Fly Guts Are Brown

I think there is something seriously wrong with me. Maybe I’ve gotten some kind of mutant version of Bird Flu or Swine Flu or whatever disease the media is freaking out about- I don’t know. The point is that I’ve started saying “Ouchie” instead of “Fuck, ow!” I know. It’s disgusting. I’ve asked to be put down, but doctors keep babbling on about some Hippocratic Oath nonsense. Pssht.

Ah, man, haven’t you missed me? Sure you have, come on. Surely that bewildered dizziness felt at having lost so many minutes of your life in such a useless manner after reading one of my blog posts must be terribly endearing. Why, I can see the half-amused grimace on your face right now. Partly because I am intuitive, but mostly because I’ve got cameras all over your room. :D

Moving swiftly on- me having not updated in so long is good. Kind of. You can actually tell a lot about a person’s mood through their blog updating tendencies if you know them semi-well. It also helps to have my natural stalker tendencies. For example, I can tell when Freddie is in an emotion struggle when she doesn’t update. On the contrary, Cecil updates more frequently when she is overwhelmed with emotion and needs an outlet. Lyle is a sharer; he tends to update when he is inspired by certain things, be it experiences or curiosities he stumbled upon in the web. Tori...seems to not update when she’s busy or has nothing to share. Which seems pretty obvious for all of us, but let’s not be pedantic! (Def: Pe.dan.tic. adj.: Being a twat.) As to me, I tend to update when I’m more bored than not, or guilt moves me to annoyance. (Thus why I update so seldom: Procrastination entertains boredom, and my guilt is a complete and utter sloth.)

Actually, maybe I should stop wasting cyberspace my talking about how I don’t update whilst I do so. Actually, whilst unpacking the boxes which arrived a few days ago from Jersey (a sort of sick feeling caused by watching tea filled cups which belong to some other life, here) I found a diary I thought I had lost, from when I was sixteen (I am tempted to burn it. 16 did not bode well with my complexion, I have to say) and saw that the grand majority of the entries begin with “oh man, its been ages since I last updated! Sorry!”. I had to sigh about the things that never change.

Aah, man, it seems I have been here for such a long time, and yet in some ways as if summer has only just started. I still remember the first few days of my stay, though, when I was the only one of my cousins in the farm. I spent my days with animals until I smelt and felt and vaguely looked (maybe a little around the eyes) like one of the dogs. I feel sorry for people who don’t (or haven’t got the chance to) appreciate animals beyond the ‘pet’ stage. Many people like their pets, and enjoy their company, but don’t really appreciate it fully: don’t love their expressions, their charisma, their individual personalities and the tranquillity that can be gained through a bond with an animal, as strange as that may sound to some of you (and as normal to others). I lot can be said about a person by observing how they handle an animal. Psychopaths, for example, often show the first show signs of ‘cruelty’ (which would maybe be better termed as ‘emotional indifference’) by hurting animals. Even in psychologically stable people (I use that term loosely!)- take my parents for example. They treat Yuka (the dog) like their treat me. Hah! Ok that sounds vaguely wrong, but what I mean is that their comportment with her can be mirrored with their relationship with me. My Dad’s obsession with a clear domineering, He-Male, King the Third of the World role and my mother’s incessant force-feeding of affection in various healthy and unhealthy manners has been prominent in my life. I have, thus far, remained (mostly) unscarred by their parenting skills. Though maybe after re-reading what I have written so far I may have to re-evaluate certain key points of my psych.

After people started arriving at the farm it was a slow, rumbling start into pseudo-normality. Too many things have changed since the beginning of last Summer in this Family, and recuperation has been slow, and I could feel it palpably, and didn’t handle it well, I must admit now. My desperate attempts to fix some of the war wounds (still being attacked and smarting) only resulted in making a mess of the situation. In retrospect, though, I’m glad it happened. Finally, at 19 years of age, Marina Bas has finally learnt that, sometimes, she has to Shut Her Mouth. The truth of the matter is (I say this casually and with resigned humour) that that insistent trait of mine, which has been brusquely termed by a lot (a lot) of people as ‘opinionated’ or as an inability to be in the wrong, was not at all correctly identified. Ok, so maybe not ‘not at all’ but mostly incorrect, yes. Everybody has opinions, and I freely (and almost often) admit when mine are wrong (my God if this Summer hasn’t been about that). But you see, reader of mine, (who is probably wondering why oh why I am talking about this when I should be hyper on talk about summer anecdotes) the thing is that I actually made myself that way. Moving around as I have, I had the privilege of meeting a lot of people, and going through the process people only go through one or twice, (meeting a group of friends which you attach to by proximity, and then navigating to those you have most in common with) too many times to count. Therefore I saw more than my share of fakeness. Childish fickleness; the words you flippantly say about friends behind backs, and the opinions you omit or change in order to appear more likeable to a particular crowd. At a very tender and small-numbered age, I realised that I was in a situation in which I would become very susceptible to become incredibly fake. To be integrated into so many different cultures and clicks and so on, it would be easy to construct a face for each occasion, for each group. A set of opinions, of likes and dislikes, or favourite colours and movies, for each group of people. (In Manhattan she is the pale-skinned, hamster-faced girl who likes winter most of all, and would not be afraid of lakes or ice, and would be positively disgusted at keeping dead squirrels for pets. In Venezula she’s warmer, and laughs quietly, even though the noise is contradicted with a toss of the head. She likes spring now, and worms and sloths, and can star-jump, eat lollipops and not get brain freeze, and not enjoy the feel of the burning fake grass as she runs bare-footed. In London she never ties her jumpers around her waist boyishly, and does more than sit on manly, dictionary-lifting laps; plays football, and lets the boys lift her up and stuff her in bins without scratching at their mouths and necks. And in Jersey she is a rolled-skirt girl, with a penchant for illegal make-up and coquettish earrings, and most definitely does not wear clothes pegs in her hair, or daisies in her buttons, or entertains ideas of being any sort of liquefied particle, shelled insect, or sea-fond animal.) And maybe that would start out in order to make life easy- but in the end I was scared (excuse my use of clichés) of losing myself. Of being so incredibly mouldable that I would be nothing: I would be Ditto, Flubber. I thought that the only way to remedy this would be to make my opinions so clear that my personality could not be shaken; to build myself up (even at that age) with words. A Bit Unhealthy. But with time I have come to realise that Less Is More and that it’s just...not necessary anymore.
...Ah, the wonders of self-psycho-analysing. I hope you thoroughly enjoyed that (I’m sure) invigorating view into my pokemon-evolution self.

But well, despite any obligatory learning processes, the summer has had very good moments. I think I will have to remember these months through details (moments, expressions, eyes, and grains of salt). The protected feeling of sitting outside all night (from 1 to 7) with the dogs by my side. Or the walks with the mutts, long and always marked by that vibrant last hour of the sun. That first night in La Manga; going to the beach in the dark, and having sister and the howling, hooting, degausser songs. The days peppered with concerts (“It’s the spice of my life-I couldn’t live without them!”)

There was the Antony and the Johnson concert in Cardiff, which was brilliant; the lighting and the trembling voice. Though at the start, after the first song (no introduction, just a dark walk to each instrument, and the beginnings of a thrum) there was this perfect, prefect moment when the piano slowly died out and the lights were absent and blue, and suddenly some numb-minded, twat-faced woman shouts, “When do we get to see your face?!” Why!? Why would someone do that! Yagh! Rawr! Instinct to Kill: Powered Up. Resident Evil roundhouse kick to the exploding head.
Then Madeleine Peyroux, who was honey-voiced brilliance. At one point her guitar whined at not being tuned properly and she stopped, looked down and said “I think my guitar is trying to tell me something.” That woman is very beautiful.
Then Yann Tiersen which’s French-shaped mouth I want to kiss fully. Not much more I can say about him that sister hasn’t in her last blog (go, hunt down).
Then Vetusta Morla, who had the Reverted Mob Effect on us. Everybody knew every sinuous guitar cord and every poetry-laced lyric, making our dance and voice compete with the singer’s own. Energetic, consuming...grr <3

Of course, there are the shiver moments, which makes me appreciate the kind of person who, when is shown a song, stays silent until even the last thread-of-note disappears to comment. Even better, when the comment is a closing of eyes and a hummmm of satisfaction. Lick your lips. The innumerable moments of loud laughter with sister (the epic remote control toss between feet and hand, or the perfect moment not to kiss, or the “*fart*, that was poor.” “You’re poor.” “I’m Elvis!” “...As I said, real poor in sanity.” “...One for the money, two for the show!”) or getting The Creeps (Def: the.creeps, intr.v : heebie-jeebie aftershock from girly outburst) after screeching and standing on lifted surfaces after being, A) attacked by demented, shooting-star beetles or, B) spotting mutant spider crawling near us.

And more things, and more, but this blog post is so long I’m pretty sure its reaching the legal limit for ‘tedious’, so I better stop. Maybe more soon with music donations.
Humm hum hum. :)