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Fucked Up College Kids File 418
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= F.U.C.K. - Fucked Up College Kids - Born Jan. 24th, 1993 - F.U.C.K. =
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Permanence is Not the Ground We Walk On Here
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Memoirs of Los Angeles
10/17/97
Who are we as Angelenos? According to one business journal, we are "the
most ethnically diverse city in the world." We speak a hundred or more
languages. We are from every country in Latin America, Asia, the Middle
East, the subcontinent, Africa, Europe and virtually every city and town
in the United States. Take the Sunset Boulevard bus from East Los Angeles
to Beverly Hills, and you see store signs in Spanish, Korean, Thai, Farsi,
Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese, Italian, Hebrew, Russian and English. You
see Aztecs sharing sidewalks with Celts. You see descendants of the Zulu
waiting for buses with descendants of the Ming Dynasty. The very fact that
we are here, as opposed to where our ancestors called home, is a testament
to how much we are products of the transitory.
The vast majority of us had to leave something behind to come here, and,
on arrival, had to push aside what was here in order to make room to
liveroom for who we are. And wasn't that always the nature of Los Angeles'
invitation? That the city was wide-open enough, undefined enough, willing
to change enough, to accommodate the myriad tribes who would become
Angelenos? The city itself is a result of the inexorable movement of the
world's economies and peoples. It's unreasonable to demand respect for
"permanence" from a citizenry who have in common nothing so much as their
experience of impermanence.
To speak derisively of how transitory we are is to be dismissive of the
basic questions Angelenos live with. Art is about the expression of an
individual and a cultural identity. When a woman is half-Mexican Catholic
and half-Hungarian Jew, and meditates at a Buddhist temple; loves African
pop music and German string quartets; is reading a Russian novel, eating
Thai food, going to Hollywood movies, wearing Asian-made clothing; speaks
a tongue her grandparents could not understand; works in a neighborhood
where the reinvention of gender is encouraged, and shares all this,
willy-nilly, every time she walks down the street, with people as
patchwork as she, then the question of identity becomes more of a life
quest than it ever was for people growing up in more homogeneous
societies. Her life takes on all the great questions in artquestions of
what, among all this hodgepodge, is truly herself.
Multiply that by several million, and you have an enormous
mural-in-the-flesh that we call Los Angeles. Our very identities are at
stake. Identities we've lost, and identities we're trying to create. If
that isn't the stuff of great art, then what is?
The Internet brings the world to our computer screens. But what the
Internet does electronically, Los Angeles embodies on its streets. As we
work out our individual identities, and our relationships with each other
across the old barriers of race and ethnicity, we are determining more
than the fate of this city. Together, we are living an epic poem of our
history, and in our lives we are deciding a crucial question of the 21 st
century: Can so many different cultures, thrown together amid so many new
technologies, forge a new, fruitful and peaceful daily life?
Human beings in every era, and in every conceivable situation, have felt
compelled to create art. That alone testifies to its necessity in our
lives. The worth of Los Angeles, and the grandeur of the city, ultimately
depends for its cultural value not on what the critics say, but on the
unfinished work of art that is Los Angeles.
Can You Trip Like I Do?
10/10/97
That awesome song by Filter blasted through my headphones all the way
here. I arrived here in my real home two hours ago to grab some things,
make some calls, send some email, and wait for my flight back to Los
Angeles tomorrow night. The full shock of what happened hit me when I
walked in the front door. I was only going to Los Angeles to talk for two
days, and then I would be back. Almost a week later, I finally return home
for the sole purpose of grabbing some necessities for my new apartment in
Los Angeles. I stood in the middle of the house listening to my mind race
with random thoughts. A cold beer snapped me into a better frame of
reference.
What do you take with you and what do you leave behind when you are moving
into a second residence 500 miles away? To answer that question, you need
to know how long you plan to be in each city, so that the dominant city
has the greater selection of your personal belongings. But to answer the
question of the dominant city, you need to know the reasons for your
detachment with life and why you are running. Only when you know this will
you know which city will become your primary residence and how you will
divide your belongings between them. Another cold beer snaps me into
apathy. Who wants to think right now? I just want to get the fuck out of
here.
I need clothing. Fuck, I'll just take all of it, and haul it around with
me when I switch cities. Toiletries. Fuck it, I'll take my travel case
full of the stuff. I have three computers here, so I'll take one of the
smaller ones that I can fly with. Shit! I'll have to buy another monitor.
Don't forget the modem. Books. Grab the two I am currently reading. CD's.
I have a case for them, so I'll just bring that around with me like I do
already. Oh yeah, movies. Which ones should I take? Fuck. I don't have a
VCR down there, only a TV with cable. I grab about ten of the newer ones I
have anyway. Is that it? I fucking came home when I really didn't want to
just for some clothes, a computer, some movies and two books? Because the
rest of the shit I already had with me. The rest of my shit can stay here
until the next time I come home, when I will probably have a list of stuff
I needed but left here.
Email all of my F.U.C.K. files to d1s. I'm waiting for the email from him
wondering why he received so many files on a similar subject in one night.
Picture all of this happening to you d1s, and try to understand the
confusion it would cause you, and remember that writing about shit helps
clear the mind. I knew you'd understand. That's why you r00l!
Email done, make some calls. "What the fuck are you going back to LA for?"
is the question of the day. "I'm not moving to LA, it's just a second
place to hang out in when I feel the need to. San Francisco is still my
primary residence and always will be." I am absolutely sure of that. Los
Angeles is just too brutal a place to live, and I usually get sick of it
after being here for only a week, whereas I don't get sick of San
Francisco until I am here for about a month.
It took me less than an hour to pack, but I am here for another day before
my flight back. I don't know why I just didn't book a flight to take me
right back after a few hours at home. This place is boring. That's my
first realization to come out of all of this. I guess that's why I am so
anxious to get the fuck back to Los Angeles. So I can feel alive. In
actuality, the opposite is true, and I know that, but I'll run with these
thoughts for now. I have to call and change my flight.
se7en
San Francisco
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