Preface

You have confessed far too much to me, you know. I shouldn't even have been listening, shouldn't have known, shouldn't be telling your secrets to the world.

But I do all the same; all the time.

Every confession you've ever made, every trap you've ever laid, everything you've ever said that you've thought - it's just been passed on. It's all been laid bare, set open to the air, printed as if for the world to read.

You know, I thought of apoligizing to you - but how could I? And more importantly - why should I? No. I can't do that. So instead, here - I'll just confess more for you. I hope you don't mind.

-RK

nothing new

Nothing special, or significant. Nothing out of the ordinary way that things are.
Splendid. So, I'm home. That's all.

Here's what I've been thinking:
Maybe, to start off with, I could make a telephone call to somewhere in China - or maybe even Japan. I'd wait until someone picked up, and I'd hope they speak English. They will, of course.

Then, I'll tell them about everything. Just like that. And they'll find it amusing or sad or deplorable or wonderful or epic. They'll probably write a novel about it someday - in Chinese or Japanese, of course. But they won't say any of that. They'll be quiet, just breathing on the other end of the line.

They'll say they don't feel well, but they don't know why. They'll be lying of course. But I'll believe them, or pretend to because I don't speak Chinese or Japanese, and I don't think they'd like to talk about it in English anyway. And that'll be fine.

Then, no one will say anything - because I don't speak Chinese or Japanese and their English is failing - because in China or Japan it's obviously very late. Then, finally, they will say I should have known that - that it was late in China or Japan. But I'll confess that I didn't think of it, didn't even consider it.

One of us will make a joke, in English - and we'll both laugh. That'll clear the air. Their English will come back for a while even. So will mine. We'll talk for a little longer, but the converstaion won't be going anywhere. I'll try to keep on talking, trying to make myself sound Chinese or Japanese speaking English. They won't notice, or if they do - they won't admit it.

They'll say they have to go - that the sun is coming up - that the market is opening - that they have things to do. I'll try not to be upset. I understand, sure. They can't go on in English - alright, fair enough. They'll say goodbye. They'll say it in Chinese or Japanese. I'll want to say something back - but I don't speak Chinese or Japanese, you know. English just wouldn't do. So I don't say anything.

I just hang up the phone. I think to myself how strange it was that I talked to someone in China or Japan. I'll tell myself how one day - in ten or twenty years I'll laugh about all this. Then, I'll remember I can laugh about it now. I will - I'll laugh.

And I'll go to Panda Express and order orange chicken with chow mein noodles and a side of sweet and sour sauce to remind me about it every so often, eating it with chopsticks from some poor producer somewhere in the middle of some nameless factory - some man with a family, trying just to get by. And I'll laugh.

-RK

Following Suit

It’s real sad when you come to a point that airline food is more satisfying than the stuff you are used to eating everyday. Pasta – salad that would have been so much worse had it contained malt vinegar in any way, and rolls that should be sitting like rocks in my stomach. But they aren’t. That bothers me, really bothers me.

And I just have to point out that I ate ice cream for breakfast at 6.00 – a caramel flake 99. If someone would have asked me what I was thinking, I’m sure I would have rambled off some crap about it being the ‘last time’ or ‘my only chance’ or some stupid excuse like that. But now, out of the bounds of its horrid reign, I feel confused by my food choice. Even the bagel sandwich at 10.00 really made no sense either. That’s frustrating.

Not to mention the fact that we’re over Iceland. Not even across the water to Greenland – and I feel unsatiated.

And I just watched a movie that did all it could to claw at my emotional strings. Don’t get me wrong, t’was a good movie actually, Finding Neverland. I really liked what it had to say about writing and imagination and what a writer does and how a writer…well, is. I don’t think I agreed with it all – but it was refreshing. Until it confronted death and the purport of such. *sigh* A little on the English-food-type heavy side. But this, like a rock in my what – heart – intellect. That’s the one, a rock in my brain. And in this state, at this time, with these issues – I can’t handle that. What were these people thinking? Hemmm…

Duty free shopping. Of course. I already bought a headscarf, a wrap, and a Harrod’s horse. Yes, I still need perfume and a huge box of cigarettes, and jewelry. Because I don’t have six suitcases and five carry-ons. Not at all. You’re right. I need duty free shopping. Right now. …Hey, you with the cart – come back here. I must have …*perfume wafts on the air, honestly* that! I must have that.

Dear good green earth, who is really that thick? First, okay so you bought duty free. I wasn’t going to really hold that against you for too long. I could deal with your extra baggage – we all have it. But no, you had to not only buy it – getting ripped off which first of all is not so intelligent – but then, you have to a) open it, b) spray it, c) bathe yourself in it. Thanks. =0| Now I’m sure to be ill – as if lunch and Brit food wasn’t enough to ensure that fate. Cheers, really.

Looking across the isle here – I keep thinking, hemm – I could have gotten some really good shots today. But my camera was stuffed in the front pocket of my big blue JanSport and there was no way I was touching that with a fifty foot poll. I already had to rummage for my purse, for my passport, for my ticket, for every god-forsaken item I realized I needed moments after the stupid thing was arranged on my back.

Right, no here is the part where you start thinking, ‘oh shuddup. You’re just being an over traveled sissy and frankly, I’m sick of hearing it.’ because you’ve heard about my summer – and you’re obviously bitter, jealous, and cynical about that.

But no. Let me, for a brief second, paint the picture. To start, I have on a Roxy hoodie and its probably 100 + degrees Celsius in Heathrow. On top of that I have my coat (that goes on trips without me apparently). Then, the Swiss Army Passport carrier slung from my neck, JanSport over that, and of course Toshi in her cage is draped across my right shoulder. Now to really get it, JanSport is loaded with about six books. One of those hardcover – two of those multiple books bound as one. All being over 300 pages and that =s heavy; add to that a notebook, journal, diary, and other random goodies – and you have a backache guaranteed, probably serious spinal damage that will now haunt you the rest of your days. Oh, yes – perfect.

So that’s enough from me. I’m running on slim battery – and we haven’t even crossed enough time barriers for me to have pulled Toshi out and started her up. Now, in approximately 5.1 hours I will be angry and bored – and have no more Incubus on top of that. How very uncool is it of the airlines to not have a) power source for my convenience, b) wi-fi. I’m not satisfied with my service. Does this mean I get a refund?

Probably not.

-RK

Pooling for Ideas

I have a need of titles. Realizing now I really do want to go home - my intellect is thusly entirely and utterly sapped. In other words, I need your help. Thus, you get this.

Give me ideas for:

a) a dog from Dublin = decide between Isaac or Paddy.
[If you have a better idea, shoot. That's all my lost-vocabulary brain came up with]
b) a chocolate bunny from EasyJet upon return from Athens to UK
c) a Nici giraffe plushie

You know the drill. (Or don't you?) You should. Post comments. Give me brain-juices. Stop complaining.

Oh yeah - and as usual in this state of mind - cheers mates.
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Yes, and you should really check out my current pic - it's a link! Astounding, isn't it? *gasp* It really was quite opportune that I found the thing much on accident and coinsidence - it even being a dragon and all. Well, if you have a go at it, you'll see ...


-RK

Honesty unsugared, mostly.

So here, that wasn't honest. Anyone who knows - knows that.

It was a great week, yes. It was fun and wild and crazy. And I wouldn't have passed it for anything. But do remember why we're here. And for that reason - that wasn't honest.

I left the heart, the soul out of the thing. That, I can't do again. If you're going to look, you're going to know. If you're going to see, you're going to think. If you're taking the time - I'll take it too. Time to not cover over wounds or scars or the faces that we hide from.

If you're going to see it - why not see the thing as it is. Why paint faces on broomsticks and put masks over faces and cover the things up from being the broomsticks they really are.

No. It's pointless. Just like the bio I wrote on the plane yesterday. Just like the conversations I had that didn't go anywhere today. Just like the thoughts that I was thinking when I saw pictures of those other things - past days, good days, long days.

I'll admit it - there's fear. There's confusion, like a myrid of colors that don't make sense. Like threads all the wrong color of the picture I'm painting...but I can't see the end result. So, what else can I do?

I'll have to trust. Despite how ugly grey seems against the gold. Despite how bad rough feels against the soft. Just how wrong light seems amidst the dark. But, in the end - it'll be the tapestry its meant to be. And all that, despite me.

Amazing isn't it? All we've got to do is stop screaming, stop fighting, stop shouting and kicking and clawing - and the thing is done for us. We just have to keep moving. Amazing.

And yet - sometimes, the moving is the hardest thing we ever have to do. As for me, I'll need the strength - the strength to move under a weight I'm not used to. If heaven hears me, help me. If it doesn't, God put me at peace in the end of it - where I'm only trying to arrive.

Tomorrow comes a greater challenge - the leaving for good, the 'final' saying goodbye. The leaving of all this to go back to a place I'm pretty much unsure of. Leaving things I want too badly to cling to. Going to things I want too badly to run from. And for that, I'll need strength...that and for the loss that comes with all the weight that bears under the task still partly hidden from dim eyes set in my mind.

-RK

Just so you know.

I'm alive, here. I'm back - not really home - just back. Don't want to be boring with all the details - just trying to catch up. Here, I'm going to be random-esque instead. How's that?

Greek food = good. Feta, soft serve, kalamata salt manifestations, and a McCafe baguette that wasn't really bad at all - until the flight made us feel like our internal organs were being compressed. Oh and if you want that cold - you have to actually say "Frappe" somewhere in there, despite its not being on the menu. Marvel of the century, isn't it?

Modern Greek? Forget it. Got down to "P", "R", "D", even "L" - oh and "OU"; sometime "O" - but no further.

Down the street, found a whore hotel - pretty sure. And a whore who sat outside all day everyday...except when she wasn't. Lovely. Thanks for being observant.

Indecent exposure, over exposure, and indecent behavior in what was otherwise a lovely national park. As if that isn't bad enough in private - you could try to keep it there, couldn't you??? All while I'm on about Martians in England. What a trip *rolls eyes*

In a city the size and feel whereabouts of NYC - would you believe it is impossible to find a pair of decent shoes, a pencil, and a piece of paper - until you have paid exhorbatant prices for such things that weren't worth it, of course. Oh and as soon as you buy flip-flops, it will always start to rain. And stay that way for the rest of the week. Just so you know.

A lovely country nestled next to and second to Italy - but hey, what country isn't? Second in olive oil it seems, second in fashion, and clearly second in production.
Most certainly second in coffee - probably third, after France that is. *sigh* Too bad too.

So Greece is two hours different. It's a four hour flight. Don't even ask me what time it is in Hawaii. My mental capacity cannot handle that. It just physically can't. Reading War of the Worlds and scribbling notes about a certain 'Timothy Jordan Wheeler' won't get you through. And you can't sleep - you aren't that tired. You're just whoozy.

And you won't have to pee until the man (who kinda creeps you out anyway and makes you even more whoozy with his red wine) falls asleep in a manner that you cannot avoid waking him up. He might pretend to wake up off and on, but it is inevitable. You either have to wet the airbus seat you are quivering in or you have to face him. What do you do?

Hope for the best.

Oh, and chocolate scented bunnies are best when bought on EasyJet. But it'd be better if they were twins. In case you were wondering.

Transmission over and out. Back to stressing over all this luggage and how to cram a month of preps into two weeks of time.

-RK

still

things--
images, thoughts, and pursuits
all wanting to be expressed.
None will be subverted,
none ignored.

Again. Fated.
Doomed to this,
for this to repeat--
like history.

Words fail,
the mind fails --can't function,
the soul only knows
Thoughts without form
too far apart to grasp.
-------
As a disclaimer - that isn't poetry...
-------
So wait, you don't want to leave? Don't want to try, to suffer, to know?

Then let's stay here, under dim lights from grey skies. Here, we'll remember how to draw flame-letters on napkins, how to eat tiramisu, how to drink mint tea, and why cinnamon rolls need vanilla pudding. We'll walk to the BP and we'll get taxis into town and we'll take trains to the city and we'll visit Italy once a week - forever. We'll get mediocre grades and live mediocre lives, and just be mediocre lights - finding the same fruit over and over and over again.

Sure. We can stay here - where a warm sun doesn't shines, where dreams dance daily with death, where things never end and shadows never stretch, and the same day happens for an eternity.

But it's still a problem.

Poetry, prose, bad naratvites and metanaratives, worse descriptions and dialogues -- all cut-pieced together to make a boring conglomeration of all the things no one says.

We'll forget...
don't worry. we will.
Hoenstly.
We...you...I will--
will forget; have to forget; can't forget...
-------
Again, don't worry - none of this is poetry.
-------
Oh God, what am I going to do? A purpose, a reason, some explanation to why things are what they are? You had better have--

I'm done. In so many, I'm done. Throwing in the towel, letting the pieces of shattered truths fall, sinking into the canal where I have been pushed.

There aren't words that could show or symbols that would mean or an answer that would seem fitting or fair. That's the way these things go.

So I'll just exist. If that works, I'll be okay. If it doesn't - God help me.

-RK

an already sunken city

I spent my time in the sinking city. Too many things were perfect - all too perfect to last. And now? Well, now it's back to the same old life where things like that city and those dreams can't be. Where life is what it is, and I'll just go back to living it anyway.

Here, you already knew this:
-------
I feel fated. As if times ought to last and things ought to work - but they don't. As if doors should stay open and paths should be clear. As if seasons should change and flowers should grow. As if caterpillars should be butterflies and as if baby birds should learn how to fly. But they don't. As if some moment in some day there ought to be something more than--

But there isn't, and they don't, and there won't be any sunrise at the end of any dark night. And I'll never be at theat place that I feel all right. And it'll go on the same anyway --because that is life, with or without that faith.
-------

And this, I was listening to:
-------
Now's the right time for a good song,
Get something to say what I can't.
Do you feel bad like I feel bad?
Well, pour us a road, we'll both drink and drive.
-JEW:Night Drive
-------
Don't let go.
Well, dig a great big hole.
Down an endless [road] we'll both go.

You're so blind.
You can't save me this time.
Hope comes from inside.
I feel so low tonight.

If only you could see the stranger next to me.
You promised that you're done,
But I can't tell you from the drugs.

I wish that you could see this face in front of me.
You're sorry, you swear it - you're done,
But I can't tell you from the drugs.
-JEW:Drugs or Me
-------
But that was all already heard - and known - before.

-RK

I cannot

Do I really want to return? To face the life I lived before, to try and fit into a life I'm not sure will accept me? Do I really want to leave this place...for good? Do I really want to go home? Do I really want to stay?

Or is this just fear. Is this just dread and emotion and uncertainty. So many chances, opportunities, and doors lie open before me. How am I meant to choose only one? How am I to know which one is best? How am I to know what I ought to do, where I ought to go, what path I'm meant to choose?

Is there only one way I can walk, or are there many? Are there unlimited possibilites. Will my life and my soul change drastically based on the decisions I make here and now? And if so, how I can I be sure to make the right one?

I need to be directed. I need to be moved. I'm static and still and unsure of my footing - and I need the hand to push me again. I don't know which ways to choose. I don't know where I belong. This is a struggle - a difficult choice in a difficult place with difficult feelings and thoughts to fight against. I had no idea it would ever be this difficult. And yet - it is. What am I to do? What choice am I to make? Where am I to go?

God, please make it plain. I'm a plain girl with plain dreams that wants plainly to serve you. I want to go where You are leading - I just can't tell where that is right now. I need a hand, a shove, a push, an awakening to liven me up to the right path, the right door, the right choice. Let me not fail. Let me not choose wrongly. Pleas, allow me not to make the wrong choice in this. Force my feet on the path that you choose, not that which I in any way desire. Curb my selfish amibtion and my desire to make it in this world. Force my habits and my will and my choices to conform to Your's and You alone.

Let not my feet to stumble. Let not my spirit to be tarnished. Let not my way be unclear.

'Ambition comes when early force is spent and when we find no longer all things possible.' Let not this be me.

You know better than I speak. I only know and do not know. But you, You know. Please, choose for me. I will follow depsite my fear and my hesitations and my longing to always do the other. Still, I will follow, as long as You lead.

-RK

Closing Nite

It was our best night. I had issues: cutting the unbar-the-door speech again, saying bold man instead of just man. The hall had issues: tiny audience. But they responded. They actually seemed to care.

It went better. It was fun. I'm glad I did it.

But now, farewell to Beckett. Soon, farewell to Dover, Kent, London, and all of Britain. It will be a bitter-sweet farewell, as this is. It will be bitter for the farewells of friends I shan't see again. It will be sweet to return to my home, my country, the place where the ground springs of such inspiration that it is hard to withdraw forever.

Indeed, in the end it shall all be bitter-sweet. All life, in effect, shall all be bitter-sweet. Which in its own way, will make it good. But for now, there is packing to be done and there are thoughts to be hung up on the tree outside of my mind to let dry and fall into the summer sun and blow in the summer breeze. Yes, now is the time to prepare for the departure of many things. Now is the time to be ready.

And on a different note Kingdom of Heaven was worth seeing. Bloom actually did a good job, despite being screwed with yet another autrocity of a line. Poor kid.

-RK

This isn't enough, is it?

I'm not what I used to be. I'm not what I want to be or what I said I'd be or ...

No. Let's think about think about you for a while. It's better. Here: a thought.

My older brothers are poets and lovers. I am neither.
She likes to dance, but I can't move my feet just to please her.

A penny for my thoughts. More times than not, they're worth even less.
Still I want you to see the crying child inside of me.
Then you'd stay when times get like this cuz their like this all the time.

Send in the clowns, let them play us a tune to make that warm feeling return.
Send in the gray, and we'll call it the day to be sure that warm feeling remains.

She wants a deep man, she'd love a cowboy.
Maybe, I'd just slow you down with my pious integrity, dime store philosophy -
That's me, but not all there is to me.

That's it. Just think for a while. Soon enough you'll get to it. If you don't, don't worry - it's all right in the end, or it will be some day.

-RK

Opening Nite

The tally of high points:

-last section of Thomas' speech at the end Act I
-Hugh De Morville's speech at the end of Act II
-Priestesses' barring of the doors
-The Killing

And the tally of blunders:
-2 long I-forgot-my-line pauses
-Abridging of Thomas unbar the door
-Abridging of Brito's speech at the end of Act II
-a few line stumbles

I think in all we can say the night went much better than we'd planned on it going. And hey, we remembered most of our lines! Go us :0D

Come again to see it get better tonight and surely Closing Nite tomorrow.

-RK

security of life

Just now, here - in this very moment, I've happened upon a bit of relevation.

I'm tired, exhausted. Done with complaining, trying to get someone to listen or pretend that they are. Done with crying out or speaking out -- or even fighting. Done being what I was for the past year, what I was for the past four, or what I've been for the past 21. Done with verses and reveries and shines built up to better things to make me somehow a better person. Done with being nice or good or bad or rude or gentle or harsh. Done being a label, a stereotype, a person that someone doesn't have to know because it's 'easy'. Done with all of that.

I'm just tired. I want to rest, relax, sit under a Greecian sun for a while and bask in the pure beauty of the fact that I -- an individual with individual dreams and individual hopes and individual failures -- am still alive.

We don't celebrate life anymore. We spend it. We charge it on credit and we throw it away like yesterday's trash -- purchasing a life at the cost of our souls. We pay it to the cashiers at our favorite stores. We sell it to the street vendors in Venice Beach and Tuscany. We put it in our wallets and in bank accounts and hope that one day we'll have saved up enough under someone else's protection that we'll have enough to get us half away around the world.

What we don't ever think about is that the othe half of the world is just behind us, if we'd just turn around to see it. If we just looked, we'd see the East where the sun rises meeting the West where the sun sets. We'd see the North where the compass points meeting the South where the poles freeze. We'd see the world changing all around us, never the same one moment to the next. And we'd realize we were hoarding and spending our lives like oil companies do their natural resources. We'd find that we've stopped living, like a petrified tree - just sitting there, solid as stone in our social securities with our 501K's and our USDA's and our NIN's and our PIN's and our VIN's...and we think we've got life all figured out and sorted.

But we aren't even living it anymore. We're spending it like cash, charging it like a debit card, saving it like our annual bonuses, and hoarding it like a stock-up for the end of the world. We aren't really living anymore. We're just waiting...waiting for something.

But what we're waiting for, what will wake us up, what'll get us living again? Who knows -- only pray it comes quickly, before we run ourselves into extinction.

-RK

Listen--

Life is simple. Dreams in the midmorning don't mean anything. But then again, neither does any of this.

Life is simple. All you have to do is, well, live it.

Decisions are just as easy to make. You just have to, yeah, make them. I'm going to - soon enough. I'm going to have to. It'll be easy once I do. No problem. Easy.

Just gather facts and put the puzzle pieces into place, and soon enough I will know what is right to do. What I'm meant to do. What I have to do. It's simple, really.

No worries. Just have to ... well, just have to know first. That's always the first step. Just ... knowing.

Once I know, I will decide.

-RK

Could have guessed that

Your element is Fire:

Strong, hot tempered, powerful, and passionate.
Being fire you are quite strong and powerful.
People look up to you greatly and often seek your protection.
You have the ability to gain many friends and you are always one people can count on to do what you say you will do.
You are extremely loyal, be it friends or family.
You'll always stick up for them,
and you are never willing to put them
in a position that could hurt them.
You know what role you play in life --
Leader. And you intend to let people know it.
Not everyone is capable of leadership but you certainly have the willpower and flare to do it.
You have quite a temper if it shows itself,
one that can often lead you into trouble.
Once your mind is made up there is no changing it.
But no one said that was a bad thing.
What is your true element?