slapping romanticism upside the head with a glove of humility and the force of the city (a letter to john)

As the initial infatuation fades; consumed by occasions of dancing dirty interpretations of salsa, crashing puppet shows with no puppets, and reaching across busy lanes of traffic to obtain a cigarette for my taxi cab driver; when these distractions give way to more commonplace occurrences and daily routine, I'm left with sustenance for more thorough digestion, and so better able to form these impressions...

Today at work I was asked if I would like anything as one of the girls was treating us to coffee. Eager for the opportunity for anything free (I need not mention the price of water in Soho), I asked for a small with 2 sugars and soy milk, if it was available. She snickered a little and said, "Of course they have soy milk", and I was reminded again of my surroundings. Later, I tried an Arizona black tea w/ ginseng and honey. It was fairly tasty, but not as good as their sweet tea.

I worked 5 hours packing butterflies and 3 hours pinning. The majority of them were of the Morpho didius group, whose sizable, blue wings are of the more difficult to handle. It's slow and meditative work until you remember that you're being paid per bug, at which point I always panic a little and thusly tend to make more mistakes. Mondays and Tuesdays are typically lighter as they involve tasks where I'm paid $10 per hour.

Apparently Mr. Hirst came into the store last week wearing a black trench coat with a beaded skull on the back. It's an image that fits well to the stories I hear... a deified and demonized master wielding control over an army of minions, all rushing about to fulfill his needs, but then finding their actions belittled in someway or another. Supposedly the order of 28,000 butterflies (whose meticulous preparation requires the symmetrical arrangement of both head, body, antennae, and wings) will be used for a display of Victorian wallpaper. To aid the process, there's word that he's hired another crew specifically for the unpacking of the specimens we so assiduously ready to ship, who then proceed to pull off all of the wings and discard the bodies in the trash. Death and art is all-inclusive here.

Following my time at Evolution, I was required to do some obligatory house work for the Conjeauds; scrubbing bathroom floors, making beds twice, and other tasks that have proven to exceed my standards of cleanliness. Now, as it seems that my cleaning abilities are not up to a personal par, I've been asked to babysit their 6 year old daughter in addition to our initial agreement of picking her up from school on Mondays. These are more often delightful occasions of fingers sticky with Elmer's glue and construction paper bits littering the floor, but the majority of my time work with her husband instead, resulting in full day travels between his Brooklyn-based workshop and an antiques showroom in Connecticut. Between this and my work at Evolution, 60 hour weeks are typical, as is the meager pay, and an overall situation that has left me with slightly less time to paint...

On a uplifting note, my room and connecting bathroom are quite large (though perhaps not by your bathroom standards), but remain noteworthy nonetheless in this NY setting. The space overall, despite its overwhelmingly eclectic mix of antique furniture and knickknacks, has sufficed in providing a small studio area, and I particularly enjoy those occasions of listening to the French news in the evening. Afterwards, I close my door, open a book, and enjoy the warmth of my space heater beneath my comforter tent... I've finished The Fall, and would greatly appreciate the suggestion of another.

I feel an anesthetized comfort here in Greenpoint, resulting maybe from those conscious attempts to forget my previous New York mindset, and certainly as I've yet to digest any form of debt from my time in Europe... A move elsewhere may be necessary, but one that would allow me to stay for awhile. Have I mentioned the possibility of Colorado? To add, the figurative weight of my Grandfather's declining health remains reciprocal to his lessening physical mass... Knowing in some sense that my own being then dwindles a little too, the part of me that remains feels a pressing need to be closer.