tell no one

i am moments away from a pot of coffee and a tiny book that has been hidden under the far left couch cushion for days.  i'm well aware of the freedom to read whatever i want in this country, but it's not the government i'm worried about.  it's you. 

three days ago a friend gave me a book with a post-it stuck in the front with this notice:

"Mallory- This is for you. 
Read it in the most quiet,
most secret, most hidden
place in your house.
Tell no one.
Be glad and confident."

the book has since been in the front of my mind without having read the first line.  we know the history of sacred literature, of banned books, of notes passed with "for stacey's eyes only" scrawled on the front.  with all of the literary liberty we can ask for, we have constructed a system of censorship. 

sometimes it's for our own protection.  the, "Ew, you like that stuff?" still rings in my head from when i was spotted still reading the Babysitter's Club in eighth grade.  what we read (and watch), and therefore what we recommend, is still a prominent definition of who we are.  i don't have enough fingers to account for how many times i've been caught with a guilty pleasure piece of media and quickly, entirely unprompted, spat out, "oh, my friend is making me read it."  or, for my own protection, the number of books i've read that i would never tell my mother to read because it would break her heart.  because, for some reason, she would connect the ideas in that book to what her daughter really thinks.  a recommedation is an endorsement.

but then there's this strange other side.  the sacred censorship.  it's the recommendation because you are the worthy recipient.  because this book has had a profound impact on the reader and, like a good secret, needed someone who could relate and relive what the reader has found.  it's the difference in telling a room of acquaintances your favorite book and telling that one worthy recipient that what you have found out was information meant for only them, and you are amazed it has taken the universe so long to find them.  my thoughts on this were confirmed yesterday when my non-recommended book spoke it back to me:

"I hid behind a mound of earth that had been dug up to make a grave for some old books, literature was the only religion her father practiced, when a book fell on the floor he kissed it, when he was done with a book he tried to give it away to someone who would love it, and if he couldn't find a worthy recipient, he buried it" 
 -- Jonathan Safran Foer, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

it's a strange love of a book that we believe we would rather have dead than to belong to the wrong person.  it's a sacred text that we feel self conscious evangelizing to the masses, but that we believe that one day, one pure-of-heart may come and know the goodness and peace that the text gave to us and will also give to them. 

it's enough weight to make me more aware of the words put down on a page or in a song-- that they should perhaps contain something more than juicy fiction and a self-imposed deadline.

the coffee is done.     

a suggestion

A strange self promotion with profound interviews and a cast of characters that simultaneously make you want to quit and hope.  It may be worth it for you to check it out.  I caught it at the Nashville Film Festival and I still have thoughts about it.  A good sign, yes?

                                                                            Broke*

something nice

it's nice when other people write for me instead:


"Singing odes to cigarettes, chiding lovers who treated her badly, and sweetly--if not hesitantly--announcing next to whom she wants to wake up, Mallory Graham's commanding singing voice seems to give a megaphone to her innermost thoughts and feelings. At first glance, Graham seems to be nervous that her audience might not like her --  it's just that she's put so much of herself into her songs that she's wary of how you'll receive them. But from the moment her band strikes up a chord, it's obvious that each of Mallory's songs are slaved over meticulously. Every ounce of energy and passion she has for writing from the heart comes through in her energetic performance. It's hard not to walk away mesmerized.  

These days, Mallory Graham leads a band of guys who fill in the drums, bass riffs, guitar solos and keyboard melodies that perfectly frame her clever songwriting capabilities. She calls them her Invisible Friends, and with their support, she has struck a balance of belting out bad ass melodies and sweetly smiling at the crowd all the while. The only thing confusing is her band name: When you see her troupe of friends and musicians share the stage with her with complete gusto, you'll be certain that her friends aren't invisible. In fact, you'll probably want to befriend her yourself. I do, anyway."  
                                                                                
                                                                                       --Megan Pacella, Nashville freelance writer


and then there's this:

Mallory Graham Thinks About Her Invisible Friends or How Did We End Up In Kentucky

Halloween weekend, 2009, Mallory Graham and myself crammed 5 guitars, a couple guitar amps, enough pizza rolls to feed a family of 18, my grandma’s old Wurlitzer accordion and our bass player, Mike Shannon, into the backseat of my Toyota Corolla and we drove from Asheville, NC to Nashville, TN. Mike sat, for the entire trip, in the backseat with his feet on the accordion case and his left arm up at a 90 degree angle so the pot of soup balancing precariously on top my guitar amp wouldn’t spill on top of him as we took the winding detour through Hot Springs, NC.

We recorded 7 of Mallory’s songs that weekend in producer Chris Leonard’s living room, bedroom and select closets throughout the house. Andy Black was there too. And so was Danger. And Stephen Sebastian stopped by just in time for an awesome guitar solo. We recorded all the tracks live with additional overdubs over 4 ½ days and it was relaxed, intense, and magical. Nashville friends stopped in and out to listen and to wish us luck and Nathan Crandell even brought beer and sang some buttery and beautiful background vocals. 

Mallory’s songs usually start out as small things; minute details, sentence fragments and a couple chords, and if you listen closely you can still hear that hesitation and the fear of speaking and creating something that lives and exists outside of herself. This isn’t a fearful record and Mallory isn’t a cowardly songwriter. It’s quite the opposite, actually. Not one to hide behind metaphor and ambiguity, quite a few times I’ve seen Mallory write a song about someone, and call them over and say “Hey, I’ve written a song about you.” It’s embarrassing to watch that person squirm in the songs’ accuracy. I’ve thought a few times, that Mallory might gain too much pleasure recalling the stories we’re not so proud of, using them as two-headed snakes and bearded ladies to lure the curious behind her curtain of human eccentricities. Maybe she does. Like on the last song, “Speak Up,” she writes about a friend’s infidelity from the perspective of the man-on-the-side. This is classified information, you know, the kind of stuff you whisper, not sing about.  Not when you’re friends with Mallory. We layed down tracks on Halloween night, lit candles and turned off the lights so trick-or-treaters wouldn’t ruin our takes. We performed this to                  tally live, vocals, accordion, everything, and you can hear us standing uncomfortably in the open space, shifting our weight in our chairs, and gathering our breaths as quietly as possible. When we finished our last take and finally exhaled, I was struck by this thought; Our history exists, whether we want it to or not, and it’s best to speak of it, call it our own, put a tune to it and sing it to whoever listens, because what is left unsaid and undone is really what controls us. I think Mallory knows this and wants us to know it too.

Well, all the pieces have finally come together and this delightful EP is available for you to hear. I couldn’t be more excited.

                                                                                      --Scott Tyler, http://scotttyler.tumblr.com/

now isn't that some credibility?  

it's like she knows

last night i sang nursery rhymes to my dog.  she responded in time with barks and jumps.

some people might think that this is a first sign of my biological clock ticking.  i think it might be that she is the one invisible friend that sees everything that i see.  no, not being a crazy dog lady.  just thinking that any living creature that spends 21 hours of her day with me might have better insight than even i do as to what is going on in my head.

child, dog, or inanimate object: it's good to have someone else looking in the same direction.

last night's conversation

me:  "do you think they know?"

him:  "know what?"

me:  "that they let us move out and into a house in another city?"

him:  "and make major life decisions?"

me:  "yeah."

him:  "no."

me:  "i don't, either."

i think i'm...

it may not be paranoia.  actually, i know it's not.  i'm not worried about something coming to get me-- it's more like a heightened sense of self awareness.  when no one's around. 

it's become increasingly evident to me via this blog how much i think about how much people (or things or government or spiritual entities, real or made up) are looking.  it explains my need to speak out loud when i'm by myself in my house.  it explains why i talk to my dog when we're walking at night.  or day.  or ever. 

another is-she-really-throwing-back-to-her-childhood-and-do-we-have-the-responsibility-of-assessing-her-psychological-stability example:  it started when i was a kid.  maybe it was the self imposed guilt of a hard-working protestant upbringing that conjured the feeling.  maybe it's the hereditary chemical imbalances.  either way, i was acutely aware that everything i did-- alone or not-- was being closely monitored.  i know that the "god is always watching" idea in protestant life is meant as a comfortable fallback to the abandoned, disheartened, and/or neurotic; but i'm pretty sure it backfired.  it didn't seem to matter what i did.  god is always watching.  i started feeling weird about my chronic nose-picking,*** the way i spoke to my stuffed animals, and all those tricky things that start happening at the blossoming of a young flower to a woman (yep, i said it).  i had to ask god to stop, STOP IT-- it was weird.  it persisted.  then the pleading, "hey, i know it's your job, but could you just close your eyes for a minute?"  always watching.

well, hell.  i'll keep up a performance, then.

it only seemed to get worse from there. when i would spend the night at people's houses, i was convinced that they had cameras set up in their bathrooms (always the bathroom-- i don't know why).  at school, being in the post columbine genre, the feeling was relatively justified as the cameras were hung where we could see them.  then there's the bars, supermarkets, workplaces, and my car.  always watching.  maybe not god, but the government sometimes.  sometimes just perverse individuals who i'll never meet but know me forever as the girl who would very modestly preserve her entire identity in ladies' rooms. 

what am i getting at?  how bizarre it is that i'm here.  tonight i am willingly headed to a bar to perform on stage for a group of people.  right now, i am writing into an entity where anyone with a computer or who knows someone with a computer or accesses the public library can see.  maybe it's always worked up to this point.  maybe the someone-is-always-watching has always just been a clear step in the direction of a performer.  or maybe it's the other way around-- like i need to legitimize the feeling that someone is always watching. 

what a strange place we've found ourselves.  you watching me right now, me knowing you are.  and just like always, the self consciousness only seems to go one way. 

unless i just made you feel weird.






***i'm certain in this respect, thank god that god was always watching.  i heard that kids that do this lack sodium in their diet.  this may explain my guilty gluttony at age ten when i started hiding bags of potato chips under my bed and in the closet for after everyone went to bed.  either way, god's watching made me so uncomfortable that i had to stop.  the nose picking, that is.  i may still have a bag of lays stashed in the back of my underwear drawer.

invisible online social networking.

i don't actually think making friends is easy for me. i think that might explain my hesitancy toward online social networking. you wouldn't guess that by the mass of sites i currently have in my possession. i can actually owe that to a few people along the way that insisted that i, simply, needed to be more social. but the collection of friends like pogs to clip on your profile is scary. like the girl scout badges i never earned. proabably because i was never in girl scouts. mostly because i was too nervous to make new friends. thinking about the possibility of having to still makes me a little nauseous. and so my mom didn't (and still doesn't) make me.

every time i (am forced to) add another way for people to see my goings-ons i get sweat on the keyboard-- what if no one wants to be my friend? what if everyone finds out that i'm actually more socially awkward than dj tanner? what if no one gets to find out that i'm this socially awkward because none of them will be my friend? worse, what if they become my friend, sense my insecurity, and leave like a bad blind date before i can even post a overly grateful "thank you for being my friend" on their wall? like how you feel entering the room for a party. no, like how i feel. i assume everyone else in the world is actually capable of having a conversation without perspiring and quietly wishing they were back home under the covers.

it's probably not as bad as i'm making it out to be. but writing to you-- whoever you are-- is maybe begging for a little performance. like when you feel a little bit like big brother or some sicko installed a camera in a public bathroom, so you overreact with extreme modesty and then twirl around as you leave, giving the finger. wrong sentiment. it's like when you're a kid and your siblings don't play with you so you make up an invisible friend that looks and talks just like jesus christ, and you over enunciate and make bigger gestures because, since no one else can see and hear him, he must have a hard time seeing and hearing you as well.

i'm sure all of your siblings played with you. i now also grant that none of your imaginary friends were jesus. weirdly, i have the chance to edit right now and i'm not taking it...

online social networking as a series of invisible friends. there we have it. there's the tiny consolation that keeps me from having to wear my finest party dress every time i post or log on to facebook. invisible friends mean that i take a part in molding who they are, as well. social networks give us all the chance to be an invisible friend to someone else, but also them to us. still scary for me, but much easier than real friends. real friends team up with your siblings and leave you alone with jesus. that's enough for this session.

oh, i'm on twitter now. invisiblegraham is the name. follow me! i mean, if you want...