Jujube/su

Su

In Nov 2017, Su and I recorded a screen in which we used a mozilla pad to "converse" with each other. It lasted for almost 20 minutes.

I also captured footage of us typing (back to back, in a shared studio).

Now I would like to complete this project.

Thoughts

Su and I have not talked since our parting in 2017.

When I said I wanted to make something out of the footage, she said I needed to decide what it was about.

It was an example of letting the narrative (or idea) emerge after the making, I suppose.

Possibilities

17.09.2018

I will email Su and ask her if she would like to type with me again. I am in Rotterdam now. Is she still in Seoul?

22.09.2018

I haven't emailed Su.

Staring into the balcony and thinking about an installation of the typing setup. It's poetic.

08.10.2018

I haven't emailed Su.

I have taken on so much at school. So much is exciting. So much doesn't make sense. All does not require explanation.

I have come to detest premature intellectualization.

Su introduced me to Certain Fragaments by Tim Etchells. She said she would buy the book twice if she could.

01.11.2018

I haven't emailed Su.

Su seems to be a code name now.

It's her name, but I have lost its meaning from time to time.

This week has been horrible in many ways.

I don't know if I'd tell Su about it should we write to each other.

She often used the word absence.

16.11.18

I haven't emailed Su.

It seems she's the only one to whom I can say this:

something happened today, and I feel guilty about it.

(But I do know this page is open should one seeks it.)

Su would probably laugh and tell me, "I am not a Father and cannot forgive your sin."

I would probably say, "no one could, actually."

We would discuss morality.

"It's rather somber," I'd think in the moment.

"I placed too much weight on one action," I'd tell her days later.

At some point she would say,

"I don't really care about understanding or being understood. In fact, I quite like misunderstanding and mistakes."

That was something she did say about her work, which I found strange and beautiful.

22.12.18

Hi Su,

Dear Su,

Dear Su,

How are you?

I mentioned your name today in front of 150 people.

I said you recommended me a book that continued to influence me today.

I was almost reading from my speech, and only looked up a few times.

I was a bit choked up during part of it (not the part about you but something about the difficulties in my continuing travels), but I decided to manage my temper.

A few people told me they liked my story.

One person said that because she was close to me she could see I was nervous at some point.

"You did well. You were very... peaceful... is not the word. You were calm."

I wonder if this calmness, so it was perceived, correlates to your comment that time.

You said, "you observe."

25.11.18

I haven't written the email to Su.

I haven't written any email to Jeff.

Will I?

04.12.18

Su,

I brought you up today.

It's a funny phrase, bring up;

You were brought up in Seoul.

I mentioned you today, I guess, that should be clearer.

I don't know who you'd become.

And I am not so sure about who I am becoming.

A friend laughed when I said I cried while watching Widows. She was next to me.

I was surprised that she did not.

"When she made a sound and he said... yes. There was no line. It was perfect."

I cry more at movies now.

29.12.18

Hi Su,

I am at Brussels-Noord. It smells of piss. There is trash all over the benches. People are shouting. I read a reddit article. Flixbus drivers say passengers are robbed or have their bags stolen. Oops. I am sitting next to a group of young people who communicate in sign language. An old man who seems to have no jaw talks to someone he knows -- covered in a black hood and watching youtube clips -- I do not see his face. I tried to get on an early bus, but the driver told me it was full. I changed the ticket to a later one in case my budget flight was delayed; it was not. The couple next to me on the flight were very loud and oblivious. The woman ordered a bottle of white wine and the man, two whiskeys with a pepsi. He got another whiskey shortly after. I tried to finish my reading.

I hope I will make it to Rotterdam in one piece. Besides these, Christmas has been great. I saw Fontana di Trevi and even filled my water bottle there (from a side fountain, not from the pool, thankgoodness.) Are you enjoying the holidays? Not sure if Christmas is a big deal where you are...

10.01.19

I am alive, Su.

Somehow I want to live very, very quietly for a bit.

I am tired of noises and worries.

It's a new year that feels old.

Old: familiar.

Old: stale.

Old: predictable.

Old: aging.

23.01.19

Someone called me an "old friend" today.

Would I call you that one day too?

27.01.19

So much stays.

So much escapes.

Do you ever feel that way?

05.02.19

Su,

I used to, perhaps still am, obsessed with the precision of words.

If someone misuses a word, I get annoyed. You can count that as a fact.

But then, when it comes to an idea, I am the opposite of precise.

I become very vague.

Is that how I seek refuge?

My distrust towards the world.

But how can I move the world if I cannot trust it?

This is my dilemma.

08.02.19

I did not know who she was.

She told me she was a photographer.

I did not remember how to pronounce her name, even.

She told me she was moving to Idaho.

"What made you choose to move there?"

"Love."

I wanted to ask what her name was again, but it seemed we would remain friendly strangers.

I have kept my own name from people in the past, I am now reminded.

I told her about the film I was — am still — have just started — making.

"It's about the loss of home," I told her. I told her other things.

I wonder how much older she was. She didn't seem that much older, but she said,

"when I had an exhibition in Shanghai, a long time ago..."

I wonder.

Su, do you feel at home?

06.03.19

We drank tea with cranberries, and I told them the snapshot of my years.

I wrote to Nuri.

I still need to write to Mirla.

I have written to you, Su, I suppose.

I imagine giving you a book one day.

And in return, you show me what you have done with the dedication pages to Mike.

Have you written in the notebook I gave you?

13.03.19

Hi Su,

I want to tell you something and you might laugh at me.

Today I went to the parking lot and discovered some tiny houses.

I shared this newly found treasure with someone I wanted to share it with.

He found the fire extinguisher funny, too. I was glad.

But before we could finish our goodbyes, he ran to catch the tram, and I was left, a bit empty.

I sat in the space that they made to imitate a living room at central station. I waited for my appointment. I picked up some sushi and ate them without the condiments. They didn't taste much without soy sauce and wasabi.

The living room I saw was beautiful, fake antique trimmings on the ceiling and all.

The beds were crisply made like they would be in a soulless hotel.

"The walls are thin," one said and knocked on it, "but we never hear anything from each other."

It was true: they did a test by watching Netflix at the highest volume in the two rooms, simultaneously, and heard nothing from the other.

There was the statue of a buddha on one of the window sills, the kind you could buy at a trade store with flashy fabrics and aggressive incense. The room did smell like that, a fragrance so artificial that I was all but reminded of the phrase, sickeningly sweet.

I had finished my tea; water was boiling, but nothing suggested a refill.

When I gave them a hug to say goodbye, one of them said, "oh the American way" almost with disdain.

You never liked the hugs. No, that's not right. You never liked goodbyes.

24.03.19

I am notating, writing, discussing, organizing, editing, shooting, baking:

feminist film theory, my own position against (or within) it, my discomfort (but also disdain, rather haphazardly), an event of a collective in formation/meetings with people I want to make into moving image, footage of someone else, my own footage, bread.

I keep telling myself to keep calm and give myself the permission to pause. So far it seems to work — as long as I am not overworked — I feel okay. But perhaps I am turning one obsessiveness into another, which is now more obviously work, a durational performance that is too coded for others and not that transparent to myself.

How do you answer that question now — what do you do?

28.03.2019

What was the last time you miscommunicated because you did not know exactly what you want from the other person?

In today's already tense conversation, I caught myself giving three different explanations for the same thing, which raised familiar flags. It was easy to be trapped in being logical because we never found a way to directly and kindly address our needs, so instead we went around giving hints (even righteous ones) that something was needed without realizing it.

29.03

I am missing a party because my body aches and my mind cannot race tonight. I had lost track of weekdays or weekends, but recently they've come back to me. (The neighbors are having their own party with dub steps. It was a 20-degree day after all.) My colleague said she hadn't been to a movie for a long time because she felt tired everyday. She has a toothache and ankle pain this week, so she skipped pilates on Wednesday (the only fitness-like thing she does because she needs to maintain a strong core for her unbalanced back.) Yet she still works 10 hours a day, standing, lifting 25-kilo bags, shuffling steel trays in the oven. I walked like a zombie toward the finishing hour, carrying a bucket of water. I could not feel my calves much, and at the same time, I felt my forearms swelling.My name was shouted as I realized I was spilling it.

"You were somewhere else," she said.

Did you say that you'd had enough of the darkness? You were somewhere else, too. You are somewhere else, now.