Childhood Nightmare

I'm having one of those days. I feel like a lot of people my age, or at least from my generation have this overwhelming dichotomy of childhood vs adulthood. I have a hard time letting go of childhood. No, nothing horrible happened in my childhood, I did not experience a traumatic rearing. That's not in the least what I have a hard time letting go of. Dependence is one of the biggest problems I face as an adult. I feel like I spent my whole life trying to become independent yet I keep being pulled back into the pit of dependence (or perhaps I'm leaping blindly in....). Whether its emotionally, psychologically, financially, I seem to keep being pulled back into a pit. It seems like every time I go back home to my parents house, I get overly emotional and often end up crying. Its like the moment I walk into the house, I feel tremendous guilt. I've put my parents through a lot of shit. As a teenager, I was a nightmare at home. I was always moody, always argumentative, and very emotionally and hormonally out of balance. On the other hand, I was an honor roll student who worked a 30 hr a week job and paid for everything herself. Then I became "independent" and experienced college life. Though I held jobs through school and maintained good grades, I almost aimlessly took 6 years to complete my undergraduate degree. Along the way, they often paid my rent, or a portion of it, they paid for school supplies, they bought me clothes, they paid my car insurance. On another note, they helped pay my court costs the few times I got tickets in high school and the time I got arrested in undergrad. They have spent so much money on me, and helped me along the way so much that I feel now, I'm 24 and have nothing to show for it. I feel like all hardships in life create lessons learned, but maybe I wasn't paying attention, or that I missed something along the way, because I am still not financially independent. Its the worst feeling in the world, because it seems like a goal that is attainable, and I get so close to it so many times. And then, reality kicks in, knocks me off my feet, and I'm left there crying like the little girl who fell off her bike.
When my financial life crumbles, I revert into a fucking child.
When life doesn't go my way, I revert into a fucking child.
When I feel left out, I revert into a fucking child.
When I feel sick, I revert into a fucking child.
When I wake up, I revert into a fucking child.
I am a fucking child.

New works....and more coming

This semester I cranked out a bunch of work. Not all of it was successful, and these pictures don't include everything I've done this semester. These are the first five objects I made this semester. I really make most of these things simultaneously, but there definately a progression.


This piece is titled Tripod. I made it as a continuation of a comment on the sexuality of children's toys that I had made in undergrad. In undergrad, I made a teddy bear like this out of an existing stuffed animal. Here I decided to realize it in clay.





This piece is titled Magical Thinking. Each of those pieces is about 2o-22" tall. Magical thinking is non-scientific reasoning that includes the idea that the mind can affect the physical world. If we don't believe we have control over our bodies, then what are the physical manifestations of this? Or, what if you thought unkindly of another, could you physically change that person by thinking about it?









This is a funny piece titled, Winston was a busy boy. Winston is my dog, a French Bulldog. He is loved and spoiled. Dogs are attention seeking creatures. A dog is a companion who is excited to see you when you come home, watches your every move, and seeks approval or affection. But they, like humans, have the ability to ignore others and be self servicing. Here, Winston's makin sure his nails are tip top!

I'm Mad as Hell

Sometimes I feel like Howard Beale. I love seeing great rants on film. This movie is pretty ridiculously awesome. Its seemingly satirical. You might be thinking, the only movie revolving around the news that you would want to watch is Anchorman. Well, while Anchorman is a hilarious movie, this is a hilarious movie that makes you think. Full of dry dragnet type newscaster voices, a crazy power hungry woman moving to the top, and the mental breakdown/englightening of an old man jaded by the media, this movie must be watched. Its set in the mid-late 70's and seems controversial. here's just a couple scenes... the first is him cracking on the news. the second is the exploitation of his cracking, in the form of a network television show.

I'm proud to be an American. Cliches aside, I never thought I would udder these words and actually mean it. I've never considered myself patriotic, but I now feel like a greater part of the whole. I feel like people finally got their minds on the right track and realized that this country was in some serious need of feedback and direction. I feel better about America now.

I , like many others, watched the election results come in last night. I watched McCain's goodbye-thanks-for-the-good-times-speech and Obama's Fuck-ya-America-speech. It was the first time I felt like I was actually a part of history. I mean, I remember where I was and what I was doing when I found out the twin towers were hit (I was sitting at Perkins in my hometown drinking coffee senior year of highschool cause it was ISTEP testing day or some bullshit and seniors got to come in late for school, but anyway I digress, thats what went down on 9/11 for this homegirl), but I was not a part of making that happen or had no direct relation to the incident at all. Barack Obama is the first African-American president of the United States of America. ::Pause and think. :: We can downplay that all we want but the fact is, that will be in history books and children will read that and learn about that in school one day. And we were a part of that, we watched it happen and our votes came together and counted. It's like reading about MLK, reading about the first man on the moon, first woman in congress. These are the important, non-embarrassing parts of American history. We are a part of a proud moment in American history. So Fuck You President Bush. Its time to clean up your mess.

Scary dreams and christmas

Sometime this morning I had a dream that I'm not sure if I can explain because I remember it in scenes, more than I remember the storylines. I was at my current house in PA, while somehow simultaneously being at my parents house in Noblesville, IN. Rooms kept switching from one house to the other. I was being chased or hunted by something that was invisible. I walked out into my PA front yard and I could tell that there was something coming towards the house. I could see it like you can see heat in the summer. Then it saw me and attacked me. I hit it and it went flying backwards in the air. I leaped into the air and bounded across the yard like a damn moonwalker. I had learned how to defy gravity like in kung fu movies. In the dream I was terrified that this creature would, I assume, kill me. I'm not sure why I was afraid of this creature, I just knew I had to be. The scariest part of the dream was, that in parts of the dream I was watching myself. Its very rare that I have out of body dreams, and for some reason they always scare the shit out of me. When I woke up, it was very suddenly and I had a hard time convincing myself that I was safe in the house because the lighting was exactly the same as it was in my dream. I had to spoon Billy to know it was safe to go back to sleep. When I got up a few snoozes later, I went downstairs and looked out the front window and the yard, light, neighbor's garage door being open, the leaves everywhere, seemed eerily exactly like it was in the dream. It kind of gave me that deja vu feeling.
But don't worry folks, no invisible creatures attacked me when i went outside.

On a light, yet still eerie note, check this shit out.

These two films are by a guy named Brent Green. He plays guitar and narrates these his stories (I've seen it live, its great) and has other musicians play with him. Take some time to look him up(Nervous Films) and check out his other films. They're amazing!

What kind of movie are you?

Last night I watched a movie called Ira and Abby. Yes, this is a romantic comedy, but sometimes we indulge the heart first and the mind second. I was in need of a light pick me up in cinematic form. The premise of the movie is that Ira is this neurotic guy who was raised by analysts and has been in therapy all his life. Abby is this carefree girl who has the power to get anyone to open up about their lives and see the light at the end of the tunnel. They decide to marry within hours of meeting. The movie deals with marriage and communication. When there's a lack of communication between partners, they often seek an outside source, ie: friend, therapist, mother, priest. But what he find is that he keeps trying to qualify love, rationalize love, put love in a box, etc. He does not understand why this woman, who has boundless empathy and love for all people, even complete strangers, decides that he is the ONE person she wants to marry. He can't accept that sometimes things are easier than he thought they were going to be. There is no secret formula for happiness, love, success, life in general. But often times we make things harder than they have to be.
I've been finding myself trying to make things harder. Something inside me believes that life should be this dire struggle. Everything should be stressful. Anything worth having is worth dying for, therefore I must die to get it? This is ridiculous. Sometimes being smart is a downfall. It causes a lack of enjoyment of simpler times. If my life is a movie genre, its most likely a romantic comedy, and I'm the hopeless neurotic that doesn't understand the simplicity of being happy. At least on this cold Monday morning anyways......

This music combo makes me giggle. Its probably not new, but I've never heard it before. Enjoy

scrambled brains

So today feels like a rollercoaster. Midterm and Committee Review is coming up, the inlaws are coming for an extended weekend, there's mold growing under the wet carpet in my basement, and I just taught the head of the art history department how to (not kidding) save files, burn cd's, and use powerpoint. I haven't had sex in about a month, and to no fault but my own. I feel somehow detatched from my sexuality. I can only chalk it up to be from hormones and/or stress. I'm beginning to feel like grad school isn't all its cracked up to be, but I've yet to get any real feedback from anyone either. I miss the facilities that were available to me at Herron, both technological and human. No one ever comes looking for me, no one seeks out my advice. The professors just keep asking me if I like it here, if I like my studio, and if I have any questions to let them know. I feel a bit like a zombie. This post is about as scattered as my brain. So here's a performance/installation art video I found that makes me feel happy.