rabbit, rabbit, rabbit!

cooking in Breck. 

any ideas for a new project this month? i'm drying out. the people i love are traveling for the summer, and i am suffering a turbulent landing in what my pop's calls "bummer city" : ) cheeseball. 

ideas thus far: 

- try a new thing every day 

- compare & contrast 

- links and favorite internet artists/ favorite blogs 

unleash your creative forces and help me out! 

have a wonderful, safe weekend : ) 

I love: Papa, Marsha, Jeff.

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
when the road you’re trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest, if you must, but do not quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about,
When he might have won had he stuck it out;
Don’t give up though the pace seems slow—
You may succeed with another blow.

Often the goal is nearer than,
It seems to a faint and faltering man,
Often the struggler has given up,
When he might have captured the victor’s cup,
And he learned too late when the night slipped down,
How close he was to the golden crown.

Success is failure turned inside out—
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far,
So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit—
It’s when things seem worst that you must not quit.

I love: Money, Walshie, and Grama.

Money. 

 She is artistic, gentle, and British in her manner. Very proper. 

And extremely loving. Has a better eye for art, a more acute nose for the new, 

than any person I have ever met. 

Calls me "my darling" and "my love". 

Walshie and I. 

Grampa is a nut. He is a doctor, a smart but creative type, 

who marches to the beat of his own drum. His hero is Winston Churchill. 

Calls me "dear". 

Grama, Cassie, and Dad. 

Grama is a single gal living in Toronto. She flies to Las Vegas 

a few times a year. She has tons of friends. She always makes us 

oven pizza and serves bbq chips. We play cards and she secretly 

cheers me on. 

Calls me "Robin Ann".

I am blessed to have my grandparents in my life.

Who are your grandparents? What are they like?  

I love: poets of old.

A Valediction: Forbidden Mourning
John Donne

As virtuous men pass mildly away,
And whisper to their souls, to go,
Whilst some of their sad friends do say,
The breath goes now, and some say, no:

So let us melt, and make no noise,
No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move,
'Twere profanation of our joys
To tell the layetie our love.

Moving of th'earth brings harms and fears,
Men reckon what it did and meant,
But trepidation of the spheres,
Though greater far, is innocent.

Dull sublunary lovers love
(Whose soul is sense) cannot admit
Absence, because it doth remove
Those things which elemented it.

But we by a'love, so much refin'd
That we ourselves know not what it is,
Inter-assured of the mind,
Care less, eyes, lips, and hands to miss.

Our two soules therefore, which are one,
Though I must go, endure not yet
A breach, but an expansion,
Like gold to airey thinness beat.

If they be two, they are two so
As stiffe twin compasses are two,
Thy soul the fixt foot, makes no show
To move, but doth, if the'other do.

And though it in the center sit,
Yet when the other far doth roam,
It leans, and hearkens after it,
And grows erect, as it comes home.

Such wilt thou be to me, who must
Like th'other foot, obliquely run;
Thy firmness makes my circle just,
And makes me end, where I begun.

Oh, for the days of poetic devices! the conceit, the metaphor, the old (olde?) english spelling.

Two varieties of love in this poem: of the body or of the mind... of the body lovers need to be physically close to one another, otherwise their affection vanishes.

Donne's love is of the mind - untouched by distance and earthly concerns. Lovers of the mind live in a world of their own making.

The two lovers are like the two points of a compass. One point controls the other, and vice versa... Thy soul the fixt foot, makes no show, To move, but doth, if the'other do...

despite time, distance, strife, earth, heaven, death - ultimately the two lovers end where they begin: together.

I've only felt this way about one person.

How many loves do you think someone has in a lifetime?

I love: Edward Ruscha.

Twenty Six Gasoline Stations. 

Nine Swimming Pools and a Broken Glass, 1968.

Edward Ruscha is an American artist, still living!, who people associate with Pop Art.

I decided to include him in the I love series, because Southern California is a thematic thread running through most of his work –He has his finger on the vibe of LA in his book Every Building On the Sunset Strip – or his paintings Standard Station, Large Trademark, Hollywood.

I like Nine Swimming Pools and a Broken Glass, 1968. Perhaps the bland, banal, and neon images inspire memories of Florida – 

hot suburban days… the burn of bare feet on shellrock roads, the crunch of crab grass beneath 

a blanket… humid air smelling of chlorine, cut grass, and sulfer. 

What do you all think? Is this art, or are these dumb snapshots not worth your time?

I love: Dana May.

an old friend from my wolverine days, allow me to introduce you to miss dana may. 

I didn't grow up with pets. Well, I did have parakeets for a number of years, but that was an experience far different from the dog/cat tradition that it seems most Americans have at one point in their lives. While I would treat you all to the dramas of my childhood gang of budgies-Elvis, Roxanne, Snoopy, Woodstock, and Jimi-it would ultimately be self-indulgent, and no one seems to like parakeets anyway.

I have been thinking a lot about what having a pet does to/for a person. Having very little experience with both cats and dogs, I have only started interacting with them as an adult. I currently live with my girlfriend, whose house mate has a black mutt that she adopted while living in France a few years ago. Her name is Mistral, and I don't think she likes me much. Living with Mistral, and being partially responsible for her while the said roommate is away on vacation, leads me to constantly contemplate this institution of domesticated animal and its master. How the relationship is different for cats and dogs, who are "cat people" and "dog people," and why people get involved in owning them in the first place, among other related tangents on the subject.

Take the case of Mistral. She spends most of her days in the apartment by herself. She sleeps, she chews on a toy, she barks at the mailman or at any noises she hears. The highlight of her life that is not derived from human interaction is when she masturbates. She licks herself and then rubs her bitch-parts with her rather dexterous paw as she slides around in circles on the carpet. We have been witness to her self-loving, and find it to be her most redeeming quality. Yes, I may get short with her when she barks at black people, or presses her cold wet noise against me while I am trying to eat and watch TV. But her pursuit of pleasure exposes a deeper, complex desire that I can at once relate to and be impressed by her ingenuity to obtain it.

But there are aspects of domesticated animals and pet ownership that concern me, and would keep me from ever being a "pet person," or at least a "dog person." 

Every morning she waits anxiously for someone to take her out for a walk so she can take a shit. She depends on someone to fill up her food bowl in the morning. When she does go outside for those brief moments in between long stretches of boredom and sleeping, she is kept on a short leash that keeps her from exploring her over-stimulated senses. The leash tells her to walk where it has been designated as a walking space, on hard pavement that must hurt her paws. Her ancestors may have run through open fields in the French country side, or scavenged for food in the streets of the city, making alliances with some dogs and fighting it to the death with others. Now she lies on her side, trying to go to sleep to kill the hours of her day. What she receives in security she exchanges for her freedom.

We can relate to that, can't we? We pay taxes so that the government will pave our roads, educate our children, and buy lots of weapons to protect us from other people. We are layers upon layers of domesticated and coddled, constantly wrestling with our desires to be out of someone else's control and to live by our own determination. 

What are our leashes? Currently, mine are money, desire to start a career, wanting an apartment in a city where I can walk or ride my bike to a show. I remember a few years ago listening to an NPR report on pets in China. The government started to tax the growing middle class for their trend of buying a new class status marker-pets. The government said that they were charging because pet ownership is ultimately "reactionary," the act of taking away something's freedom for one's own amusement or other selfish reasons. Of course, the CCP looks for any opportunity to make some cash on its people, but it shows not only cultural and economic variance in what it means to be a pet owner, but the significance of choosing to be one. We domesticate some animals to harvest their flesh, milk, or eggs. We initially domesticated dogs to hunt, herd, and protect and cats to eat rats. Now what purpose do domesticated animals serve us now, to rich Chinese people, or to people in a modern, suburban, post-industrial setting?

I know Robin has a dog, and that he has been a rock for her at this point in her life. I am starting to understand and appreciate the role animals can play as companions to their master. It is here that the relationship is not so much about enslavement but about symbiosis. Yes, man does take an animal away from its natural state of the wild (which humans are much too detached from to ever return to, for better or for worse), but he provides the animal not only with food and shelter, but with love, and the animal returns the same. I do question still whether this love an animal exudes (it is never guaranteed, much like human love) is out of a state of mind similar to Stockholm syndrome or out of an actual capacity to love its owner. Perhaps its a mixture of both. Again, we are not so far removed from that state of affairs. 

Regardless, I do not mean to sound overtly critical of pet owners, because I have known a few such people who really connect with their pet on a level that shows tremendous capacity to relate and communicate with another sentient being, a capability which is void of selfishness and abuse of power. I commend those bonds, but sadly, they are less than the whole of pet-master arrangements.

My mom and dad never wanted to get a cat or dog when I was at the age to demand such a childhood/suburban living milestone. I understood vaguely then and clearly now how big of a responsibility pets are, how they alter your life and space, how they can be just as demanding and expensive as children without the hope that they will ever graduate from college or wipe your ass when you are old and gray. My mom had plenty of reasons, from her allergies to her desire to keep a germ-free house. But the biggest reason for her had more to do with growing up in the wide open spaces of the Western Upper Peninsula of Michigan. She grew up seeing dogs hunt with their owners on a regular basis, living outside and being allowed to run and bark and be dogs. I imagine she was pretty disgusted moving from suburb to suburb with my father and I, seeing expensive designer dogs pent up in houses and cages all day, reduced to furry accessories that had to have their poop picked up off the grass on a daily basis. She talks now about getting a dog when they retire up North, how she will let it run free and be as close to a wolf as it wants to be. But, as both my dad and I know her, she will most likely become overprotective of it, and spoil it with fatty people food and be scared to let it out because of the risk of it being hit by a car or stolen. She knows this about herself, that she would as an owner be unable to let the dog be free, for it would go beyond the definition of their relationship, would be emotionally and logically nonsensical. Because of her inability to reconcile these conflicting feelings of wishing boundless freedom for animals and the human nature of love tangled with possessiveness, she will go petless. I am too young to say that I will never be with a pet, but it will be a reconceptualization of self and priorities, and just like many young couples before me, it may just break me in for a child. But that is another subject to dissect via blog ramble (on my own turf, again, thank you Robin for your generosity).

I have been focusing on dogs mostly, probably because I am living with one now, but I have considered cats as a potential future pet. I got a bad impression of them at first when an ex worked to domesticate a feral one. But all and all, cats seem like less upkeep, use the bathroom, and need less attention than dogs. That sounds like more my style. But then there is all that hair! And I did inherit my momma's allergies. I will have the rest of my life to think about the meaning of pets, most aptly as I watch Mistral squat to make a turd, and before I have to use all my nerve to pick up her shit, and gather all my energies to make sure my hand is fully covered in plastic...

dana: i am not a dog person, i am a sampson specific person. you will have to meet him - he will change your view on pets and domestication forever! cross my heart.

and thank you for your post, i find it funny, intellectually stimulating, and a further insight into your personality! <3 

I love: the Walsh cousins.

Ryan wrote this for Money and Grampa Walsh. I don't have pictures of some of the cousins, but here are some I could scratch up! These are the kids from my Mum's side of the family. 

Look at PJ and those little blue eyes,

It’s hard to believe all those years have gone by.

He’s our little Mozart, but he plays the guitar,

But now he’s in Ottawa studying afar.

He still comes to visit us from time to time,

When he brings his guitar it’s simply sublime!

Here is Shannon, who always makes us smile,

To make someone laugh she’d go half a mile.

She loves sports, school and all things living,

And her personality? Talk about forgiving!

She rarely frowns even when life is bittersweet,

If there’s a sad person any where, it’s Shannon they should meet! 

Oh there goes Jayme in a flash,

Make fun of basketball and you two will clash.

She does every sport whether it’s skiing or dance,

Put her on your team and the other has no chance.

When you watch her play, she really is cool,

And to top it all off she does really well in school! 

Right next to her is Ryan, with a smile ear to ear,

Need something done? Ask without fear.

He’d rather you’re happy when he’s around

He also has hair that is curly and brown.

Ryan lives next-door so you see him a lot,

In fact here he comes now I wonder what he brought? 

Look here’s Robin the oldest grand kid,

She’s been everywhere she even spent a year in Madrid.

Robin doesn’t even know the meaning of fear,

She never backs out; she’ll be first to volunteer.

Right now she’s in L.A. finishing school,

We all love Robin she’s our precious little jewel. 

Yay! It’s Cassie, our little dancing star,

Right now she’s in Michigan which isn’t that far.

We all love to see her when we get the chance,

We get flash backs to when she was little and learning to dance.

It’s great to know Cassie; she’ll always be nice,

She never is mad; she’ll make you laugh twice. 

In this photo it’s Jack she is smiling like always,

She’s been all over the place, but it’s California nowadays.

She grew up so fast! It really is funny,

But she still makes sure that she calls Walshie and Money.

If she goes anywhere, I guarantee she’ll have a blast,

Our love for Jackie is gonna last and last. 

Whoosh! There goes Ben at fifty miles an hour,

He just loves life; his mood is never sour.

He can always find something fun for you to do,

Whether it’s building a tower or paddling a canoe.

He lives out in Calgary but in the summer he comes here,

And when he does we all laugh so hard we are in tears. 

Look it’s Emma; she’s reading a book,

Her personality is as warming as a Chinook.

She really is fun to be around,

Need a friend she’ll pick you up off the ground.

We love to see Emma each summer season,

She’s always happy just for no reason! 

Hey! It’s Troy, he really is funny,

He is the newest grand child of Walshie and Money.

He’s tons of fun and smiles all day long,

They say he looks like Brad Pitt, which isn’t that wrong.

He really knows his stuff when it comes to cars,

He really is a great friend of ours. 

Here is Theresa; very loving and kind,

She’s nice to everyone, she won’t leave you behind.

Right now she’s in England, which is far away,

But in our hearts she will always stay.

She might be new to the family but it’s like she’s been here forever,

It’s a pleasure to know her she really is clever. 

Poem by: Ryan, for Money and Walshie : )

I love: Cassandra M.

introducing my sister, Cassie.

cassie, me

this is scribbled on the back of the picture of both of us:

Cassie: gentle/fat/happy/ giggles a lot/ likes classical music

Robin Ann: (2 years) likes to party/ rowdy/

can beat up any kid in the neighbourhood/

stays up later than her Daddy

Where do you live?

Evanston, Chicago, go to Northwestern.

Who are your favorite sisters?
Well, I do have all my tridelta ones that I pay every quarter for : ). JK. You two of course.


What is your favorite Dorset, Canada memory?
Hmmmm. This is a Shanty Bay one: but I remember when the Tornado ripped down like 8
hundred-year-old trees...one MASSIVE one randomly plopped into the lake like a sort of
god-given dock and we got to spend days hopping around on its limbs until Uncle Chris
sawed it up...The cottage was great too; being 8 years old and playing “property”...selling
and buying rocks with leaves...We got very competitive with it...Dad’s influence perhaps?
...ahhh and who could forget “the shed”: an old electrical hub we found mid-woods and
spend days swinging on electric cords....wow there are too many options really


What is your favorite Bobism? (quote from our Dad)
Toughie, because the man speaks in proverbs...maybe “optimists wake up and say good
morning god. Pessimists wake up and say Good God Morning!”. I use one of his quotes
almost every day for some situation in my life...Or actually, here’s a clip of my most recent
conversation within him:

“Robert McIntosh” (10:22:00 AM): going to read for a while before flying, enjoy this day,
the present!
cassiej1488 (10:22:41 AM): thanks dad! haha where did that come from
“Robert McIntosh” (10:22:58 AM): the grace
cassiej1488 (10:23:38 AM): ahah
cassiej1488 (10:23:46 AM): a book?
“Robert McIntosh” (10:23:56 AM): are you on your i phone!
cassiej1488 (10:24:23 AM): haha nope the mac
“Robert McIntosh” (10:24:58 AM): what's past is history, what's future mystery, today is a
gift that's why its called the present
cassiej1488 (10:25:30 AM): yeah i agree
cassiej1488 (10:25:38 AM): i actually think someone stole my phone when i was out again
cassiej1488 (10:25:42 AM): but i am waiting on it
“Robert McIntosh” (10:25:59 AM): how's Devin
“Robert McIntosh” (10:26:56 AM): I just called your # and got a message saying that they
are not accepting calls at this time!

THOUGHTS:
*What is “the grace”, seriously?
*How did I get so lucky to have such great parents? What kind of parent doesn’t blow up at
their child for losing her phone again...


Who do you like better, Picasso or Chagall?
Picasso

If you weren't a Libra, what would you be?
Gemini probs. I bury my emotions. Perhaps an Aquarius for my quirkiness and
independence, but I think I'm more attached then most aquariuses.

Who are the five closest people to you?
I am also excluding family because that would take up four spots.

Devin Drowley, Sara Parker, Katie and Liv, Beth, Pam and Lily, Kirstin and Nicole, lot of
different little groups im close with

Where have you lived?

Florida! Breckenridge! Canada!

Evanston, Ill: Allison Hall, Tridelta Sorority House (yikes!!!), Park Evanston, Evanston Place,
Public Affairs Residential College: it’s been a long run here
Salamanca, Spain
Madrid, Spain
COSTA RICA WITH THE JACKIE


What is your boyfriend, Devin, like?
Haha. Well...Devin is a wonderful, grounded, intelligent engineer with a conscience of steel
and a heart of gold. I hope he will be in my life for a long time, at the very least as a great
inspiring friend.. BUT my biggest fear is being seen as a big mushy codependent unit with
him so I try not to talk about him much...

I don’t believe that romantic relationships should
be the driving force in ones identity. Obviously, I feel very very strongly about this issue : )
I’m grateful for Devin but also for all the wonderful kaleidoscope of stimulating people in
my life and would like to emphasize that.

What are three things I don't know about you?
-I’ve traded a lot of my old quirks for new ones. I don’t ask thousands of hypothetical
questions any more or flip a coin when it comes to decisions...I do a bunch of other weird
OCD things now which I won't detail here hahaha.
-i'm a huge flirt. w/ both guys and girls.
-I love winter...snow flurries falling like “polite confetti over a the dark surf of lake
Michigan”, waking up to a new white-crystalled world, ice slips, wind tunnels, love it all. I'll
complain like everyone else but I secretly hope it lasts till april.


What are some additional things readers should know about your personality?
-Like Jack, I’m super sensitive as well. I’m also a sucker for flattery...sometimes I take
form over function and beauty over honesty....I like delusion: I’m working on that....also
being worked on: when I’m offended I whip out a cutting McIntosh trained tongue that
could probably rival robin's. It gets me into trouble.

A little more about Cass: she is one of the most interesting and inspiring people I know. She is unusually intelligent, always has been, and is piercing in her observations. We don't talk daily, like Jackie and I, but we might as well, because when we do talk it feels as though no time has passed. We share the same voice, and a lot of the same mannerisms. We used to pretend we were twins. I absolutely love her- she's my sister and my best friend!

Just out of curiosity: do you find us similar? I always thought we had

similar writing styles.

I love: Mands.

amanda pushing me around...

yes, I had the world's largest noggin...

this was on my dorm room wall -

middle school, two cool kids on a train.

in college, at the lox.

Amanda is my oldest friend - allegedly she was in the hospital waiting room when I was boring (so says mum).

Would I be friends with her had our parents not been friends? Probably not. But, then again, who knows… maybe yes. Perhaps our friendships are marked beforehand – before before - despite changes in the plot.

She is kind and strong, wise and loyal. She looks at the world clearly, in color, and helps me when all I can see is black and white. We will never not be friends, and that knowledge is the stuff of great friendships.

& company:

I would feel remiss if I didn’t pay homage to the rest of the clan. Amanda’s brothers and sisters, my almost-cousins. Sara: strong, Adam: hilarious, and Carmel is… Carmel is unique.

& the parents:

My almost-Uncle and almost-Aunt. My second pair of parents. Now they have been friends with my parents for... well Sabina and Dad went to high school together. So basically when dinosaurs roamed the earth.

I love you, mands: )

Later: Post about Cassie M.

Crazy "Micky" left 40 comments on my last post, so I had to update, although I am still waiting on Cassie - my other sister. 

Do any of you have the Micky problem? 

I love: Diane Arbus

I was 14 years old. Living in Toronto, at BSS, the boarding school where my Mum was sent (banished?) when she was in her teens. I was so impressionable, so unworldly, and so profoundly lost. I saw this photograph and I fell head over heels for a woman named Diane Arbus. 

She infuses her work with delicate humor and dark self deprecation. 

I think it was love at first sight, for me, because with rare exception she photographed people. She focuses on the unique and the individual, specifically people found on society’s fringes.

The epitome of suburban life. That kid in the background is me. 

John Szarkowski, Director of Photography at MOMA from 1962-1991, wrote about Arbus privileging private above social realities, triumphing courage above subtlety.

Recently there was a movie about her, called FUR? Did anyone see it? 

Is it worth seeing? 

I don't want to subject myself to any view of Diane Arbus 

that differs from my 14 year old star vision.