woodman

there is sand in the bed. its irritating my legs. he wanted to watch a documentary on a photographer named francesca that jumped off a building and killed herself. she was depressed. so now im up, drinking bullet rye with ice by the window. staring out into the dark and staring in at the computer light.  they showed her photographs throughout the film and excerpts from her diary. there were interviews with her parents, former classmates, her brother. it was haunting. and so now i am smoking again and drinking and knowing that i have a terrible smokers hack.
i told my boyfriend to pull the plug if i have a stroke and become a vegetable. he asked me why i had thought of that. he asked me again. i didnt respond. then he asked me again. i was silent. then again. because i smoke. the cat is perched upon the wicker chair. he had been sleeping between my legs. he has fleas. i tried to catch them between my fingers, to pinch and squeeze them to death, but they burrowed under the safety of his white coat. if you are an artist, you go to the studio every day. even if you have no ideas, no inspiration. you go every day and you sharpen pencils.

she had stopped taking her medication. she had tried to kill herself before. she was living under the watchful eye of her parents, in their nyc apartment. but she convinced them after some time that she was well enough to move back into her own apartment and live alone. and then she had probably stopped taking her antidepressants. she was in the morgue for a few days because no one could identify her. her face was unrecognizable from the fall. they identified her from her clothing. so, now i am wide awake, poisoning my system with bourbon and tobacco. thinking about art and artists and their work and what they want to say and how they say it and what the world thinks of it, or if they even notice it. her mother and father were both artists and her father did not really get any recognition fro his art until about 25 years in. and he had an exhibition with 19 other artsists or some number like that and the exhibition was to take place 5 days before she had died a year ago to the date. or maybe it was two years ago. i was straining to watch the docu from my horizontal position and also, i hadnt really wanted to watch it in the first place. so i was between trying to fall asleep, irritated by sand and fleas and listening to these people speak of this woman, this artist that they had known.

anyway, i am up now because i havent written anything in a while and i had to get up finally and brush the sand off of my side of the bed. and now i cant sleep. my lungs hurt. i havent been to the doctor in over 2 years. i havent been to the dentist in 2 years. before that it was 6 years. i cant even check my bank account. i dont want to see the numbers there. it scares me. i dont want to read, or delete or reply to emails. i dont want to think of horrible things or feel them. and yet, most days, if i am in front of a computer or a tv, i will watch shows about murders and solving murders.

this girl had a very focused determination to be a "capital A, Artist," as they said in the movie. she was very involved and knew exactly what she wanted to photograph. it's so easy to waste time. i just woke my boyfriend to tell me her last name. woodman. francesca woodman. maybe you have heard of her, maybe not. i hadn't. it was a sad story of a delicate person. i just wanted an excuse to get up and drink some rye. and try to sort through some thoughts. and relight an old cigarette and stare out into the darkness with the windows wide open and no screens to protect me from the bugs that fly in the night. and the thin little daddy longlegs that co-habitate in my apartment all around me. in the corners. hanging upside down from their delicate threads. its too bad we only have this one life to try and figure things out. so much of it is spent fiddling with silly things.