piper's Journal

3:31pm: Tomorrow Night
I will be performing tomorrow night along with several other Bent (the nation's only queer writing institute) students at the Re-bar. The show starts promptly at seven and costs 10 bucks cause it's a benefit. we are performing at the National Queer Arts Festival in san francisco with Dorothy Allison and the show is a fundraiser for the trip. Tomorrow night's show will be full of sexy and funny poems as well as smoking hot burlesque, so it would be a good place to bring (or find) a date. Also, I will be there. what more could you want? The Re-bar is located on the corner of Howell and Boren
114 Howell Street

I'm also playing an acoustic music set Saturday night at the Rendezvous Jewel Box for the Seattle True Independent Film Festival with a comedic trans bluegrass band called Actor/Model and several other folks. the show starts at ten.

it would be lovely to see you at either of these.

10:52pm: i just got back in seattle. i had an amazing time in england and scotland. danced my ass off. explored the ruins of castles. stayed in a squat in london...the time flew by. soon i'll be heading out to derek's sailboat. i would love to see people before i head out again. hopefully i'll be able to make a trip down to pdx within the next week or so. sailor got moved up to alaska this morning, so i'm thinking of heading up to alaska for august.

4:53pm: I'm in edinburgh, scotland. it's only my second full day and i can't even put the experiences i've had into words. an 18 year-old soldier telling me how scared he is of dying how he's seen children tortured and killed. he showed me video of actual iraqis being killed on his camera phone. the friend i am travelling with is iraqi with family still trapped in iraq being killed. we all come from such different places, but we ended up sharing a few drinks. laughing and crying. falling asleep cuddled together on the overnight train to edinburgh.

the next day my friend yasmin and i went to a breathtaking scottish beach with her friends. a group of kids all involved in a huge annual beltane celebration. there were bagpipers, bonfires, drummming, dancing, green ginger wine, singing from sunset to sunrise. this can't do justice to the experience. i wish i had taken pictures, but even those would fall short.

4:52am: all drugged up with no place to go.
I got my wisdom teeth removed a couple of days ago and i'm starting to get really restless. my upper ones were right against my sinuses and massively infected, so i've been on lots of pain medication. i can't drive anywhere. so this is day three(four now i guess) of isolation at the parents house. too much time to reflect on life and i'm starting to get depressed. but,soon i will be making my way to scotland to visit some friends i met this past summer. i'll be gone for about a month and a half. then in july i'll be hanging out with derek on his boat in the san juan island area. we're going to do the same race up to canada we did last year. after that i may head up to alaska for a bit because sailor's parents are moving her there probably by the beginning of next month. i'm just trying desperately to distract myself and to find things that make me happy. it's not so easy though. things that i would normally be really excited about feel pretty hollow. i would trade all the adventure in the world just to have the chance to be domestic with her again. fucking raising babies on a farm somewhere.

becoming a world-travelling pirate is a distant second. but it will have to do.

11:12pm: i have nowhere in particular to live next month, so i've decided to go to scotland. in search of adventure.

i hope my life feels real again someday, but for now it's all about distractions. when your worst nightmare comes true there is nothing left to fear. the only thing i'm scared of is living too long. without her. for a while i was able to be positive, but i'm afraid i've lost all hope for my own protection. over six months without a word. without an embrace. she has been unresponsive now for a fifth of our relationship. how can i not feel crazy? i feel like i made up our old life cause there's no one here who was witness to it. i feel so disconnected. i want to be punched in the face to feel something. i want someone to make me swoon to know that i still can. i just want to feel something other than disconnected resignation. not broken but pulverized heart. always on the verge of tears, but they don't seem like a worthy representation of the pain.

i am becoming/going to become something amazing. so that if she does wake up she will fall even more in love with me. and if she doesn't and there is any kind of afterlife i want her to be proud of me. i wish this was over.

"i have been skinned alive...but who knows, maybe i will grow another skin, maybe one more beautiful."

p.s. i fell down a flight of stairs and smashed my phone in two so i have no one's phone numbers. please comment or e-mail me your digits. yesterday nathan and i stumbled across a huge anime convention. thousands of junior high and old peeps in elaborate costumes with fake weapons. it was surreal.

12:46am: i'm having bad luck today
1. badly burned finger while steaming vegetables
2.car was towed
3.the person who was going to drive me to pick up my car couldn't get her car to start
4. the computers at the tow place weren't working
5. i was over an hour late to work
6. ran into sharp corner while carrying hot pizza. resulted in bruised and bloody crotch plus scalded arms and much embarrassment

i decided not to push my luck and to stay in the rest of the night. is it because it's a full moon or because it's friday the 13th? even though in theory i don't believe in that stuff.

5:34pm: nathan and i will be heading down to pdx shortly after xmas. anyone want to hang out?

2:33pm: un-melodramatic update
it's nice having nathan here. we spend our time working on derek's boat, theiving, dumpster diving, playing pinball and getting drunk. i'm really grateful that derek is able to temporarily hire us to help him with his boat. it's helping keep us afloat. thanks to everyone who's been reading and commenting on my entries, i do read them and really appreciate them, i'm just usually running somewhere and don't have time to respond. i worry i'm making bad decisions, but i just have to do what gets me through the day. at least i'm having fun. that's all i can really hope for at this point. nathan and i are going to head down to see sarah, bake some cookies with cortney and nichole, and then have a dumpster diving extravaganza with biff and kestrel (who i'm hoping to move in with if i can find someone to move into my current room). i haven't bought or made any xmas gifts yet. i'm overwhelmed by it and haven't had the motivation to begin, but i'm running out of time. i've started to write songs again, for the first time in years.

9:00am: when silence enters the room,
i am drowned in thoughts of you.
i bite my cheeks to stop from screaming.
i just want someone to tell me what is the meaning in this.
is there a meaning in this?

nothing left of our old life,
but myself,
and a picture of you,
up on my shelf.

but no matter what they say you'll always be here,
in every thought i think,
in every song i hear.
you'ved changed me so much i can never be the same,
so you can't be gone if i still remain.

1:48pm: Ten Things that make me happy
1. Sailor (when she's happy and healthy)
2. my snaggle-toothed dog Clancy
3. Gavin my poofy-haired nephew
4. my friends (especially the ones who let me sleep on their couches and/or touch their boobies)
5. playing my new guitar
6. my dysfunctional yet endearing family
7. dumpstering treasures
8. travelling (especially sailing and backpacking)
9. mango margaritas
10. putting on warm clothes fresh out of the dryer

2:14am: on the positive side
the beautiful thing about losing so much is losing fear. once your worst nightmare has already come true, nothing can frighten you. You learn to delve into every moment because it may be your last. You find a kind of solace in the chaos and impermance of all things. Every mundane detail and pretensious person is breathtaking. because it is all so fleeting. and fragile.

3:42am: D-runk
Sailor has the prettiest eyes I've ever seen. Sailor is the most real person I've ever met. Sailor has the sweetest softest body. Sailor loves me more than anyone ever has. Sailor is the most talented and creative person I know. Sailor nurtures me, she is my best friend, and my lover. Sailor will wake up. Because I need her more than I've ever needed anything or anyone. She will wake up. She has to. She will.

I'm a little drunk and I think I left my cell phone at the gay bar in Kent. or maybe SHari's. When did my life become so pathetic? Things will get better. I'm sure of it. They have to.

I hate going to sleep without her. Night is the hardest time. and waking up. Every day is an eternity.

SHe wouldn't leave me her alone. She'll be okay. My strong amazon woman can beat this.

Are you aware that I lost my Sailor, my car, my job, my drum kit, my old journals, and my pet rats in one fucking night?

This will make me stronger, If she makes it through. It will make me stronger because she will make it through. WHen she wakes up I will pamper her every moment and take nothing for granted. Life will be even better than it was before the accident, because so much of the quality of life is determined by perspective. I will probably delete this drunken ramble soon.

12:27pm: Life has never felt so long. I hate going to sleep without her in my arms. I hate waking up and having to realize every morning why she's not there. I miss my best friend and my partner. This cannot be real. But it is.

"My foundation is crumbling and shattered glass is falling all over the sidewalks, all over my feet. I am walking barefoot on broken glass in a very dark night. I am collapsing and I am collapsing on myself. I am shards of glass, and I am the person being wounded by the glass. I am killing myself."

4:26pm: I am no longer the person I was and I never will be. I am a shadow of a person that used to exist, and no one truly gives a fuck. This has made me realize how alone we really all are. I guess that's the risk you take when you let one person become everything to you. Remembering the past is too fucking painful, but who am I with no past? There is no one here that even knows who I am. I guess there's not much to know anyways. I'm just an empty shell. I've reached my breaking point and learned that I am not strong at all. I have crumbled under the pressure. I want to lay next to her and wake up only if and when she does. Her parents are taking away the fragments of her I have left. How can a mother be cruel enough to take away her own daughter's identity when she can't speak for herself? Life is chaotic and meaningless and people are self-absorbed and cruel. Those are the lessons I've learned from this.

4:14pm: This has been the hardest time of my life. I feel like this is a nightmare I could wake up from at any time but it just keeps going day after day. The chaplain and social worker basically told me Sailor would die and I fucking lost it. But she's still here. Up and down up and down on this fucking ride I can't get off of. I know now what hell is. And everyone else's life goes on the same. If she dies, I die too. And all I can do is wait. A new emergency every night and a slight improvement every morning. I will not leave her side. ever. this cannot be real. Please send good thoughts her way. Please don't just forget about this as soon as you're done reading this.

Make sure the people you love know it. Every single fucking day.

11:53am: I've been in Alaska for about a month now. It's so beautiful here. I wish I could post pictures. I've been spending my time hiking, fossil hunting, riding 4-wheelers, clam-digging, berry picking, jam making, fishing, swimming, camping and just kind of exploring the area. In one night I saw a herd of bison, a dozen or so elk, a couple moose families and a dozen or so caribou. We leave for Seattle tomorrow. I have mixed feelings about being back in Seattle working at my old job. I still have no idea where I'm going to live. I e-mailed some people on craigslist but I haven't heard back yet. If any of you know of someone in the Seattle area looking for a roommate please let me know.

4:22pm: My life is so chatoic and good right now. I've been spending my days hanging out at the Pirate Lands(anarchist collective) and on the boat. Drinking moonshine. Sleeping in treehouses and lofts. Making friends from all over the country and the world. Picnics on the beach everyday. Catching crabs for dinner. Today we set sail for the San Juan Islands. Life is fucking good. The only problem is I hurt my back really badly riding in the back of a truck a couple days ago. Oh well, there always has to be a little bit of bad shit...but this is close enough to perfection for me.

12:14pm: I've been living out on Derek's schooner with him for about a week now in Port Hadlock (which is just outside of Port Townsend). It feels so fucking good to actually be learning about sailing and ships when it's something I've dreamed of for so long. We're getting the boat ready for a race we're taking part in at the end of the month so we're doing a lot of scraping and sanding and varnishing and painting. I had a really good/bizarre fourth of july. We went to this old military fort that's no longer in use to see some fireworks and ended up stumbling across this huge fiddle festival hidden in the very back of the fort. It was quite amazing. There were hundreds of fiddlers that ranged from 12 year old girls with braces to 80 year old men with no teeth at all. The next morning I woke up to three seals playing just off our bow. This is my life at the moment. I miss my lady, but I actually get to see her tonight cause she's driving Nathan up. Nathan's somehow going to squeeze onto this little schooner with us for the next month, although I'm a bit unsure how. I better go get to work. We've had shitty weather the past few days and have been unable to make much progress on our work so now that it's sunny I get to go get sunburned and work my ass off. Which I'm actually really looking forward to.

7:24pm: Someone stole my guitar this morning :(. My $2000 guitar that I saved up for for over a year working a shitty minimum wage job. I want to find them and punch them in the head.

9:51am: Sorry I haven't posted pictures of Gavin yet, our home computer won't even start up anymore. It's finals week and I'm really stressed, but happy. I've been asked to be the set designer for next quarters play which I'm pretty excited about. The only problem is that that means I'll have to spend pretty much my entire spring break in Portland. I was hoping to visit a lot of people, but I have to have the entire set desgned and built by the end of spring break so if anyone wants to see me I guess they'll have to come to me (there's a futon to sleep on and delicious food to eat). I've been working as promotions coordinator for this non-profit called Transforming US. Our first show is tomorrow night at 8 at Holocene. T-Rexa and Cathole will be playing. There are also going to be a handful of drag performances and a couple of djs. You should come if you live nearby. I got a free Decemberists ticket! My friend Tavian's weight-lifting instructor is apparently the mom of one of the bandmembers. Oh, and me and my friend Nathan have formed a strange little band temporarily referred to as Needy Greedy Ally Sheady. I'm not even sure if I spelled her name correctly. Sorry this is short and disjointed but I have to rush to a meeting with one of the directors.

7:29pm: My sister just had her baby! He's so fucking beautiful. I will post pictures when I get back home. His name's Gavin and he only weighs a little over six pounds, but he's healthy and so is my sister.

5:56pm: Lately I've been spending almost all of my time in the library or at school. cause I'm cool like that. i'm working as a carpenter for my school's theater department too, so when i'm not rocking out at the library i'm in the shop helping build sets and stuff. it looks as though i will be spending spring quarter studying in London!%^ i'm excited. people should call me to hang out. otherwise i will be hunched in a dirty corner reading for days on end developing a hunch back and a foul odor. my dear friend octavian put me +1 on the guest list for deathcab and i'm taking my husband shey. it makes me very happy to know that i will get to see such a good show even though i am a broke ho.

1:09pm: Why you haven't seen me lately
I've just returned to Portland from an amazing series of adventures. I spent a week in Oly for Homoagogo. Then I went out to Gig Harbor to help my friends grandma move for a couple days. From Gig Harbor we drove up to Seattle where Sailor and I were whisked away to Maui. We surfed, snorkeled, jumped off waterfalls, basked in the sun, and ate lots of delicious fresh fruit. A few days after returning from Maui I got to see Concrete Blonde, one of my favorite bands ever, live for the first time at a shitty little bar. Then Nym and I ventured back up to Seattle because I was given two tickets to Rent and I took her for her birthday. Nym took the bus back down to Portland and I headed up to Bellingham to visit my friends Shey and Pants. I intended to stay for only a day or two, but my car wouldn't start so I ended up staying for over a week in Shey's girlfriends living room. Sailor then had two fashion shows in Seattle which I helped her out with. As soon as I got back to Portland, I thought for good, Nathan asked me if I wanted to hitchhike to the coast. Of course I couldn't pass up a possible adventure, so the past few days I've been hitchhiking, sleeping on the beach, eating dumpstered bagels and being harrassed by cops. It's been such a good time. We just got back last night. People should call me now that I'm back in town. I want to have craft and play time with people(especially Wyatt and Ethan) and throw dinner parties.

12:00am: Long-winded update
I feel like I should write about what I've been up to since I last updated, cause I've been incredibly busy and productive. Shortly after my birthday I played at the Bend-it Festival in Seattle and Sailor ran a DIY sex toys workshop. We spent a lot of time with my sister (who happens to be quite pregnant) and I went to my good friends funeral. The week following Bend-it, Sailor's fifteen year-old brother Nathan moved in with us. That weekend the three of us drove down to San Francisco with Derek and Tommy in a big brown old VW van. We went to the trans and dyke marches and ran into lots of lovely people we hadn't seen in a while. I wasn't so much into the pride party scene, so Sailor, Nathan and I found our way to Golden Gate Park and ate blackberries and frolicked on the beach. Then we stole some cheese and veggies from a yuppy mart and had a nice picnic. Oh I also played a little show in SF which had a small but friendly audiece and I got to see my friend Heather and finally meet her girlfriend. As soon as we got back from SF we started refinishing our hardwood floors which was a huge task. Oh and my sister's cat lives with us now because she's moving back in with my parents. After finishing up the floors we headed up to Quilcene, WA for the Institute of Applied Piracy. It was this really cool multiple-day DIY event. There were workshops about meadmaking, boatmaking, auto repair, wild edibles and other cool stuff. Everything was free including all of the food and there were lots of friendly foxy people and at night there was much homebrew drinking and accordion and violin music. Sailor and I have been making tons of cool crafts since we've been home. Like these really hot belts made out of bike parts and cute studded under roos. I need to be in a band. Is anyone in the Portland area interested? whew.

11:07am: So it's my 21st birthday today. This morning when I went downstairs to eat breakfast there was a newspaper laying on the kitchen counter with a post-it stuck to it that said "Stacy" on it. At first I thought it was some kind of birthday gift, but it turned out to be the orbituaries section of the newspaper. My best and only friend in highschool died a few days ago. They didn't say how he died in the paper so I'm assuming he either killed himself or overdosed. I've been attempting to contact him for months. He was just too sensitive and breakable for this world. I couldn't have made it through high school without him. I can't stop thinking about the last time I saw him. I can't help but wonder if I could have made a difference if I had just really reached out to him instead of distancing myself. I just didn't know how to deal with his spiral into heroin addiction. He didn't seem like himself anymore. I can't believe I'll never see him again. He was only twenty years old.