tongue in teeth.

As I was saying...

I've never felt Love like this before. The kind where every step matters; means something new. Every move you make actually generates some sort of response. Your mistakes (and to a greater extent, your shortcomings) are not just boring ways to keep you status quo. They're reasons to start to watch your steps even more. No one has ever made me watch my steps before. Not until now. I've always called and cried for my downfalls to be pointed out to me. I've begged for them. No one's ever had anything to say. I've always demanded some sort of challenge, whether it be in the form of creative struggle, or an interpersonal dynamic. I've always craved something that dared to kill me if it wouldn't make me stronger.

This much is true:
i've cried more in the past three months or so than i had in a year and a half. i guess in ways, it sounds sadistic. in some ways, i'm sure it just doesn't add up. but this is something that i've been wanting and needing for a long long time. someone who doesn't just roll with the punches... someone who isn't afraid to dish it out sometimes as well. someone whose actions speak volumes. they say, "are you even listening?"

Think about it.
I've always been so damn strong. At least, I always thought I was. Maybe it was just that I had never been put up against any real adversity. There is no way that I can not grow from something like this. And think about any other twenty four year old (knocking on twenty five) that needs to grow up more than I do.

Granted, this is just one angle of my life. This is just Love. There are still layers and layers of things that I want to take on. To fail at. To succeed on. To waste my time on. But this right here, this girl, is someone who can bite back. Someone who can remember. Someone who, really, I have no control over.

Someone who, despite all of this, still Loves me back.

Oh,
Paranoia Agent never got any better.

There's a Fairweather song that I'm putting on Mix #10 that I always forget about, but that means worlds to me.

Still Paradise
Try to pretend that everyone’s not dying here.
See this youth that’s draining out and drying up.
The color fades.
We decay and turn away.
Won’t you try and cover up all our lives.
Don’t you try?

You find yourself falling apart when there’s nothing wrong.
Breathe in breathe out this is the end of me.
Fall in fall out there’s nothing permanent.
But is it possible that things move on while we’re breaking down.
Just hold me close.
Don’t let me go until I’m alright.

Cover us up and walk away.

The bolded piece of that mattered so much to me two Wednesday nights ago, when I went shopping for Christmas gifts. I feel affected by it, touched by it, consoled by it, and guilty of it, all at once. That's how it works for me, anyway. Especially in this relationship I have going on.

I've put such high stakes on Her for one reason or another. And due to this, I'm constantly finding things wrong that aren't even wrong. I'm coming down on myself and therefore affecting the outward trajectory of my wordsemotionsactions. Another new feeling, and direction. I've never felt jealous like this before about the little bullshit that exists. Call it the fact that in my last relationship I was left for another guy because I gave the girl all the trust in the world. Again, though, maybe I was just too distant in that relationship for it to work. Regardless, I get scared to death of the little and big things. I overcompensate. I undercompensate. I think I do everything except be comfortable at my own level.

It's a huge mistake.
But I'm trying.

This might sound too philosophist, but I don't know how else to come across. Nothing is permanent except for yourself. Forget your legacy, because once you're gone, it can be tarnished. Once you're gone, and you've done all that you can that's all the permanence that you can handle. Make yourself the number one priority. Love yourself and allow others to love you only as much as you can feel that you deserve. Don't let anyone in who doesn't deserve you. You really are worth that much. Believe me. Whether you're home in your own town, surrounded by friends, and things and places to experience, and a family that loves you, or if you're in a completely distant city with nothing of interest to note, nothing stimulating within traveling distance, or any love to warm you, there will always be the choices that you make to get you to that next step. Anything and everything that you decide will get you to the next hilltop or valley. If you choose to not choose you have accomplished absolutely nothing.

I made a difficult choice. I left everything I knew to come to a place that I knew nothing about. I took a chance. I'm still taking it. Without it, I would have never found things about myself that I need to know. I never would have found things about others that they didn't even know they could have said. I never would have tested myself. I never would have known real loneliness. That genuine solitude that I needed to have that I thought I completely understood. I never would have known how to balance bills. How to learn to get by.

I never would have known my limits as far as a living partner goes.

This decision is going to last until July. That's when the lease here runs out. I'm not sure where that will lead me. I'm really not completely positive where I'll lay my head at the end of this ticking calendar. But I do know that I'll be here another seven months. In about ten days, I'll be halfway through my Miami stay. And whether I'm coming home to Long Island, or even New York in general, or if I'm going to West Virginia, or the west coast, or Europe, or Asia, that's something I'll probably start thinking about in May or April of 2007.

I'm sort of floating right now.
You guys knew that about me. Come on.

So, me and Rahul ended up talking for about an hour and forty five minutes last week. It was genuine quality. I loved it.
I'm calling Brian tonight, some time after nine.
I want to try to get in touch with Dave to hangout again sometime before Christmas.
Kerry called a couple times this weekend, but I haven't had a chance to get back at her. Maybe tonight after Brian.

Still nothing from Carissa.
It hurts.
We spent a week together. And then some.
And then, silence.

Um,
but we've been playing Paper Mario for Gamecube. It's a solid RPG. No garbage, nothing drawn out beyond where it should be. Just Mario doing mostly Mario-esque things in paper form. A lot of clever puzzles are strewn about. Plus, there are a ton of awesome Mario universe characters drawn in a new art form (nothing new to the Mario-verse; I mean, how many different iterations of Goombas have we seen?), my favorites being the different kinds of Bob-Ombs they've been throwing into the mix, a Koopa Troopa decked out in a spiky knight uniform, and the softened up Buzzy Beetle. And the boss characters do not disappoint.

New Nas track is out of control. Hit the myspace for that.

I finished reading Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?. It was definitely a good, tight sci-fi novel. It felt more like a short story, though, the way things didn't pan out to huge proportions. It was pretty much a bounty hunter carrying through his missions, and, as sci-fi always does, it touched upon several different real-life problems in its own way (morality, religion) via the book's characters, and world. It was a good read, and one that you can no doubt get through in a week if you were really to try. It's worth it.

I'm currently reading Bradley Hathaway's All the Hits So Far But Don't Expect Too Much: Poetry, Prose & Other Sundry Items. The kid apparently tours with bands, and does spoken word poetry. The big problem with him is he doesn't have a whole ton of talent. I know I have more. At least, yo, let me break it down like this. Reading his stuff doesn't come across like he has any skill. Maybe it's the way he speaks it, maybe it's the way his stage presence steals you. I'm just not sure. But he just isn't that good with his words.

This is the sort of thing that blows me away.

In my mind, I have a lot of stuff to offer people hungry for verbiage.
And then this kid has a book published.
And has toured.

Ambition/Inspiration/Initiative: 45,000
Me: 0

the deadlock.

Paranoia Agent isn't the anime I hoped that it would be. At least, it hasn't established itself in the first two minutes as anything I'd want to pay attention to. I'm speed typing away on my sidekick, though, while I watch the end of the second episode. There are some cool ideas at work, visually. But the only characters that they've established are peripheral; ones that pop in sporadically. I know them more than I know the ones who are taking up most of the screen time. This is the kind of thing that steers me away from the genre. Sometimes, it's better to just watch television. While this medium has a TON of potential, it doesn't fully represent itself the way I know it could. I'm just about ready to take this and the next volume back without watching the rest.

What it seems to me is the entire series is a bunch of short stories that are tied together very loosely due to a storyline that cycles in the city.

I'm trying out Desert Punx next, because the imagery on that seemed interesting. Post-apocalyptic and desolate, with lots of gasmasks. Sounds like a good place to start.

I watched Girl, Interrupted the other night.
It brought me places.

It's kind of bizarre to think about contact, and lack thereof, and the thought that it could be everyone's fault, or my fault, or their fault, or no one's fault at all. Contact. It's like Team Miscommunication continues and continues without us even saying a word.

I'm going downstairs to get a snapple. I think. As a matter of fact, I'm walking to 7-11 to get a snapple. I want to use up more time.
-- and it isn't until now that I realize what David meant about Snapple being readily available up north.

I got water instead.

Love is hard. Just like Art is hard. Just like Creating is hard. The way this Love is, anyway. And I'm not sure if it's Justine, or Me, or Miami, or the fact that neither of us is Home. But it's choppier than I remember. A more involved beginning than I remember. More intense in every way than I've ever remembered. It's just new, I guess. Someone different, and a completely unpracticed way of doing things. That's the way it should always be. Relationships and matters of the heart aren't like math classes. There is no cumilative knowledge. Everything you learn is about yourself. And you can only hope to be able to use what you've learned. But nothing has ever been the way I've remembered it before. Nothing has ever been the same.

I've never been able to say,
"I remember this part."

Even when everything was happening over the phone, again. It was still all brand new.

Rahul plans to call tonight.
Brian called me Sunday.
I've actually seen Dave twice.
Kerry called Thursday.
Kailyn still makes frequent contact through several different airwaves.
Carissa is nonexistant.
Nicole and I shared some huge e-mails.
I miss Anthony, but we try.

The people that matter,
they're all trying.

(to be continued)

look:

this is me, november.
it's around 60 degrees everyday here, and i feel like i'm freezing.
i use my days off to clean most of the time.
i don't listen to music anymore, because nothing is worth listening to.
i never read.
these are mostly complaints, but they're buried.
i miss everyone.

i'm very happy.
i'll try to write more.

always e-mail me.
steve.cuocci@gmail.com.
always.

i think of you,
and of rusted out factories.

when they walk through ash, they'll name us by city.

Well I loved this town like you did
Ill burn it to the ground
Packed your things and then
You were gone
Called a new place home

Like you do
And you'll never change

More than lights expose who you are.

eyes locked for hollows.

i have been trying to finish the newest mix for many, many months it feels like. it's actually only been just short of three months. but it's just not coming together. it's because music has been very shallow lately. there are a few things that i've been working backwards on, but just about everything coming out that's new is uninteresting. the two big releases of the past two weeks? puff daddy, and brooke hogan.

such is The Industry.

a few suggestions.
1) read the site.
2) Oh, Sleeper: Legit breakdowns.
3) Sparta: the new record is not disappointing.
4) Misery Signals: the new material blows the old stuff out of the water. less dense, more experimental on their end. the new singer more than fills the old shoes.
5) John Legend: straight up r&b.
6) Fields: the first song on their profile is off of a new album which i'm instantly excited about.

so much has changed in a month's time, and it's hard to verbify it. i moved out of north miami beach, and down to south beach. dave got married and needed room for the mama rabbit. plus... i mean...

i sort of met someone.

it's hard to convince or describe to anyone the spontaneous eruption that ended up being Us. i think i actually might have said, "there's a new girl at work. she seems like she'd be really... interesting to talk to." i think this came at a completely random point in my conversation. i think it was obvious.

here:
I'm in Love.

don't.

it is.
it's hard.
it's so hard.

hostage me.

the tale of two cities never
knew obliteration like this.
we're talking population control.
we're talking martial law.
we're talking body count.

the scribes, the playwrights,
the painters, all debutantes,
reduced to memory.

blank media for years,
as unemployed muse
cartels roam the
gypsy paths.

surrounded by mountains; claustrophobic

i speak to her pseudonym in the third person.

this, from the 609.

five lines.

it's not a medication but a bellowing of the organs of your rhythmics.

i don't believe in the dead, but these are premonitions. that's right. i said fucking phantoms. haunting the inner workings of anticipation, the eyes, the smile.

notebook pages lines the roof of my mouth, waiting to be tasted. the things i ingest are aimed at your skin. i want to be heard in your footsteps. i want to feel you coming. i want to feel you coming.

bass heavy, like the ocean. a lung so deep, we're talking creatures. inhabitants.

the waiting at transit length is benign. a clairvoyant mentioned charmed existence, but i told her i was just a vagabond. my coating of arms, a penciled diagram on the blue lines. my reputation, a line in legendary sand.

X: THIS is a fucking opportunity to make a difference.
X: you don't NEED him.
X: this whole blocking/silence/crying thing... it's an opportunity.
O: im just scared i guess
O: that nothing else is going to come around
X: of life, of the world without THAT.
X: god.
O: and im not good at being single really
X: please.
X: give me.. BLESS me with a world without that.
O: i just dont think anyone else will be like genuinely interested in me
O: and i feel like if someone does come along - tha tim going to scare them away
X: DO YOU REALLY THINK HE IS?!
O::-X: just answer it.
X: if not answer it.
X: think about it.
O: i am thinking about it
O: its all ive been thinking about
X: it doesn't seem like it.
X: like, do you see what you're fighting to stay in! ahh!
O: i know
O: and i know its a shitty excuse
O: but like i said, im scared
O: im not as social as i used to be
X: this kid better have a dick like a sledgehammer.
O: we dont have sex anymore

oh my.
if there's anything that could ever defeat me, it's unworthy self doubt, and the death of a romance.

a locale.

giulia has this picture up on her myspace.
i asked her where it is so i can go visit it.
i'm pretty glad that it exists.
come with me.

"how fast do feet grow, my sister?"

Her: So, am I a messenger now, or something?
Him: Well, I mean, you could tell me where you live, so I could just punch it through your window.





just to set the record straight,
last night doesn't count.

a craning.

and then, just frames.
if we're quiet and shut the door,
they won't know.

so quiet, we'll scream in nerve endings.
quiet like window panes.

leaving fingerprints on the skin loving your ribcage.
leaving mouthprints on where your throat meets your vessel.
teethmarks.

so if it's dark and if we don't tell a soul,
they won't figure us out.
bring me in with you;
guide me at arm's length.
when we meet at the eyes again,
that's when it starts.
a soft and expectant sonata,
this will be our masterpiece.
breathe me in with all of you.

quiet like archways.

i want to see the shapes our clothes make on your floor.
dunes, i think.
mountain ranges, i think.
camouflage.

elbows and knees dividing the friction into angles. a craning neck and a smoothed out back. reaching out for you and me and everything and more. so much. handfuls, and nails. play the passion in my ears. don't stop.



and then, just frames.

a date.

i was on myspace looking through some bands that i hadn't heard about in a while. the hope conspiracy and ratatat just came out with records last week, and i was curious if i should buy them or not. i then went onto iron & wine's to see what/if he was doing anything [plus, i found out he was from miami] and then went to modest mouse's site to see if something was going down with them, and saw that they were playing some situation in miami on november 11th. i thought it was a joke. so i checked it out, and it said they were playing with gnarls barkley. this had to be a joke.

clicks later, this is no fucking joke.

the artists that i'm psyched about performing?
duran duran, tiesto, common, daft punk, gnarls barkley, modest mouse, thievery corporation.

the rest?
jesus. i'm about to spend a good chunk of my day looking through what these people are about. i'm psyched. they have a player on the site which i hope includes at least one gateway song for each. most of them seem to be solo artists named by their name which means DJs and such. i have NO problem with that

example:
george acosta. hirofumi ohta.

also performing:
haiku.

if you're not down with beat, electronic, or dance music, understandably, you're not going to be into this sort've event. but for a full day from eleven AM until midnight, this will be a day where i think being in miami will completely pay off.
.
-
it's been raining for three days. our lake is exceeding its threshold. even the ducks don't know what to do. i went to the management office this morning. i walked through puddles. huge ones. shin deep ones. it's a huge difference between me and the people i hangout with on a regular basis. the people at home. some of the things that i do, if it wasn't for me knowing them, those people would probably be pointing and laughing. i figure that might give them some insight on different people, but it doesn't.

i do, i worry about being too much of a child for this world, this life. but i really don't know how else to enjoy it. i don't take a lot out of technological toys. i'm not going to have a huge home one day to outlandishly illustrate within. it's always been the little things. maybe i've been instilled with too much of an appreciation for them, that it's hard for me to see outside of them.

i do, i think about the gene of the traveller. they're out there. they're everywhere. what is it that makes people want to be constantly on the move, and on the go. what makes people want to take these places down as words, and photographs, and sketches? i don't come from a horrible place. in fact, i don't think i could have had a better upbringing, or environment to come up in.

there are few things that make me more excited than the prospects and possibilities of who and what lies beyond these borders and these shores. i'm being completely honest with you. to think that somewhere, in london, there's a kid who loves a band as much as i love fairweather. the fact that, quite possibly, i've never heard of this band. i want to meet this guy, have him need to make me a mix CD. to have that feeling that it won't be enough for me to hear it on my own. i want to see his face, and his fingers while he's telling me how this band made his last few months.

this, over and over and over.
-
it's still raining.



-

why i shouldn't work at a record store.

que shiraz.

i think i finished what i've been working on since january seventeenth. it took four and a half months to materialize the emotions, words, and results which would then become the final product. i put it down for two or three months, and recently picked it back up again, and finished it. it needed to be extracted from me like venom.

i sweat this shit out like heroine.

i wonder what she would say if she read it. undoubtedly, it would come off as unfair. it's just my side. and i never saw her side of things, except when they were my side of things, maybe. it's so much behind me that i can't even remember. it's the saddest shit in the world, because i can't even place a moment in time where we were really in a bad way. the fact that it takes so little to qualify The End. i had to cauterize everything that was there. all the nerve endings, and all the memory-transit sealed shut.

i never dream.
but i did last night.

i went to a pub. it was mid day, all the sun coming through the tinted windows as filtered lighting. there was a host stand near the end of the bar where jimmy stood with a guy who had a short clippered blond head of hair. there was a girl there, too, but she was just a mental decoration that i must have thrown in for an ethereal form of feng shui. i asked jimmy if i could see the test that tina took. the other guy, i'm thinking he felt like a brother, or a best friend, started foaming something through grinded teeth. jimmy started writing on a piece of business paper, handed it to me, and then said, "i'm sorry, is it just me, or did i just steal your girlfriend?"

you'd think i'd be a puddle on the floor at this point. but instead, i laughed, said, "ha, shut the fuck up. let me just check this out." like i knew this guy. he hands me a piece of paper with jumbled words on it, and i don't even know where to start. the first one says, "L S T H". there are four more puzzles on the paper, each one adding an additional word to the mix. i just said, "aaight."

we ended up continuing to talk for a little while, at one point, even going so far as him showing me a voice mail that he received in november from her. it was just the sound of a voice, because in the dream, i wasn't about to craft a full voicemail in a voice i haven't really heard in months. so instead, i was just given the vibe. it was more or less the kind of message you leave someone when you're overwhelmed with emotion when you see/hear something that reminds you of them. the kind that you keep hidden away so well, that you don't even know it's there.

yeah, in my dream, maybe in real life, she left him that kind of message.
i was fine with it.

maybe it's just time.
maybe it's what i wrote.
something culled this dream out of me.
but that dream was the nail in the coffin.

it's over.

another dream i had before that
was protecting a military general's
reputation in the face of a wave of undead.

every fucking word.

he says:
All to be the ones, the original, the
conscience laden conqueror,
forecast new wave edition, the
prenumb stable grounded individuals
pass us by

The ones we're trying to hold on
The ones we're trying to come through
disorder

The ones we're trying to hold on
The ones we're trying to move through
temporary disorder

Factory born and level minded pardon
Them for the inability...pass us by...to
Prevent the downfall... the prenumb
Stable grounded individuals pass us by.
-

i say:
beyond the point of pretense and silent sensibilities. the way winds the way rains the way climates come your way, the way mouths move and pass breath. the way mouths move and pass words. seeing everything in cordial invitations. the barely breathe. the soaking wet. the want you here the want you here. oh, undeniably.

wear your prettiest dress.

pre-devastate.

my mind has been caught up in south beach and in new jersey.
i don't apologize.
i want to get lost.


but i'm getting tired of this reaching across miles.

soon.

i've been taking notes on life, though, as it goes by. there are some things i've been getting a little curious and excited about. i have receipts everywhere with emotions and interests on the backs of them. i should start carrying around my moleskine, if i'm going to be this observant again. sometimes, i just do the coast-along. it gets me in trouble with myself down the line. if i have that book on me, i won't be able to forget it. stay motivated, stay moving. at least, stay thinking. even if it's concerning anime, flash animated series, and cartoons, at least it's generating electricity. at least it's shaping more folds.




Trinity Blood is a new anime that's going to be coming through to Cartoon Network soon. It has that Castlevania look. The whole Victorian era with firearms thing. Beautiful and majestic if done correctly. Otherwise, it's hokey and full of excuses. With anime, it can go either way regardless of time period and theme. So with both of those in place, we'll see how we can actually do. Of course, this must be the relapse of the Victorian era, because the storyline will take place in the future, amidst a war between Vampire and Human. The artwork is really what intrigued me, not so much the story. It might either fall into place, or fall apart. Wait for it.




Ninjai is something I've forgotten about for over a year. At least. It's a flash animated series about a small ninja boy with mad skills. That's really the best way to put it. His origins are still a mystery. I think I left off somewhere around chapter five, and they actually have a dozen to check out. They take a while to load, but the artwork and interactions are real nice. The voice acting could use a little work at times, but fuck it, that's definitely not what you come to anime for.




Karate is a band that I can thank Nothing Feels Good about. The book is going through the history of emo and the scene. It's not something I need. I think I have most of it down. But small little loopholes and band name-drops are the kind of thing that are obnoxious on the surface, but really, we're all taking a lot of notes. This band is definitely what I imagine when I think of emo. I bought "Every Sister" from iTunes and was digging it big time. I'm previewing all the tracks on that album right now and they all have that same slow vibe to it. It's so low maintenance and sad. I love it.




Fearless will, apparently, be Jet Li's final martial arts epic and I feel horrible about that. From the Once Upon a Time In China series to Hero everything he's done has been at the very least solid. The whole thing is sort've getting the "hype" rumor, which is good. Either way, Li will be representing Huo Yuan Jia, a real person who is one of the most famous martial artists in Chinese history. Regardless, this should be a sick martial arts movie to say the very least, and if Jet Li decides to make it his last, I'm sure he won't go out without some sort of bang. Cross your fingers, bang or not, this is only rumor.

-

days ago...
somewhere, horrible is happening. someone is saying, "but i can try..." and "but why!" right fucking now, someone's trying to not have an enormous piece of their life disappear. somewhere, they're taking what's left and taking inventory. this guy, no matter what he has, it's adding up to nothing tonight.

this morning
i'm surrounded by this city, but i'm just not here. like staring at the Vatican through the eyes of a demigod.

what is it you needed to show me of the steadied hand? moderate my angles. demonstrate the way the country looks on unlined paper; all splatter-sketched, a new way to see through your eyes. leave me with rustic examples.

i want to feel
your bite and your scratch.

in silent post-vocal hours, i'm playing the unremarkable role of the ambient. the music leaves minor-key stab wounds, soft lights needling in like excavations.

i could just be a terrible aggressor.

add this to the list
how did i forget?

i think i have plans.
still not sleeping... still great reasons.