the guez

      Well, this week beats last week's gig as a waitress at a money-laundering operation for Albanian thugs. That blog was too hard to write, so I skipped it.       "Ok, here's the pitch." The producer slid into the chair between the piles of vhs tapes and invoices, pushing aside the giant rubberband ball and the plastic keyboard accessories that we'd been throwing at each other earlier. He shoved the storyboard in front of us. "So there are these people and they're driving in this car. They're having so much fun that they don't want to leave. We need music for it that is classical but still kind of poppy. You know, fun and cute but sweeping and orchestral. Something hip but not too young. Something moving, but not powerful. You know, popular but not too recognizable. And we need it in an hour."       So the task fell to us to dig through our music files and memory for our favorite songs that could be used for the pitch. It was the first

Spring was joyful but short-lived. Now the air is like dirty bathwater and there's no easy place to go swimming. It smells like rot and exhaust and there's always some guy on a jackhammer outside my window in the morning. On the subway, I practice careful breathing. Sandwiched between so many damp bodies, the air is sick with the sweat of multiple ages and genders and ethnicities. The other day on the bus, a short man standing next to me looked down and inadvertently wiped his sweaty, bald head on my arm. Not wanting to embarrass him, and not having anything with which to clean myself, I let this stranger's sweat dry on my body. And still, I am so glad to be back. New York! I spend my free time puttering around my new apartment, running my hands on the windowsills, breathing into my little potted plants. Buying lamps and growing roots, slamming them into the ground. home home home home home home. Then at night, practicing guitar up on the roof where it's cool, the eas