INTEROBANG?! (updated again!)
meme time, y'all.
Comment on this entry and I'll respond by asking you five questions so I can satisfy my curiosity. Update your journal with the answers to the questions. Include this explanation in the post and offer to ask other people questions.
asked by kokanshu:
1. What's the best thing about writing for you?
sometimes i have readers ask me if writing, especially in the manner i do, is cathartic. i've never found it particularly cathartic, and sometimes writing something personal takes me to a very dark place. so, beyond craft and content and anything to do with the actual mechanics of writing, for me the best part of it is the conception. that place behind the eyes where this idea comes to life, dances along, leading you, expecting the pen or press of keys to follow. it's like watching a film unfold (when you're in the thick of it, anyway, an effortless falling down of inspiration). in some ways this is also the worst part: the disparity between what i've seen and what i've tried to make other people see. it's supposed to be a gift, this ability to see into the beyond, as if all the great writers have their ears pressed to a gleaming wall, where Truth and Beauty and dead poets whisper through to the people on the other end, to us (well, you. i'm just peeking over your shoulder). it's like a channeling, and that's the film we're watching: something accessible by everyone (the collective unconscious), but harnessed by few (writers, filmmakers, artists), as related to us by Something Else. it becomes a question of opening a locked door, wherein what lies on the other side of the door is the Idea, and the only way to open it for other people to see how truly fucking awesome it is inside is to fashion a key out of words, a story.
i don't know what i'm saying. in short: the seeing and the key-making; for both their power and their ability to give back.
2. You post a lot of photos of different foods on twitter - do you consider yourself something of a foodie?
aw, shit, i fucking love food. i rarely watch television, but when i do it's definitely a good idea to keep me far away from the food network. have you seen top chef? that show is pure crack for me. i have great, great respect for people who are gifted in the kitchen. i can follow a recipe down to the last pinch of salt, but like hermione in the half-blood prince, sometimes that just doesn't cut it. the ability to create fantastic tasting things is an artform, one that transcends ethnicity. so, in that way, i guess you could say i have a healthy appreciation for the varieties of food los angeles has to offer.
3. Favourite food!
just one?! i can't! i do have an unnatural love for calamari, but there's also steak. fucking steak, medium rare, dripping and succulent, oh god. so, let's say steak or calamari for the à la carte, for a group of food: seafood, and then cuisines: japanese, mediterranean, thai, mexican, korean.
4. Favourite movie.
this one is also unfairly difficult! i used to have this tier i would rate bands and films under, but for ease, let's go with darren aronofsky's the fountain. i can hardly stand rachel weisz or hugh jackman, which is testament enough for me of how extraordinarily moving i found the film. i believe in enduring, transformative love, and above anything else, i think that's what the film lauds: love in the face of life, death, loss, transformation. it's beautiful and it's painful and haters can hate, but i love the hell out of it.
...but there are so, so many others that i could pick, omg. the fall for beauty, dead poets society for sentiment, almost famous as a way of life, 28 days later as proof that scary movies can also be an artform. they're all a little bit different, hard to throw together under one giant umbrella of cinema.
5. If you could go back in time and change one thing in your life, what would it be?
wrap the umbilical cord around my neck. and i mean this very much.
if not that, i wish i hadn't tried to slit my wrists sophomore year of high school... during class, no less. i know my life would be very, very different if that one event didn't start a chain reaction of consequences that changed my life (probably negatively) forever.
asked by gold_panner
1. What do these words mean to you:
sunrise that which is cruel: supposed to be about hope, but sunrise is just one thing after another, over and over again like a taunt. it's supposed to be pretty, but every time i've been around for a sunrise, i've just had a night full of debauchery or sorrow. sunrise is a lie orchestrated to keep you optimistic for something when there is nothing coming.
talent that which is unattainable: people who are talented at things get all the glory. i wish i was one of them.
lover that which i will never have: sometimes i think if i have someone to love, someone who loved me, to be a lover and have a lover, my life would begin to make sense. to be a lover of things--of bands and art and film and music--is to be a lover of voids. to be a lover of things that take and take and give back so infinitesimally that it might as well be non-existent. i waste my self on things that don't love me back because i'll never find the one that will.
paper that which is fragile: appealing in a worthless, one-time use, sort of way. paper skin.
simple that which is good: a cutting away of things, broken down into the most base and most necessary components. simple forms, simple lines--everything clean, everything pure. free of taint, free of complexities (read: bullshit). everything is so layered now that the real challenge is being simple again, unlearning, negating.
2. If you were given the gift of being able to speak another language, which would you choose?
i took a couple years of french in college, but it's really the sort of thing you have to stick with. i'd love to be able to speak french fluently, read and write and the whole deal. but i like languages; i'd just as soon pick japanese, portuguese, russian, italian. french, though, would be first. feels refined and ancient to me.
3. What do you find is the most annoying habit or trait for someone to have? Like, say no matter how great a person is in every other way, is there one thing that could turn you off them forever?
well, there is the issue that even the most annoying habit won't turn me off a person forever. i am very selective about who i choose to be friends with, so, after that point, now matter how fucked up, annoying, or terrible the person is, i'm in it for life. that said, i cannot fucking stand it when someone wants attention from me but does not out right say they do. ex: "god, my parents are such assholes!" and then refusing to elaborate, instead just talking around and around the subject with hopes that you're going to ask them, "oh, no! what happened?" cannot, cannot, cannot stand. if i suspect someone is baiting me for some form of attention, i act totally indifferent. if you want something, ASK FOR IT, fuck.
that and shallow people, but i don't think i'd call shallow people annoying. worthless? yes. a waste of humanity? yes. and i mean shallow in the "my biggest concern is what to wear to night" or "i can't believe my boyfriend ignored me, i'm going to kill myself" shallow. very surface level, very fake, very fucking retarded.
4. If you were only allowed to listen to seven songs for the rest of your life, what would they be?
the receiving end of sirens, "this armistice"
anathallo, "kasa no hone"
the appleseed cast, "marigold & patchwork"
jimmy eat world, "for me this is heaven"
brand new, "jesus christ"
further seems forever, "on legendary"
gatsby's american dream, "work lies sex love fear hate friendship"
5. What is the last thing that made you laugh out loud?
i can't remember. i haven't laughed today. i've been doing more crying than laughing lately. it was probably something my kid brother said yesterday, though.
asked by sharpersoul
1. Do you think you could step back and objectively examine and describe yourself? Why or why not? If you had to objectively explain your personality type (but not yourself) to someone, what would you say?
i feel like when i'm at my most coherent, i'm objectively examining my worthlessness. it is entirely possible for me to step back and take a survey (though i don't think this is possible for everyone). my conclusions sound wrong to the people who think they know me, but that's because they aren't analyzing in the same objective way. a friendship bias skews how your friends respond to your objective self-view.
in terms of brand name jungian personality type analysis, i'm an INFP. taken the test a million times, and it's always the same. for a more run-of-the-mill description: i'm an analytical idealist.
2. Does your first (or most vivid) childhood memory continue to influence you and your reactions or decisions?
i'm pretty sure it doesn't. my first vivid childhood memory (first-person--i have weird third-person memories that can't possibly exist) deals with me having been asleep on the brown shaggy couch in the living room after pre-school. i must've been around two or three years old. i heard my grandmother cooking in the kitchen, filipino chicken adobo (i know because of the smell), and i remember looking at my hands, slowly gaining awareness. i can't imagine how this might be influencing me since it's such a simple, innocuous memory. i don't have a great love for my grandmother or filipino dishes, don't have any weird nostalgia or unexplainable urges toward anything that memory signifies.
3. The universe is speaking to you. What is it saying?
kill yourself, you dumb fucking bitch. can't you see what a pointless, insignificant waste of space you are? twenty-six more years of your bullshit will only prove your own stupidity at not ending it sooner. any friends you have are ones you mistreat, ones who end up despising you. you alienate you family and don't know how to apologize. you have no marketable skills, no reason for continued existence other than to waste, waste, waste money, energy, air.
i mean, if it's speaking, i'm pretty sure that's what it's saying. if it's not saying that, then i'm inclined to think it's not saying anything at all. the universe is silent, mechanical. even if it chose to speak, who am i that it would choose to speak to me? or, is it like god's voice, still and soft and all we have to do is listen? fuck god, fuck the universe. if it's speaking to me, i don't want to fucking hear it. it can sing my praises to the fucking heavens; as long as it fucks me over and fucks me over, i don't want to hear it.
4. You have six months to live. Why? Is there anything you can do to stop it? What are you going to do during that time?
i have a terminal case of the blues. in six months, post-east cost transplantation, the blues will get the better of me. there is nothing i can do to stop it because it's not something you can control; it is something that controls you. i'm aware of it now, but soon i won't be able to tell the difference any more. during the next six months, while the disease slowly sets down roots in my head and my heart, i'm going to look for all the world like i've just re-located across country, coming to terms with the limitations a new life brings. i'll be looking for work, looking for new people, trying to keep my head above water in terms of bills and sadness. but it won't work, and i will be eaten, eaten, eaten slowly by the fucking COLD SHOULDER of the universe or the spinning hands of a clock. no, there's nothing i can do. and i will want to fill that time with alcohol and heroin (because nothing feels as good as getting high, nothing nothing nothing, all the synthetic pleasure so perfect), but i will just look like i'm battling hard for some life to call mine.
but it won't work, in the end. no exit, no hope, no escape.
5. You believe in Love, the kind that heals and transforms. What influenced/influences that view? When did you first consciously acknowledge that as a belief? Is it something you want to believe in?
because i was loved, i was saved. i went from looking toward every exit to understanding that it was okay to stay here a little bit longer with people who wanted me and needed me and loved me. i acknowledged this as a junior in high school, 16 years old, when i found people who finally understood me, and then i explored it through faith. christianity let me down, but the idea of an unending, unselfish love did not. you can't expect it from people because people are weak, people are fallible, but you can trust it as an idea, and that idea has the power to hold sway over the fallible, has the power to command the physical, the emotional. in the same way descartes said , "cogito, ergo sum, i know this Love is real because i feel it inside me, churning away like crushing diamonds. it's not something i want to believe in, because then it would be one less reason to stick around for, but it's real. i'm sad that i don't have the romantic kind, but i have tons and tons of the platonic kind. it's real, it is, because it's not like i'm talking about something i can't feel. i do feel it, i feel it every day. it's why i'm still here
asked by pouikee
1. what do you love about liars/why?
people haven't looked closely enough at this catchphrase to understand the finer nuances. in the same way i could say i love axel, so it translates -> i love a liar -> i love liars. the people i love are liars. they lie, lie, lie to me. why they do it, i don't know. but they do. the other implication is there, too, that to have someone defined as a "liar" means that he is a specific type of person, a certain attitude (suave swagger, a confident con artist, a beautiful bastard), and that does tend to be my type as far as types go. a successful lie is many, many things, and it is certainly: an element of the actual so it has the taste of truth, an entertaining act, and unwavering confidence. liars are craftsmen, are artists (and i mean this apart from the people i love--friends, family--i mean the real liars, the ones who make a living by it). there are deeper complexities here about the necessity of lies for the liar, about the level of self-worth they feel for themselves and in relation to the people they're lying to. i like the threads of it, how complex it can be, and how simple.
2. if you could remove one thing from the world when you die, what would you take out?
every single memory or proof of my existence.
that, or i would subtract greed. moreso than envy (and i feel like envy would cease to manifest since i think greed and envy have the same genesis: selfish desire for something--greed acts upon the desire; envy remains inactive and seethes). you hear "money is the root of all evil," but it's not the money, it's the love of money, the greed that makes people do fucked up shit. without greed, i think there would be the start of of something positive for the rest of humanity.
3. what has been your favorite vacation and why?
family went to hawaii for the first time as its core unit (dad, mom, me, sister, brother) in 1997 (april, i think, for spring break). we were in kauai for a while, then spent time on oahu. it's the first trip where, before we left, i realized i hadn't been enjoying previous trips because i was focused on annoying trivialities. abandoning the teenage mentality allowed me to enjoy how truly, truly beautiful hawaii is. i've been back since '97, but nothing compares to how i saw it the first time; i hardly have any memories of that second trip other than jumping off that waterfall on the road to hana. there was a certain peace, something in the sand, that felt very calming to me. i've been tons of other tropical places, but nothing with that easy gentleness.
4. you have a time machine, and it only works once. where/when do you go? why then/there?
to the moment of my birth so i could stab my mom in the stomach. that, or probably the middle ages. i like that time period. i think it was difficult for women, but i also think it was easier. simpler. i wouldn't mind churning butter all day and getting married off to some farmer. wouldn't mind dying from the black death. i'd probably pick late 1500s, though. or mid 1300s. spenser or chaucer, one of them. or maybe the british romanic period, post french-revolution. it was an exciting time to be alive, full of possibility, and i think it's a period that sympathizes with my views on literature and life. it's a little too industrialized for my tastes, though. i like it either manual labor and stone like the middle ages, or super chic and modern, which makes me think of going to the future. 2500 A.D.
i dunno. i don't fit anywhere. i'd probably pick to go to the future, see if it's all it's cracked up to be. if it's not, i'd find the nearest laser gun and shoot myself in the face.
5. given the choice between being loved but not reciprocating and loving but not being loved, what do you choose?
if you're loved, at least you know you have the capacity for being loved. you could always settle if worse came to worst. it wouldn't be perfect, but at least you'd be adored. (and secretly i think that's what i want most: to be adored by someone, like an actual queen whose knight loves the fuck out of her). obviously the real goal is to have that adoration and return it, but i don't know who would pick the latter option. to love and never be loved back? fuck that. that sounds like eternal torture. i'd know; that's how i feel right now.
Comment on this entry and I'll respond by asking you five questions so I can satisfy my curiosity. Update your journal with the answers to the questions. Include this explanation in the post and offer to ask other people questions.
asked by kokanshu:
1. What's the best thing about writing for you?
sometimes i have readers ask me if writing, especially in the manner i do, is cathartic. i've never found it particularly cathartic, and sometimes writing something personal takes me to a very dark place. so, beyond craft and content and anything to do with the actual mechanics of writing, for me the best part of it is the conception. that place behind the eyes where this idea comes to life, dances along, leading you, expecting the pen or press of keys to follow. it's like watching a film unfold (when you're in the thick of it, anyway, an effortless falling down of inspiration). in some ways this is also the worst part: the disparity between what i've seen and what i've tried to make other people see. it's supposed to be a gift, this ability to see into the beyond, as if all the great writers have their ears pressed to a gleaming wall, where Truth and Beauty and dead poets whisper through to the people on the other end, to us (well, you. i'm just peeking over your shoulder). it's like a channeling, and that's the film we're watching: something accessible by everyone (the collective unconscious), but harnessed by few (writers, filmmakers, artists), as related to us by Something Else. it becomes a question of opening a locked door, wherein what lies on the other side of the door is the Idea, and the only way to open it for other people to see how truly fucking awesome it is inside is to fashion a key out of words, a story.
i don't know what i'm saying. in short: the seeing and the key-making; for both their power and their ability to give back.
2. You post a lot of photos of different foods on twitter - do you consider yourself something of a foodie?
aw, shit, i fucking love food. i rarely watch television, but when i do it's definitely a good idea to keep me far away from the food network. have you seen top chef? that show is pure crack for me. i have great, great respect for people who are gifted in the kitchen. i can follow a recipe down to the last pinch of salt, but like hermione in the half-blood prince, sometimes that just doesn't cut it. the ability to create fantastic tasting things is an artform, one that transcends ethnicity. so, in that way, i guess you could say i have a healthy appreciation for the varieties of food los angeles has to offer.
3. Favourite food!
just one?! i can't! i do have an unnatural love for calamari, but there's also steak. fucking steak, medium rare, dripping and succulent, oh god. so, let's say steak or calamari for the à la carte, for a group of food: seafood, and then cuisines: japanese, mediterranean, thai, mexican, korean.
4. Favourite movie.
this one is also unfairly difficult! i used to have this tier i would rate bands and films under, but for ease, let's go with darren aronofsky's the fountain. i can hardly stand rachel weisz or hugh jackman, which is testament enough for me of how extraordinarily moving i found the film. i believe in enduring, transformative love, and above anything else, i think that's what the film lauds: love in the face of life, death, loss, transformation. it's beautiful and it's painful and haters can hate, but i love the hell out of it.
...but there are so, so many others that i could pick, omg. the fall for beauty, dead poets society for sentiment, almost famous as a way of life, 28 days later as proof that scary movies can also be an artform. they're all a little bit different, hard to throw together under one giant umbrella of cinema.
5. If you could go back in time and change one thing in your life, what would it be?
wrap the umbilical cord around my neck. and i mean this very much.
if not that, i wish i hadn't tried to slit my wrists sophomore year of high school... during class, no less. i know my life would be very, very different if that one event didn't start a chain reaction of consequences that changed my life (probably negatively) forever.
asked by gold_panner
1. What do these words mean to you:
sunrise that which is cruel: supposed to be about hope, but sunrise is just one thing after another, over and over again like a taunt. it's supposed to be pretty, but every time i've been around for a sunrise, i've just had a night full of debauchery or sorrow. sunrise is a lie orchestrated to keep you optimistic for something when there is nothing coming.
talent that which is unattainable: people who are talented at things get all the glory. i wish i was one of them.
lover that which i will never have: sometimes i think if i have someone to love, someone who loved me, to be a lover and have a lover, my life would begin to make sense. to be a lover of things--of bands and art and film and music--is to be a lover of voids. to be a lover of things that take and take and give back so infinitesimally that it might as well be non-existent. i waste my self on things that don't love me back because i'll never find the one that will.
paper that which is fragile: appealing in a worthless, one-time use, sort of way. paper skin.
simple that which is good: a cutting away of things, broken down into the most base and most necessary components. simple forms, simple lines--everything clean, everything pure. free of taint, free of complexities (read: bullshit). everything is so layered now that the real challenge is being simple again, unlearning, negating.
2. If you were given the gift of being able to speak another language, which would you choose?
i took a couple years of french in college, but it's really the sort of thing you have to stick with. i'd love to be able to speak french fluently, read and write and the whole deal. but i like languages; i'd just as soon pick japanese, portuguese, russian, italian. french, though, would be first. feels refined and ancient to me.
3. What do you find is the most annoying habit or trait for someone to have? Like, say no matter how great a person is in every other way, is there one thing that could turn you off them forever?
well, there is the issue that even the most annoying habit won't turn me off a person forever. i am very selective about who i choose to be friends with, so, after that point, now matter how fucked up, annoying, or terrible the person is, i'm in it for life. that said, i cannot fucking stand it when someone wants attention from me but does not out right say they do. ex: "god, my parents are such assholes!" and then refusing to elaborate, instead just talking around and around the subject with hopes that you're going to ask them, "oh, no! what happened?" cannot, cannot, cannot stand. if i suspect someone is baiting me for some form of attention, i act totally indifferent. if you want something, ASK FOR IT, fuck.
that and shallow people, but i don't think i'd call shallow people annoying. worthless? yes. a waste of humanity? yes. and i mean shallow in the "my biggest concern is what to wear to night" or "i can't believe my boyfriend ignored me, i'm going to kill myself" shallow. very surface level, very fake, very fucking retarded.
4. If you were only allowed to listen to seven songs for the rest of your life, what would they be?
the receiving end of sirens, "this armistice"
anathallo, "kasa no hone"
the appleseed cast, "marigold & patchwork"
jimmy eat world, "for me this is heaven"
brand new, "jesus christ"
further seems forever, "on legendary"
gatsby's american dream, "work lies sex love fear hate friendship"
5. What is the last thing that made you laugh out loud?
i can't remember. i haven't laughed today. i've been doing more crying than laughing lately. it was probably something my kid brother said yesterday, though.
asked by sharpersoul
1. Do you think you could step back and objectively examine and describe yourself? Why or why not? If you had to objectively explain your personality type (but not yourself) to someone, what would you say?
i feel like when i'm at my most coherent, i'm objectively examining my worthlessness. it is entirely possible for me to step back and take a survey (though i don't think this is possible for everyone). my conclusions sound wrong to the people who think they know me, but that's because they aren't analyzing in the same objective way. a friendship bias skews how your friends respond to your objective self-view.
in terms of brand name jungian personality type analysis, i'm an INFP. taken the test a million times, and it's always the same. for a more run-of-the-mill description: i'm an analytical idealist.
2. Does your first (or most vivid) childhood memory continue to influence you and your reactions or decisions?
i'm pretty sure it doesn't. my first vivid childhood memory (first-person--i have weird third-person memories that can't possibly exist) deals with me having been asleep on the brown shaggy couch in the living room after pre-school. i must've been around two or three years old. i heard my grandmother cooking in the kitchen, filipino chicken adobo (i know because of the smell), and i remember looking at my hands, slowly gaining awareness. i can't imagine how this might be influencing me since it's such a simple, innocuous memory. i don't have a great love for my grandmother or filipino dishes, don't have any weird nostalgia or unexplainable urges toward anything that memory signifies.
3. The universe is speaking to you. What is it saying?
kill yourself, you dumb fucking bitch. can't you see what a pointless, insignificant waste of space you are? twenty-six more years of your bullshit will only prove your own stupidity at not ending it sooner. any friends you have are ones you mistreat, ones who end up despising you. you alienate you family and don't know how to apologize. you have no marketable skills, no reason for continued existence other than to waste, waste, waste money, energy, air.
i mean, if it's speaking, i'm pretty sure that's what it's saying. if it's not saying that, then i'm inclined to think it's not saying anything at all. the universe is silent, mechanical. even if it chose to speak, who am i that it would choose to speak to me? or, is it like god's voice, still and soft and all we have to do is listen? fuck god, fuck the universe. if it's speaking to me, i don't want to fucking hear it. it can sing my praises to the fucking heavens; as long as it fucks me over and fucks me over, i don't want to hear it.
4. You have six months to live. Why? Is there anything you can do to stop it? What are you going to do during that time?
i have a terminal case of the blues. in six months, post-east cost transplantation, the blues will get the better of me. there is nothing i can do to stop it because it's not something you can control; it is something that controls you. i'm aware of it now, but soon i won't be able to tell the difference any more. during the next six months, while the disease slowly sets down roots in my head and my heart, i'm going to look for all the world like i've just re-located across country, coming to terms with the limitations a new life brings. i'll be looking for work, looking for new people, trying to keep my head above water in terms of bills and sadness. but it won't work, and i will be eaten, eaten, eaten slowly by the fucking COLD SHOULDER of the universe or the spinning hands of a clock. no, there's nothing i can do. and i will want to fill that time with alcohol and heroin (because nothing feels as good as getting high, nothing nothing nothing, all the synthetic pleasure so perfect), but i will just look like i'm battling hard for some life to call mine.
but it won't work, in the end. no exit, no hope, no escape.
5. You believe in Love, the kind that heals and transforms. What influenced/influences that view? When did you first consciously acknowledge that as a belief? Is it something you want to believe in?
because i was loved, i was saved. i went from looking toward every exit to understanding that it was okay to stay here a little bit longer with people who wanted me and needed me and loved me. i acknowledged this as a junior in high school, 16 years old, when i found people who finally understood me, and then i explored it through faith. christianity let me down, but the idea of an unending, unselfish love did not. you can't expect it from people because people are weak, people are fallible, but you can trust it as an idea, and that idea has the power to hold sway over the fallible, has the power to command the physical, the emotional. in the same way descartes said , "cogito, ergo sum, i know this Love is real because i feel it inside me, churning away like crushing diamonds. it's not something i want to believe in, because then it would be one less reason to stick around for, but it's real. i'm sad that i don't have the romantic kind, but i have tons and tons of the platonic kind. it's real, it is, because it's not like i'm talking about something i can't feel. i do feel it, i feel it every day. it's why i'm still here
asked by pouikee
1. what do you love about liars/why?
people haven't looked closely enough at this catchphrase to understand the finer nuances. in the same way i could say i love axel, so it translates -> i love a liar -> i love liars. the people i love are liars. they lie, lie, lie to me. why they do it, i don't know. but they do. the other implication is there, too, that to have someone defined as a "liar" means that he is a specific type of person, a certain attitude (suave swagger, a confident con artist, a beautiful bastard), and that does tend to be my type as far as types go. a successful lie is many, many things, and it is certainly: an element of the actual so it has the taste of truth, an entertaining act, and unwavering confidence. liars are craftsmen, are artists (and i mean this apart from the people i love--friends, family--i mean the real liars, the ones who make a living by it). there are deeper complexities here about the necessity of lies for the liar, about the level of self-worth they feel for themselves and in relation to the people they're lying to. i like the threads of it, how complex it can be, and how simple.
2. if you could remove one thing from the world when you die, what would you take out?
every single memory or proof of my existence.
that, or i would subtract greed. moreso than envy (and i feel like envy would cease to manifest since i think greed and envy have the same genesis: selfish desire for something--greed acts upon the desire; envy remains inactive and seethes). you hear "money is the root of all evil," but it's not the money, it's the love of money, the greed that makes people do fucked up shit. without greed, i think there would be the start of of something positive for the rest of humanity.
3. what has been your favorite vacation and why?
family went to hawaii for the first time as its core unit (dad, mom, me, sister, brother) in 1997 (april, i think, for spring break). we were in kauai for a while, then spent time on oahu. it's the first trip where, before we left, i realized i hadn't been enjoying previous trips because i was focused on annoying trivialities. abandoning the teenage mentality allowed me to enjoy how truly, truly beautiful hawaii is. i've been back since '97, but nothing compares to how i saw it the first time; i hardly have any memories of that second trip other than jumping off that waterfall on the road to hana. there was a certain peace, something in the sand, that felt very calming to me. i've been tons of other tropical places, but nothing with that easy gentleness.
4. you have a time machine, and it only works once. where/when do you go? why then/there?
to the moment of my birth so i could stab my mom in the stomach. that, or probably the middle ages. i like that time period. i think it was difficult for women, but i also think it was easier. simpler. i wouldn't mind churning butter all day and getting married off to some farmer. wouldn't mind dying from the black death. i'd probably pick late 1500s, though. or mid 1300s. spenser or chaucer, one of them. or maybe the british romanic period, post french-revolution. it was an exciting time to be alive, full of possibility, and i think it's a period that sympathizes with my views on literature and life. it's a little too industrialized for my tastes, though. i like it either manual labor and stone like the middle ages, or super chic and modern, which makes me think of going to the future. 2500 A.D.
i dunno. i don't fit anywhere. i'd probably pick to go to the future, see if it's all it's cracked up to be. if it's not, i'd find the nearest laser gun and shoot myself in the face.
5. given the choice between being loved but not reciprocating and loving but not being loved, what do you choose?
if you're loved, at least you know you have the capacity for being loved. you could always settle if worse came to worst. it wouldn't be perfect, but at least you'd be adored. (and secretly i think that's what i want most: to be adored by someone, like an actual queen whose knight loves the fuck out of her). obviously the real goal is to have that adoration and return it, but i don't know who would pick the latter option. to love and never be loved back? fuck that. that sounds like eternal torture. i'd know; that's how i feel right now.