Thought in real time

Think of all the beauty, brilliance and radiance that goes unrealized and unexpressed.

My voice can soothe your pain

Dub Fx is a street-loop-beatboxer who uses Roland BOSS effect & loop pedals to create sounds which when layered creates a live musical construct. Enjoy.

In real time

Eggs boil, coffee brews, Bach plays.

Saturday morning music

God, I'm so lovin' this.

Thought in real time

Life is going by so fast.

Sitting at the sidebar

Un poco Paco

Entre Dos Aguas, by Paco de Lucia.

So lovely.

Mustang Memories

Originally posted January, 2007

Just before I turned 16, my father bought this 1967 Mustang for me to drive. Even though it wasn't yet considered a classic, it was a damn cool set of wheels, and it was everything to me. It represented endless possibilities and was the reason I couldn't wait to get out of bed in the morning. It was my first taste of freedom, my ticket to anywhere, at least anywhere in L.A..

I'll never forget the day I got my license, or the feeling I had when backing out of the driveway for the first time. It was like leaving each and every one of my teenage cares behind me. After dark, when I returned home, I was exhausted and shaking, and the odometer revealed all: day one out of the gate and I had driven 200 miles.

I slept in my bed and ate breakfast in the kitchen, but I lived in that car. I even gave her a name. Frankie. Driving her I played music non-stop, picked up friends and drove everywhere--to rock concerts, the beach, and through the hills of Hollywood.

Once, when returning from Malibu, I pulled up to a stoplight on Sunset Boulevard. In the car beside me was, by teenage girl standards, the hottest guy who ever lived. He looked at me and mouthed the words, “You’re beautiful.” I sat there speechless, and when the light turned green and he took off, I looked at myself in the mirror. My hair was a wind-blown mop, my eyes bloodshot red, and my face burnt by the sun. But I felt like Cinderella sitting in her magic coach, and no clock striking twelve could ever take that away.

Painted black

I have a lot on my mind lately--generating more income, preparing my child for seventh grade, writing my memoirs, and of course health care reform. But I'm also manifesting a dream that began a year ago this month, one that started in color, but that I'm now contemplating in black and white.

Click here to see where it all began.

And I love her

It's easy to express my love when it's swimming down a peaceful stream, or drowning in a violent sea. It's easy to express my love to my child, because it's like the palm of my hand--just right there.

But when I think of my mother, the tears come on cue, but the words don't flow.

Even when I'm in her presence, I protect my own heart from what it feels for her. It's as if I open the door, I'll be left stranded in emotion with no way to express or describe it.

The love I have for my mother is love itself, and even if I could wrap it in ten thousand poetic words, it wouldn't be enough. The love I have for my mother lives in the baby I was, in a five-year-old girl, in who I am now, and in the old woman I will one day be.

Trains, pains, & automobiles

Something wonderful is here.

However you look at it

That's me.

What I want

Nine solid hours of sleep, a book I can't put down, thinner thighs and a long, slow kiss.

Fact #598,443

At the corner bar, a cocktail was named after me. "The Katie Lemonade."

Confession

I feel bad, because I don't feel bad, for the guy in the next building who coughs his lungs out all day and night.

Please

Sign this petition to stop the dolphin slaughter, scheduled to take place in two weeks in Taiji, Japan.

Click here.

Sitting at the sidebar

I have an apartment to clean, phone calls to make, and transcripts to read in preparation for a job. But instead, I'm remembering a song I used to love by Peter Frampton, downloading it, and posting it here at The Half Note.

Click the music player to listen.

Thought in real time

I miss the loud and silent way it felt to be loved.

The air up there

The view was not to be captured that night by my little pink camera. Musicians and appreciators spent time inside and rooftop. A clear black sky with white and smoke-gray clouds illuminating high above the city, and a thick slice of a half yellow moon hanging low over Central Park.

In an alternate reality

These are my wheels.

Fact #671,009

I can't be intensely attracted to a man unless he's got the devil in him.

In my dreams

This morning I woke from a dream, just one word whispered over and over:

Cadence... cadence... cadence...

In real time

Woke late and inspired, Lee Morgan plays, out the door for coffee, the city calls.

In real time

Stunning, sunny day, sitting by the open doors of the cafe. Cars zip, wind blows, laptop and coffee. Spiderman came in and gave me a kiss--it's actually Matt, a daytime regular, here with Nick, smiling pretty for the Half Note.

This is a song for you

Tonight I attended another great party hosted by my friend, David. Central Park West and a view of New York, and as always, inspired singers and musicians getting up to play. The vocalist pictured here had me in tears, because his voice was as sweet as the weather tonight, and because he was singing The Nearness of You.

Desire

David: "My daughter is lusting after a new iPhone, her mother is lusting after a new, expensive car, and all I'm lusting after is a clean apartment!"

Seen

Yesterday, my mother described me as a "Full-blown human being," and this morning, my ex-husband said I was "Autobiographical."

Thoughts in real time

I'll forgo an existence more balanced, and keep the butterflies and the bliss.

Today

I got tea, but no sympathy, from my friend Marcia.

Life is sweet.

Secret

I don't think a crush is worth much unless there's a dash of obsession mixed in.

Evolving 101

I don't know what's happening or what will happen, I'm not writing stories for life anymore. All I know is I like the way I feel, and if the feeling lasts only one more day, then I'll be grateful for the day. I'll need nothing more, until I need something more.

Unsolicited advice from me

Originally posted February, 2008

When you’re feeling less than yourself, get on the “A” train around 8:30 p.m., exit at 59th Street and go have a swim at the YMCA. Swim and swim and swim until you can’t swim anymore, then go another lap. Have yourself a steam bath and sweat the man who’s hurt you one too many times right out of your body, then sweat him no more. Take a long shower, wash your long hair, get dressed slowly. Say goodnight to the woman at the front desk, and when you exit onto the street, decide that instead of going home, you’ll walk twenty-three blocks up Broadway to see your mom. Stop and get a cappuccino to go (decaffeinated, it’s almost eleven after all), then continue north. Toss out your empty cup at 79th Street, and as you approach your mom’s place on 86th, notice how fast you move. Notice the weight of your backpack, the way your braid, wet from the shower, feels cold and heavy on your neck, and how your bright red sneakers peering out from blue jeans hit the ground. As you turn the corner enjoy the moment you feel 16 again, and because you do, you start to run. You run through the black iron gates of the building where your father lived and where you first kissed the man you’d marry. You wave at the doormen, who are waving at you, then bolt across the courtyard, past the fountain, through the glass doors and up the stairs. You turn the key and call, “Mom!” You’re bursting as you fly into her room where she’s in her pajamas and in her bed. You take off your sneakers, toss your backpack, you are your mother’s child, and she smiles and shouts, “You look like a kid!”

Then notice how it feels to be 44 and 16 at the same time – tell your mother what hurts and listen to her wisdom. After a while let her close her eyes as you go into the kitchen and make yourself a slice of toast and jam. Then write it all down, shut off the computer, climb into bed and, feeling more like yourself than you did before, fall asleep next to your mom.

I mean, if you’re me.

A new chapter

I walked up to the counter at Barnes & Noble and dropped my stack of books in front of the cashier. He shuffled through my selections: The Truth About Bioidentical Hormones, Solutions For Women Over Forty, and When Your Hormones Go Haywire.

"And how are you today?" he asked.

Before I die

I want to dance to Dancing in the Dark by Cannonball Adderley--with a man I love.

It's at the sidebar~click the music player located on the upper right side of this page.

He woke up, the room was bare
He didn't see her anywhere,
He told himself he didn't care, pushed the window open wide,
Felt an emptiness inside, to which he just could not relate--
Brought on by a simple twist of fate.

~Bob Dylan

In real time

Out of a cold shower on a hot day--what to wear for a birthday celebration tonight?

Cleaning house

Finished with the laundry--how nice to be done, how nice to no longer feel like I'm hanging, how good to finally be free of that.

Leo horoscope by Rob Brezsny

Lately I haven't been inspired by what Brezsny has to say about Leos, but today my friend Tai was inspired enough to email me Rob's latest, and I am inspired enough to post it.

Leo: If you really knew how much you were loved, you would never cry again. A sublime relaxation would flood your nervous system, freeing you to see the beautiful secrets that your chronic fear has hidden from you. If you knew how much the world longs for your genius to bloom in its full glory, the peace that filled you would ensure you could not fail. You'd face every trial with eager equanimity. You would always know exactly what to do because your intuition would tell you in a myriad of subtle ways. And get this: A glimpse of this glory will soon be available to you.

Sitting at the sidebar

One of Annie's favorites--listen all the way through, it's a fun ride.

Rental review

I don't think it was as good as it could have been, and it was cuter than it should have been, but at 79, Clint Eastwood is still a super badass and the sexiest old man I've ever seen. Also, the movie left me cryin' so The Half Note gives Gran Torino two thumbs up.

Sitting at the sidebar

It's what's playin' in real time.

Familiar direction

Annie and I were in the car heading South on West End Avenue when we came across this traffic signal.

"What are you gonna do, Mom?" Annie asked.

"I'm gonna do what I always do," I replied. "I'm gonna stop, go, and wait, all at the same time."

A matter of taste

Cristian wasn't impressed with Chinese dumplings, but he loved peanut butter and jelly. He really liked the iced chai, but he rejected the granola. He didn't care much for bowling, but he went wild for the Yankees. He liked my neighbors, but he adored my mother.

Cristian was helpful to me, but he would have given the world to Annie.

We miss you, Runnerfrog!~Katie, Annie, David, Lulu, Ann & Honey.

Look here

Annie laughed when she spotted me wearing reading glasses while squinting at the computer screen.

"You'd better get used to it!" I say. "I can't see anything anymore!"

"They don't look awful," she replied.

Pause.

"They don't even look bad."

Pause.

"They look nice!"

Thought in real time

The piece at the sidebar reflects my mood--it's simple, and there are a million things going on at once.

Sitting at the sidebar

Sometimes I don't know what I'm feeling, until by chance I play something that tells me.

The Sun will Set by Zoë Keating, and I will always need music to lead the way.

What I want

I want to be less tired and more sleepy, I want my dog to be mentally stable, I want Annie to wake refreshed, I want my younger brother to have success, I want my older brother to find balance, I want my mother to be fulfilled, I want a friend to be loved, I want another friend to recover, I want a father to rest in peace, I want health and happiness for everyone who is reading this, and for everyone who isn't, and I want to post this picture of a kitty with a balloon, just because I like it.

What I want

I want to write a novel and have it published, I want to move to the West Village, I want world peace, and I want the baby next door to stop crying.

The way things aren't

I thought I saw a sign that said, "Chelsea Denial Center," but it actually said "Chelsea Dental Center."

Birds and bees

Annie: "At what age do people usually have their first serious relationship? I mean, what's the average age?"

Me: "I don't know, maybe seventeen?"

Annie: "Seventeen? Maybe back in your day, but things are a lot different now!"

Me: "Okay, then, sixteen?"

Annie: "Try fourteen!"

Me: "You're still a child at fourteen, I don't think you can have a serious relationship at that age."

Annie: "How old were you when you had your first serious boyfriend?"

Me: "Seventeen."

Annie: "And how old were you when you first kissed a boy?"

Me: "Fourteen."

Annie: "Was it a real kiss?"

Me: "Yes."

Annie: "Did he touch you?"

Me: "He felt me up, if that's what you mean."

Annie: "Ewwww! He felt your boobs?!"

Katie: "He did."

Annie: "That's so gross!"

Long pause.

Annie: "Did you feel violated, or were you happy?"