In a Foreign Language

Now, I am what should be a stereotypical American in the sense that I am mutlicultural and multilingual. I am comfortable with difference and the encounter of the foreign. I feel myself connected to many identities, racial, ethnic, and national. As we encounter in American mainstream and underground arts, gender is fluid for me as is my sexuality. American is a word that encompasses two continents and the cultures formed through the dialogical dynamics of oppression and resistance. However, my Italian sucks. And the specifics of my personality, or my Britishness...perhaps my paricular Britishness which is Scotch Irish, I cringe at the thought of going to the supermarket on my own unable to speak the language. The cringe is isolating. I want to just stay in the apartment working on my dissertation in English. It is much more difficult traveling with a dissertation than I anticipated. It is such a vampire in that it pulls me away from connecting with the people around me and turns me into a creature of my own desires where I sleep when I want and eat when I want and lock myself in my coffin when I want with a great feeling of jouissance.

Bliss in Perugia

I am sitting with my back to a floorlength open window listening to the cd of Gnu Quartet, a performance we stumbled upon last night in the city center that does instrumental covers of pop songs. I am reading the book of theory that I took for granted even though I had no idea it existed. Chela Sandoval in Methodology of the Oppressed argues that the "survival skills, theories, methods, and the utopian visions" of U.S. third world feminists are "not just useful but imperactive to all citizen-subjects." I am learning how to taste coffee. A quick lunch was prosciutto and provelone on toast. I went for a walk to get gelatto with my best friend from when I was three. I am sitting in front of an architects library of anarchy, futurism, and socialism. This is the town I spent three weeks in at age 11 and have been dreaming of returning to for near enough two and a half decades. Tonight, we are going to check out the demonstration organized in conjunction with the demonstrations occuring this weekend across European cities to demand economic change.

Guest Blogger: Pedro Number One:

This situation is odd

Colour Your Own Blackface

at the Rowan Tree Garden Centre situated on the A78 tourist route.

First Hours in Scotland

You get off the plane at Prestwick Airport--Pure Dead Brilliance and purple thistle themed hallways. This is a small country. The air wraps you sweet and dancing. Make no mistake you are in faerie land. There is an airport; there is a train station; there is a golf course; there is the water. The train arrives and pulls you through Ayrshire towards Glasgow Central. You have your boarding pass from the plane and buy a single for £3.35.

T-2 Days

More like one day. I am at the paralyzed stage. Where a really lovely day did not allow for much checking off of the lists... maybe. I did do a lot. It was all threads hanging down and paperclips. I don't like saying goodbye. I need to sleep. I need to breathe. I played baseball for a minute this evening at the end of a little league game. I had a long lunch. I started a gallery. I made a picnic. I picked up a pay check. I canceled my phone (for after I left). I made phone calls. I still have to pack. I feel like a failure because I have not yet packed. I need to print out my ticket. I need to print out directions for when I get to London. I need to make sure I have all the phone numbers I need. I watched the dirt-dusted ball travel towards me; I love that I can see where it is going to be and connect, clowck, the sound of switching directions on impact. I do not have jeans. How can I travel without jeans? The sky at late sunset and shades of midnight blue to periwinkle. A moon sliver and the just budded green tree leaves caught in a caress of electric light.

T-3 Days

I am just off the phone with the insurance company and my bank, which always does so well by me. I have decided I am not going to stress. I am going to be responsible. I have my ticket there and back and what happens happens. I am going to buy myself a pair of running shoes that I cannot afford because I want to go running and my current shoes are a year old, and I do not want to return injured. I also need to buy a flash drive to store my photographs. That is the only battery-powered technology I am taking. And maybe my digital voice recorder.

I heard a quote from Betty White this morning when I was listening to WNYC AM820. She said how people love to complain and can get upset with her because she has nothing about which to complain. Betty White has always been one of my idols since I started watching reruns of the Golden Girls as a child. Now I know why.

I have paid my credit card bills. Finished a draft of chapter one of my dissertation. And am doing my best to tie up financial and personal threads before I leave.

The background color of this blog is black because that is the most environmentally responsible. The background color of my phone is set at black, which reminds me, I need to turn off my phone. I am really excited about traveling without a phone in my pocket. That used to be the way I rolled. I think it is important to remember the ability to travel and connect with people independent of the technology of a mobile phone. The internet and its technology is easily shared in public spaces. The technology of a mobile phone is much more private. For instance, I can check my email from a library; I can write a blogpost from a library; there is not a similar public access to the mobile phone. I am not going to be wirelessly networked for a few months...

T-4 Days

I am about to head off on vacation and have decided to blog it here. Really, I am planning to keep one foot off the grid, here at this site will be my concession to communication in a digital age. I write this as I listen to Morrissey's Years of Refusal on vinyl.

Before I leave I still need to:
A. Finish a draft of Chapter One of my dissertation
B. Send the police report to the insurance company
C. Pack
D. Set up a gallery space
E. Organize my room
F. Organize my office
G. Organize my itinerary
H. Pay credit card bills
I. Tie up a variety of financial and personal threads

That is enough of a list for now.