Just Whose History Are We Talking About? [Letter to the President]

Dear President Obama,

Weed is harmless - more so than the very legal and regulated Cigarette and Booze Industries - and you know it.

Wall Street is dangerous and you know it.

Government control and taxation of Marijuana, whether strictly medicinal or recreational, could bring in billions of dollars and you know it.

The people are telling you what they want. 
They're screaming it in the streets. Literally. 

Why aren't you listening?

What happened to being on the right side of history?

I knew people expected way too much of you, but it's not like you haven't done anything right. You've done a lot of great things that have gone unnoticed and unpublicized.

It's obvious you're going to go down in history no matter what - so what's the deal?

And yeah, there are totally bigger things to worry about. All the more reason to just stop the madness.

Here's to hoping you fix this, or somebody runs in 2012 who will.

-L.

Everyone must believe what they are doing is right, or else implode.

I'm a PC girl. Apple computers are too much like toys to me. I like to be able to hack my system. Apples shut you out and hold your hand for the most simple tasks.

Anyway, with that said, here's what this post is really about:

I've been scared that I'm sick. I'm scared that because I don't have money for my own personal doctor, I'm going to go undiagnosed, and I'm going to die younger than I want to. My life started with a death - my Gram's death - so this kind of "existential dread" is not outside the scope of my experience. It's not my imagination, playing tricks. Not everybody gets a happy ending.

And then, there's this:

"Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart." - Steve Jobs 2005

One of the most exciting things in the world to me is resonance. I remember coming up with these ideas as a little girl - hell it still happens today - and then I find what I'm talking about in some book or movie or essay by somebody we hold up as genius, or important, or influential. Maybe I sound like an asshole when I say this - but if it's ever happened to you - then you understand - you're who I'm trying to reach out to.

I think this fear is what drove me to finally open this blog up to the world. It's been online for just two days now and already I've had almost 800 hits. As exciting as that is, it's darkened by the fact that only five readers have made comments - have reached back - and not necessarily by commenting on the blog itself.

Please, I don't care if you agree. I don't mind if you think I'm nuts. Please just tell me what you think. Maybe you don't believe what you think matters, but it matters to me. Not because I'm going to be sad if you don't like what I write - if you don't like me - but because I'm trying to figure out just what I'm dealing with. What world I'm living in.

Part of why I love writing so much can be summed up in this quote:

"It's no wonder that truth is stranger than fiction. Fiction has to make sense." - Mark Twain

The world is scary to me. People are scary to me. Further, I think I'm scary to them. The only way I've been able to make sense of it is through the lessons that fiction has taught me. People have motivations, even if they're not very rational. Everyone must believe what they are doing is right, or else implode. Our language, gestures, casual choices often betray our real feelings. Things usually work out in the end, even if "working out" really means "not existing". It's important to be brave. It's important to care. It's important to choose not to be evil. 

I don't believe in religion. I don't believe in MTV. I don't totally believe in Politics, in private Health Care, in Authority. If you do, alright. We all need hope, love, meaning - no matter where we find it.

So, in the face of death - whether imagined or simply feared - I've offered this up. I'm brave. I care. I'm not evil. 

And if - and when - I die - at least I tried. 

At least I took the path less traveled.

I've lived by my personal mantra that expression is existence. 

I hope someday I can stand in front of a crowd and say, with all honesty: and that has made all the difference.  

As usual, it hit me in the shower.
Think of it this way: One voice may Lead, but many voices Change. 

Do you want to follow or do you want to participate? It's your choice. 

"Please tell me how you know tomorrow staring at your shoes"

I never remember the things I write. The things I do. I don't know why. I thought it had to do with PTSD. But how can that be if I forget the good things too?

This blog just went live this weekend. I've never shared all these things publicly before. Only my closest friends have ever even had access before.

So I've been re-reading through. Trying to find particularly interesting posts. But over and over and over, the same problems. The same self-defeat. Shouldn't I know these things by now? It's almost formulaic. It's pathetic. I get stressed out. I get sick. I get depressed. I get inspired. I write. I feel better. It starts over. How I can expect anyone to care if all I do is ride this stupid carousel?

Has anything really changed? Perhaps. I am proud of this blog. I have found a sense of self-esteem. For the first time in my life, I'm really proud of myself. But what use it that to anybody else?

YOU TELL ME.

“It is our choices, Harry, that show us what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”

I get that. I live by that. But what are my choices now? What paths haven't I ventured down yet?

I've been sick - and with my grades and therefore my scholarships and therefore my degree and therefore my life on the line - it's been freaking me out.  I can't shake the feeling like I've done it all somehow. Like I have no more life to live. A lifetime of bullshit has been compacted into 21 years - my body's already reacting like I'm a hundred years old. I say things that even stun myself - I wonder if any of this is real.

Where do I go from here? Does this mean I could live for the fun of it - from now until the end? Could I get discovered, published, and live out my life the way I always dreamed from here on in? Is that really a possible ending?

Most likely, no. I think a tragedy is much more plausible. It's all felt like a fairy tale so far, why should it stop now?

I need to back away from this. I need to find something else to do.

Maybe I'm cranky because it's 4:30am - scratch that - 6:37am now - ugh fuck me - 8:16 am - and I - still - can't sleep. Maybe I'm angry because I have things due and I just have no will, no inspiration, my head aches, I'm nauseous. The thoughts just keep coming. The guilt for working on this instead of the piles of homework I have to make up for class. I don't care about my grade, as long as I pass. As long as I keep my scholarships. I just don't want to let my Professors down - not after they've been so nice. I need to stop this. I need to stop acting like school is my family.

Maybe it's all just what xxx calls "existential dread".

xxx has been reading too. Their response, as it often is, was to send me a song. I think it sums up the situation well. Does anybody out there have an explanation? A solution? If you do, I'd love to know. Please tell me. I'm serious. As you can see, I haven't been able to figure it out.

Here's the song: Yo La Tengo: Tears Are In Your Eyes

Here are the lyrics:

You tell me summer's here
And the time is wrong
You tell me winter's here
And your days are getting long

Tears are in your eyes tonight

You tell me that you haven't
Slept in days
You tell me sleeping only makes you tired
Anyway

Tears are in your eyes tonight
Tears are in your eyes every night

Although you don't believe me, you are strong
Darkness always turns into the dawn
And you won't even remember this for long
When it ends all right

Please tell me how you know tomorrow
Staring at your shoes

Tears are in your eyes every night
Tears are in your eyes every night
Tears are in your eyes tonight

Laughed Out of Town

I want to write a letter and make everything okay.

I don't even know what "okay" means anymore.
So what if by magic or summertime or luck I can wake up tomorrow without the weight of a million and one thoughts on my mind. So what? I'll still be a female in, as my psych of women professor says, a "white supremacist, patriarchal, capitalist society". I'll still be part of an invisible system; so ingrained in everything we are, and we do, and we see, and we think that people would rather laugh than take the time to realize it exists - to see how the world could be different one day.

Arendt said that evil was the product of inattention, not a creation by hateful minds. Like weeds in a garden, evil exists when we ignore what's really going on; when we deny the bitter or overwhelming truth. The truth is that in America and most of the world, men/males are the power-holders - specifically white men, but men nonetheless. It's a passed down mentality, an inherited system, not something the boys of this generation just came up with one day on the playground.

Power: "possession of controlling influence, authority, might".

Yes, we've come a long way through history (in a relatively short amount of time) to establish women as equals with men. Even just 40 years ago, women didn't have the same experiences or opportunities available as they do today.

Remember, men did not give women the right to vote. Whites did not give blacks civil rights. It was raged for, fought for, and only then was it won - not given.

There is a lingering oppression among women. An internal oppression. We are always talking talking talking about the media: ads and TV shows, films and songs that objectify, categorize, simplify women. As both men and women, we know in our hearts that we do this to ourselves; allow ourselves to listen and soak in these messages, to perpetuate and personify what we see because all we want to do is belong. Those women who rebel against this definition of femininity must abandon our gender in order to be taken seriously, to be "one of the boys". As I've learned in my classes, there are generally two kinds of women (as there always seems to be), the ones who seek to be liked by men and those who seek to be more like men. Everything is in relation to the powerful; the characteristics or desires of the ruling force. The sinners vs. God. The slaves vs. the master. The pawns vs. the president. Women vs. Men.

The good girls vs. the bad girls.
The cheerleaders vs. the fighters.

If you don't believe me (and you're male), ask yourself:
Which is more like you?
A) Does who you are depend on whether you are ever loved by a woman?
or
B) Do you forgo traditional masculine traits in order to be "one of the girls"?

I bet you laughed at that, didn't you?

These are the two choices, the two scripts, that women are told to choose from. And we are told to unconsciously pick a side before we ever know the whole story, so by the time we see the truth, it's too late - our choices are too ingrained in our chosen identity. The resulting civil war and policing among women, the competition and manifestation of insecurities, is why we have the reputation for "cattiness" or "girl-fighting". Even if you managed to reject either script entirely, you will still be surrounded by either side of that civil war. And moreover, if you try to show them how they've fallen in line, distracted from the bigger picture, they'll join together then -- and laugh you out of town. Good luck with that.

The truth is that, through some trick of time travel, things could easily be reversed. There could be an alternate universe where Women are the ones given agency, unspoken authority, unchallenged visibility while Men must adhere to a strict set of social rules about what it means to be a "good boy". Power is situational, men and women still hold the same strengths and weaknesses within themselves - are more diverse among the different personalities and nationalities and cultures and choices within a gender than between genders. The words "power", "ambition", and "anger" do not have to belong to men, just as "beauty", "kindness", and "sensitivity" are not exclusively female. The only differences remain in our perceptions, the stories and scripts which we have internalized - what we have been lead to believe.

Something Few Will Read

A man died today.
As he opened the gates at a Wal-Mart on Long Island, he was trampled to death by a crowd of Black Friday shoppers.

There are many ways that someone could react to this.

First, there is disgust.
I want to be disgusted. I want to be angry. I want to be justified in my hatred for those ignorant and greedy consumers who - even after they realized what had happened - did not want to stop shopping. Those people so focused on all the things, things, things that they had to buy for their parents, their children, their brothers, sisters, cousins, lovers.....all at discount prices, holiday specials, once-in-a-lifetime-deals.....that a life outside of their little world could not even register on their radar.

Are the shoppers evil people?
No, probably not. But they are blind and they are careless.
They are products. We all are.

We can't help but be influenced by the world in which we live.
TV, Radio, Internet, Blogs, Forums, Movies, News, Games, Cellphones...
The-next-big-thing.....the millennium of money....Cool America.
The more we expose ourselves to it and the harder we try to understand it only helps us to control how we personally choose to survive in it.
It's easy to make someone angry, it's very hard to make them fix the reasons for it.
Very few of us can truly change anything. We don't even know where to begin. No one person can change it on their own. No - it would take a force to change people - an industry with advertisements covering the cities reading:

"THERE ARE MORE IMPORTANT, MORE BEAUTIFUL,
AND MORE TERRIBLE THINGS IN LIFE THAN THIS."

But we forget, especially around the holidays, that while people may be ultimately good - we are much more complicated creatures than that. We love being important, being the best, being loved, and being wanted. The world we live in today tells us that we can be all those things with just the right gift. We don't see this as a bad thing, we're giving someone else a present after all - but that's how the cycle begins. That's how a man's life becomes so much less important than getting that damn man-made-whatever that so-and-so has always, always wanted.

I'm not saying that we should burn (or better yet, recycle) all our material goods and create a socialism state of peace, love, and home-grown vegetables. But we should do something - what can we do?

Maybe all we can do is just care about each other a little more, and our own egos a little less.

Happy Holidays.

No Witnesses

How many people die each day.
Everyday.
People I don't know. People I might not even have liked.
People no great amount of people will ever remember.
Maybe two, three tops until they die too, of course.
But it all goes on. It's nothing personal. Nothing to get too offended about. It's just how it is. If everyone were famous - no one would be famous. All we can do to stop death is to manufacture more life. Seek permanence in books, art, industry, children. Maybe money isn't the root of all evil - maybe life is.

Everything must belong somewhere.

Step outside and take a look.

Somewhere out in America, it's starting to rain. Can you tell me one thing you will remember about me?

* I reference songs a lot, if you hadn't noticed *

I'm one of those thousands of people out there. I belong here in the world. Another face, a tourist's passover shot with a hand held camera. I'm an american. The people on this bus. The expanding world outside and beyond. Blips. Beautiful, colorful, momentary blips.

The world requires no audience. No witnesses. No witnesses.

I am just so much.

What if I were to be suddenly diagnosed? What if this bus crashes, or aliens invade the earth? Will I be able to live with my own death? As long as I keep writing, keep believing, I think I can. I can survive my own death. And so, I am everyone I write about. Everyone I write for. Heroes and strangers and friends - together we will all live forever through letters.

America

By the look of the number of people on the bus I get on, I can't help but think I'm going to nowhere anyone wants to be.

I started to think that I really lost sight of what was really the whole purpose of going to college. The whole process of growing up and becoming an adult - I took for granted all my moments of strength and maturity, forgetting that there's more to life than rules and pretty phrases. I've been a brat. Good adults know that everyone has pain. That these boundaries aren't as solid as we think, on either side. I need to remember my dignity. My powers and my weaknesses equally, and to just sit back and enjoy.

"I was walkin'.... all by myself"

Pride in Independence.
I think that's why Boston calls to me. I can be more independant there. More focused and free. More alive.

A fog of grime is coating the world outside the bus windows.

If I could do anything, I think I'd like to be a traveling writer. Document today's America. Maybe I could assemble a documentary crew, and we'll spend years going from town to town. My role would be to write all the narration. We'd take turns driving.
Visit towns, interview people. Always be nonthreatening, a blank slate for them to write on. For us to document on camera. Subcultures. Landscapes. Expose poverty and pollution. Show the faces behind the polls.

What is America? Modern America
And what we found there....

What If [We are a generation of thieves]

We are a generation of thieves.
We steal each other's time,
Beauty. Freedom. Choice.

Our ability to live any kind of adventure is greatly diminished. Only the strongest ones can catch the train now. Only the lucky ones.

The love inside of me is there, I know it, deeply suffocating. It's fighting.

Oh god, how I long for a time that is older. Whether myself being older or just going into the past, the wrinkles I remember in my Grandmother's face remind me that I do not truly belong here. I overcompensate my youth, substitute it with quirky humor and broad smiles. But I am not so young. Unless romance is only for the young...then I suppose I'm wrong...what if I'm wrong about everything?

What if there is a God?
What if there is an afterlife? Oh how much easier living this life would be.
To know that you will see them again. Talk to them. Kiss them. Touch them. Feel Them.
What if nothing were ever over? What if it never ends?

*6/13/25 note: no god worthy of worship would have let this shit happen to anyone anywhere in the world

You're a sparkling ball of electricity, bouncing through the black cosmos until you collide with - anything - and life explodes on impact.

Oh how fortunate we would be. This modern life has been clouded. We no longer value the important things, the real things, on a day to day basis. Gap is the God of Love. Oil is the God of War. Money is a deadly sin, a necessary evil we all indulge. Adventure has been written off, adventure is for those who can afford it. We've thrown it to the movie stars and Hollywood to interpret for us in 120 minute blocks of light & sound & sex. That's our escape. When we blink back into our reality as the lights come up, we forget. Everyone forgets. Promises are broken, honor is lost. Follow the masses! Fall into the pit. We're all so lost, so unhappy, so screwed, and all so alone among the sea of everybody else.

But what if I fight back? What if I don't listen to the magazines and the logical minds that tell me "love like that doesn't exist." "lower your standards" "be realistic".
What if I keep my dreams, never let them go, pursue them with every cell in my body?
What if I write? Draw, create, organize, lead, revolt, win? What if I choose love? What if I choose happiness? What if I could get everyone else to do the same?
Perhaps then, fear would not be so scary. Love would be more daily than expensive jeans. Humanity would rule over technology, instead of being ruled by it.

New Ways to Watch TV

*heavy edit 6/27/19

The major events of our lives will be seen and experienced differently in the lives of those who will exist in the future.

Examples:

Titanic (as in the ship) ---> sank. many people died. very sad. really happened. Year: 1912
Titanic (movie) -> Hugely successful. Wildly Romantic. Won loads of awards. Inspired us to care. Year: 1999

-What would those lost on the actual Titanic think about the movie?-

George W. Bush ----> President from 2000 to 2008
Movies ---> W. (2008) and movies about 911
That's now. What will the future see? With what lens will the future use to look at us today?

I want someone in the future to think of me and say "You know, Laura would have loved this" and maybe in that way I will be there. Part of me, somehow, will be there experiencing it with them. And I will never miss a thing.