Pedestrians run. The enemy is all around. I stare at the ground through the slit between my scarf and hat; an inch eye elevated to see where I’m going would widen a crevice and I’d be caught at the throat down the coat cold eviscerated.
I could be hit by a truck and not notice, or care, if the ambulance is warm (and I know hell is, with open arms). Ice grows on the insides of my windows, see through fecking cold, winter’s breath freezing. Patient for the thaw, I can’t wait to remember you.
Old enough to laugh at this now.
Early January Bree and I visited Colin in Kentucky. I ate grits for the first time and reveled in Southern accents. We visited Colonel Sanders’ grave.
We gambled on a riverboat casino in Indiana and attended a sold-out opening night showing of Brokeback Mountain in Louisville. Still without a real camera at the time, all my pictures are trapped in my head and my cell phone, containing less Kentucky than Chicagoland I-beam bridges and aerial transmission tangles (the picture of me taking a cell shot of the Colonel bust linked above is care of Bree).
Indiana is a riot slash can rot. Strange how as the anti-choice billboards, Jesus is Lord semitruck signage and crapped-out roadside crosses increase so do the porn shacks, casinos and firework emporiums.
Bree and I decided the ultimate highway enterprise would be hookers who light up and gush nickels then explode. And if’n y’all get hungry after that, youse can set yerselfs down at a Waffle Steak!!
Listening to Moby. Not lately, just now.
I did get a new camera but just got the memory card today and haven’t been able to play with it yet. But soon! no more will d6 visitors have to stare at my stove. In other imag(in)e news, I’m taking a printmaking class at the U, which is free for me as a full-time employee.
It is so much fun to have a teacher, and a TA, and classmates who give me that oh-my-god-you’re-in-the-real-world look I used to give the elders myself when I was an undergrad. A few are hotshit slick but most are just moody, bouncy kids with neat ways of making things.
I love it. I ask lots of questions about registration and trap; the freshman gape and the graphic designers nod gravely. I mix paints with a palette knife and use a power sprayer and Photoshop and most of my weekend hours printing or thinking about printing and how I can make art happen, and none of it is trying too hard or feeling too bad, though my razor clean precision, a nifty way of saying anal-retentive perfectionism, comes through with a critical eye.
At the same time, there’s no pressure. I just enjoy it. Not because I should enjoy it—because my grade is irrelevant and I’m not paying for it. I enjoy it because it’s enjoyable. Both process and product give me pleasure.
My first screenprint was a dead bird made with blockout through reduction; the next project is a photomechanical piece with a zombie (Ken from the pub crawl, to be exact). Check the mockup.
It’ll be about 12″x23″ with a prettier red. Hard to say how precise I’ll get it to lookin’ like that, but it should be close.
After screenprinting is a section in lithography, where my lack of drawing skillz shall undo me. But I’m not worried. Faking it—improvising, stylizing, shrugging and throwing down scared lines with a fierce yer goddamned right this is my best, all my patience, all my heart—is also doing.
I could fall asleep in a writing class, but I could never play and mean it. I could never say “so what.” Too serious to let’s see what happens. Let’s learn from it. Set it afire and run from it, or with it, or through it, live by it or let it destroy.
My Moby music folder is a mash of time-loss ambiance and barely tolerable club mix trash. Life is like the box of chocolates no one sends, ha ha ha ha ha stepping off the curb into screeching tires. WATCH WHERE THAT YOU ARE GOING
Look at where you are right now.
The older I get, the more patterns I see. The more people I meet who I’ve met before. The more time I spend writing letters I don’t send or to people I’ve never seen.
Came home at 2 a.m. last week from a night of dancing and free cotton candy, sticky sweet mouths telling me I can really move, don’t stop, I want to watch you. I want to learn. A girl in baggy bondage pants and a boy with messed up teeth, smiles that would be sneers were the eyes not sincere.
I like your shirt. I like your feet. I like this DJ. I like this city. But don’t stop—keep moving.
I got home in heart-stopping cold people on the street bundled inhuman with crying fingers, toes, have been running through (me too), and someone was parked in my spot, a private lot where I can tow anyone I want. I parked down the block, sweat froze furious, and instead of calling a wrecker, spewed my congested lungs on the driver-side window of the trespasser, a sick patch of instant ice hate you.
I didn’t think I’d ever tell anyone. Moment of rage, child act stupid, not irrational but not likely, not becoming, not me. But what does that mean. “Not me.” Oh really.
I will never tell anyone, ever, how much I’m not hurting.
megh
February 20, 2006 at 6:59 pmthere’s a chinese kid in the library, maybe 19 or 20, who looks like my 14-year-old brother, who isn’t chinese, but they have the same lanky tall build, same smile and braces, same eyebrows and expressions. i kinda want to tackle him.
bill
February 21, 2006 at 4:10 amWinter is in sync this year with a phase I do not enjoy. The creative process, which has chosen to move from the
megh
February 21, 2006 at 3:30 pmmy pleasure. well i know the starts and stops of creative inspiration and lack thereof. it’s necessary to get out of your element a bit (either indulging or the doing) to understand your own. for instance: what the hell business do i have screenprinting? no idea. but i like it a lot, and having a camera helps me write.
Bree
February 23, 2006 at 3:02 amMan. I want to watch you dance.
megh
February 23, 2006 at 1:43 pmthen take me out, cat!
does jesse dance?
megh
February 24, 2006 at 8:38 amoh, sweet!
“‘People are born to dance,’ Ebstein told Discovery News. ‘They have (other) genes that partially contribute to musical talent, such as coordination, sense of rhythm. However, the genes we studied are more related to the emotional side of dancing
Bree
February 24, 2006 at 9:43 amHe does not so much dance. That I know of, at least.
Check back after the musical. Am swamped until then.
megh
February 24, 2006 at 11:00 am“Am swamped until then.”
yar. me too. have fun with your techie-ing! i thought it looked interesting but seeing how in-demand tickets were, i decided to defer. i’m sure i wouldn’t get most of the jokes anyway.
v1144181594
February 27, 2006 at 11:16 pmscraping out tray from my nails with bloating dry eyes and an ache in my hand where I carelessly ran it into a very wooden pointy corner of the wall hours ago at work it is good to lap it up
megh
February 28, 2006 at 7:11 pmv.etc., you are biohazardous. the pole i poke you with is so long it’s poking *me.*
v1144181594
March 1, 2006 at 12:51 amshall i pencil you in for a 1pm of feasting of my fester?
megh
March 1, 2006 at 9:32 amawwww, at 1 pm i’m danking the darker then straightaway fasting a freaker.
megh
March 1, 2006 at 2:31 pmand later i’m leeching a lecher!
(okay, okay, i’m stopping.)
nicolas Collard
March 3, 2006 at 11:20 amyes! meg is alive and here… i can just feel it.
but what is “registration and trap?” and where do I put the question mark (or any puncuation) inside the quotes when it’s mine really and doesn’t actually belong there? i’ve held this question inside for so long, oh so long… [dramatic trailings offs]
megh
March 6, 2006 at 9:50 amregistration refers to how well the colors line up–when different colors butt, there shouldn’t be any white gaps or color overlap. look at a newspaper (with color) and check out the pictures–can you see the magenta or cyan creeping out the edges of what should be a border or in the picture itself, so it almost looks doubled? that’s poor registration.
trap is the minor color overlap that has to occur so if the registration is slightly off, there won’t be any white gap. if you trap too much, you’ll see a faint outline where it will look darker than the background. looks unnatural.
the placement of the question mark depends on the function of the quotation marks. in your example, they are actually quoting, not used conversationally, so the ? goes on the outside. what is “registration and trap”? (which could also be, what is “registration” and “trap”?) otherwise, normally, the punctuation goes inside. Observe:
Nic: “Hey, megh, wanna go to a lesbian dance party?”
Megh: “Um… sure?”
megh
March 9, 2006 at 7:19 pmhas anybody read JT LeRoy and want to discuss how this childhood traumatized, HIV-inflicted, heroin-eaten, genderbending literary (though c’mon, really, cleverly annoying) wunderkind is actually a middle-aged, middle-class woman?
ben
March 10, 2006 at 5:04 pmI have to point this out because i know it will drive you crazy. Isn’t it ‘Colonel Sanders’s grave’ as opposed to ‘Colonel Sander’s grave’?
Love you Meg.
megh
March 13, 2006 at 8:22 amah. correct. actually i would opt for Sanders’ minus the extra S (both are correct, but grammar trends to minimalism. at least i do.).
mer. thanks. jerk. 😉
my socks and shoes are soaked and only nine more hours at work to go!
megh
March 13, 2006 at 10:43 amfixed it. hmpf.
i have new pants. they look a lot like all my other pants.
ben
March 14, 2006 at 9:13 pmAre both correct? I thought s’ was only for plural possesives. On American Idol tonight they kept texting on the screen, “Paris’ friends” or “Chris’ friends”. So this is right? Didn’t it used to be wrong?
megh
March 15, 2006 at 10:43 amboth are correct—or to be more precise, without an extra S is correct, and to add the S is not incorrect, but cutting-edge grammarians may pat your head and pinch your cheek. i cannot tell you why other than the before-stated minimalism. less has become more. it’s why you don’t see Internet with a capital I much anymore or email with a hyphen. with the apostrophe S, the one exception are god people. jesus gets another S, and so does moses. why? hell if i know. they just do, at least right now. in 15 years, they probably won’t.
and whoa, this almost slipped my attention, but what are you doing watching American Idol?? ha-ha.
another lesson: periods and commas go inside quotes (unless you’re British) and thus it should be “Chris’ friends.” and not “Chris’ friends”.
we could play hardball alllll day.
sometimes
March 20, 2006 at 8:10 pmwe live like penguins in the desert
why can’t we live like tribes?
megh
March 21, 2006 at 8:49 amdredg played here last night and i missed it. or maybe it was sunday? catch ’em in fargo tonight (along with thrice, deftones and atreyu).
Jerry T.
March 30, 2006 at 11:20 pmSo why is this type face so small? I nearly went blind reading it. How about making it same size as The Book? I could read that with no problem. (Ducking and running, no place to hide!)
jenna
April 10, 2006 at 4:21 pmThat screen printing sounds entertaining! I like the zombie dude with the birds. Have you finished any more lately?
megh
April 12, 2006 at 3:46 pmjenna! you are not dead, hooray! the screenprinting is indeed entertaining. i am now working with lithography. i just finished a plate litho last week–i will send or link you a pic when i take one, or it will be posted in my next news update, which should happen within a week. my next project is stone lith. the trabble with lith is it’s more drawing-centric. i’ve been able to fake it with taking photographs or stealing them and then tracing them. i cannot draw, not at all, no no, and find screenprinting easier because i can use photography (the zombie pic you see was developed/designed in photoshop then pulled apart and put back together when screenprinting it). lith is a pain, too, with the tedious processing, er, processes that must be done. but i’m pleased with what i’ve made so far. art = fun!
crystal
April 17, 2006 at 11:06 amhi~
just was checking out your page via dan’s blog. pretty rad stuff, and I love the ministry of texts. have a nice day.
megh
April 17, 2006 at 6:51 pmthanks, crystal. most of the ministry came from a time i worked in document delivery at a library–i constantly had my hands on wide-ranging weirdness of the print form that just screamed scan me scan me scan me! and show me to the world.
jenna: here is my new art.thing, also linked in the next news item, figure c. i am mostly pleased–t’wasn’t fully conceived by the time it was already happening, so a lot of it is do what i could with what i have (and with plate lithography, there’s no erasing without laborious processing i didn’t have time for. < / excuses >
http://www.deepsicks.com/figc.jpg