Money money money. // Flowers and Sparkles~

So much frustration.

What an adult thing...now I have to bootleg together some contract but its nice to get some order.

I am not being cheated out of $350. I need to tell Leena to use my deposit as my last month's rent and to use that bullshit $25 application fee for utilities.

I printed out all my records and I need confirmation from her that it's true because I don't have a landlady, just a Leena taking my money and giving it to the properties manager/landlady. I need some legal back up, and to make up my own contracts and get this shit clear.

So much frustration. Then I get a bitchy hysterical message from Leena on Facebook after our 1am exhausted confrontation where I told her very calmly that I was not used to people walking into my room and opening my closets.

Highlights are:

"

• • Dude, I really DIDN'T touch any of your stuff - it is false and misleading - slanderous at least - I showed you something on the wall when your door was OPEN and we were talking.... Albeit I didn't ask for permission to point at your closet wall - if you dont like this situation maybe you should consider moving out??? Do you want that??
    
    ..... I dont appreciate the FB remarks... seriously and the hostility when i haven't done anything to you intentionally or made you unsafe in anyway"
    
    
    The rest of the facebook exchange was a lot more calm at least but yes. Can't wait for the finances discussion.
    
    
    And Fardeen is a crazy person, getting me flowers and sending them to the office. getting the whole world to come to my cubicle to ooh and ahh.
    "oh so pretty!!"
    "ooh they smell so nice"
    "who are they from?"
    "what's that thing (the seedpod)"
    "im so jealous, i dont get flowers!"
    "awww that's so sweet, enjoy it while it lasts, once a relationship
    gets really long they stop doing things like this"
    her: so your boyfriend got those for your anniversary? how many years?
    me: 3 months
    her: 3 MONTHS? that is adorable! 3 months...wowww what a winner.
    
    
    haha
    
    
    then on the bus wait (augh with the 1 just driving past me and making me wait for the 5:49pm), i talked to corey, who told me about how fardeen messaged him for the address of the building
    i got on the bus and this 17 year old comes up to me, hands me a pink flower and says "you are beautiful" and walks to the back of the bus and sits.
    i thanked him, put it behind my ear and listened to music.
    i got home and about 20 minutes, nica and autumn pull up to my house
    we go to their house and i see the new perler beads and leftover food from july 4th
    nica, autumn, nick and i head over to max's salon (Volume Hair Studio) and each of us got a new do
    autumn got her hair dyed dark red, gold tinsel'd and curled like a divas
    nica got to dye her hair black and get weird short bangs
    nick got a trim and a feather attached to his hair
    and i now have silver and blue tinsel
    
    
    it was fun being in the huge studio and watching nick play witht he three ball and a string
    nica sat in the orange hairdying chair with a trashy mag and looked absolutely priceless. she also told me the best story about how she found a child of the earth (see jerusalem cricket and ALIEN BEE ANT THING) in her house and trapped it in a cup, left it for the night with a note on it saying "This is a bug."
    
    
    after all the prettifying, we went to Dennys and gorged. i had bacon, chicken patty, hashbrowns, and two eggs sunny side up. soo much food and good conversations and times :)
    
    
    kind of makes me forget that i come back to a place of passive aggression and tension.

Mandarin Lime Soda~

nica's chocolate has turned up. from where? no one will ever know. This is a 3-week old bag of chocolate from somewhere. Hopefully from the fridge.

Woke up, took the bus, overloaded my ears with Nicki Minaj haha

Staff meeting: haggard. natural light did not help

Lunch: BLTA (with avocado yum) and mandarin lime soda. and i bought an "indian girl paper doll" bc the irony was too delicious..

and it goes back to shit. so much anger, then sadness, then floated within myself and let it go. and then it got better.

left work early, ill finish my project tomorrow yay i guess

but jhane and gomeo need to find a time, not me. i am not the middle person for this.

i do not have enough text messaging power for this.

shut the fucking power box up with a piece of decorative duct tape (thanks to christine for having decorative duct tape)

then leena proceeded to piss me off

"oh there'll be some students coming by to look at the space for when the school year starts up"

"i don't like it either, but i need to make sure someone will move in after you"

"to really save water and energy, just use the dishwasher and dry your clothes outside"

"i have time now, because im busy for the rest of the time, it filled up"

and the two kickers:

"oh so when utilities for august come in september, tiffany, i'll just keep your damage deposit and deduct it from that AND THEN send it to you"

"well thats what I did with Astrea and she just took the money and left."

"well i haven't ripped you off yet"

"oh there's all this damage--" (waltzes into my room, and OPENS MY CLOSETS AND LOOKS AT IT FOR A GOOD TWO SECONDS)

fucking. bitch.

and then hostile facebook status. hostile words with the most passive aggressive way of expressing it.

best burn: "IT'S SUMMER IN THE DESERT BITCH, YOU'RE JUST FAT"

and the creaking started again.

okay, house, i get it. i do live in a haunted prison. im just gonna do my time, keep my shit safe, and try to keep sane

Happy birthday America, please don't set Santa Fe more on fire.

Woke up kind of early, waited around until about 11 or noon

Went out to Burrito Spot with Christine and enjoyed some horchata and an adobada taco

Talked for a long time again, but it's always fun with stories about drug dealers, Cici's Pizza, and Memphis as a city.

my boss is weird...inviting me out to flagstaff for the hopi weekend as a joke ( 6 hour car ride with bruce? hmm...), laguna pueblo to meet two artists with another colleague (not as sketch but he gave me 15 minutes notice so no), and then dances at cochiti (but then didnt give me times or anything...) weird....

Had Christine drop me off (in her cute lime green volkswagen beetle) at (Marie)Lena's house, where Tailinh, her boys, and her husband Hermann were grilling burgers, having fun with the sprinklers. Gael was crouched down, looking at the ants, with his babysitter Briana looking after him (who is a senior at Santa Fe High). Lena's uncle and cousin were there, as well, and the cousin and Herman were talking about tacos for a very very long time.

Good burgers, jack cheese, tomato, potato salad, avocado, sweet dark cherries, cherry vanilla creme soda (yum), and cupcakes. Oh Whole Foods haha

Played and read with Gael who at one point climbed onto my lap, and kept tugging me away when I was trying to take photos of Micah

Lena's cousin and uncle gave me a ride home, and I will never cease to take amusement in the reaction to the road that is Acequia de las Joyas.

About to go out for Nica's shindig at her house with Christine. Should be fun times for everyone.

To do:

- check mailbox for invoice

- call Tricore for discount on invoice

- call Allison the librarian about the catalogue

- start research on Pitseolak, Napachie, and Annie

- pick a date for road trip and just GO lol

edited:

Went to Nica's with Christine in her little Beetle, chilled with Nica, Autumn, Nick, Max, Dylan, and then Billy, Melissa, and Zach. Ribs on the grill, hamburgers, hotdogs, white corn, pisola(sp), beer with lime, kool-aid, iced tea, strawberries, melons, cupcakes with sparklers, and of course, the bag of franzia.

Cooked, chatted, went on the roof (oh god I hate heights..) at like 8 to watch the fireworks shooting from Santa Fe High. It went on for 30 minutes, and we kept yelling all things Americans: "Independence! Wal-mart! Meat!" etcetc.

The scary part was that you could legit see the forest fire, red flames and all, on the edge of the mountain, and it moved across the landscape since it started.

So much food, so much eating. Good people, good times :)

Nica: SO YOU'RE GONNA SHANK WITH A SHIV IS THAT IT? IS THAT A WHITE WAY OF SHANKING?

Aaand i have an endtable from Nica. All I need are blinds and my room is so set haha

Gotta love life's moments and enjoy good company

That and MEAT is what July 4th is all about I guess haha

Taos-Bound

So much creaking.

It's not the moonlight that's so disruptive. It's the sounds of the power box and gate just creaking and moaning in pain from the wind.

Went to Taos with Nica and Nick, which was fun. Got to see Nick's gallery Taos Connection

- toy store--little tokidoki cactus pup and charm thing :)

- fabric store

- the "I Am" "painting"

- mcdonalds lunch and pokemon TOYS!! (zorua? and spivey?)

- drive back, nice conversation and landscape

= smoke vs. clouds

- "He's just a pig, there are just pigs like that." - about Bruce

- cute mouse sticker on my phone

- rain rain rain rain rain sweet sweet rain

- got home and had a great fun conversation with Christine from literally 6pm to 11:30pm

- dinner of picante ramen, veggie pattie with swiss cheese and honey mustard with pomegranate limeade yum.

- my hair is weird.

fun night, i just should remember to keep my phone near me

"During my stay I found that New Mexicans are quite strange" - Nick

Fucking. child of the earth, jerusalem cricket.

Three-legged cricket is living under the stove

Spiders galore. I'm gonna have nightmares about the black widow. I'm pretty sure I had one last night.

Woke up late, to a text from Nica and an email from Bruce

Bruce gave me 15 minute notice about going to Laguna Pueblo to meet two artists with him and Gabe and Gabe's wife, which i declined for many reasons

Amanda came by to pick up everything and yet didn't say hi. It felt like a ghost took all of the stuff, her entire presence is gone from this space.

Christine is cool, I'm learning more about her. Half Filipina, from Memphis, college freshman at Santa Fe University of Art and Design. Just got out of a relationship with a 30-something year old, worked at a pizza buffet. Things will be very interesting because she's a cool chick and I don't feel the need to "student fellow" her, no matter how hard Leena wants me to.

Nica picked me up and took me to Jackalope, and I bought a nice small necklace for myself. This creepy old tanned man (part black, Nica says) said "I like the streak in your hair" and Nica said "oh thanks." A few minutes later we're looking at the necklaces and she notices the same guy crouching beside her, with his palm upward and his phone camera on his hand. She immediately goes "WHAT THE FUCK MAN, ARE YOU TAKING A PICTURE UP MY SKIRT?" and the guy gets up, and tries to play it off cool, putting his phone up to his ear and pretends to take a call, saying "no, i was answering my phone." And Nica persisted, saying "no, you were taking a PICTURE UP MY SKIRT," letting the others in the store start staring. Of course what happened was very uneventful, no fiery characters were around to step in. A few minutes later, the guy's still pretending to be on his cellphone and says "I really was answering my phone" and Nica tells me "yeah okay, get the fuck away from me." Crazies. Total. crazies.

This is why humanity can't have nice things. There's always someone who ruins it.

After that, we still went around Jackalope, which was a huge outdoors market, reminding me of Udelnaya in Cankt-Peterbourg (Санкт Петербоург) but there were PRAIRIE DOGS! :)))

Sooo cute! Pictures up later, but they were in a little area with a sand mound with a sculpture of St. Francis de Assisi on top, as though talking to the doves.

Huuuge market, must go back for souvenirs and kitschy galore.

Nica went in to buy a cactus or venus flytrap and decided cacti would last longer--she bought a small red one (kind of). There were no cashiers so we walked out with it. Eh haha

After that we dropped by AutoZone again for another run

And then we went on to going to Dante/Zack/Sheena's house, which had a really old colonial stove. It was definitely reminiscent of a shitty TH, a space that has seen too many parties. Got high, met this guy that Nica is crushing on hard and yet is completely clueless. He reminds me of Nick but a more oblivious version that can't stop and listen and read signals. Dante was nice and cute even if he did remind me at first of Chris Bando in terms of looks, but yeah he was nice. He is apparently the son of the Native artist Shonto Begay, and is Dine, and was on Sesame Street when he was 4. "The Life of a Navajo Boy," the special was called. Oh sigh.

After having a beer and a hit at their house, Nica and I went to Burrito Spot and I tried chincharron. It was interesting, but definitely just pork fat. I've never had it but it was good. Though I think for the same of my half I'll stick to real meaty meat for future meals.

Went back to her house to eat, plant the cactus, talk to Nick and then eventually Max and Dylan came. I don't remember half the conversation because I'm tipsy right now but I know I learned to play the game Space Bag Tetherball which involves taking out the bladder bag of wine that is Franzia, slapping it, then drinking from it hanging above your head. Certainly makes it taste better, for whatever reason. We also had $2 pizza and french silk pie, which was delicious, but maybe that's the tipsy talking.

I know at one point I mentioned God of War, and that's when Dylan pointed at me and said "I like this girl." Ha. He was nice to me for the rest of the night, filling my glass of wine but outlining that he was not pressuring me to drink but to let me have something for my tiny body to sip on. Best moment was when he said that "oh it's always the best friends that leave. Like, they came and they adapt and you fall in love with them and then they go, before you find out all the shit and flaws. And you just remember them as good friends" haha yay?

I wore a panda hat of Nick's for the majority of the night, which was nice.

I need to find more music, I need to look up "Kerli," and "Army of Love."

I also need to go into the desert to see stars

Tomorrow Im going into Taos to take photos and go to a toy store with Nica nad Nick

I need to call Tailinh and ask if she needs a babysitter to take her kids to the Children's Museum

Bruce asked if I'd be interested in going to the dances at Cochiti tomorrow, but I don't know how I quite feel about that without formal information and knowing who is going, how long it will take.

I might text Amanda but who knows, we have our paths to follow

And I hope to bond more with my 18 year old housemate, she seems really nice and interesting

July 4th weekend~

Whiplash//REAL BED//Prison

I tried getting to La Fonda to say hi to Autumn but i barely missed her :(

I got off work at 2, and on the way to meeting Corey at the Inn at the Anasazi Bar, I saw Nick doing his public art thing, drawing a cool caricature of a little boy in space. I def want one haha

Had a pomegranate martini with Corey, talked about New York and art and such. Such a nice guy haha

Caught the 3:19 bus home, and found Amanda and Laura (?) finishing up the load. Certainly interesting dynamic and conversation. Felt sad as Amanda packed up and left. A few minutes later Leena comes in to tell me that our new housemate is moving in 2 hours (enough time for me just to get my stuff into Nica/Amanda's old room).

I haven't felt like I've exhaled completely yet. So much rage built up over the situation, the lack of breathing time just to really absorb everything, awe at how quickly everything moved and i can't help but feel a sense of dread. Going 10mph is the safest, but 60mph wasn't life threatening. 120 mph and having an 18 year old african american college freshman move in with a 21 year old asian american trying to just sit out her 2 month sentence and a 33 year old canadian tsimshian filmmaker who is a mess.......

My life is a big fucking joke. A beacon of crazy events strung together. Of course there's order in this chaos in ridiculous ways.

In the last three weeks, three women have moved out.

I personally have moved into every single room in this house except the livingroom and kitchen which are now back to bare.

This house has had "every race": mexican, white, asian, native american, and now black. My bitter self thinks we're just a few seconds away from recording the worst Village People covers.

I just hope she's nice

You can't control life.

"I'm a New York woman, born to run you down
...
Something, something about just knowing when it's right"

My attitude towards the future with Leena. Thanks Lady Gaga (ha!)

Early start, took a while going around and around on St. Michael's near the Vincent Medical complex trying to find just the right building. Eventually I found my way and I got the blood drawn, only took about 5 minutes total to check in. The guy was nice, made a good amount of conversation to get my mind off the needle. Blood test, check, done what's next?

Amanda drove me to work and I stopped by the French cafe for an iced tea and a biscochito :)

Well I'm at work, looking over what I've done, what I need to do. A lot of waiting, essentially.

In the meantime, I guess it's time for me to really fully write out just how different I feel being here as a person and the people responsible. In this entry will be the two amazing women named Nica and Amanda, who are currently in my life as "former housemates," but that title does no justice to the influence and effect they've imprinted on the very fabric of who I am.

Nica is such a down to earth, practical, hands-on and strong woman. She lets things roll off her back and she keeps her rhythm consistently forward, never looking back. Anyone who lives by the adage that "money is money, you can always get more if you need it" is something that immediately stuck with me. Her creativity and energy expels from her physical body as she creates, changes the environment around her without even a trace of doubt. She's so strong and practical that she takes every obstacle in stride, does her best, and moves forward. For all this and more, I was so surprised yesterday when she told me that I had my shit together more than she does, and that I should be giving her advice on life even being 5 years younger. And honestly I think I learned so much about being firm and flexible in a way that showed me that you can retain your youth, enjoy it, and not have to jump into the idea of "full independence" and "full adulthood" feet first and not expect to fall down constantly. You can survive on very little material, so all you can do is keep yourself happy the only way you know how. I remember one of Nica's profile pictures is just of her legs and seeing that many cuts and bruises at first seemed so startling. But getting to know her, that's how she does. She throws her body into every moment, lies on the dirt to take that perfect photograph of the burnt tree, lets her hands get covered in epoxy as she fills floor cracks, and yeah there are scars, bruises, and cuts, but they all heal and don't stop her from doing what she does. I wish I could even have a fraction of Nica's confidence and creative imagination and physical ability to just shape and make things. I really respect her audacity and her ability to see things for what they are and not let much get to her despite all of her obstacles and inner turmoil. She taught me that being an "adult" is relative and that you can live independently and with others but all that matters is that you deal with what you're given and you make more if you have to. No one else will make you change your ways, only you. And I thank her for letting me really enjoying fun in a way that I was told was too "immature" and "unproductive." I thank her for all that she shared with me--everything from peanut butter and bread, to her friends, to her thoughts, to her art, to her past, to her present, and to being a source of support and fun that I will continue to enjoy and grow with during my time in Santa Fe. She is the source of so many of my laughs and lighthearted moments that remind me that it's okay to be young, fall down and get up, and enjoy the things I do all over again and even more than before.

And dear Amanda, the woman who will make "gypsy hippie" statements and then call them "gypsy hippie." In so many ways she is the opposite of Nica in that she understands and thinks in terms of abstraction to really flesh out a rich inner life and peace. Moderator and generator is right. This woman gets what she needs done. Yes we all have our problems, addictions, and consequences from bad decisions made in the past that affect us all, but all you can (and should) do is be proud of your decisions and to take your obstacles in stride within yourself and then affect the change externally around you. To make a home does not necessarily change the space's aura, but at least to follow through and put up that mirror (even if it shatters within an hour and then falls apart in a matter of days), cover up the nasty couch, is way ahead of leaving things bare. Because with every moment, every active expellation of energy, you are just that much more experienced, more knowledgeable, and stronger. I see her fire, I only have heard that it was once a bit out of control because of the idea that social anxiety was something to be torn down with numbing agents, but my perception of Amanda is of such calm and strength that I have never found in anyone else in my life. It is always so lovely to meet someone who is at peace with where they are, what they do, and Amanda takes it to a whole other level with her demeanor which is so calm, and yet firm. She patiently waits, she stands her ground, and she knows herself so well that I knew from the beginning that I would internalize her calm, quiet strength in my own demeanor. She lets herself free, her fire burn at just the right moments. And at the end of the day, she challenges me to relax (if that makes sense) and deconstruct in that she lets me do things for the first time, which include a hike (so physically challenging but provides a peace that I've never been able to experience in the urban concrete jungle), massage (letting my muscles be moved, to keep myself limber even if I have really tight skin) and even a face mask (which heals only after it completely dries and cracks which is stressful for my skin). Her compassion and nurturing nature is so apparent when she does anything--give me a ride to the grocery store or clinic to be tested, writing a poem, offering sheets and hangers, or even watering and taking care of her plants. I hope Prudence comes back home just as she is returning to hers. I thank her for providing a calm, supportive, and sympathetic nature for me to draw strength from in my darkest and chaotic times here in Santa Fe and for letting me relax but challenge myself at the same time. I am grateful for everything she's shared with me on a spiritual and philosophical level; I've learned so much from her about her, about me, and about calm compassion, and loveliness in general.