This is Disjointed, because I'm slowly taking all the screws out

I was going to write a post about how great my dad is. Because, of course he is. But then I spent the weekend taking pictures of Jamison bottles, and turning down strange men in bathrooms, and watching a bridal party dance to the Pixies in Akron, and seeing great movies, and talking about writing. So let's just take that all as proof that my father was/is a fantastic father, because my life was pretty fantastic this weekend.

It didn't start off as fantastic. It started off with me working my ass off, and then vowing to get wasted that night because of work, stress drinking, and having a messy night where I got "maudlin" and vented out all the relationship/marriage/getting old poison that's been batting around in my head all week. It was like lancing a boil, and watching all the thick yellow pus well out. In the end, I passed out in the backseat while my sister and Jere argued about ridiculous things like the Magna Carta and shit, and when I woke up we were still driving and it was light out, because they had argued themselves almost to Pennsylvania before realizing the mistake and turning back around in the right direction. And after waking up like that, the infection had passed and I was once again content and happy and appreciative. So I slept for three hours in a real bed, and then went back to the beach.

Are you sick yet of beach pictures? I'm not, so deal. Also, who sleeps in the summer? Vampires, that's who. Are you a vampire? I mean, maybe you are. And if so, let me tell you, eternal life isn't worth the price of never getting to be in the sun again. Also, vampires are assholes. So you are an asshole.

On Friday, we saw Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, and it was wonderful and slow and magical and kind of terrifying if you let yourself stare straight into the jungle and you are the sort of person who knows how real and horrible fairy tales can be.

On Saturday, getting drunk in Akron proved again to be the cure all for being Too Cleveland. Which was apt, because it happened after hanging out with Erin, and pretty much talking a lot about Cleveland. But being Too Cleveland is a thing, because the largest part of life is not where you are exactly, but how well you're doing it, and you can't do it well enough if you expect the place you live to do it for you. I'm not an expert at living, but I think I do know that.

On Sunday, the beach was overcast and dark but warm and breezy, and when I stood in the water I wanted to bottle Ohio Blue and sell it. Is it a paint color already? It should be. Maybe it can't be. When I was a little girl in the backseat of my parents car, I would look at sunsets and try to decide what color out of the sky would I want a dress of the most. I decided I am going to be friends with the lifeguard. Then, later in the afternoon while it was pouring sheets of corrugated metal, we took our atmosphere soaked bodies for coffee, and talked with the girl at the cafe about neighborhoods and gardening. Later still I went to see Midnight in Paris, the trailer of which does absolutely nothing to show you what the movie is actually about, but it's ridiculous and delightful and I laughed a lot and when I laughed, I could feel my leg muscles were just a little sore from the dancing and the waves, but sore in a hot water bottle of my soul kind of way. It was all very relaxed and easy.

The dog next door barks at everything. Since it's been nice out, his owners, who are very elderly for having such a young lab, just let him out in the backyard all day, and he stands on the picnic table and barks for eight hours at squirrels and people walking by and cars. Then the dog who lives below me will go outside and they will bark at each other (the dog downstairs has a weird half bark he does as well that sounds a little like a monkey, so it's very similiar to how I think a monkey/dog fight would sound). Then people will come home from work and let their dogs out in their yards, and all the dogs will bark at each other. Since I work from home, this has been incredibly annoying. But writing it down makes it sound charming.

When we were finally packing up to leave the beach on Sunday, because the thunder told us to, we ran into the lifeguard Mike walking back to the car. He had run to grab a raincoat and I asked if he had to stay on the beach when it stormed? He answered that he didn't really know, because no one had told him, and he didn't really know who to ask. So maybe he sat out there by himself in the storm. I don't know, we left.

So now today it's back to the beach. My Monday adventure partner got a job while schools out, and I'm back to asking around for companions for exploring since little girls aren't supposed to wander around by themselves, but really I'm just giving up because you all work on Mondays and finding someone who is down for the sort of rambling I like to do the most is hard, there are requirements conversational and motivational. The thing that happens is this: everyone wants to go exploring, everyone wants to go to movies, everyone wants to go to the beach. They see me out at places, and they tell me how much they want to do these things too, how great it is that I do them, how much fun it looks like, and then I invite them, but it always falls through. I don't think you guys understand that there is a decision you have to make to have these kind of days. And I just really believe, deep far down in my chest, that everyone I know would be happier if they came along. But I can't keep giving you opportunities. You have to make the call.

There is an idea that you are supposed to be aloof to be cool, that you are supposed to just let people come to you. I'm the worst at that. If I meet someone I want to hang out with, I'm filled with enthusiasm and motivation. I'm the puppy who jumps on you and wags her tail furiously, and then if you don't take me up on it, I quickly forget when the next new person comes in the door.


And so I wonder if I'm fickle, or flighty, or just really smart, or just really irresponsible. I mean, the most important thing is to rage against the rising of bitterness or disappointment, right? To fight it. To really really enjoy what you are doing, to put your head entirely in the moment and focus on the hour and be conscious of how long that hour is and what is happening in each minute, to feel with toes and the little hairs on your arms the little whoosh of that minute degrading and crumbling and passing. Also to get out in the fucking sun, which is also degrading and crumbling and passing. I'm only 31 for another 20 days, and then I will never be 31 again.

The Car is King

First of all, today, cause it is today already, is my Dad's birthday. Happy Birthday Dad, I love you very much and I'm extremely grateful you of all people are my father, and I'm sorry that your daughter is so weird. Also thanks for the eyes. I like those very much.

And this will always be the song that makes me happy because of you.



Do you know what this morning means? It means it's finally here, Spring and all subsequent consequences of the same. It means we no longer have to get up Monday mornings and ponder the weather, trying to figure out if we can go exploring. Like, sure it was gray and rainy and got pretty chilly in the end, but I still walked around all day in just a t-shirt splattered occasionally with sweat and raindrops. And got to drive with the windows open and the radio on. My hair got all fucked up from the wind. Inside me is this constant quiet ringing of joy.


We were going to hit up a building, but by the time I got to his house, and we had a minute or two to catch up, it was decided the thing to do really was to drive all the way down the Valley, to Kent maybe or to Akron, or Helltown. We drove for a long time. Hours going around curves and hills and highways. There were remnants of mud tainted snow melting on the ski slopes, and the moss was shining bright green along the road.


I appreciate people who you don't run out of conversation with, maybe most of all. And people who know how to just get in the car and drive for a while. We drove through all the places Peter used to drive me to in the dark, where he used to have me shine the spotlight out the window into the black woods to spot deer because I had never seen one in the wild before, and I thought about the long line of boys who have driven me places. Peter was the first and therefore the standard. It's his fault I do this. But all the others, they've just reinforced this addiction, oh some of us we had the best drives. It's the way to my heart, Ohio. Now I'm the one who does the driving, and that took a minute to get used to, but in the end it turned out to be the thing I was meant to be doing too.

We stopped off places and walked around. Locks and woods and parks. Train tracks. I was reminded how much I want to go back to Hope Furnace, that place down South where we went camping, and at the base of the huge stone fireplace we would collect those shiny black glass pieces of slag. When I was little, I loved those black shinies, and they lived with the fake gold, quartz, and tiger eyes I got from the Natural History museum gift shop, and the geode we found when the neighbors were digging up their yard.

In this tunnel, we found this guy, waiting out the rain with his hiking gear. He had been walking the Buckeye Trail for a month. He has a blog about it. There's a thing to do at some point in your life, huh? Jere told me a story about the old times in the Flats, when there used to be street brawls there every Friday and Saturday night, over stupid things like cars, and a girl he met once who said she came down every weekend just to photograph the fights. That girl and this guy are cut of the same cloth. A specific sort of genius.

The canals are a strange thing. 300 miles stretch of barges, supplies, people, mules. Now sitting all weeded and choked up, more like a statewide garden fixture, a landscaping project overgrown. Someday you know, people will dig them up and look at them like pyramids. Here is the best quote from the wiki article on the Ohio and Erie canals:

"As a teenager in 1847, James Garfield worked as a Hoggee, driving mules to pull barges along the canal.^[12] After repeatedly falling into the canal on the job, Garfield became ill, and decided to go to college instead"

I don't know if that's true, but it is just like that ITT Tech commercial. "And I thought, I'd better get in school."

We went to a place in Akron for lunch, and on the back of the bathroom stalls they had pages from today's Wall Street Journal hung. I had to steal the one in my stall, fold it up as discreet as I could in my pocket, because it had this headline: Kremlin Connection Fails To Save BP From Oligarchs. Which is pretty much the best sentence of the day.

On our way to Akron, we passed this scene, which is either an art project, or an upcoming sacrifice to a gray unknown farm god. Maybe horses are really scared of themselves, and these are like horsie scarecrows? I mean, I'd stay out of any field with straw effigies of myself too. I assume the Daddy horse is the tall one, and the Mommy horse is the shorter one, and that raises my hackles a little, which should tell you I'm definitely in the mood for hackles, cause that's pretty dumb, that's just me being contrary. It's all the excitement.

We ended the night at Annabell's, meeting up with his Akron boys and drinking our hackles up. The bouncer there had the exact same tone of voice as Boots, the same bloody Irishness, and did impressions of Ronald Regan and Rocky. There was a mark on his arm that looked very much like a large bite mark, from an extremely large mouth, like maybe a prehistoric fish. I was sent to the jukebox to put on some Wilson Pickett, and he stopped me to remark on it, to point out he had put similar music on just before. Okay. His dog was awesome.

Saturday's Questions have way too many cookies to bake before 5pm today

The best kind of toast is probably rye with some tomato and swiss cheese, but everyone I know cares a lot about basketball today, so I wanted to ask - what's the most irresponsible kind of underwear?

The best kind of toast is lightly toasted Italian with real butter. But rye is a close second, so I'll let that slide.

The most irresponsible kind of underwear is the nonexistent kind you wear when you've forgotten to do laundry. Or thongs. I don't even think that qualifies as underwear.


Are Akron and Cleveland really different cities?

No. Yes. I guess so. I like Cleveland more, but it's bigger and has a lake. I think Akron suffers from not having a large body of water near it. Also from having way too many one way streets. Akron is just smaller, you know. There's less stuff going on there, and a lot of it is related to the university, which is fine, but I'm not interested in hanging out with college kids so much. It's much more an Ohio town, and Cleveland is a Lake town. People from Akron are more Ohioans than Clevelanders. They are closer to the unlit highways with dead deer littered everywhere, to cheese barns and closing car factories, to the snow belt and the tornado warnings and the long stretches of rural road with ditches. Akron is sort of the border, where you really leave the urban grit for the unemployed farmland grit.

Akron also smells like burnt rubber, whereas Cleveland smells like burnt metal and rock water, and I prefer the rusty taste.


What is a product I can purchase for little and sell for a lot?

Love.


What's the best way to tell a girl I love her when I don't actually speak her language all that well?

First, you should learn to speak her language better. That's always a good step. But if you're like me, and terrible at learning languages, then I recommend writing her stories. The good love letters I've saved are the ones that went on for pages with stories maybe having nothing to do with me, but I still have them because they were written for me, to impress me.

And if you're not a writer, then send her photos you take, or sketches you draw. Produce things for her. Girls like things to be made for them.


What's the best way to end my story about walking a dog?

All stories about walking dogs should end with a home break in, or the dog getting dried fish. They should never end with the dog dying. Preferably there should be a boat involved. Dogs and boats are the best combination ever.

Do you think that your online and real life personalities differ?

So when I was a little girl, I used to volunteer to read in public all the time. At church I was a lector. At school, I was always trying to get picked for speeches and presentations. I fully thought of myself as a loud, slightly obnoxious child. Later in life, my friends from grade school told me that I was always really quiet. Even now, I think I talk really loud, and turns out, no one can ever hear me.

My point is that I am not self aware at all, and therefore not qualified to answer this question. I don't think there's much difference at all between me in real life and me online. After all, how much of yourself can you really hide when you've got a blog, and Twitter, and Facebook? I don't mention a lot of the more naughtier things I do, because usually the least interesting things about a person are who they are sleeping with, and how fucked up they are at the time. Maybe sometimes people think I will be snarkier in person, but I try to be fair and nice to everyone who is not a reality show star or a politician. I can devastatingly cruel if someone wrongs me, but that's only applied to 2 people ever in my adult life. So except for certain breakup meltdowns, I'm usually pretty even keeled. If you don't cheat on me with a 19 year old, I probably won't ever be angry at you. My friends are pretty drama free. When I think about it, while I was with the Ex, I was the biggest source of drama in our circles, because of all the fighting and trauma and him making me sad all the time. Poor Bridget's friends. Now I'm a pretty happy person, and I want other people to be happy, and I want my interesting friends to meet all my other interesting friends and have fun.

Unless you've met me in real life, you probably don't understand what a 12 year old girl I am actually. But then I wonder if my real life friends get that either. Really, I should be asking them this question.

Ask Me Anything

Ace Rubber Factory: Some Observations on Natural Defenses

This is the building that beat me on Friday. We tried. But the building was too sneaky, too dirty and devious for us. Also, we finally found a door that was open, after braving all sorts of terrible tricks, but then hey! There was a light on inside? An electric light? I mean, the building was broken and alone and left open to the elements, but someone paid the bills. Unless actually the factory had figured out how to steal electricity from the power plant next door, as a sort of "play dead" trick to hunters like ourselves. These places are smarter than we give them credit for.

Anyway, since I don't have any wonderful pictures of broken plaster or rotting pianos, I thought I'd take this opportunity to educate you on some of the perils you have to face when building hunting. Abandoned places, like decrepit silverbacks hiding in the fringes jungle, outcast from the rest of the family, are dangerous creatures who must be treated with respect. It's important to know what you are up against before venturing into the Wasteland, and to equip yourself appropriately. Here are some of the more common dangers you are likely to come across.

1. Gates

The first line of defense will usually be gates or fences. You can just walk around them. Sometimes, if you want to be stealthy, you crawl. They are silly and unsubstantial things. I appreciate the thoroughness in this example, but as if I would ever walk across a concrete beam with the canal raging below, when there's a perfectly serviceable bridge right next to it. Covered even. So I don't muss my hair. When it inevitably rains. Because it's Akron, where the clouds are constantly crying hot tar tears.

2. Mazes.

Mazes can be made of steel, foliage, rock. They are basically designed to grow up and around the building, to shield it from prying eyes. They are not actively dangerous, if you are careful. But you must watch your step, examine before you place your hands or weight on anything, and not think sad thoughts. Also, if you hear a roaring sound, take four steps to the right.

3. Hypnotism

I mean, the factory isn't trying to convince you you're a chicken or something, but if you're not careful at how long your glance lingers, you may find yourself becoming tired. Having to pee. Wondering if there's a better building down the street. One time I stared too long at a bottle in a parking lot, and found myself wandering back to my car trying to remember all of the words to The Freshman. Any repetitive patterns, be sure to only view them through a lens, and even then only in short takes.

4. Murder Pits

This particular murder pit is filled with water, so I guess technically you could call it a moat. But not all deep vine covered holes are quite so benign. For instance, what if you fell in a pit of poisonous salamanders who tried to eat out your eyes and lay their radioactive eggs in your spinal fluid? Did you bring beef jerky to distract the beasts? Always bring beef jerky in case of murder pits.

5. Land Jellyfish

Land jellyfish live in concrete and mortar, and spread their tentacles out over walls to attract prey. If you touch a land jellyfish tentacle, don't piss on the wound, just cut it off. It may seem extreme, but it's best for everyone involved, honest. Otherwise, you turn into a land jellyfish, then your girlfriend dumps you, you eat your dog, you lose your job and find yourself attracted to only bricks manufactured before 1951. It's nasty.

6. Grass Eels.

Harmless unless you step on them, but they will start rattling vehemently the moment they sense your footsteps in the earth. They are mostly used to activate alarms, which is why if you set one off, avoid the...

7. Raptor Pit.

8. Robots

Most robots from the turn of the century have suffered a significant amount of dementia and power drain. Though they were originally taught humans were the masters, you can never tell if this particular thought structure has held up. The robot, if still active, may try to behead you or make you a winching system. They are easily outrun, assuming you have space to run. Strobe lights are particularly effective for distracting them, I recommend keeping a small one on your key chain.

9. Barrels of Industrial Waste

It's not really the industrial waste you need to be scared of. It's the ape behind the barrels, who's going to try and throw them at you.

10. Outsider Art

Distinguishable from the robots by their strange need for solitude, and collection of cat food tins fashioned into shoes. They are telepathic, and if you come too close, they will destroy your need for approbation or sex. I mean, it's like they have laser eyes and cut off your genitals, only emotionally. If you can find your way out of the maze through the veil of hot tears that will descend as soon as you realize how worthless your own measly accomplishments are
(because at heart you are a shallow money hoarding sellout who would rather have stupid things like CLOTHES instead of artistic integrity), well it's a minor miracle.

Happy Hunting! Hopefully the nice weather will bring out some better specimens next week.

Last Night Akron Tried to Kill Me, Like Always

My friend Todd is a bassoonist. I don't know if you're supposed to put "classical" bassoonist, cause I don't know if there's any other kind? But that's what he is. He plays in orchestras around the country, jets off to exciting places like Wisconsin and Florida. He's got dark curly hair and a gorgeous poised "I look like a ballerina" girlfriend. He brews beer. He's living the dream. Anyway. Bassoonist. We love Todd.

So last night, he got me a ticket to one of his performances with the Akron Symphony. I was going to meet up with some of my other friends before the show, but I ended up running out of my house late, big surprise. I'd never been to EJ Thomas Hall before, because in general I try to keep my time in Akron succinct and to the point. Akron tries to trap you with one way streets and despite having had to drive there for my birth certificate multiple times*, and various forays out to college dance bars, I have yet to learn anything about the layout of downtown Akron. At all. I'm convinced the damn streets move like that MC Escher picture of the stairs, floating back and forth like buoys on the rough waves of fucking Summit County. Maybe it's the leftover fumes of Goodyear that turn me around, but every experience I've had in Akron can be boiled down to this: "how the fuck do I get off the Akron U campus? Why does this building look exactly like the four buildings I just passed where I also couldn't turn left? Is Exchange street in fact an alternate dimension with no beginning or end point?"

I finally got to the Hall, but couldn't find the parking lot, so I walked in the lobby 5 minutes late (after the valets finally just let me take one of their spaces since I looked like I was about to cry after curbing my car pulling into the damn garage), and had to wait until the first pause before I could go in and find my seat. The performance was beautiful, Todd's principal piece was wonderful. I actually learned what a bassoon sounds like, which sounds ignorant**, but really, it's not an instrument I see a lot separate from the whole orchestra, right? So it was like a good class field trip, one in which we went out to drink later. I did find the bar much easier. Hung out with my friends for a little, told Todd he was wonderful ect., admired Todd's girlfriends ability to look French all the time. The risotto balls at Bricco are great, the fried pickles are good but not spectacular. Then we all got up to go home, and went outside.

Into the deepest fog ever. Like, if ever there was a fog that made you think there was an alien attack or that something evil this way comes, this was it. It was all over the city in thick grey soupiness, which was fine and fitting for flitting my way back the highway, cause Akron matches that abandoned train line feel. But once on 77 and headed home, it became a problem. You couldn't see more than ten feet in front of you. Worse, a large stretch of the Bop back to Coney is street light less deer farm country. I had to turn my brights on for literally the first time in my entire time owning this car. Which meant I had to find the brights. The lone car in front of me kept disappearing into wormholes and reappearing randomly, so I went fifty the whole 45 minutes back, convinced I would hit a deer, run off the road, have to hitch a ride in the fog, and end up a news story, or wrapped in duct tape in a Fairlawn basement.

According to my friend, this is what happens when the lake isn't frozen over yet, the Blind Fog creeps over the valley and throws you back into the Country Primeval.

Eventually I crawled out of the muck into the Cleveland lights. I picked up my friend, who was biking back from a bar, so I parked on his street and waited for ten minutes, during which I saw 1 drug deal and 2 gay prostitutes. Oh Ohio City. Oh Akron. Oh Ohio how hard you try to remind us we are only settlers here, and that your weather patterns, your underground rivers, your glacial history and wet future all still exist despite our best attempts at infrastructure.




*This is why Akron tries to kill me, because I was born there, and it is my Achilles Heel Zone and I become powerless and weak when in it's grip.
** I am not in fact saying the bassoon sounds ignorant, even though that's what the sentence structure implies. Bassoons sounds very smart.