aww yea

my record player has arrived, and boy am i happy to be able to listen to my records in my room. previously only heard laying on the living room floor during summer storms, now i can play them anytime!! i just bought a crosley archive record player, my treat to myself from my hard earned tax return. the rest of the money will be going to house stuff and the large amount of debt i have accumulated. also my new diana camera has arrived in time for my trip to New Zealand/Australia. man its been a good week for mail at my house.
i am getting excited about my trip, but a bit nervous at the same time. i am not real great on vacation, my dad says i have a 4 day limit before i get homesick, and yea i think he is right. and this time i will be on my own which is a bit scary. i think i am most nervous about losing things while i am gone. i think this dates back to 6th grade when we went to NZ and when i came back all of my friends no longer talked to me. and, well, i have a lot to lose right now. a good job, and amazing boy and good friends. 2 weeks is a long time. so here's to hoping they will all wait it out.
i don't know if i am just exhausted or what but the last week my tolerance level has been lowering. i have been real great this last year with all my changes, but lately i just don't want to deal with anyones crap. maybe i am realizing that all that i put into things is only returned in half and maybe i just care too much. so if i disappear for a minute, "its not you, its me". well, actually it is you, but i will get over it, haha.
and ohhh scalleycat. me and stacie are going year 2 at the 24 hour bike race. it will be another great year, even better with the 2nd bitches with brakes team racing(liz and sarah). its funny, through college, owning a business, all the things i have "accomplished", completing last years race felt like more than all that. who knows, that's weird.
well i am off to sit in my room with hot water on my record player and zone out.
xoxo

what up suckers?!

i sure am terrible at this blog writing thing!
i think one of the only reasons i write at all is knowing that sarah may reads this and looks forward to something new each week, which i don't provide. (hi sarah!)
and the other reason, when i read it after a month, i realize, man i can be kinda funny! oh and it helps me remember moments i forgot. the shitty thing about having such a terrible memory is that you forget some good memories. like the first time you kissed, or the last time. but certain things i know i will never forget as of late are:
-there are boyfriends that will fix your roof in the rain without being asked.
-20 miles and 3 girls is the perfect sunday afternoon
-working on cars and projects in your yard with your dad on a saturday is the most rewarding time. and the 12 pack of pbr and a bbq sandwich aint a bad touch
-they only push you because they love you and know youre better than to back out
-scents only last on your pillow for 5 minutes after he leaves
-gangster rap afternoons
-this...

represent, scalleycat 2009, the bitches are in it, i aint backin' down, i sweeer, word

i think they call it love

I'm starting to wonder if i really believe in love. or that i have ever really felt it. or if i have ever really had it. looking back it was always me pursuing something i thought i could fix. tell me you don't think anyone could ever love you and i see a challenge, maybe it was just that. and when its over its always me trying to keep some sort of relationship, and again forcing it. and looking back, maybe it, maybe i was never really wanted. and yes this does sound like some pitty party but i honestly have to wonder. maybe you do only get one real love and maybe i will know the difference when (if) i seen it. but to me love means never leaving, it is never ending. and i look back and i can count all my mistakes, and list all the things i swore i would never do again, but here i am forcing myself to not make that call to say "i miss you". so really i haven't made shit for changes and am once again alone listing all the things i will "never" do again. so i am stuck somewhere between what i have misconstrued as love of my past and what i lust for off the TV shows and i can really say that i don't think i believe anymore. i just don't think i have the energy to put myself out there for one more failed relationship for the chance that it may be real.

the attic tapes

those words that run over and over in your head, as if thinking the same thought a thousand times will bring you to some other conclusion.


so tired of my mind running, repeating some stupid lyric stuck in my head or some random thought made on accident that now circles as if to only exist to drive me crazy
not supposed to care, i should be fine this is not the first time alone
aren't i better than this, stronger than lonliness
wanting to think of anything other than the look he gives, of his scent or the feeling only he is capable of evincing
if he just stops i may lose it but i shouldn't care
at least that is what i am telling myself to make sense of it all
i have been here so many times it should be so routine by now
move, stop, repeat
so why now is it any different, maybe its not
push it down put your walls back up
no good at being ignored maybe that is what i am clinging to
i'm not capable of playing hard to get
i'm not able to play any games at all
the pathetic thoughts are just going in circles
the heavy hearted feeling that make no sense in my head
makes me doubt the two communicate at all
there is one "void" i wish to fill.


blah

i was once

after putting the final steps off for too long I finally sat down to work on the skis that Luke at Moment was kind enough to think I should design. so after Max calming me down from a slight melt down, I have some-what finished them. it really reminded me of college and Peter's critiques. feeling vulnerable and standing there while people who have no understanding, tell you what you should have done to make it fit in to their idea of (cliche) art. and maybe i haven't felt this exposed in awhile because i haven't made art in so long. then there's the art i have made, mostly therapy and things for other people. but that is different. thousands of people are going to see these damn skis. and if they don't like them, they could take my bike! so now sitting here half asleep and lonely i am doing my bi-annual googleing of myself and what i found were nice things people said about me the last time (i thought) i was an artist. enjoy...

(review from an art show in Carson)

What up, Amber Gutry?

Usually she’s at Never Ender, the boutique and gallery she owns in Reno , stitching together belts out of visquine and hardware-store paint samples, or providing a well-lit, much needed venue for young painters funneling out of the University of Nevada , Reno .

While not holding together the scene, she’s behind the scenes, shooting photos. With an eye for graceful combinations of the industrial and the soft, she looks for small, urban details and ends up with a mix of sparse, graphic boldness and textural abstraction that is as close to tactile as you could get in a two-dimensional medium. They exist just as pixels in files until an outlet comes along, and she takes a flexible approach to the work’s final form. The same images might end up on a quilt or in a frame.

(from RNR review of an art show at Never Ender)
For Gutry, this was also an experiment in relinquishing some of the control she would normally have over an exhibit. Part of her idea was to take a creative approach toward meeting one of the challenges of running a gallery: finding a stable of dependable artists who consistently produce good artwork.

Gutry has always been one to capitalize on whatever resources are available. In late 2004, when the walls weren’t installed in time for Never Ender’s grand opening, she held the exhibit on bare lumber framing. In this case, she’s depending on her usual artists’ professional connections to help her cast a wider net.

some days do you feel like you are walking backwards? i do today

xoxo

whoa nelly

seems like i am pretty good at starting things then moving on...so back to the blogging!

i am winding down from my 3 days off work, a little catch-up-on-life vacation. and well, i may just feel more overwhelmed than 3 days ago. my problem with having time to do things is i just end up finding more things i want to do. i did get a bit of work done that i have been putting off and i did spend some bday cash. (lets not speak of the bday). ok lets do...

i turned 27 last week and for some odd reason while you are taking shots it always seems a good idea to take more. so 2 hours later and 8 shots, 4 beers in, the vomiting began. lucky for me i had liz, sarah and pizza guy to hold back my hair and remind me to not puke on my shoes. thanks guys! so i think i may need to cut back on the drinking for a bit, i feel like i am using it as something i should not be. but maybe i just like the taste of pabst!

back to my 3 days off...i spent the better part of sunday (a beautiful reno fall day i may add), on the roof with sparky (my step dad). i had some holes that needed fixing and since i no longer have a man around he gets to help me out, lucky guy ;) it was really nice, as it always is when we fix things, just chatting the two of us. i really lucked out in the dad department by getting a best friend as well.
i spent monday with pizza guy doing, well nothing, which was pretty much amazing. (whats that movie that says something about being comfortable enough to just shut the fuck up for a while?) anyways, it was really nice just sitting on my floor sewing and knowing someone was in the room.
and today i spent thinking i wanted to shop then realizing, not so much. then working and hanging with rukus. *rukus had a tumer removed from his paw last week (thankfully it was not cancer), so he has been not too happy lately.
so now i am pretty tired from my 3 day vacation and want to climb into bed with someone cuddly, i'm guessing it will be rukus.
i have been taking new photos, mostly for the skis i am designing for Moment, you can see them on the myspace. also i have been making a lot of random art, finally, which has been amazing. art i have really missed you.
ok, i am now rambling and need to sleep....see you soon

reading and thinking

i just finished my book, "the perks of being a wallflower". its almost sad finishing a book you have spent so long picking up and putting down. so now i journey to the garage to find a new purse book and pack away some things i would rather not look at right now, but first some of my favorite parts of the book: (while listening to sun kil moon's neverending math equation, and the promise ring's all of my everythings)

"i don't understand that. i would give someone a record so they could love the record, not so they would always know i gave it to them"

"but mostly, i was crying because i was suddenly very aware of the fact that it was me standing up in that tunnel with the wind over my face. not caring if i saw downtown. not even thinking about it. because i was standing in the tunnel. and i was really there. and that was enough to make me feel infinite."

"when i was done reading the poem, everyone was quiet. a very sad quiet. but the amazing thing was that it wasn't a bad sad at all. it was just something that made everyone look around at each other and know that they were there, Sam and Patrick looked at me. and i looked at them, and i think they knew. not anything specific really. they just knew. and i think that's all you can ever ask from a friend."

i love that last one and i feel blessed to have some people in my life as of late that know what you are thinking and know when you need a hand on your shoulder and a full minute of staring.

and one from me:

"i am now seeing that memories are what becomes when events are no longer real. looking back at events, people, feelings from my past, it's like they were never real. like i am watching them on TV as the memories role on inside my mind. and maybe for some of the memories this is good because it separates you enough to make you numb to them. maybe there were never real."

image to follow, it is drying and in need of stitching.