keyculator meandering dream

willie is desperate for pets tihs morning. he's got his tail wrapped arund my head. begging and begging but then he bites. why buddy why!
the dream was circular and hard to follow. but it was all about following. the first thing i remember is hiding - a rural village is being raided by invaders or some sort. it's really ijmpossible to tell the time or place. i don't even know what i'm doing there, but i know i'm not a native, this is not my home. am i a traveler who's gotten lost? i show up at the village right when shit goes down?
a woman finds me -- am i caught or have we chosen teh same hiding place? under some table with a white tablecloth. she's 30something, brown hair tied back, no nonsense pants, a vest? nondescript. but she smiles at me through the chaos and she's an insane light i need to follow. she tells me she never lives to stay anywhere too long and that i'm welcome to come with her but ONLY if i'm asked. never follow without permission. that seems easy enough. alright. she says sometimes we will have to go separately so as not to raise suspicions and that i must be patient and only do exactly as i'm told. if i'm ot leave first, i have to wait for her, not come back for her. or only leave exactly when she says, not rush. it seems like an exercise in total trust. but do i have enough?
she tells me to folow her behind a tree, there's soem specific steps to it, and suddenly, peacocks and towers. we have jumped to an entirely different place.
the whirlwind of adventure. romance and intrigue and ridiculousness. we meet people who it turns out are others like her, with the ability to teleport, and what a band of merry men they are. either they're all poly together or it's a love triangle of some kind or i odn't know what. but right now she is burning for this other woman, and she chooses her as her companion for the next destination. she says there can be only one. but then that woman chooses the dude. they follow the steps, walking in a particular pattern on a parrticular place, and saying the magic words. red circles burn briefly around their feet, and then they're gone, one by one. the dude is the last. he's got playful eyes and all the power in the world. will he pick me? i think he's thinking "why not?" but when he gives me the instructions, i can't seem to activate the same circles or teleportation magic as the others. either i'm stepping on the wrong spots, just not doing it right, or he has intentionally given me bad directions and this is just a big joke. is he just killing time, waiting around while the other two finally get to fuck? is this the usual game?
i wake up before i can find out.

keyculator quarantine journal

"a scroll in the morning is death to a writer." -not anyone's quote. but i think i'm summarizing.
you forgot the line. you forgot the line. you forgot the line. look at how it happens every time. even when there's paper present, even when that heavy lessens. remember how it feels when the words read right? remember when you dreamed you were flying? the kite?
last night's dream was beans and cheese, a lesbian house party, a tongue on your knees that climbing slickly, made you seize. you woke up in your usual pillow squeeze. the culmination of the epic journey into the land of the dead and these men and their quests and getting it done. the insistence on the story if it's one that they won.
meanwhile, me, with nothing to say
desperately try to fill a page.
(i guess that's how all my writing just turns out to be about writing! what a nightmare!)
last time, 2 months ago, with a deadline, ellie asked me what i was trying to write about. i have no idea. i just want words, the kinds that click together. satisfying sounds. BUT ALSO i want them to resonate and maybe be topical and probably be perfect on the first try without me having to do any editing. WHAT and who do i think i am. no wonder i never get any writing done! more importantly, no wonder i never get any writing STARTED!
today is suddenly full of words. i'm filled up again with writing projects: ones i've been sitting on (like ART PARTY and SSC missives) and out of nowhere (what if i use tarot cards as prompts for abstract free writing?)
now i'm hungry. this is the trouble with morning pages. i don't want to be bothered! but i need to focus! i need a new breakfast food. a quick, light one. latley i always want to eat the most so that i don't have to be bothered by getting hungry again. but then i end up either not having lunch or having a light, late one and then dinner is forever later. part of me still trying to match ellie's food timeline, i guess.

ohhhh dear. i got temporarily stuck in the scroll, instead of eating or writing. STUPID. i guess i got bored with what i was saying a minute ago. (rhymes were certainly more fun. EVEN I WAS JUST WRITING ABOUT WRITING AS FUCKING ALWAYS. HELP.)
the scroll will be the death of you!
gotta find prompts! gotta do stuff!
(except now i just wanna eat yogurt and play a stupid game. helppppppp.)

keyculator theatre dream

8/17/20, dream taht i wish i could remember more of.

a visit with laylee and a dream about clowning. also good sex and an appropriate amount of alcohol and going to bed tired and waking up with a little bit of good ache. i want to move my body better, more. i know i say this all the time. i know it's stale as crackers by now. but here i am saying it again, in the moment after, where the little movement sparked the big dream.
the play had multiple titles. the vichy government, or ....
at some point half waking, thinking wow i could never write that. and realizing, no but i did.
large ensemble cast, with a lot of improve elements. poetic speeches but mostly movement, strict blocking with room for loose execution.
somehow i was a late addition. my part is very small and i am not even fully familiar with the show. something very exciting about being IN the show and WATCHING it unfold around me. (how to recreate THAT with an audience?! immersive theatre/storytelling. bringing people on a journey PHYSICALLY and emotionally. well don't worry it will never happen again because covid.)
some scene where somehow the director (an old balding white dude who looks like werner herzog) ends up with his feet in my mouth??? morgan is upset, somehow i konw this although i'm not sure if she says anything out loud. i'm trying to show her that my clown is sad about having feet in my mouth but i, me, am fine with it. just hold them loosely and mush around. no sucking. plop them about like fishes.
linley and her scene partner are rehearsing lines. they have this scene super tight, alternating between speaking in unison with back and forth, humming or droning under the other person's speech (or they have a third doign this, it's not fully clear). the effect is immediate - thrilling and taut and disorienting and everything. i guess they're practicing because linley is anxious about her lines but i think they sound perfect. the director approves too.
i keep ending up on the wrong part of teh stage. the director is irritated with me for TOO MUCH improvizing?? (more likely too much clown, something i think bill has actually gotten frustrated about before during his improv games. i'm taking the spotlight. standing out too much from the ensemble.)
or i'm always drawn towards the one place i shouldn't be or the one prop i shouldn't touch. three times i mess up a delicate prop that sarah rushakoff and co. have to keep resetting. it's like a pumpkin pie or something, a little orange cylinder. it's supposed to grow or spill or something at the right moment. not my moment! the first time i picked it up and ruined it. the last time, i have been accidentally left out on stage when everyone else is gone. (the story involves a giant icy mountain and probably some kinda ice queen at the top. linley?? the cast manipulates the set as the scenes change, dancing the backdrop into something new. they pull the white sheets around themselves and up and create teh mountain. somehow i am left out in front as everyone else has spun away. i'm crouched at the foot of the mountain, all the way stage right, upstage, trying to be invisible. someone comes out for the next scene and sees me and follows the rhythm - the new rhythm - picking me up and dance carrying me across the stage. i am light as anything and full dance clown, reaching and stretching and wriggling. then i see the pumpkin!)
i think i'm being graceful and careful this time. i'm reaching and making a show of my wanting, as i'm being carried/restrained by this other person. i barely tap the dang thing, and it's bottom spills out in a big orange circle around it. i've destroyed it again!
around tihs time i start to wake up but i really don' wantto leave teh dream. can i go backwards and try again without destroying the pumpkin prop? but it's too late, i'm too conscious. willie is screaming. simon's power tools are screaming. a big kathunk from the back, what is jerel doing? and waht was the name of that play anyway? it's beginning to fade. can't go back. but want to want to want to.

light on everything

what are the words that are important now, today, when i have finally decided to cut the mop from my head? the matted mop. the rats' nest. can't even get fingers in, it is just a bramble. briar patch.
i finally gave up the idea of the mud ritual video. then i thought we'd get a picture. i thought i could "go there" in the backyard, if not in the wilderness.
but then the world exploded. again and again and again. george floyd and the protests. covid denial and reopening while deaths skyrocket. everything is looking absurd out there as we've always known it to be. more and more. it just won't quit.
meanwhile, trauma anniversaries. physical anxiety and near panic attacks without warning. visits from unwanted images. too much too much too much.
and realizing -- it's actually been FOUR fucking years since my hair has been cut. and the last person to cut it was chris. right after wickerman? or before? right before i started my new job? the end of the first phase, the "vacation." the first time i felt threatened, even though i don't think he said anything specific. he stalked off in the woods alone and i followed. it was the day after the festival had ended. shark week stuck around, just binge drinking and not wanting to return to reality. i remember standing at a drop on the mountain, thinking "he could kill me and no one would even know. he could end me with one push." then brushing the thought aside as crazy, pushing down instinct like i would do again and again.
four fucking years. the length of fucking high school. how is it possible i've worn this story for so long? i'm so ready to release it. maybe memories hiding in my hair will mean my body will also let go of some of these anniversaries. i know i can't heal it all in one chop.

but i am ready to release a portion of that harm, and that fear. i am ready to release some of my wildness, the electricity and fire that have been in hiding. maybe i can come back to some other parts of myself. maybe i can start writing again. maybe this is the start. maybe every night i should play this lovely sitar music and just float and sing with myself.
i talked with rex today a little bit. he's sorting his papers and thinking of making a zine with old notes and half finished words. i want that so much. i want that so much. how can i remind myself that i want that? it is WORK to really want it. it is work to be able to make the work. it is work to be awake and alive and conscious at all right now. it is work to hold space for others, especially poc, and in particular of course ellie, my honey, my light, my sweetness. we have been putting our insecurities on each other. trading back and forth. it is a bad habit. we need other kinds of release. i need to work on my codependent tendencies. i need to clean my desk.

honey don't overwhelm yourself with what you should do right now. you are doing exactly what you need to do right now. you are writing this down. you are gonna take the scissors and make new life.
(an abortion is like a haircut. if you can do that, you can do this too. choose yourself. make the cut and make new life. you can live again. you can be new.)

should i buzz it or should i try to shape something? i don't know. what do i need to say?
i think buzz is not what i ultimately want. but maybe it will be fun to grow fresh and see what happens and then i'll be able to truly topiary myself. but yes. ultimately i think i want to have hair that flops silly and messy and fun. i don't know. i guess i just have to start.

now i fell into the stream, the scroll. help help help. i don't want you all in my damn head. i gotta get outta here. maybe i should erase facebook for a while? fuck. is this really who i want to be???
who: at least half feral. writing. inked. loud. dancing. unapologetically other. listener. holding space. less booze. less screens. cmon honey. baby steps.

to do --

Try to do the other stuff from yesterday?
Off track already. Fuck. Why is the world so heavy.

aha

2019 was my year in the middle. the middle room of the sad house. between court and jerel. between kat and brett. desperate to connect people with each other, resulting in having issues connecting with anyone myself.

the foster cat peed on my purple shoes, so now they're garbage. they were falling apart, holes in the soles, anyway, so we can't be too sad about that, other than as much as we are always sad about creating garbage.

Should be a real free write BUT

Can you put some more stuff in my cup from the box in the kitchen

Your hand asleep outstretched asking
Can someone hold me

keyculator - lines from an unknown time (2019 or 2020)

ha, so much for
the tolerant left
you check
your balance
the noose at your neck
a dinner no chef
ingredients
in greedy paws
lip service to laws
abundance of wealth
show and don't tell
do what you do well
buy now, wait, yes, don't sell
one day til rome fell
when one knee knelt
lesson learned, cracked belt
pride in pain
just a sprain but leaves welts
generations have felt
bruised skin shed
made pelts
worn while raw
all felt
bad hand dealt

street talk

yesterday i wore my pockets out and felt like somebody who could be friends with anybody. like couldn't i be the least intimidating person imaginable? if i said hi to a stranger, it would be impossible for them to be afraid of me! red plaid jumper, purple shoes, fat potato on a leash. visionary! but also this face mask, homemade and grey, which oddly enough sets me apart. have i seen even one other today? this week? oh yes, the old guy at the gas station yesterday. and a young hipster who saw me and the old dude and put his on, standing outside his car, before walking inside. but dozens of families out on walks, mail carriers, bikers, cops -- not a one. what gives? do you believe yourselves immune to contagion? or even scarier, do you believe you don't exhale or that you won't breathe yr nonsense onto others?
it's hard to wear the mask, i know. no one knows whether to believe, without a friendly smile. and coming from someone who wants to inject my nonsense into everything, i am at a loss.
but what about this potato? can't he do enough smiling for both of us?
nah, i'm over it. i don't even wanna be outside no more, he says. you dog, are my one job, and if you dont even wanna be outside no more, i'll never see the sun again and i certainly won't be receiving any green beans. especially if tennessee is truly foolishly leaping into reopening, then i aint gonna get state green beans either. and then what, buddy? then we're outta luck i guess. take me home. take me home. take me home. i want to be alone. i want air conditioning and four walls and ceiling and the scent of a meal i missed. i want to retreat to my cool dark cave, no legs or sun, a slug. a nighttime bug. glisten mud and silver silt, sing in my chair to no one and nothing. how comfy the hole starts to feel. until you don't even even realize you're at the bottom of a well and there's no way out and the sun is getting dimmer and you can't remember any other way to be.
but what about this somebody-who-can-be-friends-with-anybody business? who are they? and what about when masks were fun and felt like freedom not restraint?
i've lost the way. i'm thinking too much. i'm thinking about the finished product. i'm thinking of a product. it was just supposed to be ideas and then my head got big and thinking i could just write down a perfection without having to edit. listen YOU ARE GONNA HAVE TO LEARN TO EDIT. or else we're never gonna get anywhere. you know?? this is where we always get stuck. we get bORED with our own ideas and don't want to take the time. we convince ourselves, this is drivel and doesn't matter to anyone. so go and hit your cymbal and make something be done for once. please. ah. stop complaining. you haven't eaten in hours. you drank too much caffeine. like you do, like you always do. how long does it take to realize that patterns have become currently permanent? that they aren't just an "oh this is right now" blur, they're a "this has been the same every day for years" sort of thing.
the trouble is wanting to make something great and that is truly stifling. the trouble is judging so hard all the time, the thought "i could write something better" and then not being able to. IT'S IN THERE THOUGH.... isn't it? why do you even think that? (because sometimes you burn and it's there and the words will find you. sometimes you have written something right. or at least that has the satisfaction of rhythmic traction and ripples in all the right ways. the unnamable rhythms that drive you when you get going, when yr hot heat and flames.)
this got all lost and that is okay. maybe you should take a break and eat something. some soup, maybe.

Finally arrived home with my smokes 2am and all I want to do now is sing and/or disappear but now I'm smoking and I opened another beer. Sounds of a fire pit jingle crackle across the street and cars still swishing trees swaying bugs calling laughter from the other side of the duplex and you'd never know it's pandemic status if you were dropped into this scene. It's good to be outside although you wish you had grass instead of gas but no you really wish you had that wildflower garden promised by the seed packet if onlu the birds hadn't eaten half of it and the landlord hadnt mowed down the rest. You wish it could be time to rest but 
How ?
The strange interchange at the gas station - the person working has to unlock and lock the door as each person comes in. "I don't know where she went" my fellow late night drifter calls to me across the parking lot. "Kevin" comes back to let us in. All I want is smokes. The credit card machine fails us and I wait patiently, the only one of us in a mask, as Kevin locks and unlocks, restarts the card reader, mumbles to me about their night. Locked wm in the beer cave too. Patron #3 pays for my smokes, despite my protests, and Kevin says I'm lucky. And I am.

i am supposed to write the other thing now. i was gonna write this little essay about CARAVAN STORIES. what was my point and what was the point i missed when i wrote about it before? should i reread what i wrote or should i just try to remember? first lets try to remember.


oh yes you're missing the part that makes it universal. you wrote about how you got entrenched all in the thing. you could maybe do some more with the metaphor of "temporary resistance." but you never got to the closing. the closing can be hard. but you could do it if you kept at it. i think so. but drunk?? can i? what can i do or even pretend to do. what is this thing i keep doing.

TEMPORARY RESISTANCE TO ABNORMAL STATE.

Debris needs me to defeat 15 Rattie. Young Elf A (now so nameless?) needs me to defend them in a battle against their overbearing father, while Child wants me to pick up that good stuffrom the bar in Ork territory (don't worry, Child is an adult dwarf).

what is the point i'm trying to make. this whole thing is absurd. comical. especially when they talk about the fucking plague in the story of the game. RATTA TATTA DEBRISIUS. not really. scubby duddy osis.

i don't even care how can i make myself care.

too hot

hey ya fuck
remmeber how you are always imagining how yr gonna write to all yr fave bands n shit and tell them thank the fucking gods for you and please keep doing it and how much you just wanna tell em and maybe also they need to hear it? why aint you just doin that. why you starin at pictures or some nonsense. what are we doing right now/1 cmon. YES i know it's hot, i'ts too darn hot ot do anything but oh well.
fuk i want a smkey so bad right now. i want a porch. i want to invite my friend to sit on the porch with me. there's no porch and there's no friends aka there's no in-person friends allowed. all loud. help help help.
anyway yr phone is dead and there's nothing for you outside. it ain't really gonna be less hot, you know? you'll just be pissed.
i wish i didn't still want a smoke.
maybe try writing. let's try writing that other mess. haha okay.

shower song

you don't mow clover
you don't know no bird


i forgot the other words. but it was something about goddammit i saw this spider and i was so happy about it but i accidentally caught it on my hands so i tried to save it but in my saving i'm certain i killed it, fuck me. so bad so dead.

truths

Night time is fake

No one will find your shoe box if you never wear the shoes

t-shirt idea

Medias are garbages !

(Yeah but it's true)

song a day song

last year i lost my xylophone
i left it at the church
things have gone from bad to good
from good to bad to worse
i wanted more than a capella songs
i have nothing to play
i wanted more than pitching lilting talk
to share on song a day

mood swings like woah

Good day at work. Like I was in a really really good mood tge last hour or two. Now mad and sad and bad thinking about court telling us she wants to move out and having to deal with that on top of a million other things. I'm fucking pissed. And overwhelmed. And just over it all. Time to hide under the covers.

future dreams

looking into mfa stuff again/finally. i was thinking -- i could go to U of M for free and get an MFA and damn wouldn't that be rad. several things sound cool, of course. classes always look fun from the outside -- creative writing. lit. anything art related, really. but also, what's the thing that's kept me from going back to school all this time?? A PLAN for afterwards. i don't want to be lost at sea again after getting a degree. (but you're already lost at sea. how could it get worse?) well i guess i don't know. BUT i think even a little nut of a plan is better than nuthing.

so what i had thought was -- MFA in theatre, with concentration in Directing. that's 3 years. meanwhile, get certified through the North American Drama Therapy Association so i could get a licensed drama therapist when i get done with school. and then????

i like to imagine myself teaching pochinko someday. or combining the pochinko work with other stuff to make it more therapeutic.... somehow. but honestly this is the big blank spot right now. i started getting distracted looking at other programs -- would Expressive Arts Therapy be better/more inclusive than just Drama therapy??? or does it really matter, if i'm just gonna be making up my own weird shit anyways? do i need a Creative Arts Therapy degree?? or even counseling? UGH i dont fucking want to study that. i ALREADY KNOW how to tap into something intuitive that isn't something that can be taught.

or why do i feel like i even need to bring the therapist certification into it? (i mean that would be pretty cool. because i've wanted to do that for forever and been irritated that i have to subscribe to a weird fucking broken system in order to provide that service to people. that's a bunch of bullshit. so yeah, fuck that, i'm obviously not going to study counseling, but maybe the cert actually is cool.) ON THE OTHER HAND what happened to the idea of studying performance itself? i guess a while ago i had been thinking, it sure would be bullshit for me to become a teacher (therapist??) without knowing more about wtf i am talking about. those ideas: Dell'Arte, Manitoba clown farm, Pigiron, Emerge NYC.... others? more physical theatre schools? clowning programs? (who am i kidding, i am a slug who can't move my body at all these days.)

so yes the web gets bigger and i get mixed up again. what do i want it to look like AFTER the training, whatever that is? yes i want to perform again/ever. that's exciting to me. but it isn't the whole picture. the bigger picture includes workshops, healing arts, spirituality. a studio or a school or something - a COMMUNITY. i think i want some kind of credentials just to make myself seem (and feel) more real, and be able to ask for money for my services without feeling like a total tool. also the thing about school would be a great opportunity for learning and REFOCUSING on what i value about all this stuff and oh my gosh it would just be so fun. now that i'm thinking about it, i do like the idea of doing drama rather than "expressive arts" because it would be fucking rad to feel even vaguely like an expert in something. (and also, i looked at one lady's website and just remembered with a crushing roar how squishy and boring a lot of this shit probably is. painting your feelings and shit. i mean, yeah it's good to do that, but it's not rad enough for me. those white ladies can teach that shit. i don't want to study with them!!!! sorry!!!!)

well it seems like the big answer here is that i want TO WORK FOR MYSELF. either having a business/school/collective whatever.... or working by contract for organizations or whatnot. does that make sense? or i could keep hanging around in academia..... it would be fucking awesome to work on research projects or books or something. i want to write a fucking book. i want to write a show. i don't want to be a professor, i don't think. i am imagining public education... or yeah, how does the therapy thing come into it? i think that's the part that feels exciting and gives the potential for experimentation. but i should probably learn more about what the fuck it actually means. will i be more boxed in than i am currently imagining? is there someone certified in memphis that i could talk to?

i just went on a long side quest trying to find people here (v---- m----, founder of pback memphis, duh) and then going down a "play therapy" wormhole and da da da. that stuff always rings a bell for me with the name - oh! play therapy! expressive arts therapy! yes! but then, as with most things in the world, it doesn't look like what i think it sounds like.... maybe that's the thing. maybe i gotta make MY OWN TECHNIQUE. and maybe that means - do the basic degree and keep it loose. maybe i'm thinking too far ahead.

except that the whole point of writing all this was to try to visualize what it would look like and what i do want to see in my future where i'm a badass theatre therapy person.
--to present another way to be, as me, to show how to be a different kind of body
--to bring people under the table, to create another world together
--learn how to be fully present in a moment and let my body ride the wave
--performing as roadkill ghost

random ideas i've had in the past that i should be remembering and compiling:
--clown class for queer/trans people
--clowning/play to process trauma -- the positive kind of dissociation, not "psychodrama"


i don't even know. it feel so incomplete. it feels so far away, these random notes from years ago now. ugh i'm so off track. maybe that's all i need to worry about right now-- getting back on track and what does that look like? if i get to reinvent myself, who do i want to be?

gotta talk to john at hte clown farm.
gotta at least do this mfa app????????? figure out deadlines.
RECOMMENDATIONS.
i should probably just call holly l.....
getting on track?! i don't know. something. just do SOMETHING.

script for SSC pep talk video

Hello, my darling cast mates and collaborators! It's the BIG DAY! We are finally going into the studio, almost exactly one year after winning the Indie Memphis film grant. WOW.
Y'all have been working hard and getting ready for this for months and now it's time to let loose and HAVE FUN! We know these songs so well, they're fucking so weird and good, and all we have to do is get into the studio and have a good time playing together.

Together, we've created 6 brilliant and hilarious songs -- the kind of songs that could never have been concocted by one or two people alone. This work is the process of collaboration -- with 8 lyricists, 7 music writers, and 17 performers, the final product could never be replicated by another group of people. This is entirely unique to us!! And all you have to do now is put YOURSELF into the music, perform it with your whole mind and body, and HAVE FUN!

What we are doing is an amazing and ridiclous thing. We are telling an important story about abortion that also features a talking horse, a lactacting space alien, and a food fight where the food is human organs.
Let's tell this story where abortion is a simple medical procedure and let's show everybody how much fun we had doing it. What we are doing is rewriting the narrative -- creating art to induce a cultural shift and change the way people think about reproductive rights. Our joy and our laughter restores our power, and it removes the power from the narrative that abortion is taboo, is sinful or evil.

With all the terrible shit going on in the world right now, it's so important for us to be able to access JOY, and for me, that looks like play and music and making stuff with my friends.
And joy isn't frivioulous! It's vital!! It can be radical!!

Because above all else, I want our audience to SEE and HEAR us having fun and enjoying ourselves when they watch this movie. When we're having fun and connecting with each other, we can connect with our audiences too.

So. This conversation is important. Laughter is important. The movie we make doesn't need to be perfect to achieve its goals. This weekend, I want everyone to experience feeling powerful and ridiculous at the same time! I want everyone to have fun and go all the way! We are making magic together! Y'all are already killing it and you're gonna fucking SLAY this weekend! I'm so fucking proud of everyone and so excited to make our dreams into realities.
I LOVE YOU ALL. THIS IS GONNA BE AWESOME! SEE YOU SOON!