On living in the Capital

Here is an open letter to my new home town

Hello Capital,

I am here now. But I am sure you have seen me around and out and about in you. I mostly get around in yellow cabs, but it doesn’t make me feel like a New Yorker. You may not have known that but I wanted to live in New York when I was younger. I bought a map over New Yorker City and spread it across the floor of my room among the Blue Mountains. I traced the boarders of Manhattan with the tip of my eleven year old finger; it’s purpled nailed polished chipped away. I had used the same nail polish to paint hearts on the red leather of my wallet it never held much money in its belly, but it held all my dreams of a new and vibrating life.

I longed to grow up, I long to write whenever I wanted to – and have the chance for others to read it. I longed to walk down a street with red and yellow autumn leaves soaring above my head. To open the door to any kind of room where art happened, to step into the dark of theatre, the serenity of a writers den or the messiness of an artists studio. Then it was just as much the images that those ideas conjured within in me as the actually activity that took place in these spaces, that intrigued me.

And you see Capital, it’s happening now. I am here and I soar in cabs. I get asked to speak my mind at dress rehearsals of friend’s productions and I must say you, dear Capital, spark my imagination. I see people I want to tell about, I hear conversations I want to finish in text. There are places that need to be filled here. There are venues that I can use; there are people who want me to use them.

I feel awaited now that I am here in you Capital. People are happy to have me here. It feels good when actually getting to live here is still hard. Because you see Capital I am still struggling not only to survive here. But to live.

The people I have been in touch with have a hard time wrapping their minds around how I want to lead my life in you. They say:
“What… are you saying you don’t know how your days will be scheduled from day to day?”
“Ah meetings you say, talks about creative processes, lectures, rehearsals….and you want that to be flexible…oh yes…”

I don’t know in what kind of life these people live, if them and I even share the same city. Dear Capital, you for one should know, do we?

I want to ask them if they plan every day to the minute, if they would feel okay with not deciding about their own time.

It’s a struggle, this really is.

But I keep confidence that once all this struggle is over and I have finally settled down here. All will be as I wished. I long to make art in this city. I long to work with people who love me and respect me and se me for who I am. And I know I will…I know that the projects that I have planned and the subjects I want to dive down into with my studying. Thing are coming together really good in that sense.

And I think that is necessary to keep my head up during this time. There is an army for me and it’s a damn good army.

So Capital, for the two days that I have made you my home here a lot of things have happened. Good things and not so good things. I soon have my own home and I hope that once I really fight Babylon it will be over with swiftly.

I know this is a fight but I always fight – all art is fighting all fighting is life.
Other people have travelled this before, they have made it and I will make it. There are memories from these people sprinkled along the path, there is a history for me, voices produced by throats in bodies with tensed muscles that whisper “It can be done…and it can be done well.”

So for my next meeting with the Babylon I will bring with me the shadows of other spasmodic fighters, they will see them guarding my back if they look close.

Bye for now then new home, look out for me while I am in you.
Love, Kittin.

On travelling....

When I last travelled to the Capital I forgot to bring my mp3 player. In a vain attempt to amuse myself on the ride back home I bought a notebook and a pen at PocketShop. On 'demand' I now publish the one thing written in English on that ride...

Vanity

“It turns out I can’t get under your skin”, he said as he rose from on his elbows from the bed and stroked his beard.
“How come?”, she said.
“There are guards at the gates of your innermost feelings he said. There’s fear and vanity and guilt. And they are strong and armoured and I am only armed with love, and love has nothing on them.”
“That’s true she said as she scratched the polish of her nails. I am afraid and I am guilty and vain- and love has nothing on that. Nothing on the cold sweat and my own scorning gaze in the mirror in the morning.”

He put his pants back on and the vanity of her eyes followed the strip of hair from his belly and down below….

“You should get rid of that”, she said as she licked her lips.
“No”, he replied.
“You should get rid of that smirk it makes you ugly. And I know you don’t want to be that. Not at all. In fact that’s the thing”, he said. “You are so desperate to be beautiful. So afraid of being seen as something less than that. That is what makes you vain, and what makes you vain also makes you guilty. You feel guilty ‘cause vain people are horrible people and more important vain people are ugly people.”

The last bit came like a roar through his lips and as they parted she could see a streak of yellow brownish goo on his teeth.

“You should really brush that away she said.”
“No! this is what I am talking about- you’re so vain you think this song is about you. And you really do! It makes you ugly, ugly, ugly!”

She had her back to him now. Slowly stroking away locks of golden hair as she hissed.
“I don’t care if I am vain. If it makes me afraid, guilty or ugly. At least it gives me the opportunity to be all these kinds of things. I decide for myself if I want to be vain and I am as vain as I decide. But you…”

She lifted his baffled face up with her slovenly painted nail.

“You haven’t even made a choice to be as dirty, filthy and raunchy as you are. You are just plain lazy – and you love me. And it makes me pity you. But not at all in a bad way as one would assume. When I think about it, it is not pity, but love and slight admiration. I assume it’s a freedom to be so ignorant she said. To really, really don’t care it must be so….”

She leaned in close. He didn’t smell of dirt but of cinnamon vanilla and heat as she kissed him. When his tongue touched her teeth she made vain attempts to rub his saliva off.

On the joys of writing and "other" languages

Having picked up on blogging again just now, and through it being given the joy to move on with all my other writing which I haven’t taken time to write recently. I have come to realise again just how much I love writing. And I have realised just how important it is to have a space like this blog, where even though others can read what I write I am free to ramble as much as I want.

I am writing a new Fiction for the FFF project, or more so a new chapter to the initial story that made that project up. It has been resting for quite a while since there have been too much stress around to really get the chance to write. But as I write on it now, I see it might have been just what I needed when things were the most stressful, to escape in its purest form into a world that I know and that I create as I go along in it.
However, I know my process of writing is not like that. I need a pretty long time span to build up a world within in me, a world with places, rules and peoples that I can explore once I sit down to write (writing happens mostly in stream of consciousness, which is in itself a form of escapism) hence, I can’t write before I know at least something about what I need to find out while doing so.

While attending my creative writing class in Bollnäs (reminds me that I still haven’t told my teacher I can’t follow trough with that as well as University this autumn…must do that) we were often given tasks to write quickly, in ten, fifteen minuets or so. I always managed to do really well then and it’s puzzled me. It wasn’t that I went around with a mapping for several stories in my head just waiting for that ten minuet chance to spit them out. Usually, when being alone in front of my computer that approach wouldn’t have worked.

Then I realised it was about being forced to write. That when not given any escape route but rather a very blunt entrance into the world of words my mind was made blank. And through that blankness other thoughts, those I hadn’t planned and hadn’t thought about for nights on end when laying awake in bed, had the chance to emerge.

Having done it often enough while in class I now do it every day. Take ten to fifteen minuets to clear my mind and just write. I have found that there is a theme to all of these writings even if they shift with my mood for the day. Sometime I might look through them and make something of it.
One of them have already become a stage piece entitled “Är det där min kvinnlighet…ska jag betala för den?” (”Is that my womanhood….will you charge me for it?”) and was preformed early this spring. (See the blog post entitled “On absolute identities”)

I feel like I am wandering off. I wanted to say that having found that blank space in my mind is really such an advantage. Now I find I plan as much as before, but then enter that ‘blank’ space when I actually write. So that I have all the ideas within but make no deliberate choice about what comes when and where, the process of that is a true delight and such escapism it makes my heart flutter. Also, I find it gives me a much stronger lust for writing since I too want to know what will ‘happen next’, so to speak.

In this space, as well as in the fiction project, I write in English. I am a self-proclaimed linguistic anglophile, that is to say English as a language is my biggest ‘turn on’. The English culture not as much, mostly it puzzles me or makes me laugh nowadays. But written and spoken English has a very special place in my heart.I don’t fully know why it is so. I guess it has a lot to do with being born on the 4th of July and being told America was awesome when growing up because of it. But I think it lies even deeper within, that it is one of those things that perhaps I shouldn’t know the reason for. That it’s a quirk in some sense, something that constitutes me but on the other hand shouldn’t be looked into in search of “why’s” and “how’s” since there will likely be no reasonable answers. Other than it’s that escapism again. That English served well in a time when I daydreamed a lot (like I am not still…) that it created a parallel to the well known, but yet a space which I could learn to master.

I think of the two languages as two rooms that mirror each other. I find the two ways of expression very similar and in some ways I find that they mirror various sides of me, my thoughts and feelings. Usually I know if a feeling serves best to be described in one language or the other. I know some thoughts and feelings are only good in Swedish and the other way around.


Anyhow, it doesn’t matter how much pretentious rambling I build up around my fascination of the English language
(I wonder where the need to do that comes from. I suspect it come from an inherited idea of rural inferiority, a feeling of shame and guilt, like I am possessing something that is truly not mine and somewhat above me, when I speak of the English language as a part of me. I find I justify my likening of the language and my vivid use of it whenever I do, saying things like ‘it’s not cause I want to be cool, it’s a soul thing’. And it is…) when it comes down to the nitty gritty it’s all about pleasure. I love the sound that the English language makes when someone speaks it. I the love sensation of it as it rolls of the tip of my tongue. I love how’s it’s composed and how its words look when printed in ink or on a computer screen.

Mostly I love to try and tame it, to make it what I want it to be even if it’s not my mother-tongue. To be frank Swedish as I know of it now is not my mother tongue either, it’s a language full of “ô”’s and “he”’s and “je”’s.

“Je kan’t säga va sûm gjer Äng’skan tä ett tôcke vakescht språk,e. Me je vät att ho ä he.”

”I couldn’t say what it is that makes English such a beautiful language. But I know it is.”

On my army

In my large novel style project ’The Mermaid’, which has rested this summer and rightfully so, I write about the gathering of an army. An army which sets out to fight death. Usually when people set out to fight death in fiction I just get the feeling they are really seeking it. All the dare-devilistic things that people come up with as exciting and assume is living life to its fullest is often just really stupid. Not to say that you wouldn’t be slapping death on its fingers now and then by doing really crazy stuff, but I would guess that’s mostly of out luck.

I have tried to focus the attention of that army that I am building on making the most of every moment and trying to build a collective that would withstand all deaths trials. And I think I have done pretty well in building an interesting mixture of characters that from the outside doesn’t seem to have any thing in common at all (that was also my major theme for the text, to show that even though we don’t think we share anything we all share as much as we are willing to admit we share…) but that ends up beings closely intertwined for one major reason.

They have all suffered loss: Loss of ability or an appearance that they used to have, loss of a beloved or loss of a place or time. Death is the one who possesses all these things, and hence, in order to, not so much regain them but to teach It that It cannot go around nicking other peoples abilities just like that, they set out to fight It.

Anyhow I wanted to say, that as I wrote that text I began to think that it would be really nice to be part of such an army (even though I do have a flare for taking the lead I wouldn’t have to be the rallying force ;) ) that it would be amazing to be part of such force and such determination.
I realise now that I was very foolish in having these thoughts. Since the truth is that I am already part of such an army.

These past days I have realised that even more. Since I struggled to be able to survive in the Capital I began to see that so many people cover my back. That even though I didn’t know if they understood truly what my life has been about they give me proof again and again of knowing just what I am, and loving me dearly for it.
In this maze that bureaucracy is and amongst all the vipers in the grass that the bureaucrats are I know they walk ahead of me and behind me. To smash their machetes against growing branches threatening to choke me and pick me up when I fall.

I am sorry if I am making it out to be like I didn’t trust you to understand me, it is not so! Just that when I deal with these people telling me my disability isn’t major or consistent enough I wonder if anybody sees that within me.
If anybody sees the struggling that this is. I have known all the time that you have, I am just so grateful to see it now. In my time of need.

So this blog post is to be about my warriors. Those who walk ahead and behind of me and the people that have made up the army I longed for but didn’t see until I was desperate for it.

I have already spoken about my brother in this space, but I will gladly speak about him again. My brother Carsten and his fiancée Emma deserve all the credit they can ever get for always sticking by me and telling me to keep my head up. My brother deserves multiple thank you’s for his never ending fire within, for taking time to ramble in anger with me about how unjust all of this is and for keeping me on the ‘take no crap’-path.

The following where already part of my army before I knew I needed one. They are spoken about as a unit because I really think we are.
Katarina, Kicko and Marie. Thank you for always being interested in what I do. For brining forth your righteous anger with me when it’s needed, for helping me lay down my burdens by the whisky-cokes and the throbbing dance floors of tacky bars. For laughing with me and making comparisons to other well known crips such as Timmy and Jimmy from South Park and the magnificent Andy Pipkin from Little Britain (if Andy get’s a PA as good as Lou then I must be okay in the end…)
Thank you for seeing above and beyond my disability but never neglecting the fact that it’s there. Tämmy! TäKåKå!

My soon to be land-lady Ulrika, thank you for opening your home whenever it’s needed and especially in such a desperate time, for allowing me to bring all the mess that this has been into your life too and welcoming me with such open arms. True generosity.

Vata-Sister, Hillevi. Thank you for understanding from just the same spot how important a well balanced body is. Thank you for allowing me to ramble for hours on end about spasms and anxiety. We are so alike it scares me at times, but it’s very comforting to know that whatever I say you have felt it too. Long live the achy-shaky vata-hearts!

Last but not at all least my muses. My and Josephine. (in a way you are all my muses but I like giving people titles…okay ;) )
Firstly thank you both of you for an ongoing feast of inspiration whenever I come to think of you. You both share an aura of force and vulnerability than intrigues me deeply and sparks all my artistic fires.

Thank you My, for all your love and your support. For understanding what the important things are and never minding sharing them. For including me in what’s important to you and cherishing my thoughts and ideas. Thanks for bringing me to lovely places to see lovely people for making me part of their lives as I have become a part in theirs. For believing me when I say that I can do this. And reassuring me when I doubt. For sharing faith and strength with me and making me tea when I needed it the most.

And finally, thank you Josephine. For seeing all the facets that make me up and telling me that they are valid. For bringing a somewhat holy wrath to this fight and offering a very hands on support, for sharing ideas, thoughts and memories and building me up. Thanks for allowing me to be vulnerable when I need to and for seeing the absolute force that is me too. Thanks for your never-ending support of my work and your brilliant witty mind.

I have faith; after all I was injected with a massive load of faith growing up, that we shall conquer this. If you stand ahead and behind me now I promise cross my heart that I will do the same whenever you need me! Thank you again – the academy, Gawd, my parents, and my army!


Xoxo, Kittin! (Timmy, Jimmy, Andy Pipkin, Sally, Anne Bonny!)

On my brother, Warren Zevon and I

Below is the song ”My shit’s fucked up” by Warren Zevon.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2aUJF3gdog

I heard it on the radio yesterday and it instantly stuck. It is by far the best song ever written about having a body that (by age or other reasons) doesn’t work the way you would like it to…

“Let me break it to you son your shit’s fucked up… the shit that used to work it
wont work now.”

Recently as I have been planning my move to the Capital, which has been a very emotional ride, I have spent a lot of time crying in the bath, but equal time being picked up and pepped by glorious friends and family, I have come to think more and more about my body and the illness that it inhabits.

I have found that they way I speak and act, the articulate and verbal mind I have worked hard to gain and take pride in using often clouds the real state of my body. That my physical lacking gets shadowed by the way I express myself… It puzzles me that it doesn’t seem to be obvious that I am disabled. I wonder if my crooked legs and tensed hands are overpowered by my seductively unbuttoned blouses and pink lips. If my frame and my shaky way of walking doesn’t show cause I tell people I believe in

“a Theatre that resurrects and builds a community… that through the
juxtaposition and commonality of words and flesh aims to give all people a sense
of strength and pride. A Theatre that rattles as well as it dazzles...”

Today I met with my brother. We were born three months too early and the lack of oxygen through our underdeveloped lounges to our brains marked us permanently. It gave us a brain damage known as cerebral pares made our legs spasmodic and stiff and our balance poor. Growing up we never dwelled on this. Even though we spent months in hospital and hours after hours in sweaty gymnasiums with out physical therapists. We were happy, smiling and safe kids. Brought up to believe that we lived because of a reason but never sheltered from the injustice that come to those who are different but taught to fight through it. Taught that everybody has a something that is painful in their life, and that it didn’t have to be physical.

My brother is one of those intentional beauties. He’s hot- I can say that because he is my brother. Well groomed and casually smartly dressed in a way that I can only aspire to become. When I saw him today, sheltering his stepson in his tattooed arms and kissing his forehead, I came to think about how we view our disabilities and what it has come to do with the way we view others.

I have often been told I am very ‘Zen’, that I accept all that come my way are not very easily aggravated when thinks are not what I want them to them. I think this has a lot to do with my inability to move freely while growing up. Acceptance of the status quo was crucial for my survival – if I had blown every small thing that wasn’t the way I wanted up and become angry about it that would have taken so much energy.

Being this mindful also made me very aware of my own body. I wonder if my brother and I share that. If he too knows exactly where every stiff spot is, where every joint is when it aches and what every muscles does when it spasms. If he wakes up in the morning feeling run over, with pain rushing through like waves hitting the white sands of pain.

The paragraph above is also something I have been told I do a lot, I write about pain. I write about bodies and dirt and blood, other people say it’s icky and strong. I never see that. Sometimes pain is like an axe splitting your backbone, sometimes is like a pair of hands pulling the joints of your elbow in separate directions until it clicks. It’s not my fault; it’s the way things actually feel.

I have thought I didn’t dwell on my disability. But I have realised now how much of the work that I do that really is body centred, how my disability has given me a fascination of the able-bodied body and what it can do. How that has driven me into directing and acting, how my exploration of my own body and it qualities has given me a greater sense of what is perceived as normal and what is perceived as deviant, and what I ascribe to these two concept. My body has forced me into being still but given me a vivid imagination and an understanding of the written word because of it.

Because of my disability and the way others perceived me due to it, I felt the necessity to well articulate and driven. To rise above what other people saw as the sweet disabled girl. But it’s only recently and from others telling me about it, that I have begun to see the juxtaposition between these two images an how well I use them and thrive on using them. I like to think of myself as a mindfuck. I thrive on not always being what you perceive me as. I love how my awareness of my body and its sensuality succeeds not only in drawing people in, but also in rattling the close-mindedness that I too often meet while out and about.

But recently I have wondered. When being told I am too well to be given a PA when I move to the capital and having to tell people that I assumed knew what my disability meant for me in real life, once again, that I cannot mange on my own. I worry about passing as able-bodied even though it is very very visible that I am not. It puzzles me, and I don’t know what to do. What to change about my appearance and the way I act in order for them to give me what I need to survive. Of course I know that the answer is nothing, of course I know that it’s not a disadvantage that I am this verbal and driven. I know I have fought hard to become that and that it what has made me me. Still I wonder what they want a disabled person to be, who they see when they think of one, and what that person’s everyday life is like.

I wonder if my brother worries about this. If he too worries about the rapid decay of our bodies and if our liking of fitted clothes and dressed up appearances is an act of resistance against death. I know we could do better, exercise more, eat healthier, and sleep better. But we’re not like that, at least not now. Now is all about fighting the decay best we can anyway. It’s about unbuttoning the top button on my blouse before I meet with the municipality’s disability conslour; it’s about marking our beloved deviant bodies with needles and ink, about sheltering the kids that are important in our lives. To tell them what others taught us. Your body is only yours. Your mind is solely your mind. And your life is worth living.

Dearest beloved brother, my darling beautiful.

We know of pain and monotony we know of dread and bondage in its true sense. We know of deep fires and heavily beating hearts. We know of scars and casts and plastic tubes. But mostly we know of love. We know of laughter you and I. We know of freedom and rushing speed. We know that bodies are but bodies, muscles are but muscles. We know that weakness is needed in order to be strong and stillness is needed for there to be force.

As Miami Ink’s Ami James put’s it “WE FOUGHT TO MAKE, NOW COMES THE FIGHT TO STAY ON TOP!”