Foux de Fa Fa

secret domestic behaviors.

the beginning

When I was young my mother told me that my first name, Karissa, meant loving in Greek. I find it fascinating that for the most part, a name can tell you so much about a person without knowing anything else about them. I’ve come to believe that it is a direct result of a few specific factors. One of the first of these variables is that parents who name their children a particular name may have similarities to other parents who are drawn to that same name. Names are more common within their own cultures than outside of them, already making the communities that those names blossom from more similar to each other in respect to standards of living, class, wealth, customs, dress etc. Another factor is that over time names tend to repeat; and as a community, humans have a collective unconscious, so subconsciously we have developed a universal understanding of how a Tiffany or a Jason might behave (for example). In conjunction with this idea, because communities have pre-determined ideas of how individuals are “supposed to act,” they treat them according to those expectations, which must inevitably affect their reactions, and therefore play an important role in the development of their personality and character traits in general. My mother told me that my name meant loving in Greek, I feel like that idea has shaped the way I see myself from a very young age. I wanted to be loving; it seemed to have more depth in comparison to those with names who meant “beautiful” or “gift from God.” To be loving meant that I was open-minded, empathetic and willing to take risks. I recently looked my name up on an online dictionary, to find that in fact Karissa doesn’t mean loving as I have always believed and tried to live up to; it means “beloved.” Suddenly this new title makes me sound passive rather than a force giving to those around me, as I sounded before. Have I lived the life of another under the misunderstanding of my own name? No. Everyday, I actively work towards becoming the person I’ve always wanted to be.

I was born at home on a couch pillow with a midwife, because my mother wanted full control of the conditions in which I was born into. She wasn’t a sheep, and she raised my siblings and me as a single mother, to be self sufficient, freethinkers with a sense of creativity that we had to develop more like a survival skill. Growing up in a resourceful family like mine, (and by resourceful I mean financial unstable) we looked after each other as equals and found excitement in unconventional places. It was essential to be able to acknowledge the difference between necessity and luxury, and as I grew older I developed pleasure in minimalism. Not as a design style, but as a way of living with greater freedom - knowing yourself on an existential level without material armor. Without a television as a child, I turned to crafts. I started making my own clothes by the age of three, by the time I was ten I was the head seamstress for a community theatre group, and at sixteen I was interning in Los Angeles for a ready wear collection. I love working with my hands. Creation is one of the most satisfying experiences, and affecting the lives of others in a positive way as a result, is one of the most gratifying acts.

Strengths and interests are often one and the same, I have come to believe this is true because most children are rewarded for their natural abilities and that is what shapes the activities they take particular interest in, as they get older. This along with my obsessive-compulsive tendency is why I think I have strength in my craftsmanship abilities. I also find personal enjoyment in presentation and communication skills. I love thinking. I love thinking about thinking, and why we think the way we think, and what influences have shaped our individual experiences. In other words, I am fascinated with the idea of perception, and how these concepts are formed as well as how to adapt them. In addition to thinking, I can’t help but talk about it. Often talking thoughts out, help me fully understand and organize all the things I’m accumulating in my head. Speaking to others is incredibly rewarding, because I often feel that I have discovered profound meaning in even the simplest details and I want to share it. Sometimes I am aware I can seem over dramatic, and I worry that others see me as pretentious, because of my overwhelming passion and enthusiasm, but I love the way I experience the world, and I see my excitement and drive as a strength more than a weakness. I like to think positively, and therefore don’t usually think of the things I’m less passionate about as weaknesses, but more as things that I haven’t gotten around to dedicating myself enough to, in order to fully develop. This upcoming thesis year, I plan on developing areas which have taken more of the back seat recently including but not limited to: research and rendering.

I strive to live life with poise, presence, and purpose.

Karissa Bieschke, September 8, 2008.

psuedo-name

bieschke
Eastern German: of Slavic origin, either from a personal name Beg (from begati ‘to run’) or a nickname for someone who always ran.

bicycle thief.

laughy

I had lots of problems with my baby teeth. Cavities and gold crowns, bridges and pulled teeth. I probably looked like a rap-star come to think of it. Everytime a tooth was pulled we would keep it in one of those tiny yellow envelopes, so that I could put it under my pillow for the tooth fairy. The tooth fairy paid better money for a tooth with roots still attached, than one that had been lost of natural causes...

I had lots of problems with dentists. They all seemed to be so violent, I was so little and they didn't know how to deal with me crying from the extensive pain. They'd yell at me and get rougher and rougher, sometimes it felt that they were making the needles and drills hurt more, just because they hated little children... just because they hated me.

I felt bad for my mother. She was protective of me, sometimes making them stop the torture and taking me away in the middle of procedures. We went from one dentist, to another, to another... they all seemed to be the same... taking pleasure in being assholes to kids. We didn't have money and I knew it must have been expensive for her, when all she was trying to do was take away the pain. So one day before going to a new dentist, I decided I couldn't let my mother keep paying for dentist after dentist.. I would stay at this one, and try to take the pain without showing it. I decided that day, that I would laugh when it hurt, instead of cry.

It worked too, everytime Dr. Czochanski took out the syringe to numb my mouth, I'd start to giggle. Usually a tear or two would run down the side of my face, but I'd smile and laugh harder the more it hurt. Dr. Czochanski would laugh too, and smile, he was gentle and would reassure me. He seemed to think I was a happy-go-lucky kid, laughing all the time, and he looked forward to seeing me. "There she is! My laughy patient, she always laughs when she's here.." he'd explain to the dental assistant.

A few years ago, and many years since I'd been to see Dr. Czochanski, I realized this practice of mine had become deeply ingrained in my personality. When things would hurt, I'd laugh about it or start to make jokes to combat the topic. Somehow it would allow me to hurt privately, avoid the worst embarrassments, and never allow people in sight of my vulnerabilities.

He who laughs last, isn't laughing.

memories

whether or not the way you perceive your past is true, does not matter. for the memories are merely reflections on how you interpreted the information for yourself. the truth is as much of who you are as a falsified nostalgia.

yosemite

My brother, sister, and I were playing in the river while camping in Yosemite with my mother and her boyfriend Jack. I was getting cold and snuck back into the middle room of our blue-canvas, three-room tent where our large leather suitcase laid on the floor near the back fabric wall. My mother had told us that her and Jack were going to be napping, so not to come back into the tent and wake them. I carefully unzipped the large silver zipper that croaked as I pulled it along the perimeter of the bag, and shuffled through the clothes. The fabric flap that separated me from the room next door started shaking and my mother was giggling obnoxiously. She must have heard the zipper and said, "Hello?" I answered, "Hello." My mother asked what I was doing in the tent so I said, "I'm changing." The rustling sounds behind the curtain hadn't stopped, and Jack shouted back at me, "Yeah... us too!" They both laughed. I walked over to the curtain flapping in front of me and opened it. There before me, was a large, blurry, hairy skin colored mass, tangled ontop of the sleeping bags. I walked out of the tent. My brother and sister were sitting at the picnic table outside. I walked over to them, my eyes wide and my face paralyzed. They asked, "What happened in there?" So I leaned in and whispered to them, "They were sexing."

dr. juroe

My mother took me to see a psycologist when I was a kid. She thought I was a pathalogical liar.

He was an asshole.

planning to plan.

My father is a big planner. He wouldn't know what to do, if he didn't have the ability to make a plan. Not just one plan either, my father plans, and then he plans three or four back-up plans in case the first doesn't work out. This is a good skill, but as a kid the kind of extent planning he would have liked us all to do.. regarding things such as leisure-time activities, seemed ridiculous. He needed plans more urgently when we were younger. I used to think it was because he didn't spend much time with us, and he didn't know what to do when he was in charge of us, so a plan was like his security blanket... an instruction manual for kids.

A few weeks ago I was visiting my father in Pennsylvania. When I woke up he had a big smile on his face and said, "This is going to be so much fun," rubbing his hands together like a cartoon cat about to eat a bird, "what do you want to do today? I thought we could take the train into Philladelphia, see the Liberty Bell and all of that, and when we got back we could go see a movie, or there's a place not too far that you can ride go carts....! Wanna ride go carts!?" When I say I had just awoke, I mean I had sat up in bed and opened the curtain which separated my bed from the rest of the 16 ft. trailer we were in. I looked at him, and said I thought maybe we'd do something a little less maintenence a little more off the cuff... say an aimless walk in the forest. Then I informed him of my plans, " I don't know dad. This is what I know: I'm gonna go to the bathroom. Then I am going to shower and brush my teeth, and when I'm finished with that... I'm gonna eat breakfast." He laughed and said, "I always forget how you kids were all pretty content and laid back, enjoying nature and all of that... I wasn't the same way. I always needed to be doing something exciting." Then I realized, he wasn't only trying to make a plan to satisfy me.. he was really just a little kid in a grown mans body waiting for an excuse to do things he wouldn't allow himself to spend money on alone.

"Yes, lets take the train to Philladelphia."

love.

The graphic design company my mother started when my parents got divorced, was always down and more down. She seemed to be working all day and into every night, and although she tried not to show it, she seemed incredibly worried and stressed out all of the time. She worked from home so that she could still be a stay-at-home mom at the same time, but she was attached to her desk chair she would refer to as "the prison."

One December when I was still very young, it was the slow season for my mother's business, with all of her clients on holiday with their families. It was always the slow season, but this year my mother needed to replace her computer, and although I didn't realize at the time how bad the money had gotten, she didn't know what she would do to handle all of the expenses including the upcoming holiday.

It was Christmas morning. Eric, Amara and I always agreed on what time we would get up and open presents so that we did it all together. That morning we rushed out to the livingroom, my mother trailing behind. There, on the floor in front of the tree lie my mothers beat up old PC. It was unwrapped and the cord lay lifeless and tangled. I didn't understand. Santa didn't come? My brother immediately ran over shouting with excitement. I picture him hugging it in his arms and staring at it as if it were precious treasure he'd never seen before, much less something we had owned for years.

Still confused I trekked down the hallway to mom's office where a new computer had suddenly replaced the old one. I remember the green blinking lights up the front that made it look like a space craft, high tech. She was holding back tears I thought were happiness or relief as she said, "Look you guys, Santa brought ME a present this year.."

That was the last time I saw my brother's face. For the rest of our childhood he would be glued to the "kids computer" playing games over the world wide web, which at the time seemed like magic. The back of my brother's head has become quite a distinguishable view of him... and since he became a computer programmer at PANDORA music, back when it still The Savage Beast... (when he was college), the back of his head has been published a number of times.






It's funny that it only occurs to me now as an adult, that my brother must have put on such a big show for us that Christmas just to keep us from crying. I imagine he looked at my mothers face which must have been distraught and splotchy, he would have known how upset she was and decided to try to turn it around. I'm sure if he had said nothing instead of embracing the gift so exstatically, we all would have burst into tears unable to recognize how fortunate all of us really were... just to have each other.

obsession.

I wanted boobs more than anything when I was little. Sometimes on Thursday night when Dad came to take my siblings and me out for dinner, I’d make him drive behind the grocery stores scouting out apple crates. When I’d spot one, I’d plead for him to stop the car just long enough for me to fling open the door, dash out, and snatch the purple molded cardboard crate, and jump back in, yelling, “GO!” as if he were my getaway driver. I’d take the crates home, cut out two connected molded cups, and staple plastic newspaper binding tape to them in order to make straps for my back and shoulders. I’d wear it as a bra under my clothes, granting myself the confidence that comes along with boobs, not realizing that people would know they weren’t authentic on my four-year-old body.

sushi confessional

My mother told me not too long ago, while eating sushi, that she felt guilty for having me. She said that she knew my parents marriage was not going to last when she decided to have me, but she needed me and has always felt selfish about it because it seemed wrong to bring a helpless baby into the world knowing it wouldn't have two parents. She didn't have me to save the marriage, she calls me the "unmutable universal force."

french toast.

I roughly remember my parents together before they got a divorce. I remember the nakedness. It wasn't like living in a family of nudists... I think they did it as a form of "the exposure effect" form of education for their offspring. We talked about sex, and used proper names for genitalia ever since I can remember.

I don't remember my father being around much before the divorce, he always traveled so much. But I know he was there... because by the time I was three, my portraits of people were all anatomically correct.

I remember the morning my parents decided to tell my brother, sister, and me that they were getting divorced. Or I have been told so many times, I have created my own memory of the event in my mind. In my mind, we weren't all dressed yet... my father was in his underwear, and my mom was wearing an oversized T-shirt without pants. My parents sat down on the hideous floral printed couch in the family room, and told us the news. Everybody started crying. Everybody except me. I was three, and hadn't been fed yet. It was the weekend which meant somebody might make a real breakfast so that I didn't have to eat cereal like every other morning. I asked my father if he would make me french toast... (my favorite) and he said he would. But now everyone was crying and didn't seem to care about breakfast anymore. I persisted that somebody should make french toast, but nobody seemed to care. It was so frustrating. Nobody would listen to me, and nobody seemed to care that their three year old was dying of starvation rolling around the floor with anxiety and impatience in front of them. DYING RIGHT IN FRONT OF THEM. Then I decided to try an approach my mother used all of the time when threatening me with imaginary consequences if I didn't do as she said... I decided to count to three. I stated loudly to nobody in particular, " By the time I count to three, somebody better be making me french toast! 1..............2..............3!" I counted to three countless times to no avail. They all just stayed where they were, as if they couldn't even hear me.

tao

refridgerator reminder.

Desiderata

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story. Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexatious to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism. Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love, for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment, it is as perennial as the grass. Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.

Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul. With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful.

Strive to be happy.

-- Max Ehrmann, 1927

the "before."

This is the house I grew up in. It was written up in a magazine after we had to sell it the year before I graduated high school. The "before" and "after" shots are heartbreaking... my childhood suddenly became depicted as some sort of lifestyle faux pas, just waiting to be painted, stripped, and dressed up with mid-century design icons and decoration only everything.

radioactive girl.

I guess in fairness, my life started before birth itself. My parents were visiting Finland when my mother was four months pregnant with me, she traveled all over, but it was not until she reached Sweden that the locals informed her that the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant had exploded and she had probably been exposed (along with her fetus) to the radiation....

When she returned to California, her doctors and midwife reccomended she have an abortion. They said her child would probably be severely mentally and physically challenged (ahem.), and that she should start over trying to have a child. My mother refused (although she believes in the right to choose), insisting that I was already her baby and she would love me no matter how I turned out.

The doctors examined me after birth. They said there were only a few things that seemed to have affected me. First, was that I was severely retarded (kidding), second that I was about a million times more likely to get leukemia (but thought I would have developed it by a very young age), third, that I had extremely thin enamel on all of my teeth (which led to endless dental battles as a child, perscriptive toothpaste as a teenager, and giving up dark colored drinks), and fourth, that when the moon is near an eclipse, sometimes at night if you rub my belly button it glows.

As a teenager I joked (but secretly kept hope) that anyday I was about to realize the superpower I must have developed as a side effect to the radiation. But as a young adult, I now have come to terms with the fact that I will never have invisibility powers... all I became was a glow-bright stick.

In all seriousness though, if you want a frightening look into what my life might have been like just google: chernobyl babies.
I don't want to post such negativity onto this blog.

The truth is, nobody knows what all the side effects of the chernobyl radiation are. They say the three groups most affected by the blast were: teenage girls, pregnant women, and fetuses (all of which were in stages of development). A few years ago information was starting to come out as the girls who were teenagers during the explosiong started reaching their child-bearing years. Many of them are incapable of having children. In my case, nobody really knows all of the side- effects because we are just starting to reach the age, where some might be trying to have children of their own.

Most of the time, I don't think about this at all. But every now and again I realize I might not be able to have kids, and I try not to care either way.

"A plant reactor exploded during a failed cooling system test, igniting a massive fire that burned for ten days. The accident, which was blamed on design deficiencies and lax operating procedures, released radioactivity equivalent to 400 times that of the Hiroshima bomb.

More than 350,000 people were displaced in the weeks after the explosion, and scientists estimate up to 90,000 square miles (233,000 square kilometers) of land in Belarus, Ukraine, and Russia (all part of the Soviet Union at the time) were contaminated with unhealthy levels of radioactive elements."

-http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/04/photogalleries/chernobyl/

birth.

I read somewhere that to know where you are going, you must first know where you came from. So I shall start there. Birth.

At home on a couch pillow, with a midwife.