Wednesday, March 05, 2008

a blog about nothing which i will never proofread. (which/that?)

tonight in harlem we were on the roof and we heard a car crash. that was nothing. then another -- louder -- so we went to look: a police car, crashed into a chased car, then maybe twenty cars rushed in, two men got arrested. a plethora of undercover cops in puffy coats, lights & noise. we need loudspeakers on 125th to play ave maria, handcuffs need opera.

handcuffs need bedposts. i've never had bedposts. of all the bones in the body, my favorites are wrists and hips. then fingers. of all body parts: hands.

i think every tuesday night (or monday, wednesday, thursday) i'll sit down and write about nothing. tuesday top nothing. earlier, i wrote something: a sunday top ten. i don't like it enough for show & tell.

i have a chronic shortage of ibuprofen. i should deal with headaches/mylife more maturely, like a grown up. chocolate is forever, i'm still eating it. many of my nearest & dearests got born in january or march, which requires rubber cement and cardboard. i haven't spoken to my mother in three weeks. we'll pick up where we left off.

i didn't like my fortune, i gave tinkerbell my cookie. last year i didn't go anywhere, this year i'm everywhere but here.

*

the other night, i was talking to tara about the rainbow depot, other trivialities, and suddenly i opened my mouth and said --

me: "sometimes i just want to scream and break my walls open."

tara: "why?"

me: "i don't know, sometimes i feel like this room just remembers too many things, i just want to smash it! i want to kick the walls!"

tara: "so many crazy things happened in this room ... literally."

[i like the idea that pauses can be pregnant. that giving birth is sometimes speech not life.]

now memories replace memories, old memories become well-oiled stories with loose ends waiting in wings. new sheets, new people, old people with restored minds, new books, new socks. still i keep the bottom sheet, the softest sheet. it's just so soft, it's so hard to get out of bed because of that sheet. sometimes other reasons. now; it's just that sheet.

*

crystal and i stood at the edge of the roof where we could see the cars, lights, cops, criminals, and the standard neighborhood hooligans who flood the streets for such events. a woman was wailing, two men held her (undercover or real/uncovered?) and one said: "that's him, there he is," pointing at the criminals. the cops shined flashlights up at us.

me: "they think we're the fourth gunman."

crystal: "it's the grassy knoll."

we retreated down and indoors where my roommates were at the window. then they said to crystal: "welcome to harlem!"

*

some parts of my life are sweet, like my bottom sheet or lemon drops. other parts are solid like bones. other parts are mushy like organs. other parts are air and planets that swirl around me and i can't figure out for the life of me which parts are authentic and which are just talkative comets/ambitiousrocketships. either way, isn't the moonlight lovely. isn't the moonlight terrible.

the roof makes me feel alive because i've never jumped off it. when i'd say i thought of such things: that was drama. not the feelings, but their respective actions. i like long, flat islands, or rather, the dream/drama of them. me in a boat.

memoirists keep making things up, they should just write novels. that's novel. my book is honest. maybe it isn't. maybe i'm copying someone else's words from accidential memory, i'll need a fact checker.

"a fat checker," susan powter said when we showed up for her yoga class at nine, not eight.

the internet is space you can call up if you want to, like photographs or a song you once knew by heart. it's virtual reality (the one we've been dreaming of) without helmets, it's Tomorrowland, specifically oriented dreamscape. books are hard and solid like bones, i mean, like moans.

*

the air was cool we snuck into the swimming pool you dove headfirst
i waded in
the scent of chlorine upon our skin

*

something haviland & i often spoke of was how much we'd like to need nothing. little self-sufficient spaceships. i'd still like that sometimes, but i know it's not true. besides, it's better this way: for example, i have good friends. some of my friends are not only friends but also miracles. i even have a friend who's not only a friend but a miracle and a blessing.

*

the stars were bright, the water clear,
i felt your heat, as you swam near
i held my breath, you held my hand
moving away, further from land
the moon was full, everything blue
the water stilled, reflecting you


*

have i mentioned that life is good? my water tastes like soap. sometimes skin tastes like soap.

i liked zipping through the canyons with haviland & cait, driving out to malibu sans traffic. i liked that we (natalie & cait & alex & I) made it past the singing bears and then down the flume alive, soaked & smiling & squeegee, and then dashing past tom sawyer island to get out before they cut the lights. i like wide eyes, i like wide full futures.i'm not sure anyone (not even me) knows how different it feels to stop daring my heart to attack. truth or dare: dare, always the dare, and then, maybe, wait a few months (close your eyes) and then and then, right, the real secret is, and then: truth. i don't know it.i'm a fundamentally ridiculous person ("you need to stop using that phrase, marie"). i'll never shake the feeling that this self-indulgence is wasting everyone's time. the starving children, and so forth. the handcuffs, the crash and the direction of sirens.

sometimes i'm alone in an unfamiliar room and think i could be anyone (now, later). sometimes i'm well aware that's a clichè, is the real secret. i find that feeling less scary then i used to. i'm more scared that i'll be a cockroach tomorrow morning than of guns or car crashes. i don't feel obligated to control traffic.

does anyone else worry you'll love a person just like you love a song -- completely, on repeat, and then ... boredom, or bad memory?

*

i'll finish my book by june first. and then.

* floating right here with you next to me gazing at stars, we drift silently

*

possible titles:
Sancho Panza - Behind the Music
my word verif is wtf just happened
me and being

*

Cait: "Sometimes you're talking about something, and then, an hour later, you'll say something else about that same thing, and I think, have you been thinking about that same thing all this time?"

Me: "Yes."

Cait: "Isn't that exhausting?"

Me: "Yes."

* late at night, the air was cool we snuck into the swimming pool i went under and you followed let's not think about tomorrow

*

What I've Been Reading:
the best first lines of a poem, possibly ever ...

I love you too
don't fuck up my hair
I can't believe
you almost
fisted me
today.
-Eileen Myles, "Dear Andrea"

*

A few weeks ago I had a lot of feelings and decided to eliminate my website. semicolon is making a new one, she's got all kinds of visions to put into practice, she knows what she's doing. I just need a bio. It's me, so it's an auto-bio. I know what happened, I've been here this whole time, I'm pretty sure I know what I did too, and what's worth mentioning, but I also feel

Anyhow, I do not know who I am. I've got some hyperlinks to some stories, essays, etc. I published stories about fucking, even the ones that weren't about fucking were also kinda about fucking.

*

When I was little, I was mostly scared of being kidnapped. Every summer, my father installed the screen windows. "If anyone tries to kidnap you," he told me, "I will wake up. I'll hear the kidnapper cutting through the screen windows." I'd imagine daggers slicing dirty cool metal screens and a sound that spoke to fathers. I trusted that.

*

possible titles:
before my head exploded, i wrote this book
i think uh huh her is a real band and i like their music
it's likely i accidentally plagiarize stephen dunn
i wrote about you, but i changed your name
this book is actually true i swear
after he died
i hate los angeles so much it hurts
this week in corrections
this might be boring but it's got a nice spine for your shelf
my spine
your spine
our spines.
everything is perfect now.

41 comments:

Unknown said...

'this week in corrections' should pretty much be the name of every book, ever. (that means I like it!)

When I read something that you've written, I feel like I can read it for ever and then I feel a little sad when it's the last sentence or word, and there's nothing left. That totally makes me feel good in some weird way.

Thus, thank you!

p.s. you are epic
p.s.s. i like to say 'p.s.' out loud so that it sounds like 'psssssss'

Mercury said...

I love entries like this.

I love the smell of paper, and the smell of skin, and I think if those scents could fuse, it would be the best scent ever.

I waste so much time following sirens.

I hate california too, but I think the way the sun is there must do more than tan skin and bleach hair, you know?

Anyway, I sent this long, drunk myspace message last weekend, and now it's finally been recieved, and now I'm living in fear.

first comment? it took me a while to write this, we'll see.
fpowp.
All you need is the middle part - POW went my life. not. but so.

Anonymous said...

I'm scared of becoming a cockroach too. Scared enough that I only read Kafka once, and never dared to think about it much. (Truth requires the most daring, maybe.) Or maybe I am already a cockroach, have always been, and am scared of people finally starting to notice.

this post hits me like a heartache
in a light blue dress.

it hits me like heavy tropical air, thick with thundercloud purple and the taste of frangipani blossoms.

I would ask you to write like this forever, please? But I won't, because that would ruin it: the anticipation, surprise, rueful delight. I don't want to have to carry an umbrella.

DH said...

Tonight was elevating, a real cultural experience. I saw Harlem. I saw the lights and noise and sirens. I saw the famed Roof that I will likely now (relentlessly) call the Knoll. But most significantly - I saw You.

And then you wrote this. It made me question if we saw the same thing, or if I really saw anything at all.

In short, nice one.

dewey said...

Its posts like this that got me hooked, what appear to be random thoughts on a page but actually piece together to form an awesome piece of writing.

Random thoughts on a page..... that’s what I feel my life is like sometimes, but it’s just on the outside they appear random, inside I know the meaning.

And....on a totally different topic....

This afternoon will be spent in my beloved London with people I love, followed by the long awaited Tegan and Sara gig. I’m so excited its verging on sad... relevance??... well because without you, I would probably have never heard Tegan and Sara.

kate said...

It's like spending 5 minutes inside someone else's head.

I love it, especially:

"does anyone else worry you'll love a person just like you love a song -- completely, on repeat, and then ... boredom, or bad memory?"

- a perfect articulation of a feeling/thought/sense I often have.

Bourbon said...

There are times that you blog so good that it doesn't seem fair to the commenters. There's so much raw goodness in this post that I can't quote bits I like back to you because it'll just end up being this whole post in a quote. But the walls thing especially, wow, the walls thing indeed.

Also. I was born in March. Just throwin' that out there...

Anonymous said...

If you use "which" you should precede it with a comma. "Which" indicates unnecessary but otherwise useful or interesting information, whereas "that" indicates something you need to know. Oftentimes, if you can insert a phrase such as "by the way" after what you have said, you mean to use "which." If it doesn't work because the information you want to convey is necessary, than you should use "that." But please, please, please. Put the comma in when you use "which!"

Examples:

"Riese's blog, which I can't go a day without reading, makes me laugh every morning." Now, you didn't NEED to know that I can't go a day without reading the blog, but you did need to know it often makes me pee my pants with glee, so "which" is the appropriate pronoun, called non-restrictive.

"The part of Riese's blog that I can't live without is the Auto-fun of the Day." In this case, the fact that I'm totes addicted to the daily quote and links you provide is the entire point of what I'm saying, so it's all necessary, thus making "that" the appropriate pronoun, referred to as restrictive.

Overall, I would say your use of "which" was proper, because it provided an aside with additional info, but wasn't totally relevant to the title. Except that you didn't use a comma. But I'll try to forgive you.

I heart grammar. Also,I heart this blog entry on the whole. I love the non-proofread fun. It makes me feel warm inside.

Anonymous said...

i don't want to say anything, but i wanted you to know i was here--caittt

let's not think about tomorrow.. everything is perfect now

asher said...

that quote by cait was perfect. especially so, because as i was reading this i was impressed with how you can tell one story so sparsely and so in depth, whilst continually tracking back to where you started. did that make any sense?

also. love this.
"does anyone else worry you'll love a person just like you love a song -- completely, on repeat, and then ... boredom, or bad memory?"
i never had that worry...before. thanks.

i want to read your book. i like the posts like this best. the prose-y ones, where you recap life, instead of the events of the living.

frank said...

making pictures of girls kissing turn into online books won't get me to read them.

don't building in harlem collapse every day?

i won't tell you what to call your book, but putting "Lozo" in the title can't hurt.

Chrissy said...

I'm really glad everyone's been asking about my "Really Papi? Really?" shirt. I just spent like 12 minutes explaining auto-win, auto-straddle, and the auto-universe in general to a bunch of girls in my acting class. Holler.

Anonymous said...

I hear Edouard Levé's influence, but this is thunder perfect now. I mean your tone is solid like moans again.

"i'll finish my book by june first. and then."

I don't think you need to burden yourself with a definite deadline--take time and care to craft it, just feel good about it, and above all, let it be genuine. It's your spine after all.

Even when the world seems to be in conspiracy to importune you with its emphatic trifles, just be like, "Whatevs, world! I got a book to write!"

"I do not know who I am." That's okay. Here's some advice from Emerson:

"The objection to conforming to usages that have become dead to you is that it scatters your force. It loses your time and blurs the impression of your character. If you maintain a dead church, contribute to a dead Bible-society, vote with a great party either for the government or against it, spread your table like base housekeepers,--under all these screens I have difficulty to detect the precise man you are: and of course so much force is withdrawn from your proper life. But do your
work, and I shall know you. Do your work, and you shall reinforce yourself."

Did I mention that I love this blog entry?

I do. Bravo.

MoonKiller said...

I like when you write like this. I love your writing anyway, but especially when it's like this. It makes me feel sort of numb. But not in a bad way. Maybe a middle way. I'm not sure.

'this room just remembers too many things' - Earlier I wrote a song, the first line was 'These walls remember everything...'

Also, my friend and I are writing a play about a girl with depression who in the end jumps off her roof,'the roof makes me feel alive because i've never jumped off it' sounds like something she might say.

The Brooklyn Boy said...

[i like the idea that pauses can be pregnant. that giving birth is sometimes speech not life.]

Love it.

You write sentences I'd steal.



(In theory. That's a huge party foul otherwise.)

Anonymous said...

I loved this. Gave me goose bumps. Thank you for writing it.

Jaime said...

That's a beautiful post.

Liz said...

"Warning: This does not contain any tremendously exceptional sentences, nor good humor or anything slighlty interesting. But my thoughts as they are right now only."

Brilliant. weird. terrbibly uninteresting (except from the harlem roof top and the cops), but yet very facinating. so i guess interesting in a way.

am i a stalker for leaving a comment. yeah, probably. but then, no not really. work is boring and we all need stuff to do.

Brilliant.

Coffee Stained said...

"'m a fundamentally ridiculous person ("you need to stop using that phrase, marie"). i'll never shake the feeling that this self-indulgence is wasting everyone's time."
As a fellow writer (playwright mostly) I feel the exact same way... Perhaps that's why I read your blog from time to time. Even though I'm from Canada, and it's really hard to get the internet in an igloo!
love from Canada.
(All of us, because everyone knows everyone here. That's why were so effin' polite!)

Anonymous said...

Coffee Stained keeps representing my country... it's weird, but it works.

helenaraye said...

Love from Canada, in-deed!

Anonymous said...

:)

riese said...

you've all said some remarkable things. not just things that warm the tenders of my ego, but things that should warm the tenders of your egos. i don't have the vocabulary to respond to those things, but i want to respond, so: 1. thank you, 2. this:

helena.raye.
i'll make a collection called "this week in corrections." the first'll be my favorite, from the nytimes a few years ago, in which they noted a photograph of the capital building had been incorrectly identified as "the white house." "it is not the white house. it is the capital building."

mercury.
there's a title: when skin smells like paper. a poem title maybe, if i wrote poems. i like san francisco, but it feels too easy, i need tall steel towers to contain my monumental sky-scraping complaints.

e.
speaking of monuments, i had a monumentally boring deli job one summer, i read the norton anthology in a week, which's when i read the metamorphosis. i remember very little, but relating to the cockroach. i googled frangipani, it's plumeria, plumeria is the smell of the lotion we used my sophomore year of high school, my friend magali used it, even the next summer she still used it, and that's what her hands smelled like when she came to visit me at the deli where i'd be reading the norton anthology and eating rice pudding with my hands.

crystal.
sometimes i try to respond to a comment and instead say: "here you are, on my couch." or: "here you are, in my room." this is the first time i've been able to say that to you. i am capable of no further insight, we're already multi-format.

dewey.
on the inside my thoughts feel random, on the outside they look like meaning. carly introduced me to tegan & sara and to her i feel great gratitude, therefore projecting that gratitude onto me from you makes me warm inside, i hope you enjoy the concert, music, lesbians. and so forth.

kate.
I'd like to spend five minutes inside someone else's head, like someone smarter than me or maybe from history. i'm curious about sylvia plath's head, and joan of arc's, or abraham lincoln.

razia.
I hear things about pisces. i believe they have moods; apparently I can handle these things. i also can handle a sagittarius. you are an aries, i just looked up on facebook. also on facebook just learned that my ex-boyfriend is on the pisces/aries cusp, my friend stephanie is a pisces too, and that you share a birthday with susie bright. I also like the word "ides." speaking of march.

allie.
sometimes i can feel a rule of punctuation/grammar that i've been trying to get forevs finally getting to me ... this comment might be "the one" w/r/t that/which. i listened to a that/which grammar girl podcast five times in a row (25 minutes total) to try to absorb it, but i must've gotten too distracted by the world. but speaking of commas; i sometimes leave them out for reasons of style. also, sidenote, i have no style, sometimes i lie. it is necessary to me, p.s., to be affirmed about the auto-fun.

caitttt.
i always like to know that you've been here. let's be freezepop roadies.

asher.
carly said instead of making business cards like this --

marie lyn bernard
writer

i should make business cards like this --

marie lyn bernard
brings it back around

as my profession/skill/talent. i want to read my book too.
i said i wouldn't do this (in my intro-to-comments), but alas, i am, because i liked this: ... where you recap life, instead of the events of the living.

lozo.
you always catch the links i mess up, like, that one, i'd even tried to link that photo to the photographer but it wouldn't let me turn the photo into a link. blogger already decided, i guess, it wanted to link to our town. maybe it was a sexy book. buildings in harlem collapse every day.

possible title: "the actual size of lozo's penis"
yes?

chrissy
i hope all those girls buy shirts. it's a very flattering shade of green, and the material is very soft.

B.
i want to read Levè's whole book, i googled it, everything was in french. but also i realize i have enough in front of me to read. what i've been reading: comments.

Re: "I do not know who I am." That's okay.
"Is it really whom?"
[laughter] "No," [laughter] "no" [laughter] "It's who. You're right."
"I've been right, all this time?"
"Totally."
[Big relief, that one, on my little treasure hunt.]

deadlines, like all lines, make me feel safe/controlled.
Did I mention that I love that quote? yes, I did.

Moonkiller.
I like when you comment. I feel everything a middle way. If the girl in the play said that, I think that'd be something.

brooklyn boy.
only if in a play (see: moonkiller). if it makes it big, and someone makes t-shirts, i'd like one.

jennis.
i like writing that gives me goosebumps. i like, really, anything visceral.

jaime.
and also, the first line of my nixed sunday top ten was "who knows where thoughts come from? they just appear."

lizthelovinglass.
i am always mystified. by people feeling commenting is like stalking. only stalking is like stalking. i think "terribly uninteresting, but yet very fascinating," is an exceptional statement.

coffeestained.
i'd like to see a play in an igloo. we're rude here, not polite to people at all, i wrote a whole sunday top ten about it, then scratched it, then wrote this. not literally scratched it but you know.

alicia.
it does.

helenaraye.
indeed.

cici.
;

Rewr said...

i like this.
a lot.
miss u.

Cornish Dreamer said...

I've only just discovered your blog but oh how I wish I'd found it before! Your words are captivating and inspiring. I could read them for hours.
RT

Anonymous said...

There are SO many things that this blog is...
a 'waste of time for everyone' is not one of them.

dewey said...

After last nights awesomness, I woke up feeling rather bad but yet amazingly good this morning, it was a weird feeling.

My day soon turned bad with exam results followed by being put on f**king S.I.D by my idiot of a politics teacher.

So, I re-read this to relax. I like when you read/watch things for a second time and notice things you didn’t notice the first time, it makes me like them even more.

riese said...

tara ... as in ... tara/chase/devilkitty? (the "original tara" before there became too many taras?) as in ... hey stranger. i miss u too. thank you for both liking and (!!!) reading. (will feel stupid. if it's not you.)

rebecca.
i adore discovery. you can. because i have embarrassingly extensive archives.

a;ex.
my number one feeling is ... you're making strides in the campaign to convince me i'm not wasting anyone's time. littlefoot strides. which is ... really ... quite something.

dewey.
what is "S.I.D"? is it like sudden infant death syndrome? whatever it is, before long, it will be a memory, and your t&s memory will burn much much brighter. the second time, and so on.

Anonymous said...

S.I.D is Students in Distress, which is basically a list of students that are underpreforming/ not working hard enough/ not doing as well as they should be/ must try harder must do better.....etc. Its like being put on report, and so now i have to have like meetings with my tutor and him to discuss why Im on it and my "progress" will be monitered. Its a load of rubbish really and if anything makes me even more likely to skip Politics lessons cos i now think my teacher is a total twat.

Anonymous said...

Hey Auto-Win I was reading Afterellen's Best Lesbian Week Ever column and they're having a vlog contest, I think you should enter it. There's no way you could lose!
p.s.- I read Party of One it freakin' changed my life. Thanks so much for showing it on the vlog.

Anonymous said...

i imagine you've already heard about this, but in case you haven't:

http://www.afterellen.com/2008-webseries-contest


it sounds PERFECT for you.

Rewr said...

just checked this. yes this is theeeee original. had to read thru your responses twice to see yours to mine...was totes like, and damn the one time i leave a comment in like so long and i get no lovin! i promise i will become an avid blog-stalker once i am done with school. currently am reading the bell jar (first timer here, ya no way, i know) so i have been thinking about you lots haha and i want to see you soon. like. sooooon. miss u, love u. tD.
ps. lozo ur way hotter than i imagined u to be. not sure if that is a compliment to u but that vlog was totes one of my favs...no offense to any other auto-vlogger ppl...it just so brought me back to many a night pondering bisexuality with ri. hearts.

Kamagra said...

Nice post thanks for sharing.

Unknown said...


I am a attractive female for pleasurable and delight service in only on Chennai escorts service. Chennai independent escorts

Chennai escorts models

Best Escort Service in Chennai

High Profile Escorts in Chennai

Unknown said...

Vchennaiescorts- Our Agency is the Reputed escorts Agency in Chennai who provide High Profile and Independent Models in Chennai


independent Chennai escorts

escorts in Chennai

escorts service in Chennai

independent escorts in Chennai

Chennai female escorts

call girls in Chennai

Chennai high profile escorts

Unknown said...

Bangalore escorts agency welcomes you to the world of beautiful independent Bangalore escorts.

escorts in Bangalore
escorts service in Bangalore
Bangalore escort
Bangalore call girls
call girls in Bangalore

Unknown said...

Miss Deepti Thakral hot and Cute Bangalore Call girl offer Independent low-cost Escorts Service in

Bangalore.

Independent Escorts in Bangalore
Collage Girls in Bangalore escorts
Russian Escorts in Bangalore
Bangalore Female escorts

Unknown said...


chennaihotgirl- sensual chennai escorts avialable 24/7 for the customer
collage girls in Chennai escorts
Chennai escorts models
Best Escort Service in Chennai
Hot Escort Service in Chennai
VIP Escorts Service in Chennai

Hema said...

This is very informative blog thanks for sharing. We are also providing Call girl escorts service in Chennai. Our Chennai independent escorts have extremely high-quality, extremely tasteful, provocative, loving, perky and neighbourly gathering escorts girls to sparkle your gathering.

Bluepillformen said...

Nice post. Thanks for sharing.
Cheap Kamagra Oral Jelly Online USA

Amazon_pbr said...

Hello Sir/Madam,

Are you a Photographer, E-Commerce site owner, Online Retailer or Store personnel, Advertising Agency, Printing company, and Graphic Design Agency? Need expert and experienced Image / Photo Editing Services? My service listed beloow.

Photo Editing
Photo Retouching
Photo Manipulation
Jewelry retouch
Color Correction
Light Correction
Background Remove
Watermark Remove
Background changing to Transparent
Background changing to white
JPEG To Vector Converting
Shadow making
Watermark removing
Image resizing
Photo retouching
Jewelry Retouching
Portrait Photo Editing
Add watermark
Photo restoration
Old-torn photo restoration
Background removal
clipping path
Image processing
Skin Smoothing
Wedding Photo Edit
Hair Masking
Image Cropping & Re-size
Feel free to Request your Quote.

Regards,
Amazon_pbr