a room of one's own.

Although this blog entry magically appeared here today, it was pre-recorded two days ago—because I am currently having wheelbarrows full of fun on vacation in San Francisco. This will of course put a damper on the Halloween Film Fest for a little while—but before despondency overwhelms you and causes you to do something drastic (like find a more entertaining blog, for instance), please know that I am thinking of you, Hypothetical Reader (and when I think of you, you're wearing a flesh-colored body sock reason—which is really kind of creepy), and I'm accumulating new experiences which may inspire new and exciting blog entries. (But don't count on it. Inspiration is one fickle asshole.) 

Now on to today's entry... 

I don't know where you live and what importance your physical surroundings plays in your mental wellness. Perhaps you live in a shantytown or a double-wide that might qualify for an episode of A&E Hoarders—and it's entirely possible that you're okay with that. Maybe all the order and decorative embellishment that you need can be found deep inside your soul, so that you don't need to turn to the harlot-like seductions of external physical reality. I, on the other hand, am shallow and need my home to provide me with a false sense of self-worth. If my home is attractive and clean and modern, then I am attractive and clean and modern. The logic is spurious at best, but the basic comforts of life usually don't have a strong rational basis behind them. Teddy bears and camp fires and macaroni and cheese are comforting because they work upon our minds—they link our (perhaps) troubled minds with innocence, beauty, or a sense of general security. If we analyze this link too carefully, it of course dissolves right before our eyes. If we analyze all the links which connect us with a sense of comfort or security and we thereby lose them all, I think that's where madness begins. We need someplace to go, to get away from it all. And this 'someplace' isn't geographical.

The following are pictures of rooms which describe my aesthetic sense and validate the self I attempt each and every day to construct. My ideal home would include rooms that look (at least approximately) like these because they help me to feel the way I want to feel...

And the following rooms are places where I could never find peace. Even just looking at these photographs profoundly unsettles me. These are rooms where hope goes to die...