//////

///INSTANT///

I'm going to try this new thing called delayed gratification. Most people these days probably aren't very familiar with it (thanks to the instant nature of evolved technology), but I believe it is indeed a very beneficial trait to have. After all, most people won't always have the luxury of getting everything they want whenever they want. It is good to earn rewards, as opposed to just getting them the moment you ask. It can be good to be told/tell yourself "no" sometimes.

Well, all this only actually dawned on me now to be honest, but I have officially been converted!

Every time I want to speed while driving, I will wait two seconds & see if I really need to.

Every time I want to throw an angry tantrum, I will wait two minutes & see if I'm still angry.

Every time I want to eat in between meals, I will wait two hours & see if I'm still hungry.

Every time I feel the irrational urge to go on Facebook, I will wait two days & see if it's faded.

Every time I want to buy something unnecessary*, I will wait two weeks & see if I still like it.

Every time I want to change majors, I will wait two months & see if I still want to.

Every time I want to fly back to Manila, I will wait two semesters & see if I still miss it.

Every time I want to move apartments, I will wait two years & see if I still feel like moving. 

*something unnecessary: not food, water, gas, bills, rent, ( cigarettes), (coffee).

It's so easy to just diagnose myself with "A.D.D." & use that as a crutch for why I am the way I am, why I do the things I do. I feel like everyone seems to claim A.D.D. these days, but there's just so much being thrown at us, so much going on, of course we're having trouble paying attention to one thing at a time & wanting to do everything at once, immediately! The truth is, most things will always be there waiting, so there's no real need to rush. We've become this whole generation whose condition it is to be instantly gratified. & I've been molded into this intensely needy, bratty, volatile freak. Kiiinda wanna change that.

This is going to be quite the challenge, but I'm so down I'm up for it.

///ANYWHERE///

The books, films, & music I enjoy are the ones I can relate to; the ones I see a reflection of myself in, distorted or exact. My personal phenomenon, though, is that I can always remember whether or not I enjoyed a film or a book, but I cannot, for the life of me, remember the story line. Or perhaps I trick myself into thinking so in avoidance, because I'm so horrible at storytelling.

A film I remember enjoying as a teenager:

sometimes i just couldn't stand her. sometimes i hated her. sometimes i thought she was ruining my life.

what kept me going, is knowing that one day i would leave her.

Strange to think that teenage girls develop, almost inevitably, such a confident hate towards the woman that brought them to life in the first place. Perhaps it is the presence of fresh pubescent estrogen battling the old-timer for a place in the spotlight, & the war cools down as maturities harmonize with time. Who knows. I know I felt the exact same way Ann did pretty much all throughout my teenhood, & to this day, I still have no idea how mothers put up with that cruel behavior. A lot of screaming & tears & pain & breakdowns & worry & frustration, that's for sure. So all the mothers out there who are going through the hardships that a teenage daughter brings, rest assured that in the end they will love you & make up for all the past undeserved callousness they showed you.


even if you can't stand her, even if you hate her, even if she's ruining your life, there's,
there's something about my mother.. some romance, some power. & when she dies,
the world will be flat. too simple, too fair, too reasonable.

///ICED///

Images of feminine flowy dresses have been doing laps around my mind lately. Never would I wear one of those dresses with the cut-out sides, I'm more a fan of backless things. Backless things with black strappy detailing & contrasting soft silhouettes. & in this incessant rotation of images, the dresses are paired with dirty, worn black Converse chuck taylors, & I'm sitting at a cafe, legs crossed, sipping on rich european style coffee with elaborate foam art. & smoking is permitted exactly where I am seated, not ten feet further.

As well as a new dress, I'm in the market for a leather backpack to lug my huge camera around in because all of my existing handbags have proven to be pretty inadequate space-wise. A good quality hooded sweater would be ideal too. One with a giant grim reaper type of hood that I could just go around being completely anonymous in, but at the same time totally conspicuous.

a.ok open back silk dress 158.00 - Theyskens' Theory dewi dress 173.00 - Theyskens' Theory halter dress 209.00

Peter Vancoillie

Thakoon strapless draped gown 675.00 - Proenza Schouler slip dress 589.00

Rodarte for O.C. draped corset dress 397.50 - Free People goddess dress 88.00

Marco Fulle

Addison bucket bag 365.00 - Alexander Wang backpack 850.00

Marco Fulle 

DRKSHDW by Rick Owens hoodie 265.00

i got my feet on the ground

& i don't go to sleep to dream

you got your head in the clouds

you're not at all what you seem

this mind, this body, & this voice

cannot be stifled by your deviant ways

so don't forget what i told you

don't come around

i got my own hell to raise

///EASY///

I want to be off these crutches. At a beach far away. Dancing. Alone. Like a lunatic. But happy.

Blasting this song on repeat, as I've been doing the entire day. In my concrete loft.

In front of the computer. Sitting. Alone. Like a drone. Almost happy.

yeah i could find someone who'd never make me blue
cos nobody could ever tear me up like you
it's easy
hard as it looks

///CHANGE///

Lovers to friends. Long hair to short hair. Crippled to mobile.

I reduced a love, chopped off memories, & moved right along.

Now I want to remove all my tattoos & start over again.

If only it were that quick & simple.

I don't hate my tattoos, I'm just becoming overly obsessed with this whole notion of a fresh, clean slate.

Which reminds me, I need a tally system for my sobriety. Like how people count their days in prison, scratching away at concrete walls. Marked behind my throat, at the back of my head, cos that's where it all came in: through facial orifices.
Back rather than front cos I'm not gangster enough for obscenely frontal tattoos.

July 19th marked my first tally.

A bumpy journey, a crooked line.

Brian M Viveros

Ixchel Lara

god will come & wash away

our tattoos & all the cocaine

///HERAKUT///

Ich liebe das Künstlerduo: Herakut.

These girls with the emotions painted in their eyes.

Hurt, drained, waiting, fed up, longing, hoping, disappointed, in disbelief, & unimpressed.

///SUMMA///

summer strums slowly

swiftly along

leading the way

leading me on

a weak love is strong

a sun fading into full moon

full of mood

swings swinging

sweeping the depths

then up so high

a summer someone

in silver cloud lit skies

with golden lies

& that bronzed smile

coupled by color

& the clearest minds

beside & not behind

not behind but beside

Ixchel Lara

someone to hold me tight

that would be very nice

someone to love me right

that would be very nice

someone to understand

each little dream in me

///AMY///

love is a losing game
one i wish i never played
oh what a mess we made
& now the final frame

love is a losing game

RIP Amy.

out of the depths

&

onto higher ground now

Hedi Slimane

///SHORTY///

I haven't had hair this short since I was eleven-years-old with a bob, bangs, & two T-Boz-inspired strands hanging awkwardly below my chin. I vaguely remember making my very first trip to the Philippines with that haircut & the only memories I carry of that trip are the over-playing of the songs Magic Carpet Ride by Mighty Dub Katz & One of Us by Joan Osborne & McDonald's apple pies tasting exponentially better than the ones in the U.S. Ironically, I find that all American food chains that've made it over to the Philippines taste better in the Asian third world than in the first world where they were actually established. &, not to mention, McDonald's delivers 24 hours a day over there, & you can get your Chicken McNuggets with rice. Seldom do I eat McDonald's anymore, especially not in America where servings are increasingly generous, but I do like to indulge every now & then when I've long forgotten the taste.

early morning crop-circling

///HOMBRE///

September 2009 saw me with a quarter-shaved head in the style of Alice Dellal. & who was to guess that 85% of the Earth's female population was to catch on as well & shave anywhere between a quarter to an entire half of their head of hair off? A fun-for-a-while but should-now-go-back-to-strictly-punk trend that no one except Alice herself should be sporting anymore. So Cassie, you fucked up & you got a long way 2 go.

In March 2010 I wanted a hairstyle akin to Alexa Chung's. However, the following month my hair was chopped, dyed, & waved by some amateur hairstylist at a deceivingly trendy new salon & it ended up looking like M.I.A.'s (then (tragic)) hairstyle: not at all what I wanted. I popped more Valiums & gargled more liquor than usual over the next few months till that shit grew out, thus needing substance rehabilitation, so I went to rehab.

& when I got back in September 2010 I went (what is now popularly known as) "ombre." Which, if I'd seen it nine years previous, would've been inspired by Selma Blair's dip-dyed hair in the 2001 film Kill Me Later (rather than Rumi Neely of the 2008 blog fashiontoast).

Over a year later, now in July 2011, Alexa Chung's hairstyle is back to haunt me & I swear I will get it right this time!

My hair isn't actually cut like this yet but it will be very soon! These are just the top shorter layers,
the ones beneath are much longer but they're pulled back for these pics.

God I haven't listened to M.I.A. in much too long. Her existence in my memory faded completely when she started performing while pregnant. That was just an oddly disturbing sight considering her choice of non-maternal wear. Listening to M.I.A. brings back memories of salt & peppering my mangoes & shooting, spitting out the window. No but really, M.I.A. I think brings me back to the days when Cory Kennedy was cool & girls dressed really fucking out of it: mis-matching colors & patterns to a fault, lassoing themselves with ten or more assorted chunky chains, & then the (terrycloth) cherry on top: the sweat headband. Yes, I was one of those girls. I went to Fluxxe & I fluxxed the fuck out, sedated & dissociated, from Absinth to 32nd Street & back to wonderland over & over again.