for once. and for all. may 12th.

i'm alternating between writing digitally, writing analog, and reading cruddy.

there are so many things i love about cruddy. picking it up again, maybe ten years later, reading sentences and thinking... she just GETS it.

she nailed it. adolescent writing as an adult. about things kids do. things i've done.

and with the most brilliant execution.

i love this book.


moving on...

today i learned a lot about myself. not learned, so much as came to terms with.

i'm changing. i'm starting to modify the way i think and feel. my ideals. what i want from my life. what i value. what i want to do next. this week, this month, next month, this year.

and it's all been there. i think what is happening is that i am starting to act in accordance with the way i want to live. i am doing things to take initiative to get things that i want.

i'm settling down a little. as in, calming down.

i'm letting my mind wander and not feeling guilty about it anymore.

it's liberating.


at the same time, i'm getting sleep again. though it's midnight now, and i'm tired but not exactly sleepy, reading will fix that.

i think it might be the beer. might. because i've been having at least two a day since the fam left. three last night and tonight over the course of hours. and with food. but i'm very muted. toned down. not all anxiety queen.


i'm starting to feel again the way i felt that first week in my-your apartment.

independent. happy. free. quiet. motivated. in tune with my sense of self.


it's an interesting journey. how i imagine surfing would be. lots of peaks and valleys, and waiting. it feels like surfacing after getting caught in the undertow and being raked across the ocean floor. the feeling of finding oxygen is awesome, even though the subsequent coughing of water from lungs is not.


being offline is really starting to get to me. tomorrow verizon comes to tell me what is wrong.

i'm nearly certain that they're going to tell me that the phone lines are all dead in this apartment. to which i tell landlord to FUCK OFF already. because he is the one who said the apartment was dsl ready.

and if he told me wrong, there are not words for how pissed i'll be. because i already know that it costs $130 to get a line. and i could've been on faster internet two weeks ago. and not wasted all this time and dealt with all of this frustration.


i loathe verizon. i begged the cable company to not make me get cable, and just let me get broadband. to lower the price just a tad so i wouldn't be forced into verizon again. and they didn't do it. they wanted me to have cable tv. and it's not only a waste of money, but i never watch tv. so i got all stubborn and refused it and waited a week for the dsl kit to show up. and then it did. and didn't work. surprise, surprise.


i hate verizon. and the landlord.


i need to write him a letter. a real one. about the patching and the painting. about the refrigerator and the leak and the ants.

and tonight i heard a dog barking on the third floor.

and i was both surprised and pissed. i know it's not here all the time. it's probably her boyfriend's dog. she's rarely home as far as i can tell.

but i miss my dog. and the fact that there's a dog in the building after that shit fit he pitched with me? intolerable.


scattered again, but...


i found two new songs today. well, one is a demo of a death cab for cutie song, when ben gibbard was doing all-time quarterback.

underwater is one of my favorite songs by dcfc, i had a live version somewhere. but the demo is incredibly sad and low fi, just him and guitar and 4 track hum. and i must've listened to it eight times on repeat driving to delaware.

'you were my army and i would command,
"attack the holy land"
and you were that interstate that i would roll my tanks down
cover me stunned. wake the children, windham.
and keep the details in a jar and bury them underwater.'

also, in the same cd wallet that i discovered while unpacking, i had two damien rice cds i've never listened to.

the fourth song on 9 is amazing.

he screamingly sings 'fuck you' repeatedly.
and 'let me out'
and something else too, now i am forgetting. 'hate me'. ugh. memory of a gnat, this one... it is so full and appropriate.

in any case, the cd was very sad, and it was a perfectly gloomy day, so it was fitting. and i was back from delaware halfway through the cd, but was happy about that one song.


i don't know. i'm a mixed bag. i have the happy side. i've been around friends since the fam left. and that has felt good. because i've been laughing my ass off.

but talking to my sister has been up and down. i missed her a lot today. the drive wasn't nearly as much fun or as entertaining as when i took her with me.


work was good today. i accomplished a lot. and i'm grateful for that, because i was wondering if i was going to be able to snap out of vacation mode and get back to this.

i have a lot of work coming up, and i know that when i start to feel how i feel right now, that the pendulum is about to swing the other way.

as in, working ten hour days soon. i hate it. but i will survive it until things mellow a little and there is a changing of the guard.


i've been having crazy dreams.

and if i think about something before i go to sleep, i've been succeeding in dreaming about it. when i say something and it, i mean someone.

it's been different thoughts every night. different people. different situations. where my mind wanders when i can't sleep. thinking about people i miss. haven't talked to in a while. or otherwise.

last night the dream was about my sister. and i don't remember it at all now, but i woke up kindof upset, like something bad had happened to her in my dream. i instinctively wanted to call her, which is always what happens when i have bad dreams.


i was thinking about the doctor the other day, and about writing to him to see how he and his husband are doing. and then dreamt him that night.


if i can just keep ever out of my head, that will help. because that last dream was a little much.


i was talking to kit tonight. it's strange. the last couple of weeks, coffee has been surprisingly absent from my mind.

and i told her tonight that i wonder if it's just certain times when i am thinking about him and wondering why things never worked out. and that, because i have had a few weeks of not really concentrating my romantic energy on him, that maybe i shouldn't ask him anything at all.


and she told me that if i don't, she will.

because she can't take six more months of it. she can't take the gap from my trip home in a few weeks to christmas, hearing about a new rash of regrets and thoughts and musings.

she can't take it. and she won't.

and she added that nina will back her up.


it's funny, i don't like ganging up on people, or being ganged up on.

when these two finally meet, i think i'm done for.


i say that with the utmost love in my heart. but they both know me pretty well, and they know the hard decisions i have to make, and will have to make, and they also kinda know what's best for me. even if i sometimes don't.

and when they combine forces? i'm gonna be in biiiiig trouble.


nina's ticket here with me has been purchased. kit's ticket there has been purchased. kit has to get hers back. i have to get mine there.

but we're halfway to home, and we're making lists.

and it's too exciting. and i don't want to wait two months for it.

i want it now. like veruca salt, i want it all now.


and i'm planning and scheming in my mind. people i want to run into and people i want to meet up with.

and i have a feeling this two months is going to feel longer than it will take to get here.

if i just stay busy and work hard, i'll be okay.

it'll be here before i know it.


and i'll probably be drunk a few days before i go home, and kit will be pushing the send button on a text message asking coffee to a drink. because i don't think i'll physically be able to go through with it.

i'm mentally preparing myself, because it's going to take some time. i can talk myself into anything. and out of anything.

and i can regret like no one else i've ever met.


some days i want to do it, right when i think of it. before i change my mind.

and some days i think i won't get anything back.

and some days i think i'll bump into him there whether i get a response or not.

and some days i think he'll avoid me until he knows i am gone.

and some days i think i'll actually ask him.

and some days i think i might just kiss him.

and some days i think his girlfriend might get mad.

and some days i think his boyfriend might get mad.

and some days i think he's been waiting for me to kiss him.

and some days i think i'll show up expectantly waiting.

and some days i think he won't care enough to show up.


i hope i have good days before i head home. or the scales might tip in the pessimistic direction.

i hope i get closure. finally.

i hope that it doesn't make it worse.

the last thing i need is another december to inspire eighty five stories and imaginary endings.

no more decembers. i don't think i can take another. ever. again.


see kit? he's back. he snuck in the back door. and i didn't invite him. and i didn't notice until i thought he was gone. really, he was there all along. my immediate life clouds my brain and tricks me into thinking he's moved out. but he hasn't. he just lies dormant until the people who are active in my life fade a bit. like the thing in the corner that you couldn't see for shadows. when the light goes out and your eyes adjust, it is there.

and that is why i must do what must be done.

for once.

and for all.