if from the marrow of my bones. Plus some joints. Didn't sleep well last night and woke up early for a mountain bike ride. Got a new bike (pictures later, when I bring my camera home from work). Trying to sell the Ted Wotjic frame. No appetite. Tired. Bills to pay. Thank You cards to write.



Major Tom ran away last night. Only for an hour, then he came back. Same with this morning. Where does he go? What does he lack? We took him to Jodie's house for a few hours while we went mountain biking and slept a lot of the day afterwards. We took a nap together after work while Evan went out for a road ride.



I'm introducing poet Rick Campbell at Chatham University next Monday. What should I say about him? He told me he likes cereal, so that's something. Also, I got default promoted at Coal Hill to "co-editor" from "assistant editor" and am not sure how I feel about it. I feel like after finishing my MFA I would feel light-footed but I still feel over-burdened and full-scheduled, sick with the stress of it. Tuesday, after the farm, is a slam I've been asked to compete in. Hopefully I will get some rest before then so I can contend. Thinking of doing the poem, "Why I Walked Home From Flushing in a Blizzard." My dad read my thesis and liked it. He wants me to write his memoir. I said I will.



Time for a shower.

dreams she had before she died

two nights ago, I don't remember.



Last night I dreamt I was in a big house with a lot of friends, mainly friends from Hingham but lots of others as well. Chrissy Victims was there, as a vampire. Everyone lined up and Chrissy got in front of us and started talking about a game he wanted to play. Laura, from Rob and Charlie's in New Mexico, leaned forward and looked at me and she was some sort of monster, maybe a zombie. She didn't look totally monstrous, but her hair was messy and there was a crazy look in her eyes. Which was possibly scary than if she had fangs or something. Anyway, when Chrissy started talking about the game he wanted to play, most everyone walked away so it was just he and I. The game he wanted to play, which I suppose I had no choice but to play, had to do with throwing hue objects around the house that sort of floated as we threw them, we if we were on the moon and could throw things like pillars but they did not move quickly. My goal was, I think, to throw them at people who Chrissy had turned into vampires or people otherwise turned dangerous. At one point, Major Tom was chasing me into a room I'd run into and I slammed the door on his front legs and muzzle. There were a lot of people in the other room and for some reason having to do with the game, I kept slamming the door on the poor pup. Frank, from Boston Terrier Rescue, showed up and took the puppy away and gave him to a woman who took care of him. I saw her with him with bandaged legs and nose, holding up his front side. he ran away when I approached him. Later, I saw him and he seemed a bit better, and later still I saw her at the park and she was having doggy lessons with him, and he was running relays around a cone with a ball in his mouth. I asked her please if I could have him back and he came up to me and cuddled like he ususally does. I told her I am not a dog abuser and have taught him just about all the tricks he already knows, and I would continue taking lessons with him and send her photos every week of how good he's doing. She agreed, but said she would stop by every so often to make sure.



This afternoon's dream, when I came home from work feeling achy all over, was also weird. My dad had disappeared, and I was searching for him all night after being out late and finding out. When I finally got home (which was no house I'd ever lived in), both parents were sitting in easy chairs and my mom said a woman had retrieved him. It was the same woman I was trying to hunt down to see if she could help me find my father. My mom said to go upstairs in the neighboring building to find a man who could give me her address or number, there was an office up there. So I went and it was a dance studio like the one in my gym, and there was a guy there getting set up to do yoga so I pulled out a mat to join him and ask questions. He kept doing harder stuff and looking at me funny, but I just went along and did the same sort of thins. Then a guy set up next to me and somehow got it through to me that he wasn't a yoga instructor as I had thought, just a dude working out. We'd been doing push ups with claps in between and stuff. It was around 5:30 a.m. So I pulled my mat away and kept doing push-ups. My body was so light the push-ups felt weird. More people kept flooring the room and walking around me and when I got up and turned around, it was a school cafeteria. There were all sorts of people, like everyone I've ever known was there, just about. At one point Sheryl walked by and I wanted to talk to her about the strangeness and my missing father who was found by an untraceable woman, but she just saw me and looked at her watch and said, "well I suppose it IS getting late, isn't it! My how time flies." And walked away, as if I were some sort of time marker who was there every day at the same time. I walked further on and there were girls from my highschool who started talking about how they used to always pick on me but how i was really cool and they tried to pick on me again and they blew pixie sticks in my face and I blew them back, then walked further down the cafeteria line and Jim Sullivan was there. I don't remember the rest of it.



I think I have the flu. Everything aches real bad. skin, joints, bones, organs, everything.

Last Action Hero

The other night I dreamt that The Government had taken away all the guns. I am not sure whether it was just the US gov't or the world gov't, and if they took away all the guns of The World, or just of the US. I am pretty sure the US had taken over the world government, and then took away all the guns of the world. The place had gotten too violent and this was another dumb solution. Of course it fucked up power and status because people had no legit way of protecting their property. So The Church (Catholic, I assume, given my upbringing), knowing power, status, and regime better than any other organization in the world, gave everyone knives. This backfired, since basically all of the world could use more cash, and only a few people have sufficient funds to get by in life. Tons were killed.


Where my dream actually starts is a prison bus getting let out into the streets. there's classic bad girl movie star babe wearing a tank top and ripped with muscles etc., a bit dirty in the face, steps off followed by a few others. She announces that they are prisoners and they don't mean any harm, they are unarmed, and wish no violence to befall them and so are making their position known. Of course they all get beaten and stabbed to death. In retrospect I believe they may have been some rich people who were made prisoners for their own protection.


Anyway I go inside this big building and Evan is there with me. He sort of fills me in on what is going on, since I had apparently been traveling in some remote place and wasn't privy to any of this. There is an announcement by a woman regarding some sort of contest. A race of sorts. There have to be 600,000 people at a certain place in 24 hours or something like that, and there is a huge cash reward. People start going nuts, and Evan tells me to watch myself because it was about to get violent. He had no knife on him, and I didn't either for some reason, maybe because I'd flown? But anyway, we are in a small hallway waiting for an elevator, which has a big rugged platform in front of it, and a guy comes up and asks to get on the elevator with us and says he promises not to stab us, and Evan says no way, and then the elevator comes and the guys jumps in front of us and gets on. Then we are waiting for the next one and this guy comes up and sees Evan's sweatshirt and says, "hey is that a Void pin?" and I get up in front of the elevator so we can get on this one this time and Evan tells the guy that even though he can read punk logos doesn't mean he's trustworthy, and the elevator comes and the guy pushes Evan and gets on with me just as the door closes, and then holds up a knife to my breast plate and just as he is about to really dig it in, the doors open and there's this incredible light and the guy says something to me I couldn't understand or else just don't remember, and leaves. I get our and try to adjust my eyes and realize I am outside at an other plane of existence and hope that Evan is ok and hasn't been killed and wonder how long I should wait for him before running to my protection. That's when I woke up.


When I fell back to sleep someone gave me a knife, and then the dog jumped on me and I woke up again. There were a few more moments of this dream carrying further but I don't know what happened.

dating games

Lat night I dreamt that I was real sick and staying at Steve's my uncle through Patty. Amanda was living with him but she was younger, not married or in the army or with a kid or anything like that. The house was huge, with a floor each for Amanda, Patty, and Steve; Trish wasn't in the dream because she had moved out, and Patty wasn't in the dream because she's passed away. Anyway I was sick and trying to make food and Steve kept telling me to make omelets and eggs and stuff like that because it would make me happy and feel better. Then he said I should take a shower and brought me to Patty's shower. Everything was really new and fancy, not really their style. I got frustrated and left and had Major Tom with me, and we were in Boston, and suddenly there was casting for a dating show sort of along the lines of Singled Out but not, and a bunch of friends were there and i remembered that this was something that went on every year in Boston and I always loved it, and Major Tom and I went into this warehouse place and they separated the girls from the boys, and there was this other boy there who had a dog and we were both trying to hide our dogs. I got mad because he was standing with the girls, right next to me, and Iknew Major Tom was going to freak out and cause a scene and we'd get kicked out, but he just nipped a little and the boy smiled and I woke up. He had a pug with blue healer type markings.

day at the museum

Last night I dreamt that Harrison, Carmen, and I were at a museum. I remember we were goofing off a lot, and I did something weird but I don't remember what, something with the security guard. I went over to see my friends and they had stolen this huge gem out of a vault and we all had to run away. We hid for a while behind a car in the parking lot, and the security guard caught Carmen, but instead of arresting her or using her as collateral to get Harrison and I, he said he had made a poor WANTED poster for her and that he needed more accurate information. As we had run off, it wasn't proper procedure to capture us himself, but someone else must now, and then bring us through the investigation process. Harrison explained to me from behind the car that the security at this museum was sub par and they will probably be fired, there'd been talks already. It wasn't necessarily the guards themselves, but the regulated level of security they are asked to provide. Their tier, so to speak. Anyway, Carmen was let free and we all ran away.



Strange.

ch-ch-ch-changes

Dreams last night: One neutral, one bad. The neutral one came second. I was living at the Pittsburgh house but instead of being fancy it was REALLY REALLY fancy. There was the same uncomfortable tension between roommate X and I, but this time it was against a whole lot of people and not just me, because a lot of friends from Boston -- both highschool friends and punk friends -- also lived there, and Soupie lived there, and the dog. It was like some sort of weird huge fancy community clubhouse or something. I remember a lot of gold fixtures in the bathroom, a lot of people in the glorious bathroom putting on eye make-up, and i was yelled at again for some bullshit and somebody, maybe kris or kyle the girl, sticking up for me, and the dog being awesome.



In the bad dream, I was living in New York again. But I was living by myself, in this weird apartment in a row house. The dream was very disjointed, or maybe my memory is disjointed, but the main drag of it was that it was cold So cold. So could people were dying, and the homeless were breaking into people's houses just to get warm. The cold wasn't like a weather factor, it was an epidemic. Everyone looked ghostly, hollow. I had to leave my apartment for something, and I got accosted, and when I finally got back to my apartment it was in shambles, the cold had gotten to it and collapsed the wood, and the little bit of shelter left was overrun by crazies and the dead. So I was homeless and miserable, and looking hollow and ghostly myself, and then the dog jumped on me and I woke up.



Speaking of which, we have started getting the dog to sleep on a pillow next to the bed, on the floor, rather than in the crate. He sees it as a fairly comforting compromise, and doesn't fight it nearly as much as he fights the crate. He's also completely housebroken. I want to start letting him loose in the house while we are gone, trying it for a bit at a time. When we did it before he was great, I think he messed up once and we never did it again. But lately on walks he's been good. Even in my house, with Zoe who he loves but also who he torments, and who he's tormented by, he's stopped going after her toys so much, and when I tell him to drop it, he does. He hangs out in my room with me all day and it's no big deal as long as we play a little bit and I take him for a walk at some point. He's also learned Stay, finally, and is starting to pick up on Down. On walks, he doesn't really bark or pull when he passes dogs anymore, which was a huge thing with him for a while, one of the really frustrating aspects of taking him for walks, in parks or whatever. I think he's ready. We talked about it last night. How maybe he's just too late for the crate, since we adopted him at a pretty old age to be teaching him puppy skills like "your crate is your home."



Evan's birthday is on Thursday, and yesterday (Sunday) we had a family party for him at his mom's house. It was a real nice time, I like his family a lot and they've really opened their arms to me as a member of the family, which is comforting when my own family is so far away and spread out at the moment. I wrote him a card that he seemed to like a lot, and a book on eating right to cure ailments. Something he'd mentioned a few times being interested in learning about, but would never actually buy for himself. Which is what gifts are all about. That's what my mother always told me, and what I never wanted to believe, but it's true. We stopped by Soupie's new shop on the way. It looks great. Reminds me a bit of TRM and Bicycle Habitat. Well lit, clean, but still with a bike shop feel, rather than a department store feel. They also carry some real nice bikes, and a good number of not so great bikes that are still pretty cool and marketable. And they carry Patagonia clothes, not Nike. Really, it's just a change, and I'm glad it's a good one. I think it will be a good experience.



I guess that's it. The semester's winding down, and I'll be glad when things are over and done with. We slept in on Sunday for the first time in I can't remember how long. Months. Vacation will be greatly welcomed.

prison dream

Another dream I had a bit ago was that I was a woman, not myself, and had commited a crime. I think it was a murder or something that just sort of fell into "my" life. So this woman (me) is in complete denial about her predicament, being in prison, having found this fate. She goes through the processes in a dreamlike state, but she is on death row and every week they put her through this low dosage electrocution and torture test, that is painful and increases her idea that it is all a dream, unreal. So she makes jokes and maintains conversation with her guards, and then they let her know that the next day she is going to be actually executed. So suddenly she's at home telling her parents because she'd just disappeared and they wanted to know where she was. Her family is very Christian so they just stary praying. Then shes taken away and she is executed. But remember she is me. I woke up a bit shaken, to say the least.

dreams, awkward moments and thoughts

So I am officially "that girl" of the Pittsburgh student literary scene. I am "that girl" who cries in poetry class when, after listening to everyone go through her fairly emotional poem line-by-line, is asked to explain exactly what is going on. How embarrassing. How trite. The bright side is that my professor loved the poem and said that my tears were a sign that I am really on to something in the piece, and she said it is a very brave poem and with a bit of tweaking it will be even more powerful than it already is.


I'd forgotten what it feels like to cry, or perhaps to cry in public, when you are trying to not cry. Either way. It feels like it's raining inside you. Maybe rain feels like crying. They're both sad, they both evoke. Afterwards I went to Mad Mex with Adam, Joe, and Ed. The food wasn't very good, but it was nice to be out socializing, to laugh a lot and make jokes. I feel like I haven't been funny in a while. I'm a little nervous that my friends will be disappointed when they come see me. It's a silly fair, but a legitimate one, I think. But as Kyle warned, we will wear tights and eyeliner and drink coffee and photocopy our boobs and it will be awesome.

When I was younger I never really considered people understanding me or not, that I can remember. And now that I am past all that truly, I have a deep feeling that there are very few people in the world of people I know who actually "get" me. I feel like a big weirdo with whoever I'm hanging out with. It's alright, it's just how it is I suppose. To normal or to weird or too smelly or two clean looking or too deep or too goofy. Maybe people should stop thinking about me so much, maybe I should stop thinking about people thinking about me. Maybe I'm doing all this thinking about people thinking about me, but no one is really thinking about it at all.


Soupie's gone and it's depressing. I'm really glad he's out on the road, and that he's in California and the west coast in general, seeing so much, but that selfishness of also missing him and wanting him to come home is hard to suppress. Not that I want him to leave tour early, I just want the next week go to by quickly. He's been gone for a week and a half, and will be home in another week. The bright side is that the first complete draft of my portfolio is due the day he returns, so in the meantime I am preoccupied with school and also not distracted by him. Also, My parents came to visit last weekend for a day, and tonight Kyle and Metro arrive and will be here until Sunday. Also, Nay is coming to visit on Saturday. Full house, lots of friends, hopefully they will keep themselves busy enough that I can get some thesis work done.



I have been having reoccurring nightmares for the past few weeks, maybe longer. Not every single night, but maybe every other night. The overall story is that I was at a fort, it was my home, and troops of some sort came in to evacuate, but I wouldn't leave, and kept hidden in the dark hallways, with some other people. Eventually the troops annouced that we could stay, but then started massacring and torturing people. People get skinned in every dream, that's the most common torture/murder, and you can hear them in agony, and you can hear people searching for you, and some soldiers see you and tell you where not to go, who to look out for, etc. You see people you knew were skinned walking around, and they have weird plain loose clothing on, and act totally normal, like they are in shock, and I can't tell if they are alive and in shock, or dead and don't realize it.



The whole emotion of the dream is suffocation, and it's horrifying. Maybe I should write a poem about this, too. It'd fit with the other ones I'd been writing. Good grief.



I finally wrote a poem about that time a gang fight broke out in front of me in the subway car I was in, during the beginning of a blizzard, in NYC. Also horrifying.


I am performing on the North Side at some music festival thing on January 3rd. If you are in the Pittsburgh area, please come. And if you'd like to come, please buy tickets off me, they are two dollars cheaper ($5 opposed to $7) and it pays me more, the more tickets I sell.



I don't know what else to write. I get my Latin America paper back tonight, I'm nervous.

last night's dream

took place largely at the house in which i grew up, in hull, ma. only it belonged to my current boss, rachel. there was some sort of party going on, jon showed up, and i had to get something in rachel's room (which was my old room as a kid)-- either my paycheck or a present for jon, i don't remember. anyway before he showed up, rachel had told her brother (not her brother in real life, her dreamland brother, who is younger than her real brother and sorta punk) and his friend they could go into her room to get something too, and they never came down and she was like, "that's weird i wonder what they're doing." so jon and i go upstairs to get what i need to get, and her brother and his friend are jerking off and as soon as i come in they scramble to put their things away, wink wink, and i don't even flinch because so what, big deal. but they were incredibly embarrassed and made sort of a big deal out of it.

and that, for some strange reason, if all i remember about it.

dreams of pasts and autumn

The theory is, we dream before and after deep sleep, when we are definately sleeping but not quite sleeping well. We dream, in the course of an 8.5 average recommended night of sleep, about 7 dreams. This is of course a guess and an estimate, based on neurological studies I'm sure, though I've never conducted one myself.



Anyway, I have not had a full night of sleep in weeks. I sleep for an hour or two at a time, wake up, fall back to sleep eventually, pattern repeated, until I just give in to the day. This morning I gave in to the day at 5:30 in the morning, having initially fallen asleep around 1:30 or so, and waking up for about a half hour at about 2:20 and again about 3:45. I worked for 9 hours, came home and tried to write, but needed a nap because I went through 4 plots and could not develop any of them.



In this nap (I typically nap exactly 1 hour at a time, with no alarm waking me), I dreamt spookiness regarding my sister.



We lived together, or one of us was visiting the other, likely I was visiting her. She lived in a rustic house, set away from town a ways in the woods, which is her style. We were the ages we are now, maybe a little younger, or at least I was. And it took place out of time. Timeless, yet giving the feeling that maybe it was a generation or two before us. And it was October, late, around Halloween.



She disappeared. There were reports going around about different mysticisms to watch for, different threats in the physical realm and in the spiritual as well. I got visions that struck at me violently. I saw her in waves. I felt her in strangles. I knew things and I didn't know them. I saw images and had to put truths to them that made sense.



Halloween day. Maybe I get a phonecall from my mother. I run outside. go to the back of the house. There is a path. I found a pile of dirt and knew she was under it. But it was strangely high. There was a ghost. And a man. And a wolf.



That's all I remember.

torpidity is the devil's playground

I don't remember the dreams I had last night. I do, however, remember the dream I had this morning, after seeing how early it was and putting myself back to bed.

It was a short dream. Minimalist. I was lying in a grey room, with no furniture, trying to sleep but still aware, ust incredibly torpid. There was an overwhelming, oppressive feeling of loneliness in the room. That was the dream. Existing in a stale, lonely room and trying unsuccessfully to sleep through it.


Damn.

Dreams

I've been having a lot of strange dreams lately. The kind where I wake up and feel the need to tell someone. Where I lay in bed for a while after waking up and don't immediately check my email the way I sadly usually do (my laptop sleeps on the floor next to me, and stays on, so all it takes is a click of the "refresh" button), but instead just stare inwardly for myself, wondering what is wrong with me, or what is going on in my life to have these dreams. Not all of them are fucked up, but they all do leave me with that "Hmmmm...." feeling.

The other night I dreamt I went to my parents house in Massachusetts to pick something up, and there was this dirty old envelope on top of my bookcase from Nana Kate (my father's mother). I was all, "What the hell, I'll open it up." It was for me anyway, and I have a horrible history of never opening my mail, even when it's good things inside. so I open it up, and inside there's a smaller envelope. Inside THAT is cash. tons of it. Peering into the envelope it appeared to be all 5s and 1s without flipping through, but Rob was with me and he insisted I was "set for life" so for the remainder of the dream I was convinced this was true, that the envelope was full of hudreds of thousands of dollars.
There was a letter in the larger outer envelope, explaining that the money was from my grandfather. The odd thing about my family is that we are so close that my dad's mom and my mom's dad were best friends, and in the letter she admitted to being in love with him. Which is ok, my mom's parents were seperated and my dad's dad died when my dad was only 16. So it's not scandalous except for the fact that she could have been getting her socks rocked off all those years instead of remaining celibate and somewhat grouchy for 50 years in the name of loyalty. But it's a dream anyway, and in real life they were friends
So I have all this money. And am wondering what I should do. And was feeling like a huge dick for a second because the letter must have been from Spring 1997, when Papar died. I never opened the letter when Nana Kate was alive, so I could never talk to her about why I was getting the money through her and not in the form of a Will inheritance or Trust Fund or anything. Where did this money even come from? But that feeling didn't last too long because it was a dream and I had other things to do.
I meet with a poetry guru who gives me a lesson on zen and existencialism. I did not write the lesson down upon waking, but I remember he wrote me a zen poem about the beauty I see in things are aspects most people see as ugly, or else don't even notice them. Which has to do largely, of course, with perception and openmindedness. Of course, the first thing I do is seek out a zen poet master! Of course! I wish I had written down the lesson, I will undoubtedly need it in the future, when February continues on like a lecture.
Back in Pittsburgh, I wonder what to do with my newfound wealth. I bump into my friend Steve who somehow already knows I got all this money. He instinctively directs me to his best friend, with whom I've recently been romancing.
"We're all set," I tell him, "we can do anything! We can move to Cuba, write manifestos, rekindle La Resistance." My head is already in bloom with poetry and ideas. He asks me what my grandfather did, how he had all this money. I describe my grandfather, who in real life was a great guy but continuously lost everything through drinking and betting: the house he owned, the bar he owned, his position in society in Charlestown. He ended up moving into the projects with the whole family, and then they moved to Hull when it was just my aunt Suzie left of the five children he'd fathered. My nana Ollie kicked him out of the house once and for all, and he moved back to the projects and lived there basically the rest of his life until moving to Florida on some pension or something. I don't understand those old people deals they get, something helped him out so he could move to warmer climates Also, this is all hearsay from what my mom has told me, and what I have retained from those stories. In the dream these were all truths, but in real life I understand the fallacy of memory, and that history, generations, and romantic notions only further the inacuracies
Regardless, my bubble was pretty burst. The envelope seemed to fade out of my grasp as I accepted the "truths" of it's improbablility, the rediculous notion of having this cash with no strings attached to it at all. I woke up fishing around my bed for a moment for the envelope, trying in vane to reclaim that monetary freedom.

*******************

That was three nights ago. Two nights ago as another odd dream, of which I no longer have any recollection. Last night's dream was even more bizarre, however, and more disturbing.

I don't remember as many details as the other dream, except that I believe this dream also took place partly at my parents home in Massachusetts. This is especially odd for me, because I hold virtually no sentimental value to that particular home and have never quite felt "at home" there, for all my years living there. When I needed safely, I would find solace at my friends' homes, the forts, walking around Cambridge, etc. I don't know why, really. Maybe because when we moved there, my folks told me we were just spending the night to check it out, to see how we liked it. And then we never got to go back "home" and I never really felt very moved in.

Anyway, in this dream I was the nanny for Hitler's grandchildren. If I remember correctly, I was an older lady in the dream, and had previously helped out his children, though I don't remember if I was their nanny also or if I was a confidant.
I was not a nazi in this dream, nor was I a nazi sympathizer. Just an older woman who was a philanthropist and saw no distinction between the descendants of those who'd made errors in judgement and those whose ancestors were the victims of such errors. In real life, I feel the same way on some level. However there is also a necessity of awareness of place, and it's crucial for those of us who come from a privelaged lineage to understand that their life choices and world views are going to come at a different angle from someone who has a less prosperous family history, and that many things in life are cyclical and also systemic. Personal accountability for one's actions and reactions is imperative, but we are humans and therefore have the ability to see and interpret the "bigger picture" which I feel is important to not disregard. But anyway..
Hitler's grandchildren, a boy and a girl if I remember correctly, were at risk of being charged with some accountability, or something of that nature, and were being hunted down by a mob-like governmental force. I was their adamant protector. I annexed them in a safe hiding place in my room, which turned to be my room in Pittsburgh, where I do feel comfortable and at home, which probably has more to do with the age at which I moved to Pittsburgh and the circumstances under which I came, here, namely circumstances I chose. Not ironically, my room here in Pittsburgh is an attic.

*******************

Rob, my roommate, has an acute awareness of his own spiritual presence, and therefore is very atune with Feng Shui. I have been reading on Feng Shui for years, and for the life of me can never get it right, can never remember a damn thing about a damn thing in regards to the energetic blueprint of my living quarters. Rob told me I should not have a bed that aims itself in the direction of the bedroom door. In Ancient China, bodies of the dead were bondaged and delivered head-first into tombs and incineration chambers. I did, actually, set up my "bed" with my head facing the exit-wall (though the door is on the other side of the room) until the aforementioned co-romancer came for a visit and instinctively moved my pillow to the other side of the designated sleeping quarter.
My feet are still facing the door.
Rob claimed that he had once set a bed up in this manner in a different apartment and had horrible dreams until he moved it, and later read about Feng Shui's connection to bed-placement. I have significantly less negative dreams than I did when I lived in Boston, when I lived tucked into a wall behind a stair bannister, again in the attic. I was then positioned perpendicular to the door, behind it, and over it. But I was head-first with the window, being the most direct exit. As it stands now, I am perpendicular with one window, head-first with another, and feet-first with the door.

I just think I maybe shouldn't eat before I go to sleep.