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[28 Aug 2006|02:18am] |
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The job of being an R.A is really just reminding young people that it is possible to die in the exposition part of their life story.
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| Fuck it, I'm back |
[11 Aug 2006|05:53am] |
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I decided to start the process of slowly destorying my myspace blog...Because lets face it, it's just a tool used to get laid, and me writing about being depressed and doing drugs and getting drunk isn't the most attractive selling points. So I'm posting what I consider the "best of myspace" (I know it's an oxymoron) and then deleting the entries on myspace, or replacing them with happier topics, like me rock climbing or helping old people, or both, who knows.
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| New York Story |
[11 Aug 2006|05:45am] |
At a bar in the east village, a young woman climbs on top of the stage and dedicates the next song to her lover, Judy. I meet eyes with the bartender, a tranny with large implants, and order a jack and coke.
"Oh, we're out of Jack"
"What, how can you be out of Jack?"
"Well if you want, I can take you in the back room and jack you off"
"I don't think I can afford that"
'What you think I'm some kind of hooker?"
"No, I mean I don't think I could afford that on my conscience...I'll take a 7 and 7 instead".
The woman onstage starts belting the tunes to sweet child of mine, occasionally winking at Judy. I drink my drink, pay, and leave.
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| Split Ends |
[11 Aug 2006|05:44am] |
I take my shirt off in front of the mirror and begin rolling it into a tight rag. I glance over and see Alain behind me bending wire with a set of pliers. Staring at myself in the mirror, I can see the damage left behind on my body this year. White skin from sleeping through the days and working at night. Exposed ribs sticking out of the skin from malnutrition and substances. Rolling the rag tighter, I reflect on how it's important to see the changes and marks we leave behind, not only on ourselves but on other people and the world in general. Whether it be skid marks on the freeway, a broken heart, or hateful phrasings on a bathroom wall, we all leave behind tiny legacies wherever we go. Behind me Alain shows Lindsay a small piece of bent wire with a straight handle coming out. She takes the wire and holds it up to the light, examining the shape. I take another deep breath, wrap the tshirt around my head and slip the fabric into my mouth. Time to create another legacy.
It was an hour previous when Lindsay and I were driving on the 5 in her Jeep wrangler. Going past my car, past the campus, past other students that were struggling as we were, past the road signs and warnings that spelled out in fluorescent orange, speed kills/slow down, we were both just trying to get past it all. My days were made up of meetings and reviews and confrontations and letters, all coming to the same conclusion in the end that just made me want to drink and write and fuck and forget about it all. On the 5, I play DJ while Lindsay drives and scramble potential songs on her ipod, not really giving anything much consideration due to my lack of care. I finally settle on being ironic, and play freebird, I figure it's such a long song that we will be there before the song is over. I hit play on the ipod and look up and notice that we are taking the 10 exit, a long off-ramp that curves against a 14 foot wall with no lights. We go past another sign, a yellow diamond that warns it's a steep curve and to take the exit at 35 miles per hour. I look at Lindsay's speedometer and notice we are going about 65. Right as I'm about to tell Lindsay to slow down, I feel the Jeep skid and my side go off the ground.
A few days later, I watch people pack their cars and quietly leave the dorms, not really bothering to say bye to anyone. It's me and a few other RA's in the lobby trying to organize the charity donation bins, and the thoughts that are mostly occupying my head are trying to put the hazy details back together from the night before. I walk around the lobby grabbing what is obviously trash that people left behind out of laziness, mainly half eaten food and class papers. I drag the rolling trash can over to one wall and begin tossing in trash, then pick up a broken mirror that someone was stupid enough to think someone could use and throw it in with the rest of the garbage. A second later, my hand tightens into a fist, and I find myself hurriedly walking down my hall, cursing at the person that put that mirror there, all the while leaving behind a tiny path of blood on the carpet.
My side of the jeep touches ground again and we start to spin towards a concrete wall at 65 miles per hour. Lindsay manages to get us away from the wall and we spin out towards traffic. I hear her scream oh my god and keep repeating it, but I grab my armchair and prepare to feel metal pierce through my skin. As checking out of life goes, I figure you really can't get any more spectacular than dying on a California freeway, especially with "freebird" being the last song I'll ever hear. The car does another spin and a car jerks out of the way to avoid colliding with us, and the concept of death starts to dawn on me some more. I've already had my last drink, my last word, my last lover, and they were all pretty shitty in their own respect.
I've been through three near-death experiences so far. If life was a giant game of Russian roulette with death being an invisible revolver pointed at my head and pulling the trigger each time I came close, the odds would now officially be against me. Twenty one years spent, about seventy more to go, and already I'm halfway closer to death. I came up with this realization shortly after the near-miss at. I realized that the self-awareness I had of my morality would eventually fade, the next day I'll go back to smoking and drinking and writing and fucking and not caring about any of it. I knew I needed something to make me not forget that the odds for living are stacked against me. And I knew that I needed to rebalance the universe and suffer some sort of pain for being spared. Which led me lying face down on the floor of Alain's loft with my t-shirt between my teeth and three people holding me down. Alain gives instructions to the people holding me down, telling them to be prepared to push when the metal makes contact with the skin, I'll probably kick. He gives further instructions, but they are drowned out as the heating gun is turned on to heat the metal until glows amber. A minute passes and all what I can think of is: I'm alive. I'm alive and can do stupid shit like this for the rest of my life, or actually leave behind a true legacy. I'm alive when I should have absolutely no reason to be, and now I have to take this seriously and leave behind something other than blog entries, broken hearts, and empty bottles. The roar of the heating gun stops abrubtly and in the room it is dead silent. A second before it happens, I can feel the heat of the wire hover over my back.
Then the wire is plunged into my skin.
I bite down on my shirt and constrict every muscle in body. The smell of my own burning flesh fills my nostrils, the smell of burnt hot dogs on a grill. The nerves send painful messages to the brain that they are being cooked and dying, but all what I think about is how I should be splayed like an asterisk on the 5 right now, causing a two mile back up as people slow down and gawk at an overturned jeep and the two passengers that were ejected from it.
And then it was over. I smoked a cigarette, took a shot of whiskey, jotted down some notes on a paper and stuck it in my back pocket, and made a phone call. Game on.
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| Anniversary |
[10 Aug 2006|05:26am] |
If it wasn't for that damn slip of crumpled yellow paper, I would have forgot what resonance today holds. Had I decided to be responsible a couple of weeks ago and look through my bundle of paper-work then, or even just continued my streak of procrastination and never bother to open that shoebox full of papers, then I would never have to face this painful moment of reflection of what happened 365 days ago, and what I have turned into.
August 10th, 2005, the arbitrary details that come to mind: Another nice, sunny day in Southern California. Thoughts of how I should try to go home for a day or two before school starts. The thick smell of grease and that sharp sound of chaos I experienced while I stood by the kitchen, waiting to use the bathroom. Getting back in my car, a yellow parking violation ticket in my hand, contemplating what song on my ipod would be most appropriate for this occasion. Yet another nice, breezy night in Santa Clarita, discussing with my roommates how it all went down. Wondering if Nate was dead in "Six Feet Under". Thinking about what the phone conversation with Mom was going to be like, and then asking her if I could borrow forty bucks. Urinating in that bathroom at that restaurant in Glendale with the odd fake plant, thinking of a couple of things. One, I wish I had a condom so I could've fucked last night. Two, why did she go off birth control? Is she planning something? Three, when I come out of the bathroom, it will be the end. The song I played as I watched her walk back to her car crying was "Song for the Dumped" by Ben Folds Five. When I got back to my room, I decided it was time to buy a new mattress so I don't have to sleep on the one I had. I recall thinking about when the next time I would get laid would be.
August 10th, 2006. On the floor of my room in the same apartment I lived last year, I examine the ticket. At the very top it reads, August 10th, 2005, 8:46 AM. How much value has this ticket gained now that has a year passed? (And I mean that in the literal sense). I reflect some more about what has changed and what hasn't. Steve and Drew and Cy are still my roommates. I don't like the RA's as much as last year. I can't drink like I used to. The computer I used to have a year ago I sold, and used the money to buy booze and drugs. The ipod I had got stolen when I was in Denver with a BFA 1 dancer. My hair is black, a tooth is rotting, my left nostril is still burning, there is a s-shaped scar on my back, and my cell-phone has a new text message from a girl that works at the mall that I picked up last week and will drop off soon. Yeah, I guess a lot has changed since that last August 10th.
I throw the ticket away, I know I'm never going to pay it and I'm getting new plates anyway. Sitting outside a coffee shop with mall girl, that overplayed song comes on a speaker that's hidden inside a Styrofoam rock. I remember, I remember when I lost my mind/there was something so pleasant about that phase/even your emotions had an echo/in so much space. I wonder what song will be playing August 10th, 2007.
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| CSSSA Story |
[27 Jul 2006|05:40am] |
Grant takes a sip of his beer while I take a drag, and then he continues his drunken tangent:
"See, in order to get chicks to fuck you on myspace, you gotta have two accounts. One that portrays you in a postive, sexy light, and then the real one".
"Hmmmm" I say as I grab another ciggerate, thinking that I'm only smoking because of him, he really is killing me with banality.
"You also have to be careful who you accept as a friend on myspace, you don't want a potential fuck seeing you have six pages of friends, all of them dirty sluts"
"ha, no, that would be bad" Jesus, being sober is more difficult than I thought.
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| New York Story #2 |
[14 Jul 2006|05:41am] |
We left the east village bar and our group was way ahead of us, so we took a cab back to the loft and made it back earlier than they did.
At the loft:
She said you know Im not going to fuck you, and I laughed and said sure, and then kept making out with her.
I kissed her neck and she slowly whispered in my ear, if you could do anything to me right now, what would you do? I had to think about it and try to find some sort of rationalization, but really just drew a blank. So I said Id go down on her. She pulled my head closer to her mouth and said you wouldnt want to feel me from the inside? I began drawing a spiral on her left breast with my hand and hearing her breathe harder, but she was still waiting. I said no, right now I just want to make you come with my mouth, and then we kept making out until the bell rang from the people downstairs. Don't ever think something is worth more than its face value, it's usually a lie to begin with anyway.
The End
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| Fort Worth Story |
[30 Jun 2006|05:42am] |
I flew in and called the friends and met up at houses, coffee-shops, and bars. They all had the same concerned but awed look on their face as I was with them, making the same remarks about how skinny I looked and what L.A is like. For the first couple of days, I didn't know what to say and just said it's just like any other city, but different.
Days crept by in a hard heat that forced me to sleep during the day and explore at night. When the sun set on the flat horizon and the parents went off to their respective jobs, I would drive aimlessly around town with all the windows down in my late model volvo, the same one I drove in high school, and the same one my parents bought 20 years ago when they married and swore they would give to their future child.
Sundance square, the starbucks by the mall, the IHOP, the bar, the park, these were the places I would frequent every night, sitting by myself and smoking while making phone calls to people I was friends with a long time ago. Sometimes they came, most of the time they didn't, and sometimes I cared.
When they did come, they wanted to hear stories. The adventures in New York, the branding, whatever happened to that one girl you brought by, the clown story, plays I worked on, what L.A is like, they were all entertaining stories that I didn't mind telling, but the more I told the stories, the more I realized that they all ended on a sad note.
Out of my natural tendency to leave an imprint on wherever I go, I tried my best to create something that would later make a good story, something I could say when my friends asked what I did in Texas. All that came out of it was empty bottles of whiskey that I only drank and friends in wonderment on what I have turned into.
When the bags were packed, the people I said goodbye to was usually said in a slur of profanity. Later, I wonder what the point of the trip was as I search for a parking spot in Hollywood, at bars, and outside cafes. I evantully realize what I should have said to all those people that asked what Los Angeles is like: It's a town that is connected through its loneliness. The only town you can spend the entire day without any human contact, and you don't even notice. In L.A, the minority are the people that share a true connection, otherwise you would see more than just a carpool lane on a 6 lane highway. That errie feeling experienced back in Fort Worth was something I had forgotten about, the feeling of what it's like to be alone when everyone else seems truly connected.
But hey, at least there is my myspace, right?
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| Observational Humor |
[06 Jan 2006|05:46am] |
I ordered a pizza a few nights ago from pizza hut, a jalepeno pinapple itallian sausage on thin crust. Yeah, I know, I'm strange. What really fascinated me was the graphic design on the pizza box, this really annoying font was everywhere on the front of the box with really horribly phrased suggestions for kids to ask their parents questions (Who was your best friend when you were my age?) and questions for parents to ask their kids (What's your favorite color?). I guess I was really annoyed at it because there has to be a large demographic- maybe even a majority, of lonely people that don't cook and resort to ordering pizza such as me. Maybe I'll design my own box and when you order pizza you have the option to get the "make it a family night" box, or the "He's just not that into you" box with helpful questions to find motivation in your life.
Possible questions on my box:
1. What would you call the "breaking point" that lead you to eating pizza by yourself on a friday night?
2. Do you have fantasy relationships in order to prevent the pain of real relationships affecting you?
3. Are you watching fight club, eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, or garden state right now?
4. Do you know your local 24 hour suicide hotline? (1-800-273-TALK)
5. If you've answered yes to more than 2 of the above questions, talk to your doctor about...
Jesus, this is such a good idea! Now I'm debating even posting this on the internet, if I ever see a prozac sponsered pizza box, I'll know who to hunt down. Shit, I'm going to print this post and mail it to myself as proof that I orginated the idea before any of you inside-the-box-thinkers stole it from me.
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[02 Jan 2006|02:16am] |
You're still here? Why, everyone knows that I became lame and moved to myspace.
www.myspace.com/jake_pea
yeah I know, it's a terrible looking username
Oh, and since this is livejournal, I should post some
emo lyrics:
I built you a hole in my heart
with rotting wood, it decayed from the start
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| Last Night |
[30 Dec 2005|05:47am] |
The metroplex burns as we speak, a conspiracy of high winds, dry conditions, and the single spark of someone welding is to blame. News stories of people with water hoses spraying their fences dominate the airwaves.
Since I've been home my main acitivity has been sleeping all day, hibernating and storing fat, recovering from one semester and preparing for the next. My dreams have been long and elaborate, I blame my mind trying to make sense of everything that has happened this year, kind of the same reason as why I am writing now.
I got an incomplete in my "undergraduate play analysis" class, which wasn't much of a surprise. What was, however, was the email I got back from the teacher when I emailed him and asked what assignments he was expecting:
"Did the Incomplete surprise you? I grew to have great respect for your talen [sic] and brain power at the end, but surely you were a definition of Incomplete in my class. Am I remembering wrong? I'll figure it all out with you when I come back."
Jake Mitchell: The very definition of incomplete
Inbetween hibernation, I've finished up writing my play "disappointment" (working title). I don't know if it's worth submitting to New Works, but I'm thinking of organizing a cold read to see how it plays out, if you're intrested or just want to read and talk about it, contact me.
More to follow, I promise
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[29 Apr 2005|10:24pm] |
Holy Shit, I have a live journal? I forgot all about you little journal!
Anyway, I'm moving to myspace, where all the kool art school kids reside.
Maybe you are wondering what the hell I have been doing the past few months. Well, I would tell you, but I've wrote over 10,000 words of papers today, so instead I will post pictures:
I went to paris over spring break with my friend suzie, bryan, lovely girlfriend Sea, and a bunch of animators and artist in a class.
The plane ride was 12 fucking hours long, on coach. I watched first daughter, collateral, sharktale, king arthur, and still had time to take a 3 hour nap. We left LAX at 11:30 AM and arrived in Paris the next day at 7;30 AM. I'm not sure how that happened, all I know was that Sea and I were Jet Lagged and Cranky all day long.
Here is Sea and I on the first day, being awake for roughly 34 hours. Aren't we happy?
We got over the jet lag over the next few days and did some sight seeing. Things we saw:
Notre Dame, ohhhhhhhhh
The Pompidou Centre, one of the greatest art museums in the world
an example of the cool art inside
Leo, instructor, tour guide, death march leader
Some other photos of what I have been doing:
doing shows (taken during a break of tech rehearsal, this is Rite of Spring by the way, if your wondering why there are cheerleaders and a football field, remember that I go to an art school)
learning how to entertain guest (always have lady drinks and real beverages when throwing a party)
mudfights
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[25 Jan 2005|01:12am] |
And life in Cali starts back up. Things I've done since I've been back, in arbitrary order:
Went to the beach with Sea, Susie, and Abbey, watched the sun set and walked on the border of ocean and land hand in hand.
Got my official production assignments, working on two shows this semester, and already have been asked to work on a shitload of independent projects. Woot.
Turned 20. Crawled out of my old skin to begin a new decade of life. And got really, really wasted.
Evolved my relationship with Sea.
Decided that I wanted to go to Paris for spring break. And I am.
Made a to do list and realized that I already have way too much stuff to do than write on my stupid blog.
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[04 Nov 2004|09:23pm] |
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So I was looking at the variety of aborted human baby fetuses that were on display, and they were arranged in chronological order, starting from 6 weeks all the way up to 33 weeks. What irked me was this really stupid couple looking at the 33 week old baby fetus trying to figure out how many months that was. When the guy said "I think that is 11 months", I let out this giant sigh and everyone in the room turned around, even the people next to the skinless pregnant woman with the visible fetus inside her. What a fucked up week it's been.
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[20 Oct 2004|04:49pm] |
That is what my dorm window normally looks like. The past couple of days it's been the oposite, which is a nice change. My new roomate moved in and now the room looks a whole lot better. Plenty of room to party it up. He also moved his bed to the corner of the room where you can't see when walking in, so now I don't have to see buttsex when I open my door.
Pics of the show I am working on coming soon.
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| Strange Occurances |
[16 Oct 2004|07:37pm] |
On thursday, there was an earthquake drill. The RA's would go room to room making sure no one was in the room, and they would put a sticky note on the door to indicate it was clear.
Someone wrote on my sticky note "I meow for you". No other sticky notes in my hall were marked.
I came back from work yesterday and there were grey tube socks in my sink. My roomate is at home for the weekend, and my suitemates claim that they don't own grey tube socks.
My webcam currently has Oscar shirtless with his girlfriend handcuffed to him pinching his nipple.
Wednesday I lit some of Nude Media Night. I watched 5 naked guys in a circle playing music on laptops.
Now it's saturday night, nothing to do, bored and lonely as usual.
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[07 Oct 2004|07:40pm] |
"Sad people dislike the happy, and the happy the sad; the quick thinking the sedate, and the careless the busy and industrious."
-Horace
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| Setteling in |
[28 Sep 2004|07:35pm] |
it's the third week of classes, and I think things are beginning to settle down. My roomate moves out friday to shoot an indie movie in Texas, so I am getting a new roomate. This new guy is really cool, a lighting/sound designer. Oh, and he is also gay. I can't wait to tell my grandma.
When I have time to think, I start to think about how much I left behind, and I start feeling homesick. It's a feeling I hate, because even if I just said fuck it right now and went home, it wouldn't be the same. There is no going back.
The show I am working on, "Rite of Spring" is going to be badass. I saw the light plot today, and although there are a shitload of lights to hang, barely any pipe will have to be hung. Rite of Spring is a ballet, but the way it is being done here is it's two football teams fighting it out for there turf. A Cheerleader cheers herself to death. I love this program.
And now a brief description of my classes:
LIGHTING DESIGN I: This semester the class is focused more on the paperwork and plot aspect. It sounded easy, but we are learning about calculating beam angles and drawing them on paper. The first project is due thursday, and nothing has been done with it, my study group keeps flaking out. Oh well, I think I will get a lot out of this class.
BFA 1 DESIGN STUDIO: I have this class two times a week, a 2 and 3 hour class. It's intense. Learning about design theory is fascinating stuff.
FUNDAMENTALS OF COLLABORATIVE ART: This is a fun class. Today we watched this really fucked up movie about a japanese playwright going on a suicide mission to kill a genereal, and the narrative structure was through his plays.
ARCHITECTUAL STYLES: This class makes my head explode. Really intresting stuff, but it goes by so fast I don't retain it. Our final project is to build a model of a monumental architecture peice. Oh, and it has to be made entirely out of food.
THE BLANK PAGE: I was taking another class, and it blew. And this class just opened up, so I sat in on it and was hooked. It's about the history of history, how events in history have multiple viewpoints, and how it is told.
PLAYREADING: This class can suck my balls. Really boring class where we read a bunch of greek plays I read in High School. It's more for actors than designers.
THE THEATER: Sort of a pointless class, just various people come in to talk about what they do, and they talk about what they are directing .
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| The First Week- Memento Style |
[13 Sep 2004|09:49am] |
TODAY: Woke up as my roomate was leaving the dorm. The shower curtain on our window was left open last nights, so the sun forced me to wake up in a cold sweat. Great. I was going to take a shower, but I was slow on the uptake as my suite mate jumped into the bathroom first. I do have class right now, but it was cancelled because Lap is doing something. My other class today is BFA 1 Design Studio, from 2:10-5. This is a class that is making me nervous, as it is porbably going to require drawing, which I suck at. Oh well, I need to learn it somehow.
YESTERDAY: Was hired for a gig tonight, but I was stood up. It was supposed to be a light hang at the evedince room, the call was from 5pm to 1am. I was told I would get a ride from two people, but neither one ever showed up to the dorms. Oh well, fuck it. Instead I read under a tree and enjoyed my last night of freedom
SATURDAY: First went and got sushi with a bunch of Musicians. I like the musicians here, they are ironically the most social and fun people I have met. Then we went to a party in the mountains. It was pretty crazy. By the time we got there, the beer supply was low, and I only had two beers before it was gone. After that the party dwindled, and I found my own ride back to the dorms around 3 in the morning.
FRIDAY/THURSDAY: Sort of blurred together, as nothing intresting happened. I did class sign up, and it wasn't as bad as people made it out to be. And I managed to transfer 21 critical studies, so I am ahead in that.
WEDNESDAY: Got my first taste of driving on California Highways- in a SUV also! Played designated driver as we went from Shooters Pool Hall to this other party, then back to the dorms for some drunk LD's to sober up.
TUESDAY: Went out to eat with my parents for the last time. I guess not "last time", as in I am going to death row, but it will be the last dinner in this context. From this point on, time spent with my parents is nothing but time inbetween school. I hope I can handle that
MONDAY- Moved in. My parents are fucking crazy when you throw them into a small room and let them move the furniture.
SUNDAY- Arrived in John Wayne, drove to Santa Clarita. Hotel wasn't as nice looking as the Hyatt we had stayed in before, but it had an internet hook up.
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| My Schedule |
[11 Sep 2004|05:22pm] |
MONDAY
Lighting Design 1
9:10-12
BFA 1 Design Studio
2:10-5
TUESDAY
Fundamentals of Collaborative Art and Design
9:10-12
Architectual Styles
1:10-3
Production Meetings
3:10-6
WEDNESDAY
Poetry Today
12-2
Playreading
4:10-6
Thursday
BFA Design Studio 1
1:10-4
The Theater
4:10-6
FRIDAY
NO CLASSES
Rehearsal from 7 till 11, possibly later
workstudy schedule not known.
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