The deed is done.

I died my hair. It is official and officially lighter/darker than it was before. I mean why the hell not? I have joined the club of many a women before me that solve each new mid-life crisis with a new color. It feels great. Subtle rebellious and fresh. I think the new mane makes up for the roar that was attempting to let loose but didn't have the umph to back it up.

The past week or so has been a blur. So many shows and random gatherings. People leaving, people getting older, all the celebrations.... I am attempting to sort through my drunken lullabies and revelations from my factual, actual, realities. I have learned that you never want to get to the state where you have to hug a toilet that also serves as a domestic cat's potty training campsite. I have also decided that if in doubt, stay away from the bar squatters past 2 in the morning. they may turn out to be rowdy, over the hill, Liverpuddlian's that will keep you up way past your bedtime and won't offer to walk you home afterwords. My class has just ended which I am terribly depressed about and I am now trying to figure out what is next. I met with Karel tomorrow to discuss the next few months. The restaurant is on delay another month and he wants to talk about some "ideas" that he has. I hope that I don't get screwed over in the end. I am in no position not to work and if that means I have to be a sheep medic I will have to do it. Or hunt for work in the city until I can round up enough to make a move again.....

Too short and not so sweet.... I will do better next time.

cheesecake, projections, and eli the cat

I am losing my touch and there is no way to start something properly when it is long overdue. Prague. Let's talk about that. It is not that I do anything in particular or even that I feel as though I have found a particular place of my own in this city but it seems to suck people in. It lures people from their week long vacations into domestic lives. It tempts people into ex-patriotism and provides one with many a bars down dingy, mangled streets and allies. To say the least it will be missed. I have established that going back to the farm will be much harder than I intended it to be. On that note, the lack of drawn out conversations and flirtations in my own language will hopefully lead to a puddle of time that lends itself towards creativity. I have goals dammit! I wish I could list them all right now two after one ten after nine but I am selfish and I want to secretly check them off with no one's hand but my own patting my back. One day the list of things that I have done with my life will reveal itself.

I am having a hard time tracing steps into the past few weeks so I will try to start informing my way back. I woke up this morning next to a guy from some town next to some Dot on the map in Kentucky. I would say that he is a not so nice boy that is very nice to look at. Everything about the evening was predictable. We met the evening before at Ken Nash and Sarah's headlining show and after an evening of flirtatious jabs at each others lives, which was only a means to blatantly make fun of ourselves and find comradery in the fact that we were mirror images of the same tragic tale it was almost fate that we would suffer through it again. He advertised his emotional unavailability in the most inviting of ways and the poor Czech girl who sat starry-eyed within range went home with him, as she has many nights before, feeling like one day he would admit to being her boyfriend. I will remain to feel emotionally unattached and continue to take all life and joy out of analyzing my own tragic existence through his. That said, the morning this was great. We passively aggressively made breakfast, ate it, and listened to (smog) and seemed to do it with a sense of familiarity and ease. Strange how that shit plays out but overall it was only how it could be expected to be. You meet someone but you see them from across the room first and let it happen. You say things and it is as though you are both allowing one thing lead to the next as though the rules of engagement are only for humors sake. You very well could have said "nice to meet you, now lets skip to the good part". There were no formalities in our goodbye. I could just as well never see him again as start bumping into him all the time.

Mom and Dad AKA Sarah and Ryan have taken me in, fed me, given me a place to sleep, and in turn I started making cheesecakes, organizing cupboards, and trying to show my appreciation in any way I can. They are the picture perfect, ex-pat, domestic residents of Prague. Sarah stuns the very walls that surround her with her quirky yet refined appearance and grace. Ryan manages to make that very same room laugh out loud in calculated bursts with his presence, and Eli the cat is the yogurt to the soup...absolutely complementary. It has been a true pleasure to be a part of their world.

My time is coming to a close. The late night drawing classes, the Bikram Yoga, the days after days of shoving Czech into every orifices of my body, the homemade soups and various delectable cuisines, the moving of the cat poddy trainer to use the bathroom late at night.... it will all be missed. I am wondering how winter will treat me here and weather or not I will wilt with the coming of the season.

making ones way

I came to a realization this morning that with each city that I have spent a considerable amount of time in I prefer one method of transportation over another. The buses of Quito counseled me through my struggles in coming to know my own imbalances. They calmed the warrior at the end of the day and reassured the woman within that there was more to life than shocking the men of the world and their mentality that was so embedded in the culture. The streets of San Francisco knew the pads of my feet as well as the drops of rain that washed it clean the entire summer that I lived there. Their concrete beings were embracing and coached me through my unrest by providing me an endless journey of unlimited routes and corners. I am now cradled by the darkness of Praha's metro and despite the fact that all whom I have come to know prefer the trams I find comfort in revisiting the sun as many times as possible through out my days.

I am on the verge of an emotional breakdown.
I am ready to yell aloud from the frame of every open window.
I lie in bed with only unrest to keep me company.
I fight anxiety with a placid stare into others illuminated windows.
I need to laugh out loud at my own faults.
I beg myself to forgive all that I have done.
I worship the sweet nothings that happen in precious moments.

I ignore these small tributes to my existence by assembling an appropriate, slightly looked after, but generally tame outfit, stuff my bag with things I know I will not use on my venture and proceed to slip it over my shoulder. I imagine my life playing deep inside the mind of someone else and try to provide the most appropriate soundtrack to the script. I walk down five flights of stairs, retrace the well traveled route to the metro station, and watch myself descend the steps in the reflection of the billboard above.

I don't hesitate to keep eye contact with people who dare to look and when they finally decide that they are no match for someone who doesn't care to be noticed they shy away to their own familiar territories. We are bound by a contract of understanding. They do not want to know who that girl is that so boldly challenged their curiosity.

* * *

PETER GOAT

Petr surprised me the other day by taking a stand for something he believed in. Unfortunately, as the drunken, mindless sentences began to unravel I have come to the conclusion that he is but a mere product of a childish, collective thought. He sternly claimed that it was not normal for me to stand naked in front of other people and that he was not my boyfriend. If it were not for the audience in the background I would have tried not to laugh at him. I knew very well that he would not have been able to spit out such dribble without the support of his equally immature clan of friends but I had given him more credit in the past for a more evolved and modern mentality. You are right Petr. It is not right for a woman to unabashedly show her body to whomever wishes to draw it when she has allowed one young man of only 18 to think that it was his own private right to gawk at. It has always been knowingly cruel of me to watch him inflate his own ego with such pride and assurance. He has since apologized for implying that I am a whore, would like to remain disillusioned that we will live happily ever after in some fabricated wonderland, and politely pleaded that I keep my clothes on. I will from here forth have to stop trying to turn him into a man and allow him to live within his own years and only hope that he will turn out alright in the end. I despise the sense of superiority and indifference that I have adopted in terms of love and compassion.

Today I am an unstoppable flame sweeping the streets and outshining the sun. I am elated at the sight of nearly everything and cant help but smile at all that I pass. I will drift into this evening and relish my new sense of self.

A Tale of Two Tangled

A week ago I made a list of things that I wanted to accomplish while riding the bus to Prague.  I wanted to find a good language institute that offered an intensive Czech course in a short period of time.  I had my mind set on finding a place to live for the next month that would taylor to my needs as a student and as as someone ready to be let loose in the city before locked up in endless fields and horizons.  I also wanted to kick off my new lifestyle, however brief it was going to be, with a nice detox, a haircut, and a few new articles of clothing that would allow me to blend in comfortably.  I am pleased to say now, as I am getting ready to start my first day of a month long, five hour a day, intensive Czech class, that I have checked all of the above off of the little scrap of paper that I wrote them down on.  As I was on the search for a little flat of my own and was close to sealing the deal, Sarah and Ryan offered me the extra bedroom in theirs.  I am paying less and they have a little extra pocket money to get through life with.  I think that it will be a really nice arrangement.  One week into my detox, which consists of nothing more than lemon juice, cayenne pepper, maple syrup, and water, I am feeling great but desperately trying to avoid the scents of anything flavorful until the next seven days go bye.  

Petr picked me up at the train station on Saturday afternoon and I was surprised to feel just as happy to see him as he was to see me.  I must admit that I am aware of my calloused existence and that he doesn't stand a chance in the long run and I am not ashamed to say that he will be the better for it in the end.  I have been admiring the ways of Dominique Francon and how bound I feel to her.  She knows how she affects people, she knows what to say as though her words formed the rules and the realities.  She has no friends and no particular like for anyone in particular but she makes others feel as though they need to be around her and want to be wanted by her.  She plays no game, only comes and goes as she pleases, and while some may feel as though they reached someplace special they dare not ask because she would not hesitate to express the nothingness that they really shared.  I know it seems cold but it is mere honesty.  I can be whatever Petr wants me to be but I can never be his and he is not so naive not to know it.  While December lingers over his head in a manner that he must fight and relish in every moment we have together.  I am happy to drift along the moments with ease, take pleasure in all that I am doing and in the slight excitement and twinge of pain that it causes.  It must be a hint of self torture that is the driving force of my being.  Making friends with Distaste and Unfamiliarity brings excitement and mental problem solving.  It seems to be one of the only ways I can actively use my brain these days, knowingly putting myself in difficult, emotionally involved, and undesirable situations. 

Enough of that.  I am happy for the time being.  I know the above paragraph will be read by many as unhappiness but for those of you that understand, it isn't about being happy, it is about being in control of ones actions and beings and not depending on anyone else to live.  

Winter seems to be coming closer because my leg finds itself under the covers at night as opposed to being draped over the edge of the bed.  It is almost as though this detox is clearing the way for my dreams to release what I keep neatly tucked away every moment of every day.  The dreams are horrible because it forces me to think I actually talk about the things with people.  Then I wake up and it seems to be ok.  I have some sort of bodily obsession which I can only assume most people do, but mine seems to consume so much space.  I have no standards but my own which I think must be the worst kind because who is ever pleased with themselves other than the ones that believe in happily ever afters?  Since living on the farm I have been more physically active since I don't know when.  It is not that I, in my own nature, don't appear physically active, but I am generally a procrastinator and if you at least appear physically active you can put off the actual activities as long as you want.  It takes the slightest strike of truth of absolute hatred towards ones body that brings action.  I have had mine and as painful not eating for fourteen days may be it is all an act.  I rejoice in front of the mirror every day because the muscles that I have become more pronounced as the fat withers away.  It is interesting how the body can turn on itself.  "You aren't feeding me!" it shouts.  "Fine, I will start eating myself inside and out."  I swear I laid in bed and could hear my ass fat screaming in horror and running away into some unknown place.

I attended a yoga class the other night.  It wasn't nearly as refined or disciplined as I like but it felt nice to consciously provide breath to my body and to activate the muscles to assure that they will never be neglected and only bowed down to.  I plan to attend again even if the music drives me crazy.  I can seek for mental clarity elsewhere.  I have found an indoor climbing gym and that is where I will let my mind let loose.  There is something about it that I can't quite describe.  It is complete surrender to something bigger and stronger than you and yet a sense of accomplishment and effort in dominating its exterior.  I am also, once again, scheduled to bare all in the small art studio and am not afraid to say that I am excited for it.