Prosperity

Thursday morning I received a stuffed animal of the squirrel persuasion.

At some point between then and now I ate fermented soy bean sushi. not that i'm hating on the soy bean but this is just NATTO K.

This weekend I embraced my inner tourist and paved the way toward a prosperous future, which will apparently involve run-in's with Batman asking for hand-outs on the sidewalk. Good to know that Batman and I have similar fates.

My lips are chapped, and yet I remain calm.

Pure Depth

"One woman's red flag is another woman's treasure." Who knew that E! news could be so insightful.

Today I jumped for ten minutes, obsessed over Kat Dennings, seriously pondered the legitimacy of Khloe Kardashian's wedding, and kind of agreed that Kourtney's baby daddy purposefully impregnated her. I didn't leave the house all day. But I did send a fanblast. Yes, rest easy children, a fanblast was delivered.

Here are the fanblast cliffnotes:

Thank you for coming to Buttonwood Tree and Barnes & Noble.
Thank you for downloading "Alibi."

Join my facebook fanpage: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/pages/Jenn-Friedman/13766676442?ref=ts

Gig announcement!!!

Jenn Friedman and Chantilly
Thursday, October 8th, 9:15 PM
Uncle Mike's Tribeca
57 Murray Street, NYC
$5 Cover

www.myspace.com/chantillysongs
www.jennfriedman.com

Buy my Roland RD 150 88-weighted-key keyboard. Discuss.

Good weekend wishes...

and the customary links:

www.reverbnation.com/jennfriedman
www.jennfriedman.com
www.myspace.com/jennfriedman
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/pages/Jenn-Friedman/13766676442?ref=ts
www.jennfriedman.blogspot.com (you're one step ahead of the curve here)

Happy? Did ya like that? Next blog will be a quiz.

Love,
Jenn

Tuesday Morning Rubbish

Noteworthy things:

Brandon and I sat in a green room in Barnes and Noble before going on. a GREEN ROOM!

Serious coughage taking place this morning. Its the remnants of my attonement.

I fasted yesterday for Yom Kippur which was good but then I ate too much at night which was sucky sucky.

I have discovered that my new target audience should be sixty plus.

I woke up at 5:30 AM today which is a new record for this season.

I am so going outside for a morning walk right after I finish this blog.

I need to sell my keyboard - 88 weighted key roland rd 150 - any takers?

I did my first protest Saturday. an abortion clinic defense counter protest. There was a free donut involved but that was a fluke. Regardless, I'm going back this Saturday, if not for the free donut, then for the feeling of empowerment and community. If you want to come, email me at jenn.fried@gmail.com. Good people, really great cause.

And in closing...apparently there was a beetle in my bathroom, and apparently that beetle is no more. i'm in mourning.

enjoy this crisp and lovely autumn day! I loooove fall... <3

World Peace and Butt Signing

If you live in the vast and glorious state of Connecticut, you should come to my show tonight at the Buttonwood Tree! 605 Main Street, Middletown, CT. 7:30 PM. $8, $5 for students.

If you don't live there, you should at least have some sort of DESIRE to go...a seat will vibrate in your honor.

Tomorrow, if you live in or around the UNITED STATES, you should come see me at Barnes and Noble on 66th and Broadway in New York, NY, Friday 9/25, 6PM. Performance and signing. I'll sign your cd, your coffee cup, your butt. Oh and get this - the signatures are free. You won't find a deal like this anywhere. COME AND SEE THIS MOST FABULOUS SHOW!!! Guitarist Brandon Vetrano will be there. If you're nice to him, he will sign your butt too.

I am going to write a blog soon called "Fat and Unempowered." Its going to be about "days like these." Not today, not me, not specifically, just days like these for whomever, wherever, and why on these days we equate feeling bigger with losing power. That blog is going to be hot.

Today marks one year, ten months and eight days of no smoking. I'm not anal...

I thought about smoking on the train this morning, and then I thought about religion, and then I thought they're kind of one in the same. Absitence from smoking is like finding your religion. There are ten million ways to do it and when it boils down to it its all the same. We fight over which way is best, we have a very strong conviction that our way is actually the ONLY way, and we preach and get in each other's faces. (I'm different, I KNOW my way is best hahahaha). Seriously though...You know what would be fabulous? If people from all different religions sat in a room together and discussed the feelings that arose from their religion without alluding to what the religion is. That would be fun. World peace OMG.

I was also thinking, wouldn't it be a cool experiment to go through an entire day without looking at the time once? from waking up until going to bed? preferably on a weekend or holiday. I think that representatives of the United Nation should try this experiment. It would relax the entire world for a day, hence world peace again, hollah!

Try it. Try it! Wake up Saturday and don't look at the clock. Eat lunch without looking at the time first to see if you should be hungry. Go out and play. Do your work. Exercise. Do whatever you want. Just make sure you don't know the time at any point throughout the day. Go to sleep when you're tired. Don't be anxious...swing with the natural shifts that go on throughout the day! You'll know its night when it gets dark out. hrrrm.

i'm such a hippie, geez....

Alright. Later folks. Enjoy Thursday, it never did anything to you. and thank you for downloading "Alibi"!!!! And thank you in advance for coming to my show tonight, spiritually or physically, and for buying my cd, physically or digitally.

www.cdbaby.com/cd/jenn2
www.itunes.com/jennfriedman

Loves you.

org.com

Tomorrow is going to be craaaazzzzy. I wake up at an ungodly 6:30 AM to pick up my mic stand at grand central station from my friend at 8:30. then i am basically working on stuff all day, lap-toppity stuff, until 3:45 when I arrive at Arizzmaradio to co-host with Rew unti 6PM. Then I'm off to Chantilly's show at 7 at National Underground, which will be a great reprieve! Then a possible Paradigm Shift meeting if I can make it work.

My website is having an identity crisis right now so while I'm sorting things out you may mosey on over to www.reverbnation.com/jennfriedman. I now have jennfriedman.org as well, which i have to build so there's nothing there yet, but i have to take care of .com...i may still be able to save it...

Okay I laughed so hard at this website, I seriously haven't laughed like this in a long while. Read it if you adore a good belly-laugh. My cheeks are still recovering:

http://www.dontevenreply.com/

Its a site with mock responses that somebody wrote to various classified ads. Genius!

Shaman

there is very little rational explanation for this.

...


i may have met a shaman
it seems to be a pattern
the meeting of god's healers
the owing of our debt

he asked that i might show him
where cardboard waited for him
so he could hover to his post
and eat his daily bread

your woman was a shaman
she took to you like water
and tossed the matter of her
prelimonary men

they never were the wizards
they sully in the deserts
and tighten up your tourniquet
while supper catches cold

they hid with all the banshees
in novices and teepees
and let the night fall in good time
as mother root took hold

and when the night would find her
with supper laid beside her
it pawned out suns a dime a piece
and bid she keep the rest

so some nights she would hire
a protege to guide her
and took to counting acrobats
as mother did her best

i may have met a shaman
was sent to me by lightning
or something catastrophic
your cronies would contend

but when my soul takes heed on
just any kinda woman
i rest my saddle on her
and reel a madam in

Un-forgetting

I used to be hungry a lot. Sometimes I think, "That wasn't real. That didn't happen. I was just doing it for attention, just to mess with myself and others. I could've stopped anytime. Nothing HAPPENED TO me."

That is a dangerous thought, because then I transfer that judgment onto others who are going through it. And if I plan on being any help at all, I need to dispell that terrible inaccuracy pronto.

I made myself hungry on purpose, but I also felt like I was imploding and had no choice, no room, for food. I had to contain and confine myself to a simple body and a small voice. Just as I spoke about hate building on itself, so can hunger; it did so with me, and it was addictive. Restriction was implosion; bulimia explosion. Sometimes I forget about the imploding. Bulimia was a very loud part of my eating disorder, so it stands out the most. But it started with restricting, so its very linked, and one clearly caused the other, and I simply cannot afford to forget that this disorder happened. It wrecked my life for four years. I forget about the first year because I don't think it counted, because it was before I declared myself "in control." And perhaps I didn't have a diagnosible illness, but it was a year wracked with warning signs, and it warrants rememberance.

But what are warning signs really when your mind is made up? How can you help somebody who is already half-way there? Already formulating their journey further in? Its a formula, these eating disorders. We're all just wrapped up in our tiny little formulaic worlds. How do you stop the pendulum once its set in motion to gain momentum?

I see women sometimes, and I see the hints they drop. But by the time their hint is visible to me, they're already gone. they've left town, dropping hints and trails, but they design it so that whoever discovers their tracks is already too far behind to help them. its part of the formula.

So how do we tweak the formula? how do we get inside, catch up, even get one step ahead? And who are we to do that? and why on earth would they listen to us? just who ARE we to think we could save them?

My friend who is struggling said, "God is in and all around me, yet I do not feel him speaking to me." Speaking to. Its the speaking to, the connecting. If God is idle inside you, there's nothing to be gained from his presence. This woman needs to awaken her God. Or allow him to awaken her.

Just like God, there is a force. a universal healing force that is accessible to everyone. But sometimes you need a middle-man. Someone who will negotiate on your behalf, who will ease you both toward one another, who will slowly and gently awaken the life force inside. And most importantly, convince you that this life force is worth meeting. It would be premature to try to convince you that its already inside you straight away, but to meet it like a friend might be worth your while.

Who is this middle-man? A mother? a teacher? a healer? a therapist? a doctor? a friend? maybe it is an animal, or some kind of stone, or a painting, or a piece of music. Maybe its a daughter or son, or something profound in nature. Maybe its the sunrise, or maybe it is night.

Whatever it is, it must be of equal or greater force than the addiction. It must be worth returning to. It must create hunger.

Recovery begins when you hunger for something greater than hunger itself; when you allow it to transfer, as energy transfers, onto more sustainable sources.

I'm thinking about people who have entered blindly into the dim and quiet world of eating disorders. I have not forgotten about the crippling nature of this illness. If you are struggling, then please understand: you are more than this, and there is hope.

Please feel free to email me at jenn.fried@gmail.com with any thoughts.