All posts by Avens O'Brien

Avens O'Brien is a second-generation libertarian residing in Los Angeles, CA. She spends an enormous amount of her time working for a digital media startup, and the rest of her time on numerous pursuits of passion: she tends to participate in fun antics and adventures (which she then writes about) as well as pretending to be really smart about politics and philosophy. She's an agitator of ideas, a doer of things, and contributes regularly for DL Magazine and Thoughts on Liberty. You can find all her writing on AVENS.ME.
Current Events, Humanity

The Boston Marathon Bombing

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Boston was my home before I moved West. Boston will always be “home” to me, that place I go to see the family (blood and chosen) that made me who I am.

This afternoon I received the news that two bombs had exploded at the finish line of the Boston Marathon in Copley Square. Copley is a familiar place to me – I used to work a block away, and I’ve watched the Marathon go by many times, in the past I’ve greeted the runners as they finished their 26 mile run.

As usual, when a tragedy strikes, things are chaotic. Reports were coming in from every media source, I sent and received dozens of text messages checking on the whereabouts and well-being of the people I know and love in the area.

It’s been six or seven hours since the first bomb went off. We still don’t know who did it. We don’t know the full count of people injured, though there have been two confirmed dead. We don’t know much, and news media simply recycles the same story until there’s something new to add. We are surrounded by images of emotion, of blood and pain and smoke and fire, and incredible videos of people who ran towards the explosion, towards the people there who needed help. There is such a mix of feelings – the pain of knowing that some humans do this to one another, but the hope found in knowing how many come to help, how many come, selflessly, to give, and reach out to one another, strangers united by their humanity.

MarathonRunnersWhen the dust has settled and we’ve learned more and had time to try to make sense of this tragedy in Boston, perhaps we’ll take a moment to reflect on the fact that being the victims of bombing, whether foreign or domestic, is a terrible thing. 

Maybe as we heal from this hurt, we can take some time to learn where other bombings have taken place in the world lately. Maybe we can try to help. Maybe we can try to stop them. Maybe we have that power. Maybe it’s time to look to our leaders and demand we no longer be responsible for this feeling we’re experiencing, experienced by others around the world.

No person, no nation, no people should feel what Boston feels today.

Adventures, Experiences, Past, Travel, Writing

Love (Found & Lost) Along the Road

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So, the context provided in the entry before this one should explain that I’d followed love to a strange set of life-decisions. After having planned for over a year to move from Boston to Los Angeles, I finally did, and a year later I left to drive haphazardly across the country. Because of a Boy. Seriously, read that damn entry first.

So I left Los Angeles on June 3rd. It was very hard to do. My stuff was in storage, my birds were in their travel cage, there was less money in my bank account than I’d hoped, and I was very, very, nervous. I had just moved to LA a year before. I’d been so excited to start my life there. I kept looking at my favorite restaurants, favorite haunts, thinking to myself that I’d be back in two months, that I’d just settle right back in, hopefully bringing the Boy back with me.

The only way I was able to leave was by reminding myself I’d be back soon. Reminding myself that I had an adventure to go on, and that I’d be home again before I knew it. That the time would fly by.

So I drove to Las Vegas. I checked into my hotel room at The Artisan, a hotel I’d stayed at many times before and have stayed at many times since. I spent the next two weeks working – booking tables, selling bottles, hosting parties, Go-Go dancing, bar-tending private parties, gambling even, all cash and quick. The plan was to make as much money as I could fast, and to head East.

A few days before my expected leaving date, I met Ghost. Ghost has a real name, but I don’t feel like using it, as few people know it and by keeping it close I feel it makes him still belong to me in some way, even though I’m giving away this story.  Continue reading Love (Found & Lost) Along the Road →

Adventures, Experiences, Past, Travel

The Context (Leading up to the Summer of 2011)

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Two years ago, I was in a very different space. So different, in fact, that I can barely recall it, so I flip through journals and pictures and try to reassemble the jumble of memories. I loved a Boy who lived 2,000 miles away from me, and I struggle to remember why. I try to remember kisses and adventures on chemicals in a forest land in upstate New York where we found one another among the clutter of New Age festival wildness.

Two years ago, I packed my life up and drove across the country for three months. That’s the story I’ve been wanting to tell, but before I do, I have to explain why I did, which is a story in and of itself. So there are few entries to read, and they’re autobiographical nonsense of a girl in her early 20s who seems to make a lot of life-altering decisions for boys. But these experiences, for all that they twist me around and make me run off on crazy paths in alternate directions, they’ve really shaped who I happen to be.

So, I guess we’ll back up to July of 2010, when I flew from my home in Los Angeles to New York for an annual hippie festival I’d been attending for years. It was already set to be a wild adventure – I flew out with clothing, a sleeping bag and a pillow, but no tent. I had no room for one in my baggage and decided I knew so many people at the festival that I would find someone to let me share their tent. It was a crazy idea, I’ll admit, but I love those kinds of situations. I have always made the best of not knowing what comes next, and Brushwood is a real home for me, filled with friends of my parents, friends of mine, former lovers, and lovers yet to be discovered. Continue reading The Context (Leading up to the Summer of 2011) →

Experiences, Past

My Socrates

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On March 23rd, 2009, a great man passed away. I meant to post this on the anniversary of his death, but I’m off by a few days. I have recently been talking more about him, as he inspired one of my tattoos (that story is for another entry someday).

This is what I wrote, the day of his funeral.

…

I was a student at Manchester Community College from June 2002 until May 2005. One of my very first classes was Critical Thinking with Eugene Rice, on Tuesday and Thursday mornings from 9:30-11am. I was 14, he was 72. Our connection was dynamic – we were both full of questions and answers. I developed my questions through rebellion and discovered my answers through speculation, and presented both arrogantly. He achieved both through experience and trial and error, and presented both in various fashions, from elegance to antagonism.

What we had in common was a desire for thorough knowledge, and an antagonistic spirit to achieve said knowledge.

He hated the word “teacher” he told us, one class, due to his belief that it implies indoctrination, preferring to refer to himself as a “mid-wife”. Knowledge was already inside us, you see, and he was simply there to assist with the birth of it.  Continue reading My Socrates →

Adventures, Experiences, Modeling, Photography, Writing

A Valentine

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Photograph by Judd Weiss.

So I love. I’ve had so many great loves, so many butterflies and wide-eyed moments of trying and failing and hurting and giving. I’m not afraid to feel, not afraid to enjoy and embrace, but profoundly appreciative of how rare I find those sparks and subtle wants to please and need.

Things are great sometimes, with cuddles and kisses and irresistible trysts. I’m rather non-possessive and attentive and affectionate and all of these things come naturally and preemptively for the right person, the right dynamic. I’m passionate and careful – with my heart and others’.

I try to be the best for someone, the best that I can be. People deserve the best from one another, and I love the song in my soul that serves to remind me I deserve someone who inspires the best of me.

Maybe love is for a short time, or a long time, or a lifetime. In this instance it is, so far, six months of laughter and dreams and adventures and late-night stir-frys, and reflecting on the distance we’ve come and the hurdles we’ve climbed and the things we might wish to do. Six months thus far, and if this were as far as it went it’d be perfect as it was, and if it continues, it’s perfect as long as it lasts. We learn from one another, we give and we hold and we provide safe space to grow and be, tender and gentle, dominant and submissive, and everything, anything, together. It’s not exclusive, it doesn’t have to be, it lacks the resentment I tend to find in binding myself to one, and yet there is no disrespect, just compassion and courtesy, trust and openness. I’m very grateful for it, tremendously so.

I don’t grasp at love, fleeting as it can be. I just bask in it.

I’ve got so much love to give, to share — I love you, Valentines. All of you. And him.

Adventures, Experiences, Work

My City of Sins

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Photo by Judd Weiss.

I live in the notorious Las Vegas, Nevada. I first visited this city in 2010 on my way to Los Angeles. I’ve had a love-hate relationship with it over the past three years. I began working here in 2011, and moved here in January of 2012. As of February of 2013, I’m about ready to leave.

People ask me what I think of Las Vegas. When people diss it, I rush to defend it, and when people gush about loving it, I shrug and add my negative pieces. I’m leaving, right? I must hate it here; but that’s not true. It’s an awesome city and I love it, but I can’t stay here. This isn’t home. Continue reading My City of Sins →

Adventures, Experiences, Modeling, Photography, Tattoos

Ink #5: Serotonin

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Serotonin, or 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) is a monoamine neurotransmitter.

It regulates a number of functions within the body, but my largest interest in it is how approximately 10% of serotonin in the body is synthesized in serotonergic neurons of the central nervous system, where it regulates mood, appetite and sleep, as well as affecting cognitive functions of memory & learning.

Popularly, serotonin is thought to contribute to feelings of happiness.

A dear friend of mine (of nearly 20 years) has the above image tattooed on her forearm. She and many other friends of mine have struggled with depression. I’m immensely thankful in my life that I have always seemed to have enough serotonin, even in the days when I would experiment with various chemicals which would cause my body to release more (and can be problematic for those who do not produce enough).

I spend a lot of time around people who are taking substances which affect their serotonin receptors.

As my dear friend went to a tattoo shop here in Las Vegas to get a new tattoo following a tremendous heartbreak (in October of this year), I began speaking with the other artist in the shop that day, and within a few hours had decided to get my own serotonin molecule, for a variety of the reasons I’ve mentioned above.

In December I was in Los Angeles, and Judd Weiss and I did a photo shoot, which included a number of shots of my ink.

Photo by Judd Weiss.
Photo by Judd Weiss.

Tattoo #5. Done by Brett at Redemption Tattoo in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Eventually each tattoo I have will be explained and pictured on this blog. Today was the day for serotonin.

Poetry, Writing

Three.

The lover of another covered me in kisses, her specificity dismissed for the bliss that we could witness. At first glance I was coy, but the division was elusive, my submission to the substance and her heart was most profusive. I watched skin touching skin and those satisfying sounds of lovers giving in to their passions all unbound, and the test was passed most surely by each in their own way, as the girls we felt emotions that came strong and held some sway.

Curves of bodies, moans of pleasure and disappearance into dreams, I can’t say it wasn’t lovely and heartbreaking at the seams, as you learn the look your lover gives the other all undone, and you cling to what you have because it’s all you’ve ever won. Still experience is effort, and we gave it as we got, the openness was awesome, battles won but never fought, for there is nothing gained in grasping at the fluidity of love, just some souls all pressed together, hope as pure white as a dove.

November 7, 2012

Experiences, Pets

Ender

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There’s a draft post here in my account on WordPress from the day I took Ender home. I never finished it. He deserved a post in life. He truly was amazing.

Ender was my baby birdie. He was hatched in late March, a yellow-sided green cheek conure (read: colorful little birdie!), and I took him home on May 21st of 2012 at eight weeks old. I named him after the protagonist of Ender’s Game, because I’m that much of a geek.

Ender, the day I took him home.

Conures have notorious personalities, and Ender was no exception. He had to be with me all of the time, constantly exploring whatever it was I was doing or cuddling on me or actively engaging in his surroundings. He was pretty quiet, especially compared to my Quakers, but he loved to make odd little noises and laugh at me. The only word I ever heard him say was “baby”. Continue reading Ender →