everything in its right place

the end of last semester was a period of complete internal chaos. scratch that, college was a period of complete internal chaos, of which, almost 5 years after i started it, i’m still understanding the full scope of its consequences.

its a place of self-discovery alright,  its perplexing how i was able to at the same time come to terms with–rather, realize my limitations and create grandiose plans for my future. but i think the deepest scar comes from crippling self-doubt that i learned in college. i don’t trust myself anymore, and lets say i get by on subsistent levels of self worth.

almost a year after i graduated, im still left with this herculean project, its long overdue, but i think the professor will still accept it. i need to revisit plato. sigh.

anyway i decided to write this awful post because i remembered how at times i became so in need of a clutch, and considering that i’m a nonbeliever, and a fan on music, i started to take radiohead’s lyrics pretty literally. i made myself believe that everything would be ok because thom yorke said so!

i mean, wow. Kid A was my personal bible.

i also remember maybe a month later after i acquired this new religion when i realized that he maybe he was ironic/ i was being crazy/ although a great album, it cant be my reason to live.

ridiculously enough, i still remember how my heart sunk at the realization of a false religion. there really was a period of my life that i believed that everything was going to be ok because “if you try the best you can, the best you can is good enough”.

its certainly one of those moments when you don’t know if you should laugh or cry. but thats college for you.

nanda

what seems to have been in a different life time

hey, do you remember when we went to see deerhunter on election night?

it was raining, and cold, it was november after all. I think it was before we really got to know each other, we just randomly went to a concert together, Michelle and Sasha were there too.

it was at the black cat, the place was damp, and scarcely populated being that we were in DC and it was election night. few fellow dcers consider a deerhunter show more important than watching election results. I barely remember the opening act, all that i can recall was that i didnt really like them, and that the lead singer was dressed in some scary costume…. was that that concert? i think it was, like he was dressed in something with feathers and i think he had a hoodie  with a bird’s beak.

we were both on the look out for a man, wearing red lipstick and concert attire, i think you might have suspected that a certain someone might come to the show. i think i drank my usual red stripe… wait were sasha and michelle there? i feel like there were, it might have been the first time you met them.

during the opening act, bradford was hanging out with the crowd, i think some ‘muc kids were there as well, and they talked to him. and then we went up to him, you greeted him, i was too embarrassed–i just smiled at him. how embarrassing. i wasnt a big fan of them yet, i didnt understand deerhunter yet.  but im so glad that we went to that concert.

when they came on, i remember it being really loud, fuzzy. the black cat doesnt have the greatest sound system. but i think two things that stick out the most on my mind was: a) how they announced that obama got elected and then they played star spangled banner, and b) how there was that girl guitarist (or did she play the base?), at one point she messed up and bradford snapped at her. i think she was dating the stoner looking guy (… im still strangely attracted to him).

when it ended, i had a headache. it had been so loud. So opposite the feeling that i had when i saw them again in bmore, at the round robyn thing (god, when i saw them then, i couldnt get enough of them, i ultimately was so frustrated with no age… they were so subpar when up against deerhunter… anyway, different concert).

out on the streets it was a party, Ust was in chaos, people making noise, walking on the streets, honking, waving at each other–overall sense of euphoria, i think.

to sound cheesy, i think that the whole night really just felt like a deerhunter song; disorienting, full of emotion, and beautiful.

this brings a tear to my eye, but warms my heart… i’m so glad that these will be the memories of my early 20s.

full of never ending sap (im starting to suspect that its the effect of occasionally watching brazilian soaps), much love to you my music lover friend,

nanda

The Life of Principals

The quaintness of a small life. Let go of big aspirations.
Conformed to living the same day everyday.
Hoping that love will make life worth living.

it turns out that i’m condescending.

nanda

What song defines me?

oh boy.

I came to this question when I began the hilarious task of trying to think of three words that define me.
I was filling out my OkCupid profile. So, please don’t hesitate to make fun of me.

Now I sat there thinking of three clever words to choose from, only to find it that I’m not that creative–and that led to a minor breakdown, well not really, but still, minor I suck at life moment. I quickly moved on as I resorted to music to attempt to find words that define me, and thats when thought of said question. Really, I’m surprised that I haven’t thought of figuring it out before. I have a pretty clear idea of what band best captures how I generally view/ feel about life–that is Radiohead. I think you will find that answer tiring. I know that for you its painfully obvious.

That is the kicker though, I don’t know if I can find my song in Radiohead’s repertoire. I was thinking about how to define my song, and I guess I meant something like, well, if I were to have a theme song that played every time I came into a bar, or if I were a character in a movie… you know, cheesy things like that. I mean, seriously, the whole task is a very smelly cheese. But who cares.

Frankly, I don’t even know where to begin. I thought maybe Joanna Newsom, but I’m afraid that that is just a reflex from having listened to her so frequently in past month.

Well, so I’ll keep you posted of my findings. This won’t be easy.

I hope you are having some amount of fun around Europe. I hope you are taking some pictures.

nanda

Welcome to the Jungle

“An artist’s only concern is to shoot for some kind of perfection, and on his own terms, not anyone else’s”
Franny and Zooey

I think we can broaden that, and say that anyone wishing a good life should aim for some form of personal perfection. We should view ourselves as artists striving to create beauty.

Prior to that passage, there is a bit about how really the ones who genuinely reach greatness, do so because they are driven by their egos. Or that they are doing what they truly wish to–they are doing it with all their might. Thats the point that I want to get at. I think that to be happy, we need to know and understand what drives us, reach for it with all our might–and that is how we can attain/create beauty.

That felt really pertinent to me. I’m embarking on a career path right now, frankly, I don’t know if this is what I want. It feels like its in the general direction of what I want. Is it too late to for me to discover what drives me? Optimistically I believe that its never too late, but that may just be one of those fairy tales we tell ourselves so we can continue on bearing existence.

Sometimes I question if I can hear the siren.

So right now there is no knowing, just hoping. And my new struggle is to do it with all my might. Completely devote myself to this choice, if something better presents itself–great, and if not…, if I don’t give it all…well…..

.

Sitting at the airport in Rio waiting for a plane back to São Paulo, I’m having coffee and pão de queijo next to some randomly famous person. At first I thought he was one of the members of Guns n Roses, and since he was literally right next to me, I got a better look and realized that it was Sebastian Bach. At one point he asked me if he could have this chair that I wasn’t using and I said “Sure. That’s cool.”

It wouldn’t be right if I didn’t mention how before that interaction I had spent a good 20 minutes daydreaming a scenario where he was a total asshole and how I’d tell him off. Why? I don’t know. I barely know the guy, I couldn’t name one of his songs, I just had this desire to show some passé celebrity that he is no better than I.

Anyway the point of that story, I think, is that i feel like it does a good job at epitomizing the absurdity of reality.

Most of the time we go from A to B as a result of random happenings in our lives, there are though, the few life changing moments when you are conscious of the choice that you are making and where its going to take you. But even within that subset, the variables are always changing and you just never know who you are going to meet/where you’ll end up.

I guess what i’m trying to say, not so eloquently is: on the flip side, if your life doesn’t turn out to be something big, huge and exciting, there’s always the random absurd occurrences; some may change your life (you may meet a best friend) and some may just amuse you (you may come across an aging rock star). And that is also beautiful.

NANDA. over and out.

On your impending reunion with the Tigress

“The masses do not see the Sirens,” Nikos Kazantzakis observes.  “They do not hear songs in the air.  Blind, deaf, stooping, they pull at their oars in the hold of the earth.  But the more select, the captains, harken to a Siren within them… and royally squander their lives with her.”

Kazantzakis’ siren is a “merciless voice — the Tigress.”  She is his companion on all his journeys.  She “digs her claws into my brain, and we reflect on all we have seen and all we have yet to see.”  Robert Graves calls her the “White Goddess,” who can appear as a “she-wolf, tigress, mermaid or loathsome hag.”  The test of any writer’s vision, Graves says, is “the accuracy of his portrayal” of her.

The goddess’s physical beauty lies only in her eyes.  Her allure is the life of the mind.  For it is the yearning after comparisons and metaphors for each new object and landscape that sanctifies consciousness.

I’ve started reading an interesting book by journalist Robert Kaplan about his prolonged travels through the Mediterranean in his twenties.  Mediterranean Winter seems like the perfect read for me here and now, especially as I consider how to best live the next 3-4 months of my life.

You’re leaving to go on an adventure in mere hours.  I found this one little snippet in the first chapter to be fitting for the both of us — for me, as I grapple with and consider my own intimacy with the Tigress (lately she appears as a loathsome hag), and for you, as you look to rediscover her, go about with her, and depend on her for the new sort of consciousness that perhaps can only come about from following her call.

Travel is where we truly meet ourselves.  Thank god we’re the types who can hear the Sirens.

Be safe.  Miss you a ton.  And most importantly, share stories of awkwardness and delayed response due to weird language abilities.  I find that entire thing hilarious.
GERTRUD

Out of Practice

Its been too long, and really, its just because I’m in this place in my life where I seem to be shunning introspection. Perhaps I successfully visited  the “doer” –not world–erhm, reality. And suppressed my more introspective (read: self-conscious) self. Dostoevsky talks about this. How men of action don’t suffer from the pangs of acute self-consciousness.
Am I a woman of action now?

ha. Hardly. I just spent most of my day not doing anything productive.

So maybe I just disconnected from everything because too much on the outside is changing so I need the inside to be a constant for now, otherwise it’d all just be too much.

Gertie, your previous posts were excellent. And this shabby one doesn’t do our blog justice, but its better than nothing. I’m hoping that once the big move happens, the reality of my new situation will hit me, and then I will have more profound thoughts.

For now I’ll leave you with this: today I had one of the best music experiences that I’ve had in a while. I was listening to Panda Bear and I drove through one of those old school car washes. The all encompassing chaos caused by the disorienting swirls of the brushes, the thick layer of soap, and the playful bubbles perfectly fit with Panda Bear’s music. It was magical, and it made my day.

Hope all is well,
Nanda

where do you run to?

last night, after an overwhelming moment at my apartment, i went to the gym an hour before closing and ran four miles in forty minutes.  about ten minutes in, i started to feel this intense sensation on the left side of my chest — you know, where my heart is.  the pain was great and it started to spread towards my shoulder.  after twenty minutes of running i kept thinking, i should stop.  i might have some sort of heart problem.  i might have a heart attack and keel over and die.  this has happened to many people before, even young ones.  it happened to my brother.

and upon that thought — that my heart might just stop or explode if i don’t stop running — i turned up the speed to a sprint.

the difficulty of loneliness is that you’re forced to bear the burden of the world on your shoulders alone.  i used to pay for the kind of friendship that would relieve my sore shoulders and shaking knees from that sort of strain, and that service was called therapy.  i don’t think i need therapy anymore, or at least right now, and so i find myself turning to another socially acceptable form of companionship — this blog.  there is something important about opening your mouth and letting words come out, even if they’re the wrong ones.  every time i talk and watch the words leave my system, i don’t have to own all of them anymore.  sometimes giving away words for free is the smartest investment you can make in your own success.

i wouldn’t necessarily say that i’m lonely or unhappy or terribly sad, and yet here i am in hopes of throwing words at this space and letting it carry some of the weight.  my skin is sagging from the mere force of my innards wanting out.  since i returned to this continent, i have made attempts at being my own slave driver, and guess what — it really worked.  man it’s unbelievable the high i’ve been experiencing since deciding to be better.  i found myself stupidly happy in my little nook in the center of athens, listening to tons of new music and dreaming of my future.  oh how i adore those periods of pure solitary amusement, when you’re in such a constant state of straight-up inspired enjoyment that there’s no space left to tack on judgment or superficial layers.   i’m such a giant of a personality in those moments that any spec of self-doubt is instantly obliterated; my brain is functioning at such a high level that time and space and distraction and any form of loserdom can’t survive.  i simply won’t give air to it.

suffice it to say, things were looking up.

and yet, i’m not an island.  every time i think i can allow my island-like characteristics to shine for a while, allowing me to simply enjoy myself, i find my little world attacked by intruders.  my controlled environment gets spoiled by interruptions and obligations and relationships and… death.

my brother died one year ago today.

and with that i’ll let the internet take on a bit of my burden and give my skin and muscles and shoulders and knees a break.  one year later, and we’re still sore.  one year later, and the words still come out so slowly.  i hold closely his person and his wit, his smile and his thor-like calves.  i can bear the weight of his truth.

just take that fact.  i can’t lift it today.

10 days and 10 bullets – part one

a couple days ago, nikos ziggity-zig-zag encouraged me to think about the multitude of things i’ve done/experienced in the last week as a sign that some cool shit is going down in my athenian life.  what’s more, it’s happening at an alarming frequency.  is this because i’m abroad?

anyway, out of tribute to the craziness in greece over the last week (the first anniversary of the killing/murder of a 15-year-old greek boy by a police officer that spurred on over a month of rioting in exarhia was this past sunday), i will write in bullet-form.  god, that cheese i just laid down right there was stinky.

so, in the last 10 days, in no particular order, (part one)…

1. i turned 23.

in all honesty, like pretty much every single birthday to come before it, i didn’t have huge expectations for the day.  all i wanted was to have a good time in some form or another, preferably with greeks.  i actually had to work on that day at the fulbright office, where i’ve been reviewing and approving a select number of applications from greek secondary school teachers to attend a two-month-long fulbright program at george mason university next summer.  it was really surprising, then, when out of nowhere the entire fulbright staff surprised me with the birthday song and a number of delicious greek pastries with candles.  it was a nice way to start the day, if only because it means i’m totally “in” with some incredibly important people.  i’ll be riding that gravy train til it don’t toot no mo.

later, nikos came over and gave me several presents.  he also gave me a physical gift: tom robbins’ “villa incognito.”  i’d expect nothing less.

anyway, the day finally culminated in going out.  i was getting anxious about it all week after the roomies insisted on taking me out but started to show signs of noncommittalness at the last minute.  andi and i were going to get a few drinks at tralala and then meet up with them later, but right as i hoisted my infamous neon-pink bday leggings up past my american thighs, she insisted i go to her apartment for what seemed to be an impromptu music gathering.  i showed up to find a dark room with candles glowing and andi with four other greek musician friends i know, all with instruments in hand, serenading me beautifully with the birthday song in greek.  they had a cake too, which resembled and tasted more like incredibly dense and dry stale bread, but it’s mere existence made me giddy.  antonis, andi’s sexy greek landlord, was in attendance along with odysseas, a dj who’s spun at all of antonis’ notorious parties (that have become the highlight of my indie social calendar in athens).  while the musicians played, we talked why? and the fuck buttons while guzzling red wine.  a few infrequent hits of greece’s finest led to my participation in a music circle where i banged a drum.  the way i played, there are no words, to describe the way everyone felt (bad stone roses reference).

later, stamatis answered important questions about my existence based on astrological readings.  surprise, surprise, if i truly want something, i’ll get it.  it took him 45 minutes on a computer and nearly 2 hours of my rambling to come to that conclusion.  still, it was a sweet moment between the two of us when he suggested that all of my tentative plans coincide with my astrological inclinations within the universe.

that conversation inspired antonis and me to go buy more cigarettes and talk about the existence of god on the way.  it was great, normally i only get to interact with him around andi who is obviously hung up on the guy and who also has zero chemistry with him, but this time around i felt like i really got in a little.  you know, i did my whole abrasive flirtation bit that works every time.  it felt particularly appropriate in this case when he mentioned a belief in the after-life.  i mean, enough said.

i suppose in retrospect what transpired afterwards is not entirely shocking given that quick walk to the periptero (kiosk).  later the room cleared out and then there were three: me, antonis, and andi.  andi wanted to go out, i was a tad toasted, and antonis wanted to watch a movie.  so we went to his room and all relaxed on his bed while starting up nacho libre.  and then, there it was, antonis shoving his tongue down my mouth while andi looks on awkwardly.  i turned my head out of respect to her, at which antonis said, “andi, you can just go to your room then.”  i felt bad so we both left and i later spent 30 minutes convincing her that he had wanted a threesome, though i’m pretty positive that was not the case.  maybe he did, and if so, then jesus christ fernanda, that’s my second time in 4 months that i’ve been in that scenario.

unfortunately, all interaction with antonis has now been somewhat cold after what happened.  i tried to tell him that i couldn’t do anything because of andi, but i think he was just drunk and doesn’t give a shit.  i don’t really give a shit either, i kinda just want him for his parties.  oh and his lusciously long hair and beard.  i’m jazzed just thinking about it.

2.  i went to three shows.

i saw a place to bury strangers two nights in a row — once with nick and ranya and a second time with andi.  also saw my brightest diamond on friday.  i have to say, a place to bury strangers fucking killed it that first night.  it also really took me back to the my bloody valentine concert from the summer (sigh).  i want to be able to click a switch and live inside a speaker whenever i want (this seems possible).  it was pretty awesome when i finally got in bed at 6am and could hear these crazy frequencies in my ears… i was mildly drunk but i remember listening to them as if i were hearing a song being played.

my brightest diamond fucking rocked it as well.  i didn’t give a shit about going and honestly didn’t know anything about her, but she is one of the finer entertainers i’ve seen in a long time.  she also gave me a continuous clitoral erection, what with the great androgyny of her beautiful voice coupled with that hard guitar.  mmmhm.

3.  i partied with a band.

when oliver, the lead singer of a place to bury strangers, emerged on the floor after the first show at rodeo, i went up to him yelling “i’m an american!!”  he was all about it and we had a good banter while experimenting with various forms of the traditional high-five.  i was bummed i didn’t stay longer to see what they were doing after the show, but don’t you dare worry your little awkward indie head, fernanda, because i went back to the same show the next day and talked to him again.  he kinda remember my name (“it begins with an A…”) and told me about where they were going later.  i ended up dragging andi along and sure enough they showed up.  at one point oliver and i danced to the violent femmes’ “kiss off” — not my fav song of theirs, but certainly a band to which i wouldn’t mind consummating my first marriage — and smoked some cigarettes.  honestly i was getting a heavy attraction vibe from him but i wasn’t about to make a first move.  sadly, he eventually returned to all the female-only greek fandom that made up the rest of the small bar and that would be the end of the ollie and ashley tale.  after andi left, i was left sitting on a stool by myself in this near empty bar, where i chain smoked while ashing into an ashtray i situated on the stool next to me.  as the bar was in exarhia, less than a block away from me, i thought i’d stay a while.  at one point i actively conversed with said ashtray.  frankly, i’m not totally sure that that conversation even took place entirely in my head either.  i have no shame.  ashtray, you have stood by me through thick and thin in this crazy adventure so far.  i will not tarnish your name.  bad-dum-ching!

4.  i got a visa and bought my flight to beijing.

i leave a week from tomorrow (sunday) and  i’m staying with my bro until january 5.  i’d post more about this if i had more concrete things to say about it, but i’m not really there yet in my mental process.  i’m psyched to see carsick cars at a show they’re playing new year’s eve though.

5.  i’m having regular sex.

and when i say regular, i mean habitual, as there is nothing standard or run-of-the-mill about it.  it feels great to be an intensely sexual being again.  i’m simply delighted to remember how being a sexual object, totally at someone else’s mercy, can also coexist with intellectual respect, maturity, and most of all, fondness.  there was a time when those concepts were at odds with each other, that i couldn’t find a way to be both at the same time while also being honest.  i can feel a change happening now, and i have the thigh bruises and spotty sheets but also the long messages and political conversations to prove it.

with that i’ll close, as some of the next five relate to the events that have occurred in greece over the last week and it might take a bit longer to write those out.

missing you over here and rooting for you out there,
GERTIE