this

Dear You,

This is an intervention.

Calm down. You are a good, rational person. Yes, I know you are capable of solving your life’s problems and leaping over obstacles that the universe has thrown your way by yourself – but doing that all by your lonesome is very hard. Your life would be a little bit easier and much happier if you would let someone help you help yourself. Let me be that someone.

Here is what I want to do:

1. I want to come into your life.
2. I want to see what you love.
3. I want to help you see what you love if you don’t already see it.
4. I want to help you do what you love by removing the obstacles in your way.
5. I want to know that you are happier for finding and/or doing what you love.
6. I want to feel the world becoming a better place as a result of another person being happier in it.
7. I sort of want you to intervene in another person’s life too, but that is a decision that you would have to make yourself.
8. I want to respect you and any decision or non-decision you make regarding #7.
9. I want to feel good about respecting your decisions.
10. I want to feel the world becoming a better place as a result of my actions and the respect I have for its inhabitants.

What do you want to do? Please let me know at chachachip.blogspot.com or via email at chachachirp@gmail.com .

Sincerely yours,
Cha Cha

etp vi / collaboration

We Didn't Read the Sounds

[Ghosts live in the hallway.]

I read a story about a hallway. You were in it. Me too.

I hate hallways. They separate rooms.

No. They join them. Weave them. You don't like weaving, do you? I like weaving. Once when I was young I wanted a woven bag - my mother wouldn't buy it for me, so the artist gave it to me.

It was weird.

I wonder - had I been crying? Did I scare away the better customers? Did she try to get me to leave?

I remember the wildflowers in Dallas.

[ping
ping
ping
ping
ping
ping
ping]
*I don't know how to format this into two columns.

My bad temper
clears a room with a switch.

willow wallowing
I sweep everything onto the floor
crunching into fine bits
the frustration of numerous complaints,

destruction of the day
the satisfaction of free movement,
length of arm uninhibited

the morning's many
'authorities of the human condition'
Criticisms so stupid
petty Fistpumps for offensive phantoms.

A word of advice volleys a backhand of teeth.
Blunt, clumsy
but shocking in the manner of deployment.
Boorish behavior of one, but
twice more repeated

oh, pudding academia
the gravity of cubed jello

wobbling masses
moved
by nothing less than earthquakes

I hear my friend rush hurriedly out the door.

etp sound Erica

Beginning
Reading the words I feel everything around me. Then I close my eyes and feel everything. What comes out? The sound of the ocean seems to permeate the entirety of San Diego. Dogs bark and parasailors brace the wind, trusting it to only take them higher into the musky clouds. I hear the cars go around everything. My wheel clunks into a pot hole. The tire thuds around more and more until the tire finally retains it shape. Engines keep curdling and buzzing. When was my last oil change?
Middle
In bed asleep, the walls have other sides to them. Ghosts live in the hallway. I still can’t hear their stories. They still refuse a frequency that no one besides a whale could make out. One side holds a window. The dogs barking remind me seven dogs live on our property and the children’s laughter allows me to know my neighbors. I know their happiness and youth. The anger that resonates through the streets from the couple next door fighting reminds me both are brief. Still, the heavy curtain lets me forget the sun. The drip drops of rain let me appreciate the value of a roof. I can hear the sound of my roommates having sex and experiencing orgasms; both fake and real. It tells me I need to get out of this room. There is a world outside, something behind the walls I love to be surrounded by. I get dressed, put on some makeup, and find a bar.
Tangent
I’m asleep. Not a light sleeper, but today was not a light day.
“CHARLINE FOSTER! PLEASE COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP OR ANSWER YOUR CELL PHONE!”
I’m instantly awake, not even sleepy.
“CHARLINE FOSTER! PLEASE COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP OR ANSWER YOUR CELL PHONE!”
I run out my room to the front window.
What could be going on?! Were there cops in the street? Who was Charline Foster? What kind of crime had she committed? Around here, I’d expect random drug dealing and perhaps some unpaid bills, but maybe it was a real criminal. A contract killer finally caught or some escape con or even the rapist that had been suspected of being about ten miles from here. Were they dressed homeless and disheveled? Were they scary and how many cops lay outside? Were there police dogs involved?
I see the window, hearing the words repeated again. I guess she still hasn’t come out.
“CHARLINE FOSTER! PLEASE COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP OR ANSWER YOUR CELL PHONE!”
An old lady with bare feet and a hair wrap saunters out. I can hear her complaints and annoying cries.
“Alright. Geez. I’m coming.”
She walks up to the twelve cops and five police cars and immediately turns her back to them with her hands behind her. She’s prepared to go. She’s prepared to be cuffed.
They cuff her. We go back to sleep.
“CHARLINE FOSTER! PLEASE COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP OR ANSWER YOUR CELL PHONE!”
End
And I’m going downtown. Cause my lady’s free. Going downtown. Gotta get in for free.
Tap taps tap.
Remember the movie taps? It had Tom Cruise in a rather tiny role.
Doors creak and I can’t help but hear more taps. Keyboards can get pretty annoying sometimes.
What sound does a body make when being put in a trash bag and dragged down stairs? Does it echo differently when the stairs are enclosed? Does the buzzing of the fluorescent lights soften the echo in any way?
I have heard that a punch sounds very similar to dropping a leather jacket onto the roof of a jeep. Or was it breaking lettuce heads. That one may in fact be bones breaking. I find I prefer authenticity in sounds whenever possible. Putting the sound of squealing pigs into the audio mix for the tornadoes in twister just doesn’t seem like a good idea to me. I now can’t help but associate Helen Hunt with pigs. An Oscar winner deserves better.
So what does it sound like for someone to drown? What does it sound like to suffocate from a pillow? Lately, these have become very important questions. Answers pending next week.

etp vi / emily / sounds

etp vi: sounds

20 fevrier 2009, 10:56 a.m.
explosion
-
me
on the march
on the walk
:
mom
!
i do all of my work
all of the time
-


-
bang bang bang
shoot shoot shoot
you told me to put up a target
to scare away others
but you only scared away yourself
-
reload
-


7:07 pm sunday feb 22
the sound of actors
clapping for other actors
makes me want to die
sooner

-
8:45 or 9:15 am, monday feb 23
you know what sucks?
the sound of clicks that won't be answered

-

are you the jealous type?
oh yes you are.
call me again, why don't you.
why don't you?
-
i should listen to you more
-
i should talk less
-
no
-
you should talk more
-
no
i should be myself
you should be yourself
and we should avoid each other
-
also
i should never write poetry
(not even of the prose variety)
-
6:03, feb 23
HONK!
things i ran into today besides you
(in order):
a fireplace
a toilet (an ex-boyfriend)
-
memory:
last week, i stood up to a television.
-
7:46 pm, 23 fevrier
you called without asking!
but,
i was asleep.
don't call me when i am asleep.
when i am asleep, i sound very annoyed on the telephone.
i sound like i want to be sleeping instead of talking to you.
this is not true.
i would prefer to talk to you.
don't call me when i am asleep.
-
8:42 pm, 23 fevrier
ooh you emailed me.
after you talked to me (when i was asleep).
good boy.
i coo to you.
you're very smart.
-
10:02 a.m., 24 fevrier
whispered words in another tongue
of another love
why won’t you be like that?

she is
she rips out my heart too

I want to talk
I don’t want to talk
you should never tell a girl that she talks too much
(i shouldn’t be a girl anymore)
because then she will shut down in class

I want someone to make a video of a poem that I write
but I don’t want to write any poems
-
whoops
-
look at me
-
this is not what i want
this is not my beautiful chair
-
hey
don’t talk into the floor.
I think you should not talk into the floor.
-
to order my mirrors
and turn them on you
make you happy?
no
this would only make you sad

sometimes i wonder
if you have to get sadder
to get happy
again
maybe
for the first time
-
hey
why don’t you give up
and go back to your farm
-
memory of
a verbal slap
and a slap pat at
on your shoulder
both of which are funny
both of which you deserved
both of which make you sad
-
I need to learn Spanish
so that I know when
Medusa is coming down
-
memory
when there’s nothing left to burn,
you have to set yourself on fire.
that's what you told me
and that’s what i told you
i’ll tell you.
-
11:22 a.m., 24 fevrier
achoo
achoo
achoo
ACHOO
don’t worry, it’s normal.
thank you.
I’m going to get some water.
-
sometime in the last half hour, 24 fevrier
wheels turn
i burn
-
a candle
-
that's a good idea
-
here are some recent ones that weren't:
you,
you,
you,
you,
you
(a toilet,
a marine,
a reverse wingman,
an overlap,
an other)
-
2:02 p.m., this was also a bad idea, this is a construct, this is a construct that i
am starting not to like
i need something to work out
in
-
ping
            ping
ping
            ping
ping
            ping
ping
            how many emails does it take to have dinner with you?
-
3:44 p.m.
explosion
-
psssssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhsssssssssssssss
apparently, i am not allowed out of the house without kombucha exploding on my sock.

etp v (revised) / emily

I Think That This Will Explain a Lot

by Emily Star

Things I Didn't Tell You About When We Weren't Dating:
Recipes for Disaster (Areas)
that was the worst party I have ever been to, and it was in my apartment
terrible parties that I throw in my apartment
My Favorite Joke

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Dear Future Emergency Contacts,

I am in rehearsal for, oh, roughly, 35 hours a week. I also have school. I also have to go to the gym so that I can survive being thrown around onstage for 35 hours a week. On Monday, for the first time since January 1, 2009, I had a day off. On January 1, 2009, I had had my first official date to a still-married man that I had met and kissed several times on Christmas Eve and the early morning hours of Christmas Day 2008 in a gay bar.

I did not know that he was still married when both a) he kissed me and b) I agreed to go out on a date with him. On said date, I think we both wanted to kill ourselves and/or each other, since a) he thought I was 25/26ish, I am not, b) I thought he was divorced - he is divorced from his first wife, but not his second, and c) he has two children, ages 6 and 8, if I remember correctly. As soon as I could get out of the bar in which said date was taking place, I hung out with a guy with whom I had had a somewhat contrived, early New Year’s Kiss around 10:34 pm on December 31, 2008, because he had somewhere else to be later, and I was having an impromptu New Year’s Eve party in my apartment.

So late last week, I realized that I should definitely be around some good people that I know, not some random guys that I don’t know, on my first day off in a long time. I know a hearty bunch of good people. I like to consider myself a good person, but I do have some terrible qualities (examples: leading a life wherein I only have a day off every month and a half, inviting guys that I'm not dating to come over and hit on my roommates). In order to be around the highest number of good people on said day off, I decided to have a Gathering at my apartment. I am referring to this gathering as a Gathering in this story, and annoying everyone with an ounce of good taste, because that is what I did last week. I am a vegetarian, but some of the good people I know are vegan, some are vegetarian, some are lactose intolerant, and most of them are picky. Also, I have a friend who is allergic to wheat, soy, bell peppers, garlic, onions, dairy, most household cleaning products, and several other things that I try to remember but usually don’t. She has zero tolerance for alcohol. She feels sick and tired a lot, particularly at inconvenient times. For example, she did not come to my impromptu New Year’s Eve party because she was feeling ill. A few days ago, her doctor discovered that she has elevated levels of mercury in her blood. Mercury poisoning. Like Jeremy Piven.

On most days, all I have to do to feel better about my life is be happy that I am not her.

So I decided to appeal to the lowest common denominator and make delicious vegan food that everyone would enjoy. I would make tomato orange fennel soup without veggie broth or onions so that my allergic-to-the-world friend could eat it, Fall in a Pot (sweet potatoes, red lentils, green apple, tomatoes, lots of dark leafy greens, curry spices), and an edamame carrot couscous thing with kumquats and olives. When I was about to start chopping the fennel for the soup, I received some terribly sad news that related to a presentation I had to give the next day in class and my past life as a sad person, and I had to deal with it. Then I was way behind on making soup. So I called my emergency contact, and asked him to come over to the Gathering and hit on my roommates while serving as my can opener. If I explain why that is funny, I will not finish this story in time for rehearsal. He laughed and said he would be over as soon as he finished working in his garage, which contains several motorcycles that require constant care and attention.

While the soup was simmering, I started making the rest of the grub. I was somewhat distracted and mistakenly put edamame in the Fall in a Pot, because that is what I usually do even though I told myself so many times to put the edamame in the couscous thing, not in the Fall in a Pot. Then I realized that I am not my mother, nor (name of one of my roommates, let’s call her Marsha), as I am not a perfectionist. The red lentils weren’t going to go bad – was I really going to give myself shit about red lentils?

No! Of course not.

Then Marsha came up to me and said, “Emily, (name of boyfriend, let’s call him Martin) and I need to eat something with meat in it.” Inside my head, I very quickly noted the fallacy in this statement: perhaps she and Martin were hungry, but I was in the process of making three huge pots of gorgeous vegetables, two of which contained significant amounts of plant-based protein, so unless Marsha had recently become concerned about whether or not she and Martin were getting enough Iron, I’m pretty sure she could have eaten, oh, I don’t know, some of the food that I was almost finished making alongside some of the leftover chicken and potatoes roasted in goose fat that she had in our refrigerator. One half-second later, I cheerfully replied "Sure!" as I moved the soup, which realistically was ready to cool before it went into the blender, to a different counter, and shuffled the couscous thing and the Fall in a Pot onto the smaller burners of our communal stove.

Then Marsha began to make the saddest, most beautiful chicken pot pie I have ever seen.

Let me tactfully explain: Marsha thinks that Martin does not love her. Whenever she thinks this, she makes something that she thinks they will both enjoy eating. On some level, Martin enjoys having Marsha make food for him, but each time Marsha tries to improve their relationship by making food, they both get a little bit sadder.

At one point, Martin came into our dining room and said, in a voice that I thought was funny but Marsha probably hated, “Mmm. I love chicken pot pie!” To which Marsha replied, “no.” “What, honey?” asked Martin. Continuing in a voice hovering closer to under-her-breath than appropriate cocktail party volume, but loud enough for both of us to hear, Marsha said, “you’ve never loved anyone.” Then I pretended to go find something, maybe the bathroom, in my room.

I could go on.

I could go on for a very long time.

But I am going to skip ahead.

My emergency contact realized sometime after he said he would come over that he could not, in fact, come over, because, and I quote, so this is not plagiarism, he is “a terrible person consumed by hatred so [he has] what’s coming to [him],” ie., spending the evening being sad and alone in his house instead of happy and with good people in my apartment.

He wasn’t the only person that didn’t show up to the stupid, really, very stupid Gathering, but he was the only person that I actually cared about seeing on my first day off since January 1, 2009, so, yeah, I was a terrible hostess. I forgot to offer anyone leftovers, and even though everyone there hated that Marsha and Martin plunked down and started watching reality television and turned off my carefully-selected music, I was too sad and exhausted and, eventually, inebriated – it does not take much, and I had had a room-temperature corona cut with cold diet root beer and some cheap champagne – to care.

Let’s see, what else…

Here was my favorite joke before Tuesday that I would tell my emergency contact all the time:

ME. There’s always a pony. (fake throat-clearing noises).
EMERGENCY CONTACT, in monotone, begrudgingly. Why is there always a pony.
ME. Because there’s so much shit!

Then, after my presentation, we watched a video of a pony dying.

The End.

ETP V Collaboration

I Think That This Will Explain a Lot

well what did you expect, I am in rehearsal for, oh, 35 hours a week.

YOU'RE KIDDING

so late last week, I realized that I should definitely be around some good people.

BUY FRIENDS! BUY RELATIONSHIP! MAKE IT DRINK!

POUR WINE DOWN / INTO / OVER IT

AND FLOAT IN THE MOST AMIABLE PURPLE CONTENT

--IT COULD BE WONDERFUL!

some of the good people are vegan

most of them are picky.

APPEAL TO THE LOWEST COMMON DENOMINATOR

AND MAKE DELICIOUS VEGAN FOOD THAT EVERYONE (WILL) ENJOY!

cup - CLATTER - cup - CLATTER - dish - CRASH - (SHOUT!) - spoon - THUD - 

fork - CLANG - steak knife - close, but CLANG - (YELL!) -

pulled tablecloth - CLATTER -upturned table - BOOM - chair - THUD -

I called my emergency contact, 

He laughed and said he WOULD BE OVER as soon as he FINISHED working in his garage

which contains several motorcycles that REQUIRE CONSTANT CARE AND ATTENTION.

[my propensity for violence]

-the saddest, most beautiful chicken pot pie I have ever seen.

I Ask If I Can Sleep With Anyone Else

Get A Little Bit Sadder

I think that we watched a video of a pony 

Dying.

etp v / emily

I Think That This Will Explain a Lot

filtered by emily

Possible Titles:
Recipes for Disaster (Areas)
that was the worst party I have ever been to, and it was in my apartment
terrible parties that I throw in my apartment
Pony
Pony Up
The Dead Pony Society
Public Displays of Emotion of the In-Class Variety
If you can’t tell shit to other writers, who the fuck can you tell?
My Favorite Joke

Dear Class,

I am in rehearsal for, oh, roughly, 35 hours a week. I also have school. I also have to go to the gym so that I can survive being thrown around onstage for 35 hours a week. On Monday, for the first time since January 1, 2009, I had a day off. On January 1, 2009, I had had my first official date to a still-married man that I had met and kissed several times on Christmas Eve and the early morning hours of Christmas Day 2008 in a gay bar.


I did not know that he was STILL MARRIED when both a) he kissed me and b) I agreed to go out on a date with him. After said date, when I think both of us wanted to kill ourselves and/or each other (he thought I was 25/26ish, I am not; I thought he was divorced – he is divorced from his first wife, but not his second; additional fun fact – he has two children, ages 6 and 8 if I remember correctly), I hung out with a guy with whom I had had a somewhat contrived, early New Year’s Kiss around 10:34 pm on December 31, 2008, because he had somewhere else to be later, and I was having an impromptu New Year’s Eve party in my apartment.

So late last week, I realized that I should definitely be around some good people that I know, not some random guys that I don’t know, on my first day off in a long time. I know a hearty bunch of good people. I like to consider myself a good person, but I do have some terrible qualities (example: leading a life wherein I only have a day off every month and a half). In order to be around the highest number of good people on said day off, I decided to have a Gathering at my apartment. I will continue to pretentiously refer to this gathering as a Gathering for the rest of this story, and annoy everyone with an ounce of good taste, because that is what I did last week. I am a vegetarian, but some of the good people I know are vegan, some are vegetarian, some are lactose intolerant, and most of them are picky. Also, I have a friend who is allergic to wheat, soy, bell peppers, garlic, onions, dairy, most household cleaning products, and several other things that I try to remember but usually don’t. She has zero tolerance for alcohol. She feels sick and tired a lot of the time, particularly at inconvenient times. For example, she did not come to my impromptu New Year’s Eve party because she was feeling ill. A few days ago, her doctor discovered that she has elevated levels of mercury in her blood. Mercury poisoning. Like Jeremy Piven.


On most days, all I have to do to feel better about my life is be happy that I am not her.

So I decided to appeal to the lowest common denominator and make delicious vegan food that everyone would enjoy. I would make tomato orange fennel soup without veggie broth or onions so that my allergic-to-the-world friend could eat it, Fall in a Pot (sweet potatoes, red lentils, green apple, tomatoes, lots of dark leafy greens, curry spices), and an edamame carrot couscous thing with kumquats and olives. When I was about to start chopping the fennel for the soup, I received some terribly sad news relating to my group’s Dictee presentation and my past life and had to deal with it. Then I was way behind on making soup. So I called my emergency contact, who I am not dating (even though he thought, at the time, that dating each other eventually would not be the terrible idea that I thought and now we pretty much both agree it is), and asked him to be my can opener. If I explain why that is funny, I will not finish this story in time for rehearsal. He laughed and said he would be over as soon as he finished working in his garage, which contains several motorcycles that require constant care and attention.

While the soup was simmering, I started making the rest of the grub. I was somewhat distracted and mistakenly put edamame in the Fall in a Pot because that is what I usually do even though I told myself SO MANY TIMES to put the edamame in the couscous thing, not in the Fall in a Pot. Then I realized that I am not my mother, nor my roommate, let’s call her Marsha, because I am not a perfectionist. The red lentils weren’t going to go bad – was I really going to give myself shit about red lentils?


No! Of course not.

Then Marsha came up to me and said, “Emily, (name of boyfriend, let’s call him Martin) and I need to eat something with meat in it.” Inside my head, I very quickly noted the fallacy in this statement: perhaps she and Martin were hungry, but I was in the process of making three huge pots of gorgeous vegetables, two of which contained significant amounts of plant-based protein. Unless Marsha had recently become concerned about whether or not she and Martin were getting enough Iron, I’m pretty sure she could have eaten, oh, I don’t know, some of the food that I was almost finished making alongside some of the leftover chicken and potatoes roasted in goose fat that she had in our refrigerator. One half-second later, I cheerfully said “Sure!” and moved the soup, which realistically was ready to cool before it went into the blender, to a different counter, and shuffled the couscous thing and the Fall in a Pot onto the smaller burners of our communal stove. Then Marsha began to make the saddest, most beautiful chicken pot pie I have ever seen.


Let me tactfully explain: Marsha thinks that Martin does not love her. Whenever she thinks this, she makes something that she thinks they will both enjoy eating. On some level, Martin enjoys having Marsha make food for him, but each time Marsha tries to improve their relationship by making food, they both get a little bit sadder.

At one point, Martin came into our dining room and said, in a voice that I thought was funny but Marsha probably hated, “Mmm. I love chicken pot pie!” To which Marsha replied, “no.” “What, honey?” asked Martin. Continuing in a voice hovering closer to under-her-breath than appropriate cocktail party volume, but loud enough for both of us to hear, Marsha said, “you’ve never been in love before.” Then I pretended to go find something, maybe the bathroom, in my room.

I could go on.

I could go on for a very long time.

But I am going to skip ahead.

My emergency contact realized sometime after he said he would come over that he could not, in fact, come over, because, and I quote, so this is not plagiarism, he is “a terrible person consumed by hatred so [he has] what’s coming to [him],” ie., spending the evening being sad and alone in his house instead of happy and with good people in my apartment.

He wasn’t the only person that didn’t show up, but he was the only person that I actually cared about seeing on my first day off since January 1, 2009, so, yeah, I was a terrible hostess. I forgot to offer anyone leftovers, and even though everyone there hated that Marsha and Martin plunked down and started watching reality television and TURNED OFF MY MUSIC, I was too sad and exhausted and, eventually, inebriated – it does not take much, and I had had both a room temperature corona cut with cold diet root beer and some cheap champagne – to care.

Let’s see, what else…

Here was my favorite joke before Tuesday that I would tell my emergency contact all the time:

ME. There’s always a pony. (fake throat-clearing noises).
EMERGENCY CONTACT, in monotone, begrudgingly. Why is there always a pony.
ME. Because there’s so much shit!

Then, after our presentation, in which I inappropriately alluded to my personal life several times, we watched a video of a pony dying.


The End.