no. 46

(Black, Ochre, Red over Red) 1957

spending my time

At other pretty things and duskin; dreaming about this dress and listening to This Mortal Coil.

Dress, Duskin Spring 2009

it must suggest something about me has changed

My Love,
I went to Yamamoto to choose my trousseau. For our reunion. I spent hours trying things on. In the end I chose black silk trousers and two shirts to be worn together, a gray one and a blue one. I want everything to be perfect. My outfit must travel well in the plane and suit the circumstances: a reunion in India. It must be elegant but without affectation, chic but understated, and flattering. It must suggest that something about me has changed, a subtle metamorphisis, show you how I've missed you, but that you're not totally indispensable to me and even that I have grown more beautiful, more mature, away from you...

From Exquisite Pain, by Sophie Calle (Thanks SF Library)

who shall say

The Lover, by Marguerite Duras is less than 30,000 words. The Postman Always Rings Twice, by Richard Cain, about 35,000. Fahrenheit 451 about 45,000; and The Great Gatsby, maybe, 50,000.

Photo: Denise Grünstein

maiden & moonflower

"One's self is always shifting in relationship to beauty and you always have to be able to incorporate yourself or your new self into life. Like your skin starts hanging off your arms and stuff, and then you have to think, well that’s really beautiful too. It just isn’t beautiful in a way that I knew it was beautiful before" Kiki Smith.

Kiki Smith Wallpaper at Studio Printworks
Per Paul Pincus' hallway

interpretation

"I was not looking for my dreams to interpret my life, but rather for my life to interpret my dreams." Susan Sontag.

Broad Shirt, Le Bouton

change sounds like this

Saw a Youth Speaks performance tonight. Mind blowing.

Photo: San Francisco Chronicle

blue valentine

My favorite imaginary couple.

Short Cuts.

from the haircut file

Facehunter and Toast

me llamen calle

I don't think Manu Chao's Radiolina or the video for Me Llamen Calle won in last night Latin Grammy's, but they should have. Me Llamen Calle, Manu Chao's tribute to s-x workers, is well worth a listen.

I never can quite say

I never can quite say as much as I know. I look at other parrots and I wonder if it's the same for them, if somebody is trapped in each of them paying some kind of price for living their life in a certain way. For instance, "Hello," I say, and I'm sitting on a perch in a pet store in Houston and what I'm really thinking is Holy shit. It's you. And what's happened is I'm looking at my wife.

"Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot" by Robert Olen Butler
Photo from Either The Drapes Go Or I Do

truant

Jessica is sorta wonderful. She has a delicious blog; an inspiring shop; and now, with Erin, a completely cool online travel magazine, Truant. It might be the best thing I ever got for $2.

"I am a Bird" by Mareike Auer available at The Shiny Squirrel

you were saying

"You were saying something nice about me, I can feel it." Samuel Beckett, Eleuthéria

1820s Georgian Coral Ring, Erie Basin

minor obsessions

These honeycomb necklaces from Black Sheep & Prodigal Sons, thin black t-shirts from Acne and American Vintage, anything written by J.M. Coetzee, Kill City jeans, David Byrne, Kern River Valley, Sister Mary Corita, public radio, and Kiki Smith.

Photo The Selby via Jen