Bird - ProfilesArchive

About Me

I seemed to have developed the habit of observing even myself from a certain, I don't know, distance. I am watching, judging, censoring. I am my own silly puppet. So if I am several times removed from myself, then imagine at what astronomical distance I must view my fellow man.
I am a sort of anthropologist of my own time. A journalist/sleuth traveling backwards from the Pompeii that will surely come. We are headed for a meltdown. And I suppose in my own way I want the opportunity for the na-na-I-told-you-so of my time. I don't imagine anyone from now will listen. This technology allows for too many performers and no audience. But maybe some curious soul sifting through the digital detritus of the 21st Century wondering...how did we get here? How did this happen? Some historian from whatever third world nation is standing on the smoking ruins of the what is now/was then the Yew-nited States of Amereeka.
I invite you to come sit up here with me a spell. The view will amaze and astonish you. Look at the people like ants scurrying around sniffing each others trails. Each blindsided by his own urgent task. Too narrowly focused to see who is really served by all of this blustering and fuss. There she is, bunkered down deep. Queen sausage ant. Bloated and engorged. Too distended to move. The United States of America.
Life has reached a kind of stasis for me. I'm a dirty old man. I have an easy chair with a pile of books next to it. I like to putter around out in nature and pick edible mushrooms. I like to curl up on the couch with my greyhound and sleep. I am in love. I have developed a latent case of OCD. I like lists. I have camped out in the Amazon rainforest and been bitten by a snake. I have swum with pirhanas. I have watched over 400 species of birds fly and sing.
I am not so disaffected that I do not ache inside when I hear about abuse and torture of other beings. I keep searching for answers that will never be found. I think speculative fiction will do more for the human race than any science or philosophy.
I counsel people who struggle with hearing voices and other symptoms of psychosis. I am making my pre-flight plan for getting into a masters program in clinical psychology at SFSU.
I (still) want to weld fins onto my 93 Toyota Corolla.
I used to be a gothy girlie but find myself in civilian clothing more and more often.
I wish it didn't rain in Canada.
I wish people wouldn't take more than they needed.
I am a passive activist. Theme parties and hipsters make me yawn now and I'm waiting in a tattered ball gown to usher in the return of sincerity.
I am part anarchist, part academic, part anthropologist, part philosopher, part psychologist, part nature geek, part bitter, part soft, part hippie, part consumer, part white trash, part velvet, part slug, part carbonation, part smoldering pyre of fuck, part petit-bourgouiesie, part gams, part fashionista, part atheist, part Marxist, part critical theorist, part novelist and one half couch potato.
I heart Miles. internet bathrooms
sometimes I have gone to houses where
all of this chaos could be contained
for a moment
bathrooms decked out like museums
or like theatre
annoited, sacred
with the acrid smell
of buttery, perfumed soaps
placed preciously
one on top of the other
arranged like carefully composed
family photographs
a record
a proof
you cannot come clean with this soap
you are meant to linger
finger the invisible velvet ropes
that mark the spaces
where towels hang
embroidered
you are a guest
this is the family photograph
life occurs in short bursts here
can be contained,
flushed
or the
lighting rearranged

My Interests

Listening to people tell me about their mothers, reading, politics, Marxism, human alchemy, vintage clothing, philosophy, plotting revolution, feminism, cocktails, mutual mental retardation punctuated by moments of brilliance, compassion, birdwatching, gender, primatology, laying in a field watching the shooting stars, making up birdcalls while stoned and then recording them, remembering why I only get stoned about once a year, being nice to you even if you are annoying me, narrowly avoiding collisions with deep, debilitating depression, making messes, looking for someone to weld fins onto my Toyota Corolla, research psychology, speculative fiction, admitting to myself I still have feelings, cognitive behavioral therapy, facilitating groups, trying to be vegetarian but lapsing about once per week, writing, making lists of manic projects that I may not ever get around to doing, playing wild fungus russian roulette, sincerity, slowly learning to open myself up to the world.

I'd like to meet:

People who trip social booby-traps. People who can't decide which camp they're in. People who fit in nowhere and everywhere simultaneously. People who are paranoid that the FBI has a dossier on them and paranoid that the FBI doesn't have a dossier on them. People who have plans for world domination if they could just get out of bed earlier. People who knock over at least one full glass at every social gathering they attend. People who are pejoratively classified as "complicated" by people who are sort of funny but only when they drink alot of beer and you do too. People who are thwarting a long slow slide into disaffection by staring into the sun for long periods of time. Good peoples. Fascinating peoples. Preferably both and in that order. People who want to talk about cognitive behavioral therapy. People who admit they are confused and don't have all the answers. People who can't walk down the street without tripping but are writing manifestos which may never set foot outside of a desk drawer. People who subvert gender paradigms. People who make beer. People who are going to hell because once or twice a year they eat at Mcdonalds and drink Coke. Poeple who are trying to quit drinking Coke and eating at McDonalds. People who can give good conversation. People who like to read with just the tips of their toes touching someone else's. People who speculate and debate endlessly about how much of human nature is socially constructed and how much is soft-wired. People like me but with better memories. People who are as happy camping in death valley as hosting a cocktail party. People who will not make me feel bad if I am perpetually losing my keys or getting lost. People who know where my keys are.

Music:

This Mortal Coil, Magnetic Fields, Peggy Lee, Johnny Cash, Belle and Sebastian, Neil Diamond, The Smiths, Janis Ian, David Bowie, Lhasa, Nick Cave, Ani Difranco, Fleetwood Mac, Gordon Lightfoot, Various shameful soft rock classics, Rachmaninov, Coil, Bright Eyes, Radiohead, Death Cab for Cutie, Iron and Wine

Movies:

Amoros Perros, Dead Ringers, Existenz, Adaptation, Being John Malkovich, M. Butterfly, All about My Mothers, The Control Room, The Yes Men, The Weather Underground, Happiness, Welcome to the Dollhouse, Devil's Backbone, Human Nature, Blue Velvet, The Pink Panther, What's New Pussycat, The Owl and the Pussycat, The Red Balloon, Harold and Maude, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, You and Me and Everyone we Know, the Ice Storm, Fight Club, Mulholland Drive, The Quiet American, Monster, 9 to 5, Winged Migration, The Lover, Ed Wood, Rushmore, Airplane

Television:

I'll only tell you if we're sleeping together.

Books:

I don't even know where to start...