Daniela Scrima’s blog

I got drunk & I ate a chicken

nobody@vox.com(Daniela Scrima) — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 05:43:58 -0700

I .What I really wanted for breakfast was an orgasm but instead I'm on my second iced latte. Happy Bad Decisions Month!

I will try not to sleep with your boyfriend.

II. for a while I really cared about hurricanes then I just started fucking idiots. It becomes evident when it becomes fall especially if you have no fall. Keep a strong focus on 2005 and 2006 and remember that we were never kidding.

III. Archives Part One

Yes, I'm being followed by a moonshadow OR my lovely lady lumps

Sep. 17th, 2005 at 10:38 PM

First of all, everything was ruined for me very early this morning when I was lying awake Thinking I was Going to Throw Up on Myself, and I realized that all things in life lead back to Tupac Songs. The reason I realized this was because Tupac songs kept playing. A Sigur Ros song would play, then Tupac, then Bright Eyes, then Tupac, then Of Montreal, then Tupac. I was trying to explain desperately to Danny that everything led back to Tupac, but all Danny wanted to do is Snore and say "Uh-huh." Danny, maybe you are bitter because I bit half of your lip off. I do not remember this happening, but I remember Bailey screaming "oh my god oh my god" and Danny spitting up a lot of blood into the sink. Also, the bathroom was flooded. I sort of remember a piece of Danny's lip being in my mouth. Whoops! Will someone please tell me why the bathroom was flooded?

Other things that I remember in no order: jason and I making up a handshake that involved pouring whiskey on our hands; screaming "bailey hug me! hug me, bailey!"; hugging bailey; giving orders to bailey/danny saying "do not talk until you finish your drink"; jason going to get bailey straws and then standing on his car in the middle of the road maybe he was singing or yelling, i am unsure, this was actually hot though, for the record; danny telling me he would be my boyfriend as i rolled around on the bed screaming that i wanted my life to be normal; NONE OF THIS ACTUALLY MATTERING IN THE MORNING

I am rewarding myself with One Livejournal Entry. I've been giving myself a lot of rewards today, for good behavior/emotional breakdown. I was going to say it all when I came home this morning; except I came home drunk. Drunk from our life of fake boyfriends and fake manners. I wish that I could tell this to you in chronological order, but chronological order is not part of my life.

This is how my diet life has gone
yesterday:
two slices of pizza from california pizza kitchen
half bottle of whiskey
today:
strawberry milkshake
piece of bread from sandwich
48 oz regular coke

Today at work everyone asked me why I was covered in bruises and why I had hickies on my neck, they then proceeded to be mean to me and talk to me like I was retarded. I of course let them, it is not my fault that I have not worked as a Beauty Consultant for five years. Maybe I will start lying and saying "when i grow up I want to be a Hairdresser," I already lie and say "when i grow up I want to be a dental hygenist."

I do not know how I have suddenly become a fifteen year old girl, but that is how I feel, I feel like I Am Throwing Glasses Against the Wall. That actually happened too, why did that happen? I do not remember this happening. I remember there being glass on the floor this morning, and the bathroom was not flooded anymore. Bailey and I have learned that sleeping in beds with twins is good for your heart, and bad for your hair. And we all know where our priorities lie.

Music:RAINBOWS NOT MY FAVORITE COLOR

how many brothers fell victim to the streets

Sep. 10th, 2005 at 10:57 AM

Bad decisions month continues with
1. Bailey and I on highway 666
2. Semi-skinny dipping in the gulf of mexico at 4 AM
3. Thinking intense thoughts about exorcisms while walking into my house with all the lights off
4. Doing all of this when I have to work 11 hours today also: danny dropping classes
7. Bailey running two red lights
6. 6 AM bedtime, 10:30 Wake up call

you're the stigmata that i starve for

Sep. 9th, 2005 at 4:21 PM

Bad decisions month is coming along nicely; three bad decisions a day &a well balanced diet.

yesterday's bad decisions:
1. not doing sit ups before bedtime; listening to rap music instead
2. jumping in puddles fully clothed w.neighbors
3. arguing/name calling until two in the morning

today's bad decisions
1. sleeping in until 11:30
2. seeing "The Exorcism of Emily Rose," in the middle of the day- affirming that I will be completely terrified for the rest of the day/night/weekend/week/bad decisions month. I was quite upset by the whole thing, some people walked out but I am not brave enough to walk out during horror films as it is a guarantee that you will offend demons &they will you in your sleep etc.

3. yet to be determined

I am now color coding my outfit for work. Work we are allowed to wear 1.gray 2.black 3. white &then "accent colors" today I am wearing white/black with yellow as an accent color. Yellow shoes, yellow undershirt. I think it comes together quite well. Maybe I will get expensive hair products so I can look at my hair so distraught in the mirror and think that shampoos with names like "self-absorbed" and nail polishes called "but i'm not a waitress," will really do something for me.

In sociology we are watching One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, my favorite part is when Chief says "mmm Juicy Fruit."

I will drink my red bull &do my hair, I would sort of like to go to a party this weekend maybe? I do not even like parties if they are "stranger" parties so this is sort of absurd but I feel it would go well with the theme. You see kids, you have to stick to the theme.

but then she went to cleveland.

Sep. 4th, 2005 at 8:59 PM

If you keep going South on Alternate 19 passed scientology and before the road with the large McDonalds you can find what I am about to tell you about. We made a road trip in twelve hours and figured we had nothing left to lose. There was a house and it was abandoned, we had been warned about abandoned houses from our time spent in Safety Harbor and everytime we sang "With Arms Outstretched." I know you know the days I am talking about, whether you acted on them or thought upon them, I'm sure they got you nowhere, too. Everyone (everyone being more than one person in any situation) asked us why we were skipping out on our own lives.
"Don't you have places to be, don't you have school?"
It's summer
"Don't you have jobs?"
We have all of our lives to get jobs, it's summer
"Must be nice to think like that"
It's alright, yeah, it's nice
"Kids are so goddamn privelaged"
We used to be painters, before we were children
"Are you on drugs?"
No.
"I used to talk like that when I was on drugs."
Sir, I bet you say that to everyone
"Everyone? Now why would I say that to everyone?"

We had just decided it was in our best interest to flee the scene. We knew the roads well on our side of Florida. We did not understand Florida without strip malls or oceans. We did not understand the day in Florida with cows and farmhouses, with hills and lakes. We had salt water for our wounds and convenient stores for our souls. You may have had clear skies, but we need you to know that we had tourism. All the roads connect to each other. You will pass ten inches of land where you will think everyone is poor. It will pass, like everything. There will be hotels and screaming ladies, and we will make jokes about Jesus Christ. She can quote the bible, it would make you laugh. And if you're feeling sad, I will capitalize it for you. It's not an allegory, but it could be tomorrow. What I am trying to tell you is, you have the wrong girls. I know what you're thinking about "malicious intent" and "homewreckers" but you've got the wrong girls. Half of our lives we just didn't know any better and the other half of the time, you don't want to understand. But we are not those people, we are not those people that you see on the street. That's us there, but there's nothing.

I know you'll reason with me that there was history, that there was more than this. That there were four hurricanes last year and I am overreacting, and besides you can hit "delete" like a man, or a phone or a song that I only heard when I was in England. I'll find out that the Crown Jewels are actually crowns, and I'll walk too fast through all the wrong places.

Someone will be standing there, screaming for money, and I'll be sprinting because there was a sale to save lives for half the cost, on the other side of town, where it was no longer summer.

Sep. 3rd, 2005

9:07 PM

my dog was lost (Clearwater Public Library)

Sep. 1st, 2004 at 6:55 PM

1) A man at work walked by me &said "you're going to get fat!" and then walked away, summing up my whole day

2) I'm tired &there are teenagers at the door talking to my father?? I cant see what they look like but they are holding bottles of mountain dew &I would like some mountain dew

3) Tonight should consist of so much driving, except for me not having any gas- following the theme of Florida &Hurricanes. Hurricanes are so much more disappointing than I ever expected &I have the Dawson's Creek Hurricane Episode to thank. ugh.

in your shell where you belong

Sep. 12th, 2004 at 11:48 AM

With blood and rags &barbed wire mouths they asked "where is my baby". Laying down in rows of beds &staying up in lines of ceilings we watched them depart their own bodies &we bit down hard on our tongues. The use of showers &the air conditioning, artificial sweetner and debit cards. I kiss my mother's cheeks before she boards up the airplane because she is going to try &go North (all over again). We won't stop until we get it right, we wont stop until we see it in writing. With a boarding pass &a wine glass half way down her throat we realize all the women in my large family are either sedated off drugs or the holy ghost &they'll fly or drive to anywhere to set things right again. We will drive two thousand miles to send apologies to highschool lovers &we will fly across the Atlantic to fix the house in old country.

It passes through a woman in a bar, it pretends to be a hurricane, teaches us to read &gets a twenty percent discount. There are citizens singing on the sidelines they are saying "where is my baby", and we are wondering if this is rehearsed. Where is the chorus line, Ma? Is there a piano on stage right? Stage right and stage left reflect the actors perspective dear, not the audience- now straighten your soldiers &breathe from your diaphram (it says). It passes through some sadness, stops to say "good bye" we mimic but it is not satisfied- no say it like this- so we try again &again. We end up trying for the rest of our lives to get the words out right. With our mothers in their hospitals, our mothers in their SUV's, our mothers in their graves, our mothers on their airplanes (flying away to set it right) our mothers drinking their gin &tonics, our mothers talking like men, our mothers raising us &our father's slapping us &then our mothers fleeing the scene time &time again raising their eyebrows as if to say "Get out while you still can, child". All the songs were overplayed so it turned off our radios, it closed our schools &said "I'm just pretending". It passes through a woman in a bar, flips over four cars &likes to watch television. With blood &rags &barbed wire lips we are all kissing on the mouths, victims laying in the streets &schools on fire from the inside, love made it all go wrong &she'll board an airplane like she could ever make it right.

146: LOL (location Kent, Ohio)

Sep.1st, 2003 at 2:35 PM

Everything smells like popcorn or piss, you walk through the halls &all the doors are open. The girls gather and make out elaborate plans about how they will get boyfriends, and how if so &so doesnt go out with them it will be the end of the world. I'm sorry, excuse me, Um, yes, when did I sign up for highschool with dorms? Wasnt this supposed to put me in my own element? Wasnt I suppose to meet people like me, who get sad &read books &have Elizabeth Wurtzel moments?

I'm looking for attention; so come dig me out.

mall life, pt.7

Sep. 2nd, 2006 at 9:29 PM

Tonight this drug dealer came into the salon to buy prodcut for his girlfriend. She bought two liters of All Soft Shampoo and two liters of Color Extend Conditioner. They had a crying baby in a stroller. He went to pay for her shampoo &conditioner, I observed his hand tattoos, the baby knocked down a basket full of lotion. The tired mother-girlfriend put her hands on her hips and let out long sighs. Between his tattooed fingers he held a stack, a bill-fold of $100 bills, there had to be at least five hundred of them. I swooned calmly &scanned them &wished I got tips instead of comission. They left the store while I am still sitting there, begging to be adopted into their family. I could take phone calls for his cell phone that never stops ringing or maybe just give the baby his bottle &read him Dr.Seuss stories- or just explain to this tired twenty-four year old women that she is using the wrong hair routine regimen after all and for this price range we could move up to Broccotto Cloud Nine &make everyone happy.

In short, I should have left with them.

please pass the mr.t cereal

Sep. 3rd, 2006 at 3:19 AM

1. recieved $800 phone bill from time spent in Europe
2. purchased matching cupcake necklaces with heather michelle
3. i know you are but what am I
4. convinced heather to apply for the victoria secret credit card, the sales lady looked at me and said "you have one dont you?"
5. deciding to neglect all of our friends to have a sleep over. age thirteen, welcome back.

baby hold on a second, look, it's the best of all possible worlds

Sep. 5th, 2006 at 10:01 PM

Sometimes it wasnt anything at all. Not your million dollar jaw line or the way you crossed state lines, the way I'd confuse words like "phase" and "face" when spelling but not speaking. Your instructions to slow down. I'd pretend it was all the fall of some empire, to get north to go south. The little acts of desperation we all throw out on airplanes, being reborn without religion, being unwashed without chlorine, like a long joke or your favorite swimming pool. There is a story you told me and I wish I didn't remember it, the way I remember everything, from before when I knew you. We've known each other since we were five, swimming underwater our eyes open before we ever met. We fought on the playground until their was blood in our mouths &blisters on our tongues, yeah, before I ever knew you. Sometimes it was everything, when we were seven and we never saw each other, a long speech I delivered with chlorine in my eyes and half the world in my hair. And you're standing there, stuttering, because you have never been sorry- no sir, not one day in your life, because they will sort this out for you &then slice your bread so you can sit down smiling while I try to place it out on a timeline- remembering a quote you once said, in the desert - miles from any oasis staring at my picture, wondering when you'll know me. And it doesnt matter, because we remember it differently and our feet are always falling asleep. In your favorite shopping mall, on your favorite airplane, I am wiping chlorine from your eyes &spitting on your shoes, you explain blood flow &we nod our heads with all the passengers, I tell you about an airport that I once went to, after I knew you, but it is not a story or a quote that you can memorize, or remember.

Mood:pt. 1

Voice Post: count yo money

Sep. 15th, 2006 at 11:43 PM

VoicePost
1000K 4:55

“dear livejournal we were counting our money and we wanted you count your money with us, "you better count your money, you better count your money, you better count your money" x50
various rapping from various man
"woah nelly"... i am still listening but now i'm going to comment.”

Transcribed by: hatsuchi

the devil &daniela scrima

Sep. 17th, 2006 at 4:12 PM

I am moving to NYC on January 4th, it seems. I would say that it feels surreal but I really have no right to say that about anything anymore, I mean honesttttly. When I was in middle school and I finally came to the realization that I had breasts &life would be miserable from there on out I would make lists in my notebooks, belly down on the bed about life would be like "when I grow up," and when I grew up I was going to spend my summers in Europe and move to all these different cities in the United States and write stories that would be made into movies so that thirteen year old girls could lay in bed, on their stomachs, not realizing that life was quite ruined &watching the films playing in the corner of the room- and they would say "that is how my life will be."

From the time I was eight until the time I was fourteen my parents and myself (no siblings, no pets) would spend a week in North Carolina, or Virginia or anywhere where there are mountains. Once in Fontana, once eating boiled peanuts. We would always stay in some secluded cabin, in the middle of nowhere and while we walked I would imagine a bear jumping out &eating all of my insidies while my father tried to fight to save the family. When I would lay in my mountain bed at night, I would think "this is how things should have ended up, I should have grown up here." And I would imagine my life in one of those towns, population three hundred, so my boyfriend could pick me up in his pickup, drive me to the tasty-freeze &let me wear his jacket.

I always had this fixation of some life that I was missing, some perfect town on the other side of the country (Nebraska playing on repeat) that I of course, was missing out on.

I know deep down that has to be a huge reason why I moved back to Ohio the week after I graduated highschool. So I could set up my life the way I thought it should be. And there it was Kent State University, a place so paralyzed by the May 4th Massacre that the students still walked around like there were bullets flying. I sat in my dorm room, looking out the huge windows, staring at my American Politics note, knowing that this was exactly how life was supposed to be. All my new friends would take me on drives through these little towns (with only one restaurant, only one donut shoppe) and someone would tell me about a factory that used to be there- sometimes, but not always there would be these big signs hand painted "THE MAN STOLE OUR JOBS," or "GIVE THE WORK BACK TO THE PEOPLE." I was fixated, flat out obsessed.
My cousin Michael, who was my best friend at the time, helped me convince my uncle to take us to one of his friends home two hours south of Cuyahoga county- we spent the weekend behind the bar drinking beer out of cans &liquor out of mason jars, feeding Jefro the donkey &watching people play "Cow Bingo,"- don't ask, I mean really don't ask.

But the funny thing about all of this was, this culture of the working class that I had become so obsessed with was something that everyone I met was trying so hard to escape. Beautiful blue eyed boys would sit at the corner of my bed while we laid there, watching the snow fall &they'd ask with so much sincerity "Daniela, why would you ever leave Florida?" me- I had no idea where to start answering, with my long speech of "No one is really from Florida the whole state is completely transient, it's not Disneyworld- it's not like you think," but sometimes, I'd shut up, I'd shut up like it was the first day I had ever worn a winter coat and I would look them- I would look at them born and raised here, bleeding to death outside of the hill I could see so clearly from my spot in a self made coffin, and I would smile at them, at whoever was sitting there- take their hands into my hands and I would say, "well, I don't know."

Things didnt stay like that at Kent State University, before we fled for California before we ran back home, there was a series of third nostrils, of stomach ulcers, "the university's quiet today, we didnt clean we just talked in the bathroom," and all the songs hit too close to the heart- with the snow falling out the window &me explaining to anyone that would listen "I am freezing to death! I am freezing," and our professors, who we thought were our lovers, drunk on somebody elses bourbon, banging down our door. Then, then you cannot remember, no you cannot remember why you drove to a town to read a sign about an emotion you once felt.

Tin soldiers and Nixon's comin, we're finally on our own this summer I hear the drummin, Four Dead in Ohio I know this is true because I've asked, but when our parents dropped us off on campus they all sang this song at some point- to remind us that we did not remember 1970 and we never would. I don't think mine knew that they were spilling out self-fullfiling propechy to me, but they should have, because here we are, back from there, stuck on the beach all over again.

Everywhere you go they are talking like it's the center of the universe, they are kissing like they've created and goddamnit just let them. When you are driving in your car, when you are flying on your plane &you see all of these people around them &you realize "I will never know all of these people, they all have their own lives, I will never know about it." My grandmother used to tell me, in italian- never english, "remember, Daniela, today is the worst day of somebody's life," and I would nod, because hell, hell, hell- of course it is.

So yes, I too, am moving to New York City because it now too, just seems like another right of passage. One of my olf boyfriends used to tell me how amazing it would be if we jsut went, how I would love it, and I would shake my head, "that's what everybody does." And so it is, because that's what it's like now- you spend your obligatory summers &semesters in Europe- I stand next to Stonehenge and let someone take my picture, I attempt to drown myself in the Roman baths "heal me water- heal me" I walk through the ruins of Pompeii and I stopped to buy an ice cream cone- and I talk to my friends half way across the country, who are auditioning for The Real World, because we already have a drivers license and we've already been to all those cities and hey are you listening to me- it still doesnt feel surreal enough- it still feels too much like my life, it still feels like I am laying in my bed age thirteen cursing God or whoever else, saying "WHEN I GROW UP," oh you just wait- when I grow up.

i've been less &i've been more

Sep. 2nd, 2007 at 1:44 PM

September started.

Wandered with Gregg and Octavio into a church on Havemeyer that has a large collection of Patron Saints. You could light a votive candle for $1 and say a prayer, but the candles werent real, instead, you pressed a button and a light came on. I did it anyway. Put the dollar in, pressed the button, said a prayer. I dipped my fingers into holy water, I really know how to make the sign of the cross. So I said I prayer to God and the gods of bad decisions month. I've been biting my lip too hard; my head hurts.
I'm allergic to cats but I've been petting them all week. I think they can tell, I will sit in a room and theyll jump into my lap as if to say, "just deal with it." There is a big barbeque in Dollywood as of September 14th. I am allergic to barbeque sauce also, but maybe not in Tennessee.
I dont think that Rufus feels bad for Chuck but maybe he does. I don't know what the package is, and you probably do not know what I am talking about.
I miss Johnny 99 and even Arthur Dexter Bradley. I miss breaking the law; or having rules to break. What are you supposed to do when there are no responsibilities and no obligations? No babies with palindrome names to feed, to quiet. No mothers to come home to, someitme before 3 AM. Instead it is just us, here, acting as if we have finally called it quits.
My head still hurts. I want to go for a car ride. I like a boy, day two. Laura and I had grilled cheese sandwiches for supper but I forgot to tell her about it. I will tell Tanya. My cycle of female best friends, all complete with names ending in vowels. Y will have to be a vowel like in the Letter People. In tradition of Terrace Hall Revival Meetings, we are also going to be millionaires by midnight. I wish I could tell you more, internet, but like everything else this is one big stupid secret.
September 2nd, I have a new bedroom. In the same apartment. It is so big, do you see the 3 windows?

http://public.fotki.com/ohadhominem/2007/september-bad-decis/day-1/

(great hair)

coonfire

st.therese

the most comfortable bed in the world. there is nothing i love more than collapsing onto a pile of cold, clean white sheets

do u like my room

moving is a mess

oprah

country love record. so good.

i collect heart necklaces (owls, virgin marys)

i want my room to look like 1962/time travelling/french brothel

it will look so much better in one week. i promise. flowered wallpaper. more cracked mirrors. lingerie collection. cigarette holder. nyc city condoms. a down comforter.

i have 2 bottles red wine
1 bottle hairspray

i'm going to a town that has already been burned down.

Sep. 6th, 2007 at 10:01 PM

i don't feel like being a human.
problem #1 i don't feel like being a human
problem #2 i will take care of it tomorrow
problem #3 my hair
they should be in reverse order. someone tried to break into our building. tomorrow morning i'll be hungover, maybe? construction across the street starts early/i sleep through nothing. fashion week?
the piece of glass in my hand doesnt hurt too bad except i keep taking my finger and pressing down on it. it is in the very center of my palm, right above my life line.
tomorrow lets paint the apartment. my room is half french brothel. by monday, september 10th, it will be a complete french brothel.
i don't know what shoes to wear. "open bar"
maybe i can meet a palm reader. i have met them many times before, but this time it will be different. this time they will have so much to say.

IV.

I've been down hearted baby, ever since the day we met.

V.

what was it I saw in New York?

Sep. 4th, 2008 at 12:28 AM

I'm not the same no more.

........................................

.......

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

I have a head cold...

nobody@vox.com(Daniela Scrima) — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 11:54:40 -0700

I have a head cold. A sore throat. A stuffy nose.

true feelings

the afternoon

the weather systems

should i get up and turn on the air conditioner

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

as they become easily bored and have trouble dealing with frustration

nobody@vox.com(Daniela Scrima) — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 09:39:03 -0700

I wake up sprawled on the floor, lying on my travel pillow which I purchased for twenty-five dollars by advice of chiropractor. "I don't think you're really in the position not to take my advice, Daniela" this is what Dr.Calluci tells me, and because I've been waiting for an hour and a half among the elderly I say, "Dr.Calluci, just wondering, are you like-- an actual medical doctor?"
I buy the pillow anyway.

On the floor of the airport I sit up and I am immediately handed a pamphlet about Jesus Christ. This seems appropriate enough: the sun is shining brightly in my face, the wind is not blowing in my hair.
My arm is really banged up and because this is not New York City everyone asks over and over again "what happened to your arm?"

A boy who could be my age, but is probably younger asks me "Are you afraid of flying?"

Of course. I tell him. Not scared at all. I want to say that I love airports that I am in my element, that I could be anyone but instead I do not say what happened to my arm I say "I cannot handle the take offs and landings"

I wake up sprawled on the floor and suddenly I am taking a shit ton of Percocet with missionaries who are on their way to Peru.I let them tell me about God and I mainly not my head, I stop to say "I really only believe in the Blessed Virgin" and they note that I am not speaking of myself and keep going.
"Why are you going to Peru? Can't you just leave those people alone?" I don't know if they give me a real answer but their backpacks are filled as if they were going to go film Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas not Jesus Camp: The Sequel

Once I let my friend Jesse borrow the book White Noise and she read it on a flight with her mother on their way to Costa Rica, a missionary vomitted on her and all over the book something like fifteen minutes after take off.

We are not sure if this actually means anything, but we write it down anyway. Just in case. Just in case the police come storming in and ask for an account so I can "well here it happened like this officers, I have it on this sheet of paper"
but even the police man, the private would ask me from the door frame

"what happened to your arm?"

There are times in life where you start settling and truly, I have no idea why. I either want to say "hurry up and get it over with" or "chill the fuck out man and let your guard down" I believe in purgatory, naturally, of course, but I've never been a fan of limbo and the authorities, the missionaries, the men with missing jaws-- none of them can tell me that there is any difference.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The other day we drove in a car Nick, Ashley, Autumn, Aaron and myself and tried to find a place called "Amelia Island" we ended up at Fort DeSoto and it was completely deserted, all you could see was sand and water and some grass and an occasional bicycle going by. At first we just stood there. Then Nick waded in. That ashley said it wasnt so cold. Then I collapsed like the the earth was begging me to and then I wanted to take off all of my clothes. I have never swam naked in the ocean, i have gone bras and panties in the night, but I have never been truly naked during the day in the water. So I stripped off. Autumn, who goes to an all girls school in Roanoke, which I believe is called Roanoke, held my bra in my hand for me while I touched my own breasts in the water. I kept saying to everyone "we have to do this now because this is beautiful" there was a sense of urgency but still a sense of panic. There is always a sense of panic like "what if I can never do this again?" It's not a question of whether I'll ever come back to the ocean, but whether the ocean will ever come back.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the car Autumn, who has her masters or is working on her Masters or something about Psychology diagnosis everyone. Ashley takes a drag off of her Newports even though she is enraged that I handed her the wrong pack "Newport Lights" we didn't even know they existed.
"THESE PROBABLY DONT EVEN HAVE FIBERGLASS IN THEM"
I apologize, smoke one myself, cant inhale but figure that she's wrong and they probably do.
Then Ashley says "well Daniela, we diagnosed you already last night."

Oh do tell
"We diagnosed you with HPD"
like HPV?
"No HPD"
What's HPD? Why did you diagnose me? What the fuck?

Autumn has either printed this out or is maybe reading it from her phone but then she explains to me that if she was my doctor she would diagnose me with "Histrionic Personality Disorder"
I say from the backseat, half glaring at Nick because he was born, "I don't think I have any kind of disorder.

Autumn begins reading:

Histrionic personality disorder (HPD) is defined by the American Psychiatric Association as a personality disorder characterized by a pattern of excessive emotionality and attention-seeking, including an excessive need for approval and inappropriate seductiveness, usually beginning in early adulthood.

The essential feature of histrionic personality disorder is an excessive pattern of emotionality and attention-seeking behavior. These individuals are lively, dramatic, enthusiastic, and flirtatious. They may be inappropriately sexually provocative, express strong emotions with an impressionistic style, and be easily influenced by others.

People with this disorder are usually able to function at a high level and can be successful socially and professionally. People with histrionic personality disorder usually have good social skills, but they tend to use these skills to manipulate other people and become the center of attention. [1] Furthermore, histrionic personality disorder may affect a person's social or romantic relationships or their ability to cope with losses or failures. People with this disorder may seek treatment for depression when romantic relationships end, although this is by no means a feature exclusive to this disorder. They often fail to see their own personal situation realistically, instead tending to dramatize and exaggerate their difficulties. They may go through frequent job changes, as they become easily bored and have trouble dealing with frustration. Because they tend to crave novelty and excitement, they may place themselves in risky situations.

She finishes reading and everyone in the car just nods their heads. "I have never even heard of this! Everything cannot just be a disorder. Having a personality is a disorder"

I put on lipstick. I stare out at the ocean. I wake up days later and the missionaries from Peru diagnose me with hell and slip a white pill in my mouth.

I pack when I get home. I unpack even though it's been dark for hours.

Before bed, or during bed, I fall asleep with my glasses on. All this time I thought I only suffered from terminal uniqueness. I am back in New York. No one asks what happened to my arm, and if I told the truth would they even believe me?

"someone cut me with a butter knife"

I'm not sure. The pamphlet about Christ is at the bedside table. I cannot keep my eyes open. I didn't get a sunburn.

SYMPTOMS:

The symptoms include:

    * Constant seeking of reassurance or approval.
    * Excessive dramatics with exaggerated displays of emotions.
    * Excessive sensitivity to criticism or disapproval.
    * Inappropriately seductive appearance or behavior.
    * Excessive concern with physical appearance.
    * A need to be the center of attention (self-centeredness).
    * Low tolerance for frustration or delayed gratification.
    * Rapidly shifting emotional states that may appear shallow to others.
    * Opinions are easily influenced by other people, but difficult to back up with details.
    * Tendency to believe that relationships are more intimate than they actually are.
    * Making rash decisions.

and the clothes go

Life Advice:

Arnold

Amy

Mnemonic

A mnemonic that can be used to remember the criteria for histrionic personality disorder is PRAISE ME:[8][9]

    * P - provocative (or seductive) behavior
    * R - relationships, considered more intimate than they are
    * A - attention, must be at center of
    * I - influenced easily
    * S - speech (style) - wants to impress, lacks detail
    * E - emotional lability, shallowness

    * M - make-up - physical appearance used to draw attention to self
    * E - exaggerated emotions - theatrical

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

sing mercy (sing mercy)

nobody@vox.com(Daniela Scrima) — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 12:54:56 -0700

sing mercy on me

Mar. 7th, 2009 at 9:00 PM

Afterward, the cat jumps up on the night stand beside me. I didn't know there was a cat, but I am not surprised. If I didn't know better I would say "awe" I would say "hello" but I know exactly what this is about. It looks at me as if it's trying to tell me it knows something. It's on to me. It knows this isn't my terrain. Well, I know too my friend, you and your horses &your one eyes staring me down. Feel free to judge me, just let me dress myself first.

I put my bra on, the cat vomits in the corner.

I take the train back but just to read. New York feels like the biggest place in the world; the smallest planet on the block. The four girls across from me are best friends. They just got boobs. They say to me "hey mami, your white boots is ugly" and I nod my head in agreement. They laugh about other things, rowdy with their hair slicked back to one side. They are louder than everyone else and I wonder why they wear their jeans like that. For a moment I cannot remember what it is like to be fourteen, I cannot remember what it is like to write a name in hearts or to cry because of a pair of shoes I needed and could not have.

The moment passes and I remember again exactly what it is like. I watch them, feeling I am allowed to stare now that they made fun of me. They won't look back again, maybe there is something about my face that says I'd make fun of their shoe laces. Perhaps I would if the mood struck me, but really the truth is, I am just jealous of it. I want to sit next to them. I want to ask if i can be the fifth member. I will tell them what it's like to have tits, I will throw insults at the other passengers. I will lie to them, like no one lied to me and I will say "it will get worse before it gets better." They would not believe me, just like I did not believe anyone.

When I come home it's a saturday but it feels like a Sunday. I want to kill my roommate because there are always dishes in the sink and I cannot stand to look at them. I don't understand why she cannot mop the floors. I say it loud in different ways: to her face, right here, through text messages, screaming from the bathroom. I sound like one of my relatives who has gone mad because they see dust, because there is hair in the sink.

Midterms will come and I'l make decisions. I know how to drive the car still. I know still that it is up to me. I will not walk around that block with a phone in my hand and the tears clogging up all of the parts that make it work. I don't understand how phones work especially without wires. I guess it makes no difference. If Alexander Graham Belle was here, he'd break up with me. He'd tell me he wanted me long distance or that I was the wrong kind of text message. I'd tell him he's gone mad, phones could never work without me.

I think about the library in this romantic way. I have a stack of paper clips, a stack of magazines, e-mails to return and I must put on heels because I've promised to dance with you in that manner.

The reason I cant be good at this --- well part of this-- is because I want to take naps but don't have the ability to take them.

I have been woken up different ways in my life. It tells you a lot about a person-- the way they reach for your body. Sometimes I am nudged awake like I am a dog, but not a dog you love that much, kind of with a little kick like this is a bother. And then other times I am cradled back into consciencse like a baby or an angell or a girl who is too tired to type anymore but it is ready to open her eyes.
The cat throws up &my boots is ugly.

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

they've got a wishbone where their backbone should have grown

nobody@vox.com(Daniela Scrima) — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 12:53:52 -0700

"Have your coffee and stop your crying," my alarm goes off and I say this to myself like I am a strict mother giving a proper scolding. I've made the bed before I am barely even out of it. "I believe it was just the dreams, I believe it is just the weather."

Yesterday my roommate cried in the kitchen so I gave her a hug and used my fingers to wipe away her tears. I don't like to get like that in front of anyone and it's funny, because I can usually only cry late at night or early in the morning. I feel like it's daylight savings time. It's like I let myself relax enough in my sleep that something goes through the surface.
So this morning, upon rising, I burst into tears. I put my head in my hands and I take my hair down. There is water next to the bed. I drink it slowly as if something has actually happened, as if this is a reaction.
"Make your bed. Get dressed. Get a hold of yourself."

If anyone who loved me, or did not love me, was here they would say "enough with the theatrics, Daniela," they would say "is there a reason to be this dramatic right now?" I do it in front of no one. Wash my own face. I think the last thing I said to him was that I wish I needed nothing just like the story in the book.

I put "Sodom, South Georgia" on the record player because I've learned how to move my finger to the line. all dead white boys say God is good. White tongues hang out. God is good. I want to talk to Jackson but I can't feel where he is these days. You know how sometimes you can tell with a person? You can feel it with them and you can tell? I can't tell. I can't tell and I should have given him (and many other things) up for Lent.

I don't know how this happens to me constantly in New York City, but I don't own an umbrella again. I have the proper boots now. The proper stride. I can look straight ahead, but I don't know what I've done with the umbrellas. The subject line refers to chickens. Once I met a man and he loved penguins. I believe it is evident in a woman's face if she rode horses when she was a girl.

And here we go again we are back to my thoughts that don't come as thinks it is only "I feel" or "I believe" suddenly it is not "I think" or "I know" Suddenly I am telling strangers what I feel about their fingers. I put "Coxcomb Red" on the record player because once, a boy who kissed me in a dorm got me high and then got me into the band Songs: Ohia. I could see the May 4th Memorial from out the bedroom window and at any moment where I could see a massacre, I felt like things were meant to be. He told me the song reminded him me, and because I was eighteen, I did not believe him. Now that is the only compliment. You'd think it be different, that I would have trusted more than. But later on in cars with men and boys listening to the radio or complaining about a tape deck, I learned the reason all music had ever been written.
Just tell me this song is about me. Make it up.

I was talking to my 'intern', who allows me to call her that or puffin or butter cup, and I was telling her that I wish I would have moved to New York when I was 21. It seemed like it would have been this exciting, outrageous thing to arrive here at that age. A sat for a minute with the months and then I remembered that I did. I did move to New York when I was 21.

I did move to New York when I was 21. I did learn how to cry without an audience. In the beginning it was all fancy dinners and social climbers, but then I couldn't keep up. I thought we were really doing it for the arts or we were really doing it for the cause or we were doing it for the charities and then a woman who I admired very much told me to apply fake eyelashes and lose fifteen pounds. And I would have loved to, and maybe I did, maybe that did happen. But I still think if I did it, it was for the right reasons. It was to build the well, not to wear the dress.

People talk to me about regrets, about the news, about the economy. Friends act as if they are phoning to let me in on the real world, as if I have cut myself off from some thing that is actually going on. They begin with "have you heard?" and they ask "so what do you think?" and I watch the old ladies cross the street and I am happy that I can record Democracy Now on DVR because lying on the couch and seeing boring faces is the closest I can get to sitting in a car and waiting for the light to turn green.

The voices on the phones, seldom, rarely, I answer-- I don't listen to what they say. I've learned to tune into the AM radio now. If I am lucky I get a preacher all the way from Tennessee and he promises me salvation. "Get out of bed and drink a cup of coffee." And because no one wants to hear about it, because no one wants to pretend the lines on my face are the lines on records, I wipe them off myself. I feel and I believe and perhaps after I've dressed and washed my hair I too will become enraged about all of these scandals. Oh these scandals! Going on right before my eyes. I too will phone to tell the news; I too will think.

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

this &that

nobody@vox.com(Daniela Scrima) — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 12:51:56 -0700

http://www.danielascrima.com

Yesterday we had to talk about "Seymour: An Introduction" for two hours &I thought everyone was wrong. Sometimes I have no idea how I can be a lit major because I don't really like to talk about it, I like what it is to me.

Jay's flight got canceled so I poured an extra bowl of dog food, and John's flight got delayed so I talked to him on the phone and you could hear the flight attendants saying to make room under seats and overhead. I am not on an airplane.

I feel like all I do is wash the floor and I am still upset about the dishes in the sink. Maybe I will never stop being upset about the dishes in the sink. I want to live alone so I can have high ceilings and decorate how I like and have things that are mine. My psychiatrist says this is because I am an only child; my psychic says it's because the moon is in my favor this year.

Last night Laura came over and I filled my hair with aqua net. This morning I washed it twice to try and get rid of the smell of smoke. I had water and read more Wally Lamb which I cannot stop reading. Except the book is kind of about the Columbine shootings and it is also kind of very violent and sad. I tried to start it before I went to Florida the last time in December, but I stopped. Now I am almost done and I don't want to be because I like it when books go on forever.

Remember how I told you I bought Cosmopolitan Magazine? Well, it was not good for me to read. Really it says a million terrible things and it asks you to look at your boyfriends dick and see if it's different colors and then on the next page it tells you if you are single this is how you hang a picture on the wall. And I wonder maybe some lady reads this and finds out that their boyfriend's dick is different colors and then just hangs herself instead.

I have to think about packing because it will be warm in Florida. Not warm it will be hot. I bet it will be 90 degrees but with a breeze. If my skin wants to burn I will let it. I say every year that I do not get sunburns because I am half Sicilian. If you've been with me for more than a year then you know the truth, if not then maybe you will see.

I am waiting for Jayme to come back because she is gone. I am waiting for Tuesday because I need to have my hair washed and blown out and then my tarot cards read. Then people from China will stay at my parent's house and I will clean the room that is my room there but not my childhood bedroom and hopefully we will drive.

On Wednesday, we are going to Space Camp. I wonder how long it takes to get there. I remember going for field trips to Cape Canaveral and I was so happy because you could eat astronaut ice cream. It is like Styrofoam kind of, you know?

I am happy about the ocean. I act like I live no where near the Atlantic Ocean. I act like I act like I act like I act like I act like.

Sorry, I am in a fitful mood today. It is Blair's birthday, happy Birthday Blair.

I need to sit back down and finish writing my lists. I will have to wait for Jayme to come back until I can pack. Packing is a puffin party. I watched the last episode of The Girls Next Door and it ruined my life. But hey, I feel fine because another season of The Hills is starting. During the commercial Heidi cries and Spencer punches someone in the face. A lot of times.
I really am this stupid.

My doctor says it's all about iron "you're not getting enough iron, Daniela." I want to ask him if he believes in blood lines but I don't know what kind of question that would be.

I will probably act out for the next ten days, I can feel it strongly in my bones.

things I wanted as a child: a puppy, a swimming pool, siblings

things I've wanted as an adult: a typewriter, a record player, a Mason Pearson hair brush, a room of one's own

My childhood goals did not succeed but now I also have BUDDY who is a puppy/baby/angel and all the things on my adult list. Well. Except I am starting to feel very "A House on Mango Street" about wanting to have a house and it's my house. That and multiples. Twins please. I will say then to some stranger or doctor or women in line at the grocery store "I never got the siblings, but look now i have twins."

Just because it's not a joke, doesn't mean it's not a lie.

the same picture you see every day

respect your breasts

"accidents"

from when the snow storm came

from when I married my iphone

puffins

make my ____ strong _____

where secrets go to die

team who knows

I am creepy

danny &john

the not importance of bras

this was some kind of band somehow somewhere

and something

my BFF

I've gone mad

this was written on the wall when we walked into class last night

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

SONG AGAINST SEX

nobody@vox.com(Daniela Scrima) — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 10:16:20 -0800

Song Against Sex - Neutral Milk Hotel

On this lovely morning the jury is hung &the house echoes nothings , now everyone’s gone. It’s the coldest day I’ve seen in December thus far. I don’t want to stock up for the winter, So I’m calling for a hunger-strike. I’m cashing in coupons and saving up my change for salvation or a pack of cigarettes. You’ll be holding your daughter while the laundry dries in my backyard. I’ll marry a doctor after witnessing a message (not a murder) &from here on out I’ll invest in good men—not lost boys—and I’ll watch the skyline like a monument. I’ll watch the window for your silhouette &if you return I’ll shoot you down. We’ll call the troops &act on instinct. I will forget your stomach and your backbone and I will believe in day traders instead of night traitors so when the storm comes in it will all fall into place. There’s a place for you in everything, especially the scripture you read your daughter every night, wanting her so badly to believe in something, in something more than the man made lakes you try and drown in every single night.

And you know I’m not a good swimmer, that I’ve started drinking too much coffee again. That Blair gives me donuts while I sit at the counter of Jimmy’s Diner and write, like some version of a regular, or Perez Hilton. I want to tell the man lying naked next to me in my bed that when I go stay at my parent’s house it’s like wanting to play a piano that already plays itself. The man laying next to me in bed, I don’t think he really wants me to tell him anything at all. I go on anyway: I want to be a regular, but I don’t want my teeth to get stained in the process, so I am going to drink this coffee through a straw, I am going to wipe these crumbs from my mouth. I need to call Trade Secret in Clearwater, Florida, call the mall where I used to work and demand that Randy Phoenix fix my hair. Randy, everyone has ruined it, they’ve ravaged it. It’s everyone’s hands all up on my head, all up in my grill.

I’ve been living it out in bathtubs, touching necks that don’t remind me of yours. It’s not that it’s really different from what it used to be, you know? It’s just that my position has changed. I’m always eager in the kitchen, perched over the sink with my middle finger reaching further down my throat then you had ever even thought of going. Still you’re the one taunting my insides, begging my breasts to bring up the past and then watch it as it’s swept up with the sink and trembles down the drain. “You’ll never be a regular, Daniela Scrima, you don’t even have that in you, look, you’ve gotten crumbs all up in your hair.”
Failed attempts at just bein’ a human, like last week when I tried to take up smoking and couldnt decide on which hand would be held or which man would wake up naked next to me in bed—but I knew the lighting would be perfect, I knew the music would be queued, and the dogs would be shitting on the pristine tile floor. You were looking at me like you were the palm reader, like out of all of the women in the world , you could hold this deck of cards over me, telling me no man wants to play games during the first cold week of December.

A storm front was coming &the semen was damned. I told you that was my favorite television show but I don’t know why you believed me. The troops were lyin out in front of trenches, I was slathering on tanning lotion, massaging the bullet holes in your chest. Everyone’s laughing when I’m talking, except Nick, who knows I’ve never made a joke in my life, who knows he shares the same name as my father, and knows that to me, well names, mean everything. He asks for prawns to break my spirit. The troops call their estranged mother’s and their hot tempered daddies and they read the truth from index cards that I keep in my room. They laugh when you love me and they die when you declare that love is dead. You want to see my signature pose? My leg trick? It seems like I’ll do it for just about anyone, these days.

I go to my old apartment and sit with my old roommate who calls are old supplier while we sit on the old carpet. I say “when I first moved to New York City, I slept next to that radiator, right on the floor,” You round up my influence and you kiss their wrists and ankles like love is your middle name. Like love was my middle name. Cuts on lips will always remind me of you. God wouldn’t dare damn a boy like you. Not with the stars so soft and the view so clear. God couldn’t do that to us, no sir, no baby, no never. If God did he would have nowhere to showcase the New York City skyline—the one so obscured with structures that it would forever remind you of free men and dying women, the one so dark sans constellations that we wont even know when an old moon meets new. The God you believe in, well that God let me in on his big secret, kid, he warned me that boys will be boys until he sees a man where the moon should be.

On Monday, my stock broker broke down and bought a shotgun. It’s the market, it’s the times, it’s the collapse, don’t forget to do nothing when Wednesday comes, we got to prove were equal after all. You say, you say. Just like you did last week, telling me on Thanksgiving that you bought one too. You say all men have guns in Virginia, baby, don’t get so blue. This soups on the house. You tell me to stop pretend I am south of the Mason-Dixon line. You look at me with wide eyes and say “this is not a wise investment, see in New York City, we call boys like this a ‘throw-away,” you look around my bedrooms, noticing the bones &bruises. I tell one man that I am an individual and I tell another that I am made of metal, that they never gave me braces so my mouth and manners and movements are crooked. Let’s get Cotarded in here.. Let’s get Cotarded in here.

The jury is hung, the crumbs in my hair, the soups getting cold, you’re telling me to get the fuck away from the counter, you’re saying “put your clothes back on, this is my song &you’re not going to steal it”.
In bed naked, I don’t want to give a speech unless it’s a monologue. A monologue I learned a long time ago, and I’m gonna deliver it in any voice that I want to. Maybe I will become a regular, maybe I’ll sit at this counter every day instead of going to the library or sitting at my own desk, so I can keep saying that this is my job. Who am I kidding? I love everyone I’ve ever met. I may not remember their names, their faces or meeting them at all, but I’ll fucking love them anyway.

Anyway, I am drinking my coffee with a straw. I have finals next week. I scheduled a hair appointment with Randy from Trade Secret, my favorite drag queen &my favorite hair dresser. If I am going to put my head in anyone’s hands it will be that man. See, my heart is up for grabs, I’ll leave it on the counter with donut crumbs, but my hair, oh honey my hair, you’re going to have to wait more than a minute or a second or a year, you’re going to have run your fingers through it for the rest of my life. That is true love, that is what true love really is, you can feel it stop, you can’t wash it out, you cant wash it out, but you can knot it up, you can ravage it to all hell. The jury is hung and the house echoes now that they’ve gone. There’s a place for all of you in everything, especially the scripture that you read to your daughter every night, but baby, please, stop making these man made lakes, I can’t see the moon, and all I need the water for is washing a hunger-strike out of my hair, I know you think the time has come, but I’m not ready to let you watch me drown, God says he is going to stop building men with eyes that work that way.

htttp://oh-snap.livejournal.com

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

//////

nobody@vox.com(Daniela Scrima) — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:01:12 -0800

I want a banana. Like a baby wants a banana. Sitting outside I just want to say "please don't be mean" or maybe show men what women look like without skin. I could take them to a museum where they would be lined up on display, and then we could discuss it on a daytime talk show. I would explain that these women have no skin now even though they have spent years growing it back. I wonder if it would have any effect, like the burn victims on the television screen. The burn victims are massaging ointment on to their arms-- or their stubs, the places where their arms used to be. They speak directly to you, me, God and the cameraman, they say "it still really hurts."

I ask him to come in the room and watch this with me. I think he says "this is sick" or "this is fucked up" or "what is wrong with you?" And then he goes back to playing some video game where he gets to have a machine gun, where I don't get to talk. I keep speaking even though I am sure he cant hear me, and I say "you know they were babies too, you know they had high chairs," I continue, "someone puts cheerios on a high chair and they still eat them, don't you get that?" I try, and I try, but I cannot get up to the change channel.

All of the phone calls I make are long distances, but it doesn't really matter anymore. I don't know how my phone works, or how phone works in general. I don't understand how you can hear me right away. I don't like the telephone and I wish there was a thirty second delay so I could feel like it was working somehow. Long distances phone calls also don't matter, because I don't think my cell phone provider takes note of this. I can call anyone nationally and it makes no difference. I am always under my minutes every month so they roll over to the next month, and I cant get a smaller plan than what I already have. I miss my lovers and their landlines. I want to call and ask if you are home. I think that text messages could have quite possibly ruined our lives.

And I can't make excuses anymore, I can't say "oh, I'm sorry I wasn't home," because it doesn't matter if I was home or not, anyone can reach me anywhere. People can even gps my location with their phones. We can make maps of each other across the city. We are a video game that I obviously am not good at. I force myself to work through this, I sit down and listen to all of my voice mails and sometimes it shocks me that anyone says my name, the way my name sounds coming out of other peoples mouths. He leaves me a voice mail, "Daniela, it's me" I suck my stomach in and I stare at the television screen.

I swore I'd quit, you know, like some people say they will quit smoking, or how certain men have really great ideas. I've put myself all over the internet since puberty, it was a natural response to outside circumstance, to being thirteen years old. Sometimes I wish there was one giant delete button, I guess we all feel like that sometimes. But the rest of the time, I just don't stop. I am part of a larger hybrid that does this also, I don't know if this is a collective society, if we are doing this together, competing for attention or still just having an outlet. I feel like this is habit, because I can do this easily, and I cannot answer the phone or respond to my own name. I don't know how this name thing has happened-- when I began to feel it was unfair for anyone to say my name. My parents call and I want to say "I AM SORRY NO ONE LIVES HERE bY THAT NAME," as if they'd never met me. I don't want to hear about the running tab I am as a human, my carbon foot print or the words I said as a toddler. If anyone asks me why I lied, I will tell them it is because I do not remember getting teeth.

After I've finished reading and writing my papers, I learn my real life lessons through daytime television. I watch one year of a woman's life as she loses half her body weight through gastric bypass surgery. I like this story for so many reasons. I like it because they are not acknowledging the real issue at all, it's a three hour special and all they talk about is the food she consumes in secret. They don't stop to make the connection to emotional eating, or maybe they do, but not enough. I don't think they make note of it enough because they act like it will go away. I have read about people ripping through their new stomachs, snapping through their lapbands. And it has nothing to do with being hungry. You don't go to a drive thru, pull up in your car and order three value meals because you need something to eat.
They say she is happy now, except for the excess skin. A surgery is scheduled. She cries in front of the camera, and I think I would cry too, but I don't. He comes upstairs and glares me down, like he does not make love to me, I am just some body that shares his body. His eyes are blank and I almost start laughing. This is a man or boy that has no knowledge of our government, doesn't understand how anything in the political system works and refuses to register to vote. He tells me about his high scores and I want to say "I am sorry, the person you are looking for does not reside at this residence."

I just wanted to be the prodigal son, mom. Can't I come home now? Can't we change the genders and prove everything right, mom? Why don't you listen to my voicemails, mom? I make these requests to God himself and it's like his secretary is mimicking me, when I ask to speak to him, they just tell me I have the wrong number. It doesn't even matter that I called the landline.

A famous author hangs himself. I know I should tell you he hanged himself but it still doesn't sound right to me. I have never understood that pattern in speech, and I never had to think about it until Sadam Hussein is going to be executed. I do not watch this event on daytime television, I instead watch it on youtube the next day. Everyone is watching the ball drop, bringing in The New Year-- and I can't help but to find this so disturbing. I wish he would have offed himself, or that they could have given him the choice. I understand that he was a horrible man, but I know that tomorrow it is going to be 2007, and I don't want to see a video of a man being hanged. I don't like the way it sounds. I don't want to imagine the presidents face. I tell myself that things will change when I move to the city, like this is not a global event. Alone in my childhood bedroom, I take this very personally.

On television nearly two years later I watch the Republican National Convention every night for a week. The whole time I keep putting my hand on my heart. I cant chant "drill, baby, drill" and I am not understanding any of the jokes. The boy or man I mentioned earlier doesn't walk into the room because he does not live here, has never lived here, has never slept in my new bed in my new bedroom. I tell myself this is sterile ground. I change my phone number. I get new mouth wash. I answer the phone and I sound as uplifting as I can, someone on the other line, maybe you says "Daniela?" and I am so happy, so happy with the receiver that isn't a receiver at all, so happy with the minutes that arent minutes at all. I start to tell you right away, before it cuts to the machine, I start to tell you "I am so happy to hear from you! I don't remember the last time we talked! Did you hear all the men were hanged? Do you remember getting teeth? Oh you do! Well that's good. That's good." I lie, "i do not remember getting teeth."

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

it's such a sad old feeling, the memories soft &green, but it's memories that i'm stealing

nobody@vox.com(Daniela Scrima) — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 08:42:10 -0800

& it's memories that I'm stealing, but you're innocent when you dream, when you dream."

During the week days, the mornings are mostly the same. I used to fear the mornings because of “going through the motions,” because of the process, but now I enjoy it. I enjoy the ritual. I do it alone. I set the water to boil and go make the bed, I pour the coffee and while it cools I place myself on the hardwood floor &stretch my limbs in different ways. In a few paragraphs I will tell you everything, I decided to when the water was boiling. If you wanted this to be your business before, then here you go, it can still be your business now.

When I am off the floor I try and write, I have lost a story line, kept my mouth shut &forgot about plot, this morning I remind myself to take note of this again. I used to think simply in narrative, I could have delivered a voice over if you would have put a microphone inside of my brain, it could have been in all of your favorite commercials. I should give up coffee again, I did so well for a while, but now I’m back to it. The only reason I want to give it up is so I can start drinking it again. My roommate has a French press and when classes began this year I started pouring myself a cup. I would drink something, and then feel something. The fact that I could feel the effects of caffeine became a new & astonishing revelation. Caffeine existed after all. Something is actually there. There are things I know but that does not mean I really choose to believe them. Just because something happens to be a fact does not mean that I will happen to feel it.
Isn’t that right Alexander Graham Bell--why won’t you stop phoning me in the middle of the night? Isn’t that right Abigail Folger- - lying bloody on the floor?

My reaction to statements and questions is no longer answered with "I think" or "i know" instead I always say "I believe in that" or "I don't believe in that." My roommate said she was stubborn because three generations of her family are stubborn and I said "I don't believe in that.” I want to know what people believe in not what they think, not what they know tell me how it feeels. Everyone tears up in front of me all the time, so I just don't cry at all.
There are enough people crying around me. These days, I never have to cry for anyone. For years, I had to cry for them all. In all of my dreams there are cars and roads and motions that I cannot control. The roads go up mountains or the air and the world is usually desolate, there are not many people, there are things left over. In the dream I already know what's happened, but when I wake up, I can't figure it out.

You know, when I was in my last Florida relationship, I always drove down to St.Pete. My boyfriend and I both lived off of the same road, about 45 minutes apart. But it was the same road, Belcher Road, our houses were directly lined up on a map. It was a two turn drive. Left out of my parent’s driveway onto Belcher, down Belcher for forty, forty-five minutes, maybe longer maybe shorter, and then a left onto his street, there was his house. We both lived on cul-de-sacs, fake dead end roads. Mine was connected to a trailer park and his linked on to some neighborhood.
The thing was, I always made that drive. It was always me driving, in my car. First I called it the Drive of Shame, they thought I was funny, I made up names for things, I marked landmarks on the road i said "I've just driven over Jurassic Park" and they loved me. There I was, bearing gifts, shelling out hair products and advise and babysitting and it was always me making that drive, two times a day or every night. He didn't make that drive. And now, much later, I am glad he didn’t. I am glad that I don’t process the narrative that way, because then, my god, who would have had the right?

I became ac costumed to his house, his family, his bedroom. I watched his home movies, I went over his grandmother's, I went to softball games and I brought over baked goods. And in retrospect, I did this all for a person who knew so little about me, who really in the end doesn’t know that much about me at all. I never shared the good stuff, I was busy naming the streets.
I think if he was asked what color my eyes are, he wouldn’t remember.
I am absolutely sure he would have no idea what color my eyes are.
And it's funny, because I had no eyes back then. I didn't even have eyes. I covered them up. I made them bright blue, or dark green or hazel. I pushed contact lenses into them so you would never know. No one knew the difference, I could have said my eyes were born hazel and it would have been the same as giving a small child a balloon. And that’s the thing, I had no eyes back then, I had someone else's eyes, someone else's eyes, and someone else's family.

After it all ended, after he cheats on me and causes a scene like a toddler and I am exiled off the block, pulling at my own hair, I realize how some things are just for nothing. If I show up with a shampoo I don’t really have to share a part of myself, I just have to tell you what it does to the follicles of your hair. No one sincerely believes me when I explain how much I liked working at K-Mart or the mall when I was younger, but I did. I liked it because it had so little to do with me. I believed in. I believe in hair conditioner, I don’t believe in retinas.

One day in the kitchen, after I decided I would just move to New York, I told my mother "I gave them everything and now they don't even know me at all." Because he never knew my family, he never saw my home movies, he has touched my body one million times and he still if he saw me today would ask where I got that scar. And every time I told him a different story. He never caught on, he never remembered.. He never will. I could tell him
“I fell out of a tree,” “I burned to death in a fire,” “I fell down the stairs,” “I was bit by a mouse,” “I was born this way,” and each time he nodded his head, not piecing anything together. That was my fault. That was me playing the role of George, looking at Lennie deep in his eyes, he asks me where I got that scar and I tell him if he can just stay out of trouble, I'll let him tend to the rabbits.

"Oh will you? Will you let me tend to the rabbits, George?"

But that is what I Wanted love to be like. I wanted it to be easy, I wanted to be in control. And when the ball dropped, I lost it. I wanted to settle for something simple. My father would scoff in the beginning "stop referring to your boyfriend as simple, it makes him sound stupid." But he was both. He ate when he was hungry and he slept when he was tired.

There are two kinds of people in this world: the kind that eat when they are hungry and the kind that sleep when they are tired, and those that cannot manage to do either.

It figures, I have acted out all of my best scenes for a blind audience, I have given the best speeches to deaf ears.

And now I don't really love anyone, there is never anyone new. At some point I decided I would just never tell any of these stories. I would believe in: stories, feelings, hardwood floors.
I don't want to have to tell any of these stories, you know, even though that’s what I am doing right now. I wish I could hand over a transcript, some survey like the ones we used to fill out on the internet--- do you remember? First we would send them to each other in e-mails, then later on we would copy &paste them into our blogs?
That could just answer the questions for me. Name, Age, Place of Birth, Parents, Every school I've ever gone to, Everyone I ever made love to, Who my best friends are, What my parents do, What countries I have been to, What states. .
They could study it and get back to me and when I tried to kiss their mouths I'd realize that they had no lips.

They have no lips, my god, they have no tongues. It's all teeth, my god. I'ts all bone. It was all bone.

After I started having serious relationships at the age of thirteen, I kind of discovered that the pain would go away. Even if I was hurting, even if we were acting out the biggest scene, I gained some perspective that when I was older it really wouldn’t matter anymore. Yes, there are certain people that I will probably never stop loving, but then there are those who I never really loved at all. I could never be the victim in this story, just because I was stabbed in the front does not mean I didn’t bring it up on myself. I just wanted to be stabbed in the face instead of the back. It’s not like I picked my ex-boyfriend out of the crowd for his brain, it was more the fact that I liked the way he looked in pictures; I liked the fact that he had nothing to say and if I stuck to it my life would have no possibilities.

And I have blogged all of my serious relationships, it was just at some point that I stopped blogging the break ups, I didn’t write the bad parts down because then I would have been a failure. My perception became so skewed that I didn’t know what photographs I’d be able to accumulate for you. Back then, the mornings were never the same, I woke up at different times and did different things, there was no ritual it was just the mundane. You see, there were signs that said DEAD END ROAD but I thought because I knew the shortcuts, the side entrances, the best way to make a three-point turn that I could get to wherever I was going. And I don’t know if this will surprise you or not, but all the dead end roads were dead.

There was always something comforting in this idea that maybe I would never have to live up to any expectations, that I could have just been barefoot and pregnant on some shitty tile floor without a thought in my head. And then it’s over and you realize that maybe all the things you went through really weren’t that much, I want to say simple sentences like “get your idiot body away from mine,” or “don’t you ever tell me to get over anything in my life,” I will start singing to strangers: if you don’t know me by now, you won’t never ever ever ever know meeee, oooooooooo.

For two years I stopped writing the truth and instead just blurted out some vague sentences starring: Daniela Scrima! As Loopy Pieces of Metal! But now I don’t see the point in protecting the identities of the innocent, you know, I’ve been telling you this story since the day I was born, may as well not stop now, right? I don’t feel like it will be any fun of it’s all bone. What kind of ritual would I have if I spared your name? If I didn't ask you to tell me all of your dreams about owning this land, before I politely asked you to turn around &face that tree, you know baby, just so I could see the back of your head.

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

she fucked like a phrenologist

nobody@vox.com(Daniela Scrima) — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 21:43:56 -0700

Can't it just come down to phrenology, cant you just leave it up to that baby? Nothing else has worked. We've tried it all and look at us, we keep failing. I say happy birthday. Someone uses my mouth, but they are just a stranger. I'll use both my hands, all ten fingers. If you need me to, I'll take my shirt off, or maybe I'll just talk a lot. You can hear how my voice sounds and watch it come out of my mouth, you can think about my lungs. You'll be close enough to touch them if you want to-not my breasts of course, but my lungs, my breathing. I'll have to do this baby, I'm sorry, I wish we could do it some other way- but we have used them all up. I wish we could keep using government phone services, or writing letters we'll never send, I wish we could keep on with these words we use or that you'd count your dollars and take me to the movies or I could write you an e-mail, but I know damn well- Christ baby, you know damn well too, that we don't have those options anymore. We have run out of options so now all we have left is our bones. And babe, I know we have those. Those are facts. Bones, blood, skin, cells. We have to know that, don't we baby? We could sit here again reciting each others life history, but baby, we're so sick of it. You know this is all we have left. So shut the fuck up, just shut the fuck up and let me find the answers. Shut the fuck up and I'll finally figure it out, Ill figure it out by touching your skull.

Read and post comments | Send to a friend