the thing about computers

is that you just can't trust them. this simple truth i am learning all over again.

then again, it is due, in large part to my own stupidity, that *all* of the short stories i have ever written, 90% of the poems, my entire 2001 journal from the first year i spent in italy (when i wrote "mirabilandia"), the first songs i ever recorded, back before i had delusions of mini-grandeur.... all of that is no more. may it all rest in peace.

certainly, somewhere, some of this exists on paper. the songs (acoustic covers of moribund tunes like "fake plastic trees" by radiohead, "save me" by aimee mann, and various tunes by sarah mclachlan) exist on a cassette made for a boy in november of 2000. i have to say i am not sad to see those songs disappear. that boy, who is my best friend and webmaster, is also on the disorganized side, so i can rest assured that those songs have disappeared into thin air, thankfully.

the loss of all those words makes me sadder. it sounds stupid, but i feel much more comfortable writing on a computer (if you have seen how fast i type, you understand). in fact, it is quasi impossible for me to *really* concentrate while i am writing unless there is a keyboard under my fingers. of course the danger that accompanies that is that one day, your computer will go on the fritz, you will think that you have backed everything up, and you will give the go ahead to the computer repairman to reformat your hard drive, and you will not realize until long after the fact that a large majority of your files were in fact NOT on your jump drive, and have now been obliterated.

surely, in a box somewhere, i can find printed copies of the poems and short stories. the journal, no, though it maybe be on a 3.5" floppy somewhere. it is this elusive "somewhere" that is the problem. when you live between continents, and your parents are gracious enough to house your earthly possession in 20 boxes in the garage, you are hesistant to test their patience by sorting through all of that STUFF like a madwoman, papers and dust and 11th grade memories flying through the stuffy air of a garage in the summer.

still, in a certain sense, i feel a little lighter. all of those self-confessions, all of those poorly wraught turns-of-phrase, all of those shakespeare essays that probably really weren't that good.... all of that has left me, and i have a chance to rebuild my written history for those that stumble across it 50 years from now. assuming, of course, they can figure out how to work this poor ol' laptop that until yesterday was still running windows 98.

i am on the verge of some sort of major sociological discovery about what it means to be an expatriate, but that will have to wait, because it isn't fully formulated. but it is coming soon.

"pig earth" by john berger is fantastic. "the house of sand and fog" by andre dubus III was good, but goodness was it sad. "little films" will be the next vp & icom album, and, as they say, the cameras are already rolling.

words scribbled on paper, or trapped in an electronic chip of memory, or melodies etched on analog tape...where does it all go?

see you stateside folks in just a few short weeks!
vanessa