School Years as Defined By Record Albums

grade school--

The soundtrack to Dirty Dancing


junior high--

The White Album by The Beatles
Like a Prayer by Madonna
the soundtrack to Imagine
Appetite for Destruction by Guns 'n' Roses
Help! by The Beatles
The Immaculate Collection by Madonna
Ride the Lightning by Metallica
Metallica by Metallica
99.9 F Degrees by Suzanne Vega
Ten by Pearl Jam
Nevermind by Nirvana
Wish by the Cure
the soundtrack to Singles
                   


high school     
                       
freshman year--
                     
Revolver by The Beatles
In Utero by Nirvana
Mr. Fantasy by Traffic
John Barleycorn Must Die by Traffic                                        


summer between freshman and sophomore years of high school--

Surrealistic Pillow by The Jefferson Airplane
Incesticide by Nirvana
the soundtrack to Reservoir Dogs
So Tonight That I Might See by Mazzy Star
Pretty On the Inside by Hole
Automatic For the People by REM
                                                                           

sophomore year--

Live Through This by Hole
the soundtrack to Pulp Ficton
A Storm in Heaven by Verve
Nirvana Unplugged by Nirvana
Last Exit by Traffic


summer between sophomore and junior year:

She Hangs Brightly by Mazzy Star
Piper at the Gates of Dawn by Pink Floyd
Saucerful of Secrets by Pink Floyd

junior year--

Space Oddity by David Bowie
Not a Pretty Girl by Ani Difranco
Geek the Girl by Lisa Germano
Relics by Pink Floyd
After Bathing at Baxter's by Jefferson Airplane
Crown of Creation by Jefferson Airplane
Little Earthquakes by Tori Amos
Atom Heart Mother by Pink Floyd
                   

summer between junior and senior year--

Happiness by Lisa Germano (the rare version)
Out of Range by Ani Difranco
Imperfectly by Ani Difranco
Horses by Patti Smith
Under the Pink by Tori Amos
Dummy by Portishead
Ani Difranco by Ani Difranco
Dilate by Ani Difranco
                                                              

senior year--

Piper At the Gates of Dawn by Pink Floyd (again)
The Velvet Underground Box Set
4-Track Demos by PJ Harvey
4-Track Demos by Rose Polenzani (I shot the cover! :)
To Bring You My Love by PJ Harvey
Kaia by Kaia
Boys For Pele by Tori Amos                   


summer between high school and college--

Post by Bjork
The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars by David Bowie
Axis: Bold as Love by Jimi Hendrix
Nine Objects of Desire by Suzanne Vega
Live in 1969: Volume 1 by The Velvet Underground


freshman year at The Rhode Island School of Design--

Jewel by Cranes
Dig Me Out by Sleater--Kinney
Dry by PJ Harvey
Pornography by the Cure
From the Choirgirl Hotel by Tori Amos
Ray of Light by Madonna
Spice World and the Spice Girls' other album (I'm not proud to say)


summer between frosh/sophomore years @ RISD--

The CD Version of the First Two Albums by Bikini Kill


fall semester soph. year at RISD--

Songs of Love and Hate by Leonard Cohen
From the Choirgirl Hotel by Tori Amos (again)
Flood by They Might be Giants


the next spring when I took a semester off, and the summer before I started full time at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago:

Pussy Whipped by Bikini Kill


rest of undergrad--

Homogenic by Bjork
soundtrack to Almost Famous
The Singles by Bikini Kill
Julie Ruin by Julie Ruin
The Chronic by Dr. Dre
Le Tigre by Le Tigre
Feminist Sweepstakes by Le Tigre
                          

grad school--

Tales of a Librarian by Tori Amos
Feminist Sweepstakes by Le Tigre (again)
American III: Solitary Man by Johnny Cash
American IV: The Man Comes Around by Johnny Cash
The Creek Drank the Cradle by Iron and Wine
I Can Hear the Heart Beating As One by Yo La Tengo
Loved by the Cranes
Plague Mass by Diamanda Galas
The Singer by Diamanda Galas
All Hands On the Bad One by Sleater--Kinney
The Fakes by The Fakes
Plastic Ono Band by John Lennon
Requiem Mass by Mozart
The Passion of Joan of Arc by Voices of Light
Year of Meteors by Laura Veirs
Before the Poison by Marianne Faithfull
The Beekeeper by Tori Amos
                   

                                                                                  
                                                                                                                

Reasons Why I Started Smoking

The world comes at you too fast; it's nice to have a reason to take a break. That said, a lot of people are "going out for some air" now when they need a break. I can do that instead. Going out for some air is so much nicer than going out for a cigarette. I can inhale the fresh spring air instead of the dirty carbon monoxide smoke, and not feel embarrassed for what I'm doing.

 

A word on the world coming at me too fast: I'm someone who is easily stimulated and likes to take my time on things to get them just right. In school, I frequently ran into problems because I "didn't work fast enough." The kids who worked fast got to have social lives; I spent all my time on my schoolwork and gave up on my social life because I don't work "fast enough." If I chose to hang out with friends, I often didn't do well in school because of it.

 

I think our culture is sick. It stresses people out and than villifies people for the ways they try to cope with the stress, whether it's smoking cigarettes, drinking, smoking pot, overeating, or whatever. Just as very few women in our country can fit the skinny, big-breasted, blond, young and white ideal for women, very few people in general can fit the ideal in our country of a physically fit, well-adjusted, healthy person with no bad habits.

 

Well, anyway, this Sunday I will have gone two weeks without smoking.

 

 

Quitting Smoking Playlist

Tomorrow Never Knows-- The Beatles
Alive-- Pearl Jam
High-- Cure
Stepping Up to the Mic-- Internal/External featuring Kathleen Hanna
These Are Days-- 10,000 Maniacs
Today-- Smashing Pumpkins
Get Down, Make Love-- Nine Inch Nails
If I Needed Someone-- The Beatles
Man On the Moon-- R.E.M.
Mr. Jones-- Counting Crows
Shine-- Collective Soul
Fade Into You-- Mazzy Star
Longview-- Green Day
Fire Snakes-- Laura Veirs
Bouncing Off Clouds-- Tori Amos

a correction

The Pearl Jam album I've been talking about isn't self-titled, as the cover would suggest. It is called Vs. As in "versus." I remember that from my youth, now.

I posted this on a message board on facebook last night

This is my second day smoke free... I've joined an on-line Nic-Anon group... I ordered the book (I love to read anyway)... I'm on the full-strength patch... I've enlisted my 95-year-old great aunt (who successfully quit at 39... I'm 32) to ...be my personal cheerleader (that woman has a lot of life and energy left in her!)...everything's happening so fast, it doesn't seem possible that two days ago I was smoking... but I have this visceral feeling that a layer of smoke and ash has been lifted from my vision, and especially my senses of smell and taste

I was so dumb

i was fifteen years old. i was so dumb. the protaganist of the book girl, interrupted smoked (this was in 1994, before angelina jolie was a glimmer in the media's eye). franny glass smoked. courtney love smoked. but, most importantly, my friends smoked. flash forward to 17 years later: WHAT THE FUCK WAS I THINKING!!!?

i know there are other points in my life when i may have started smoking if i hadn't at 15. like at college.

i hate the person i was becoming when i started smoking. the person who didn't believe in herself. the person who gave up on herself. the person who needed a boyfriend to feel valuable. the person who did drugs even though part of her was afraid of them. the person who found redemption, or thought she found redemption, in being "a bad girl." the person who let her boyfriend convince her to become an atheist. i hate that person. i hate that that person is in my past. maybe, somehow, i can exorcise that ghost of the girl i used to be by stopping smoking. because it was her who started smoking, it wasn't me. the real me was underground, letting this fake version of me be my avatar to the world.

quitting smoking

I'm quitting smoking (again.) It's only been my first day smoke-free and I'm already at my wit's end, but I just keep thinking of all the people I see who are hooked up to respirators. I don't think I'm a lost cause at 32, I just think the time to quit is now. I really can't afford to wait a few more years anymore. Now I am going to the American Cancer Society website to arm myself with information.

more about Pearl Jam

That Pearl Jam album I bought at the rummage sale that I talked about in my previous post, their self-titled album, is actually pretty good... except that when I was driving home, for a minute there, since I live in the same town that I did when I was 15, I had this weird moment that if I used suspension of disbelief it almost seemed as though I was 15 again, wandering around my my town, although of course I couldn't drive when I was 15. Sometimes I wonder if the ghosts of this town really haunt me, or if I am one of them, haunting this town... or if there is really an appreciable difference between the two.

critique of bridget jones

cigarettes: too many
calories: who cares, f**k the establishment for telling us we have to be thin
alcohol: none but i probably need it


currently listening to: "wish" by the cure

bought another old pearl jam cd at a rummage sale last night... the only pearl jam album i actually liked in the '90's was "ten"... think i may be having mid-life crisis

go-to albums of 2012, so far:

"scarlet's walk" by tori amos
"amrita... all these and the japanese soup warriors" by loop guru

still waiting for the end of the world...   (and f**k the mayan calendar and hugh grant, too)

What Hairy Armpits Mean

Standing up for what I believe in. Standing up for what's right. Doing what I have to do. Putting myself first. Not thinking in "binary code" (ie, if I shave my armpits but still pluck my eyebrows and shave my legs, I can be free to be contradictory in other things.) Standing up for myself. Taking care of myself. Eating right. Exercising. Not worrying about what other people think of me. Not worrying about whether something I want to do or how I accomplish something "makes sense." Rejecting that because I am a married woman in my thirties, that means I have to act or be a certain way. Not defining "sex" as vaginal intercourse. Rejecting the idea that if I teach myself to do something a certain way and it's different than how other people do it, I'm "doing it wrong." Embracing the dark cunt. Embracing the dark faerie fissure in the woods. Embracing the dark swarthy sweaty hairy armpit. Embracing that life is messy. Embracing that people die for no reason and there's nothing you can do to stop it and pictures fall down from off  the shelf for no reason and the glass shatters everywhere and this can happen twice in one week but through all that not getting lost in the tangled woods and keeping track of the light, even if it is from a waning moon…