Ideas while riding the subway

I’m riding the N train to Astoria. I felt lost today; tired and out of myself. Let’s say you were born before Internet, with limited information, and you hoped to become an adult in a simpler environment. I wanted to be an adult when innovation gave you the chance to be part of the movement. I’m all about content and how it is transformed into form, but I don’t quite get the new forms. What I want to be? Where I want to be? I forget the description Rodrigo gave on Saturday about Generation Y. I think he said we are addicted to be excited. Is this the way I wanted to live my life? I spend more than 8 hours in front of a monitor. No. What kind of relationship I want to have? I want you to be drawn to me, fall for me, to come and get me wherever I am. I want to be chased. I’m sometimes afraid of the passion that drives me. I’m a predator.

My iPod plays Three Days by Jane’s Addiction: True hunting is over. No herds to follow. Without game, men prey on each other. The family weakens by the bite we swallow... True leaders gone, of land and people. We choose no kin but adopted strangers. The family weakens by the length we travel.
All of us with wings...

I met Ulysses and Carlos last night outside the building where I used to live in Manhattan. They were high as usual, sitting on the doorsteps holding Morris, the aging pit-bull. Ulysses had lost his front tooth during a fight and I could tell he was ashamed, trying to cover the hole with his tongue while we were talking; his face was swollen. Carlos was playing classical Spanish guitar and both were drinking cheap rum mixed with wild fruit punch. Ulysses is a warm-hearted guy, living a fucked-up life, sponsored by a former Jesuit who pays for his drugs hoping to compensate for all the terrible things that happened to Ulysses during his childhood. It’s sad and hopeless.

Laura is using silver string to make herself a ring and Oscar is speaking out loud while resting on the red sofa. We listen to a Chicano hip-hop song. Laura lost her job as a result of the economic recession and is moving back to Mexico next week leaving us without our home-based architect. Maria is moving in next Tuesday.

I read two inspiring art news last week: Ms. Ceballos earns $100 a month and owns one of the only truly independent art galleries in Havana. She has helped to launch the career of some of the most important Cuban artists showing their work in her own living room.
A collective art show in Damascus holds pieces from Iraqi artists that sought refuge in Syria. During an interview with the Financial Times Abbas al-Amar, the painter organizing the exhibition said, "If people start planting roses again, I will go home to Iraq. People who are planting roses are also thinking and dreaming."

For some of us marriage is rebellious. After years of being considered a free-spirit by your family no one expect you to do the things “normal” people do, and they show concern about this “new you” that actually wants to get a diamond ring instead of a symbolic tattoo. When I was younger I systematically rejected everything that represented following the norm, I even thought using a hairbrush was stupid (sigh!). Now, even when I still listen to my old mix tapes ranging from David Bowie to Tricky, I want to be with a man that can wear a suit without blaming the “system” for having dress codes. I feel like my friend Gerry, once he finally got out of the closet, he found himself in love with a woman and everyone was shocked because he was supposed to like men.

Last night I started my volunteer work with Cinema Tropical as I want to get involve in the art/film scene again. After recording a public conversation between two prominent filmmakers, one from Argentina and one from New York, we headed to the Washington Square Café for a glass of wine. In a way, Carlos and Lucila represent a certain influence for me. They are two well-respected film/art promoters who carved their work in New York after coming from Mexico 6 years before me. Like me, they chose to live in this city and call it home. - What is not to love about New York? - Carlos said repeatedly while biting pieces of garlic that tasted like olives. Lucila has it clear; she has never doubted why she moved here, “I always hoped to be taken out of Mexico”. As for me, I just knew I will live here, in the same way I thought I knew I will be a filmmaker. I’m not sure anymore.

I haven’t talked about my first months in New York for a long time. It’s funny when you remember places and events, and what it makes you feel right in the top of your belly. We used to live and work at an old building on 14^th street and 8^th avenue. Everyone living in the building had come to NY after graduation as volunteers to develop community projects; I was producing documentaries for public television. For all our hard work we received school credit and a $50 monthly stipend. It’s funny to think how we managed to build our way up in New York in such a small budget. I still can recall the squeaky sound of the wooden floors, the waterless sinks in every bedroom, the shared shower and how scary it was to touch its walls with bare skin, the cat living on the shelves of the kitchen, the pit-bull sleeping on the hallways, the rats on the basement and the homeless guys smoking crack on the roof. It was New York and we expected it to be tough. I miss the excitement of being new to the city, and the countless opportunities it might bring.

Genoveva and I tried wedding dresses at a sample sale this weekend even when wearing one for real will be very scary. She has been living with her boyfriend for more than 4 years and just decided to tie the knot; not in a small cocktail, but the big thing, church and all. The first time someone proposed to me was at a Japanese restaurant; I’d just eaten a tuna-avocado roll and I had an urgent need to vomit. My boyfriend at the time fainted after asking the question blaming the magic mushrooms he had previously eaten that afternoon. The second time was not like a real proposition. In fact, I asked Victor to ask me if I wanted to get married with him. I’m not sure if I want to actually do it, I just wanted to get asked. In any case, we still need to get Geno’s dress, something that looks like a wedding gown without being one. That makes her not to feel a bride, but someone that is just getting married. I already bought the dress to wear at her party.

I was crossing 2^nd avenue this morning, already late for work, when a guy approached me and said “you are very beautiful”. I thanked him, smiled, and continue my way to get the usual 75-cent coffee from the Egyptian vendor. I have to say, the glow of such nice words is still floating around me. In the meantime Oscar is home resting his chicken pox while Laura and Pepe are still looking for a job in such a harsh scenario. We should say sweet things to and about other people more often; life will be way nicer.

 

I love spending time in my new bedroom.

We were trying to watch a movie but the projector failed. Laura, who is the only person that can make it work is already sleeping, so we resigned to the possibility of going to bed without watching the end of the film. My stomach is complaining as a result of eating too many peanuts while Oscar tries to solve the problem by gently tapping the back of the projector. Today was a nice day. Pepe and I walked around Soho and discovered 2 lofts dedicated to showing Walter de Maria’s work: hundreds of paralleled golden bars, and a 2 room apartment filled with humid soil. Both spaces opened during the late 70’s, and the idea that they survived the real state boom made them more interesting.

Sdenka and I went dancing to Mongo’s in Sopocachi after a long day of work. A couple of Brazilian gay men were dancing by us and I couldn’t stop staring at them. Somehow they reminded me of the great proximity of cultures you feel in South America, against the lack of diversity in Mexico, and the lack of interest from the US to Latin American cultures. The US behaves like the spoiled cousin and rarely or never acknowledges the influence it has received from the south, while dismissing the richness of its 34 neighbors.