New Year, New Blog.

In the tradition of moving more than once a year, I've moved:

My URL:
http://www.myspace.com/happy_lucky_suki

My Blog URL:
http://blog.myspace.com/happy_lucky_suki

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!!

Growing Up Crazy.

Remember when you were a child or teenager, and you thought that all adults were out of their minds? I mean, there's the smoochie aunt or the drunk uncle or the mallrat mom and the golf-mad dad. The science fiction fan cousin who walked around with a propellor beanie? How about that wacky vegan who has to bring her own food everywhere, and make everyone feel bad about eating turkey on Thanksgiving?

Did you think they were all nuts? They were.

I am pretty sure now, that when one grows up, part of it is becoming completely crazy. I have refused to do it so far--I'm 34 now--but I don't think I'll be able to hold off for much longer. For a little while I thought I was going to be able to choose what kind of crazy I was--shall I be a voracious and compulsive shopper like my mom or a workaholic like my dad? Shall I be one of those crazy creative types--who is completely unstable and disagreeable, except for the fact that they write or paint sometimes.

The other day I was reading a great book called The Midnight Disease, which is about hypergraphia, and what it means to writer's block. (I've had writer's block for quite some time. I was never very prolific in the first place--not with what I consider "real writing" anyway. Real writing is novels, screenplays, short stories, articles, etc., anything that one would show an editor, anything one could sell.) Hypergraphia is a "mental illness" where one compulsively writes. Dostoevsky had it, and so did a number of other famous and prolific writers from around the world. And poets. It can be caused by epilepsy in the temporal lobe, or by manic-depression. The book was written by a woman who was in a mental institution, and surrounded by writers. She decided that one needs to be a little crazy to write. Duh.

I really don't think I have any choice in the kind of crazy I shall be. I shall be one of those cranky artists, I believe. The stereotypes are true--oversexed and drunk and lazy and agitated. Yeah, it sounds interesting and all, but it's not that fun. I really don't want my nuttiness to hurt other people, like mom's and dad's hurt me. But I don't think I really have much choice in the matter.

What kind of crazy will you be when you grow up? Comments welcome.

Reproducibility

My dad, an engineer, always got on my case about reproducibility and consistency in my art and writing when I was a kid. He would basically tell me that if I couldn't make work of the same quality and style over and over again that I was not a real artist and writer, my stuff would never be salable--I would never be paid for my work.
That is probably not a fair standard for a child or teen, who is exploring different media, learning how it all works, and making mistakes.
Having been in editorial, I have to say it is true in the adult world of writing and illustration. You basically have to be able to churn out the same good stuff in the same style over and over again--give them what they bought or thought they bought when they saw your samples.
I remember one day at Marvel we got in some pages from an artist, and the editor flipped out. He was pink with rage--which was very difficult as he was a dark Italian man--and on the phone immediately. "I paid you to draw like you!" he yelled, "and not practice being Steve Ditko ON MY TIME!" I looked at the art--it did look like Ditko had done it, and not like the rest of the book.
The same is true for editorial, of course. Readers come back to see the same thing all the time, and at the same intervals. I probably lost many readers when I was unable to write a daily blog anymore. And I probably lost even more when I switched from consistently writing about sex and love to other things. But what can I do? My work has always been a reflection of my feelings and my exploration of the world. I wonder how Charles Burns or Matt Groenig thinks about his work that makes him able to consistently churn out the same stuff?

Classmates.com is not for people hold grudges. I just look at those ads and think, well, if you didn't want to hang out with me then, why would you want to hang out with me now? Because you're a salesman?

I only dated one guy from my high school. Actually, "dated" is too strong a word. We had sex in a field a few times. That's it. All it gave me was a strong affinity for certain kinds of moss.

I was the weird girl at my school. I was unapologetic about having lots of partners from other schools and grown-up partners, when I turned sexy at 16 years old. It was an abrupt change. I went from being a frumpy, attempting-to-be-preppy girl as a sophomore, to a very sexy, if suicidal, girl as a junior. I was unapologetic about my suicidal tendencies too--but they didn't lock me in an institution. My parents had to send me to therapy though, or social services was going to take me away from them.

I should be a grown-up and forgive all the kids who shunned me. They were probably just terrified. Right.

Update.

I got back with my old boyfriend. My last one. The editor Drongo, who can look a little like a woodland fawn aspect of Satan. I did it because he promised me he would be a better man, a true partner to me. I also did it because I miserable without him. I was in no shape to be with everyone else. I cried daily, often on the ferry ride home from work.

I am sick and tired of "love" or the finding of it, anyway.

Onto the next adventure.

The apple doesn't fall far enough from the...

My mom came to visit me. Yes, I do have a mother. She was, in her day, far more sexy and adventurous than me: she looked like a combination of Kim Novak in "Bell, Book and Candle" and that chic from the Avengers (which one? the more sexy, powerful looking one of course) and took a tour of the iron curtain countries in the early 1960's. Well, anyways, everyone loves her, because she is so sweet and giving and eccentric, but of course, she is very hard to endure--I mean live with, for those of us close to her.
I won't go into the bamboo incident or the thistle crisis here, but I have often wished I was her neighbor, rather than her daughter, so I could appreciate her like everyone else does.
Anyway, she collects ugly things in her home: skulls of animals, cheap and ugly busts of witches, long-armed monkey tie racks. In fact, itwas the purchase of the long-armed brass monkey tie rack with plastic emerald eyes that I first questioned. My mom hung it up at eye level on a door molding about 22 years ago--and I asked her why she bought it--not why she hung it there, for every square inch of her home was covered with other ugly stuff-- and she turned to me and said in a drunken roar, "I bought it because it was ugly."
I never understood what she was going after until today, when I almost bought an ugly clock with a red rooster on the face. I almost bought it because it was ugly--and the most interesting thing in the store.

The New Misogyny

So, I'm reading the Caleb Carr book, Killing Time, and while it is interesting--about conspiracy theory from the conspirator's point-of-view--it has one of the worst-written women in history, outside of a comic book.

Literally, the woman acts like a guy with tits and ass. Now, she is supposed to be emotionally disturbed from being used as a sextoy as a prepubescent, but even those chics act in certain ways. They've been documented extensively.

This book is a little dry emotionally, anyway, but still...

The new misogyny shows women in all these action roles: hitting, shooting, and fucking like men. Gee, isn't this great? Women can do anything men can do!

It's not great. Women can do anything men can do, physically, but there is never a ponderance of the mystery that is woman--the moods, the tenderness, the tolerance, the fragility in the strength. It seems like the hip thing to do is forget about it or explain it all away psychologically, and that is a denial of woman most chilling.