mercury sub-one (Gen's Journal)

[En Sylvan]

DR. BOB: Nialle is actually writing a book.

WILLIAM KITTREDGE: Oh really? How's it going?

NIALLE: Slow. It's mostly outline now.

WILLIAM KITTREDGE: What's it about?

NIALLE: Er, it's sort of Macbeth with emphasis on the family stuff....

WILLIAM KITTREDGE: Do you have time to write with classes and all?

NIALLE: I try to write some every day, anyway.

WILLIAM KITTREDGE: [with a slightly teasing smile] Then what's taking you so long?

NIALLE: Some of the scenes are just... hard to get right. There's a scene between a parent and a kid and... maybe I just need to wait a few years, you know. Get perspective. Then write it.

WILLIAM KITTREDGE: Write it now. Just write it over and over again until it feels right. But you have to write it now. What you really think isn't going to get truer or less true.

*William Kittredge is a writer who spoke at my college. www.asu.edu/clas/english/creativewriting/readings/kittredge/

[fico]

2.12.o3

3:23am. (posted whenever Glenmore gets back up) (technically, this all happened "yesterday", on the 11th, but I like to tell myself that the world revolves around me, so it's going to be referred to as "today")

I had such a cool day. I woke up semi-early, like, 10:45am. After my shower, Chaia had me go over to work for a bit. (I owe her a lot of time for all the help she gave me with her Coe application.) I did a few things for her like empty the dishwasher and make her bed and things. And I got to tell her about Jamie. I, like, babbled for fifteen minutes or something. But I haven't seen her in a while, so she listened despite the fact that she was busy. I'm going to work for her again on Monday, 'cause she's having her bedroom redone, and she wants me to move some furniture in order for the wood-guy to look at her floors…? Something like that; I was sort of tuning my mom out when she was talking at me. I know that it's Monday afternoon though, and that's the important thing.

I did basic stuff. I studied Spanish; I went on Trapdoor, whatever. Then I took Rue to class and headed over to New Jersey. Rue, Lani and I had arranged to go out to Chinese food together. Lani had basketball practice, which ended at 6:00, and Rue had class until 6:15. I drove on the right road in the wrong direction for about ten minutes before realizing my mistake , but I got to Lani's school all right. We listened to emo on the way to pick up Rue. (As I had been doing while dropping Rue off and finding Lani's school.) It was great; Lani's one of those guys that you can just sit with, you know? He doesn't have to talk, he doesn't have to listen, he can just be. I love being with people. You learn so much about them as people and yourself as a person and it's just beautiful. We talked some, but we didn't feel we had to talk. I love that.

Picked Rue up and headed on over to Gold Fountain II. (It was annoying, 'cause I had to keep backtracking, going from dropping Rue off to driving back the way I'd come in order to pick Lani up to go back the way I'd come to pick Rue up to going back the way I'd come to get to the restaurant. Blargh to annoying driving. ) We got a table and sat down. I was armed with a good feel for the restaurant and The Vicar of Nibbleswicke by Roald Dahl. We made Lani get an egg roll and wonton soup, 'cause Gold Fountain II has really good ones. We ordered, and while we were waiting for our food to come, I read The Vicar of Nibbleswicke to them both. Lani really liked it, like I thought he would. (He got upset when not every page had a picture. ) We ate our food and talked about very important things such as Trapdoor and music and chinese-signs and books. We all shared a little of everything. (Though Rue didn't take any of mine since it had shrimp in it.) It was hilarious, Lani got this huge kick out of the crunchiness of the vegetables. (You know it's good Chinese food if the veggies are crunchy.) Like, he said something along the lines of "it's like an entire orchestra in your mouth", and then he delicately placed a water chestnut into the mouth in question and made a particularly noisy *CRUNCH*. It was great. He, like, started combining peapods with water chestnuts, 'cause the peapods make a slightly squeaky noise, and the water chestnuts make a somewhat liquid-crush noise.

As always, I was the last to finish. As always, I was the only one with leftovers. But it was really fun. We sat talking, even after we'd finished eating. I love doing that with people. That's, like, the epitome of close-friendship to me, when you hang out in the restaurant even after you're finished.

There was a big old row about who would pay the bill. We had all thought we would just pay our share, but Rue stole it early on, and then she wouldn't let us see it. (Stupid Hufflepufflyness. ) She kept threatening to pay for the entire meal herself. In the end, we decided she could, but only because Lani and I will pay the next two times we go out together.

I'm really glad we made that agreement. I had been getting scared that I might lose touch with Lani. I mean, we're both going to college next year. And right now, we really only know each other because of church. But I think I won't lose touch with him, now that I've gotten him on Trapdoor and we've started seeing each other outside of church/sunday school events.

We read our fortunes and did the whole "…in bed" thing. One was really great, but I forgot to pick up all the fortunes before we left, and now I can't remember them. I had been looking forward to posting them in the Observer's Room on TD.

[fico]

We left the restaurant and went back to my/rue's house. On the way, we all got this really peaceful vibe, so we decided to just drive around for a song or two. (Which is exactly what my mom told me not to do, because of black ice or whatever. But I hadn't seen any black ice, and you just don't ignore collective calm-vibes. That's practically sacrilegious. (why the hell is sacrilegious spelled like that? what sense does that make? it's related to 'sacred' and 'religious', isn't it? shouldn't it be 'sacrelirious' ? … but that looks weird. ) It's like ignoring a vital part of human communication, and that's just not right.) I took us through some developments, and then Rue told me to go to this one place so we could look across a field and see these lights… *can't describe* It wasn't that it was beautiful or anything, except that it was beautiful that all of us were there. It's just… it was… lit. It was just lit. It would be really cool to see during the Christmas season, 'cause then this farm puts up this lights show, but the lights from other things were "lit" too, and it was good. We drove back home, and Weezer came on the cd. Lani called it "his" song, which I thought was great/cute. I love when people get possessive about songs. I mean, not when they say that it isn't other people's songs, just when they call it their own. I think that's cool. (said while listening to her song)

We had been joking the entire night about how Lani is a "foreigner". (He was born in Canada, and he spent some time growing up there, as well as some time in Hungary and some in the US.) Like, he told this story about one time he was at the mall (which he hates) with his mom, and he held a door open for a Japanese couple. They looked at him and said, "oh, you can't be an American boy." So whenever he said something "weird", we called him "one of those weird foreigners". So we get to the house, and he's all like "I guess I had better say hello to your parents." And we were like, "is that another one of your crazy foreign things?" He laughed, but was still serious, so we went into the kitchen to say hi. My mom asked what we were up to, and I said we were going to have mad sex in my room. (So I have a weird sense of humour, so what?) We showed Lani our rooms (which we're both very proud of). And we discussed the use of rooms. Like, as self-expression and stuff. I've seen his, but I'm always busy listening to what he's saying about a tape he's lending me or explaining exactly why a certain book is the shit. So I rarely have time to look around. (He has a collection of empty beer bottles. That is so Lani.) He got a major kick out of my bed, which is properly in my closet. He said Rue's room felt claustrophobic, but he thought all the Harry Potter stuff was cool. Rue and I basically just showed off all our stuff to him. Including our computer stuff. Like, we showed him some Ani-videos we've downloaded, and stuff like that. And we showed him pictures of people on TD. So he knows what Gabi looks like with her beanie, and what KoNeko looks like in a tube-top, and what practically Nialle's whole family looks like. Then back up to my room, 'cause we wanted to sing the song that we'd written. I also played some other stuff, but by then it was a little after 10:00, and he has to wake up at 6:30. We decided to call it a night and drove him home.

He had trouble getting out of the car, 'cause it's impossible to park in Trenton after it snows. So we couldn't help him carry all the books I'm lending him. Rue's lending him a few also. (He's great about that. He'll try anything once. So we lent him about twenty books, since I won't see him again until the 23rd.)

Rue and I drove back home, and it just felt like a good night. We had joked around a lot, and I felt properly "loose" like I do after having a relaxing night. Then Rue and I ended up in her bed again (we seem to do that a lot more than I ever remembered before), listening to Dar Williams. The Dar cd ended, and Rue fell asleep. I daydreamed for a little, rubbing Rue's arm or stomach or something. I love watching people when they sleep. I just hate how I never wake up before them, so I can almost never see them in daylight.

*EDIT* ha! I found one of the fortunes. This one was mine. *proceeds to read in a grave voice* "You have an active mind and a keen imagination in bed." hmmm... I like that one.

-----
I totally get what you're saying, but I'm horrible at rewriting things. I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm writing the book. I'm just... having lots of difficulty.

[fico]

WARNING: THIS IS RUE

*giggles mischievously and reaches deep into her pj pockets, almost thinking they were empty but getting down to the very very bottom, practically lodged there, and pulls out two slips of paper, both of which arrived in her one fortune cookie*


You have an ambitious nature in bed.

Promise only what you can deliever in bed.

(Seriously, can anyone tell me which one of those is better than the other? )

[fico]

2.19.03

12:16pm. It's strange. I was at Coe, and half the time, I was thinking things like "don't forget that; you want to put that in your journal" and stuff. Like, I was trying to keep mental notes of what I thought important. But now I'm here, and I don't really want to say some of that stuff. I mean, I do, but not... It doesn't seem important anymore, but I know it was important. So I'm trying to figure out why my mind changed.

I thought a lot. I mean, at Coe. I thought a lot while I was at Coe. There were cool discussions almost anywhere, and there were also people just joking around if you wanted that. It was just cool like that. How there was something everywhere, but you could still just sit in a chair and try to write a book, you know?

I ... just lost my train of thought. I've got that thing where it feels like there's so much to say, but you don't know what to say. You don't know because you don't know what's important enough to mention now and what can be ignored for a little while longer. You don't know because you don't know how much other people can know. All these things. So I think I'll just make another entry later, and I'll talk about Coe then. Because my heart really isn't in it right now; I'm too busy thinking about my Bet-situation. ((*mind plays leap-thought* bet -- beta -- meta -- highway -- dude -- sweet -- ... heh. that's kinda fun. it's kinda like DADA poetry, only... more cryptic, if that's even possible.))

And it really pisses me off that I can't even post this. Something is up with Glenmore, so I can't login, and you can't post on Glenmore as a guest. I was even clever and figured out how to get into my journal, which took some thought and quite a few steps. But I still can't post the damn thing. And you know when you feel sorta down anyway, and then something stupid happens, and you're just totally out of it after that? I'm totally out of it.

*edit* ha-ha! I have discovered how to post on Glenmore. *enjoys feeling clever for a little bit*

[fico]

2.20.o3

I know why I'm feeling out of it. I mean, I knew why already, but that type of thing I can usually just work with for a bit and get over it. Thing is, I also need something to distract... That's all bullshit. Seriously. I have this awful habit of lying to myself whenever I don't want to tell myself the truth, and I'm lying like no other. *thinks a while* ...

Okay. Here's the truth that I feel comfortable saying. I am feeling out of it for three reasons. I don't feel like I can talk about two of them, and that's probably a good thing since I'm not sure exactly what I think about them anyway. But I can talk about the last one, so I might as well.

I don't have a purpose right now. I don't have anything that I'm trying to do or get done or enjoy or accomplish or anything. I mean, sure, I've got stuff to do. I have to finish highschool, and I have to work on my writing, and I really really ought to apply to St. John's. But none of that feels like it's important. All of it is kinda background noise. Like... like I'm supposed to be working on something big, and when I need a break from the big stuff, that's the stuff I should do. Do you know? For a while, my big thing was Coe. I was studying Spanish and working on other stuff for a break. But now I don't have anything. Because Spanish and Coe really meant something to me, you know? And now nothing has that meaning. Things are there, but they aren't important. So what am I supposed to do? *thinks a while* ...

I think I have to figure out the other things that are messing with me. I have to figure out what I think about them, exactly, and then I have to act on my thoughts. Because... because how can you concentrate on something else when this stuff is so big? That's it, isn't it? That I do have big things to work on, I'm just scared to. So I tell myself I don't have anything, and then I feel awful and listless. But at least I don't have to address the things that scare me, right? ... So I have to have a talk with someone really soon... And I have to think about what I think about what someone else said... And once I figure that out, I'll maybe be able to find something to do that feels worthwhile.

It's just scary. That's all.

It's scary in this really awful way. Like, I'm searching for something worth meaning, right? And when I get bad like this, it sometimes helps to make myself feel worse. That sounds stupid, but it makes sense. Like, "it's always darkest before dawn" type of thing. So I reread The Perks of Being a Wallflower, and it totally tore me up. Like, everything in there... Everything that it used to mean to me, it doesn't anymore. It means all these other things, but they're all really basic, general things. Like... like it's super-important to me that I never take LSD. I mean, sure, that's a good thing, it's important, blah blah. But it's not the point of the book. It wasn't a book written to keep kids off of drugs. You know? ... But I suppose whatever meaning you find in anything, even if it isn't the intended meaning, is still important, isn't it? It still is a meaning. But I didn't get any big meanings out of the book; that's what was different. Before, it meant all these really huge things to me, huge. Like, in almost every letter, there was a new thing that hit me. And this time... just little things. Nothing important, nothing life-altering, nothing worth getting worked up over. But the weird part was that I did get worked up. I was ready to cry about seven times during this reading... *shrugs* I dunno. I don't know what I'm trying to say, and I don't know why I'm trying. But it made me feel really crappy. Maybe because that book was so pivotal, and now it's just another book. Maybe because I feel the empty space of where it used to be. *shrugs again*

Either way, I got this completely insane urge to read Lost Boys again. This is probably one of the dumbest things I can do right now, read that book I mean. But I requested it from the library. Maybe because when Perks didn't hit me, I felt like I just needed to be hit by something, even if it hurt. I don't know. ... I don't know. But if Perks means something so very different, maybe Lost will mean something completely different, too. Maybe I'll be able to find something good in it. Maybe I'll learn something from it. Maybe it'll snap me out of whatever I'm in. You know? ...

That all sounds very depressing, doesn't it? This entire post sounds pretty depressing... Well that's no fun... But I can't think of anything better to talk about right now. I mean, there are cool things going on, like a Coe professor e-mailed me, and then got this person in Philly to e-mail me, and stuff like that. That's all very cool. But it doesn't offset what else is going on, does that make sense? It isn't "enough" or something... I'm just tired of living in this house with these people. I can't have a civil conversation with my mom. Chandra is pissing me off like no other. It bothers Rue when I can't talk to her about stuff, and I think she picked up on the fact that I'm not talking to her about stuff. *shrugs* Fuck it. I'm going to answer this e-mail, and then I'm going to eat something whether I'm hungry or not, and then I'm going to read and think and try to talk to Chaia. Maybe I just need a good, emotional talk with Chaia. *feels awful for ending the entry this way*

[fico]

2.21.o3

11:36pm. So I ended up having a talk with Chaia tonight. It was really cool. Like, not in the way it normally is; I didn't figure out as much as I usually do. But I think one of the reasons I didn't figure too much out is because I'd already formed my opinions pretty well. I already had an idea of what I thought and how I wanted to act about certain things. And I guess I was sort of asking Chaia if those were good things to think/do, you know? Because she is just... good. She's just good. And I didn't want to do anything that wasn't good.

We talked about a lot of stuff, and I felt pretty good because she seemed okay with my ideas and opinions. (That makes it sound like I need her approval. It's not really like that. It's more like..., if I didn't get her approval, I would question my reasoning. If I still agreed with myself, I wouldn't change, but maybe my questioning would make me recognize something I had missed before, you know? It's like that.) And then it was sundown.

We went into the kitchen, and she gave me a yamaca. Then, because Chaia is cool and careful about this type of thing, she asked me if I was a boy today, because if I was a girl, I could borrow her kerchief. I said no, I was a boy because I was feeling defensive, and I put on the yamaca. (It was silky and black.) She asked why I felt defensive, and she seemed concerned and vaguely upset, sort of like, "why are you upset in my house? my house is the house of caring and acceptance." Kind of like that, only I can't say it right. And I explained that I was just thinking about a lot. About my Bet-situation, and my dating situation, and my family situation, and my college situation. I just had a lot to think about. And I wasn't sure about a lot of it, so it made me defensive.

Reassured, she got the matches and lit the candles. She had five, three in small holders and two in slightly larger ones. (I learned later why she had more than the traditional two. They're for her three children who are all away from home.) And she said that prayer that's spoken every shabbot. I almost have it memorized, but there's no way I could spell it or pronounce it correctly. And she covered her eyes and rocked. Then she said another prayer, still rocking. And she was just beautiful. You know when people just have something bigger than themselves flowing through them? She had that. And I stared at her, and I stared at the flames, and it was beautiful. She finished the prayer and looked into the flames for a bit. Then she looked me in the eye and said good shabbot. And I said good shabbot. And she came around the table and gave me a hug.

I had to lean my head pretty far back for the hug, and the yamaca fell off. We picked it up, and she kissed it and put it back on the table, near the shabbot candles.

And then we just sat in her kitchen, talking about stuff. We talked about community and love and stuff. And we talked a little bit about "Fiddle on the Roof". We talked a bit about judaism. We just talked.

And while I was sitting there, talking, her eyes went really wide. And she said, "I just had the strangest feeling. [Gen], the most amazing thing just happened." I looked pleasantly expectant, because I didn't want to ruin her mood by saying the wrong thing. "You were on an album cover." This surprised me, and I always say something stupid when I'm surprised, so I waved my hand mock-flippantly and said, "oh, yeah. I'm gonna do that." But not sarcastic. I didn't say it sarcastic; I said it cocky, like "of course I'm making an album. I'm making tons of albums." And I could tell it wasn't the right thing to say. So then I looked her in the eye and asked her to describe it, to tell me what she saw.

She told me to go back to the position I had been in, so I did. She said I was going to be sitting just like that, with that smile on my face. (She described the smile. *tries to remember* Something like "a mixture of mischief and... sheer conceit" or something, and we both laughed.) And my IRL last name was on the cover, but she didn't know about my IRL first name. And she said it was sort of a very folky album. But it was also raw and new. And very experimental. And it was just me and my guitar, and sometimes a flutist in the background. It might have been a recorder, but almost certainly a flute. We talked about it a bit more, and it was going to have about fourteen or fifteen tracks, and I was going to be a fundamentalist and make a real, vinyl record. Not an 8-track, but vinyl as well as cd and tape. And it was just... I've wanted to make a record for a while now. *shrug* And now it feels like I actually might be able to do it. ...

heh. And then Chaia said, "and I'll be able to say I knew you when..." And I was like, "you'll even be able to go farther. You'll be able to say, 'I knew her when she was this *makes appropriate hand gesture* big." And we laughed about that a little. It just felt very good. It was a very good time. Like we were connecting in a more... "mature" way. *shrug* I dunno. Like maybe I'm sometimes older than five for her. But it's okay, because I can still be five whenever I want to. You know? Like she'll let me grow, or she'll let me take comfort, or whatever I need. That's one of the really great things about Chaia. She's open like that. ... I used to wish she had been my mom instead. But I would have been a completely different person if Chaia had been my mom, and I kind of like who I am. I've got my faults, certainly, but I'm working on those.

I'm still listless, but I feel more optimistic. That's not exactly what it is, but I can't think how to say things properly right now.

And good, random stuff happened. I figured out everything about Bet; I just have to do it. (Doing it tonight, before I go to bed.) And I got Dar Williams' new cd. (yay! it's not seeming kick-ass, but not bad either. besides, i usually think that until i've heard a cd about three times.) Oh! And I might see Dar on Sunday. This is uber-exciting. Because I gave her Perks last August, with parts underlined, and I don't know what she thought, because I didn't want to intrude by leaving my e-mail or anything. So... yeah. I'm hoping I'll be able to get another book to give her and take my guitar and go see her... 'cause I think I want her to sign my guitar. Seriously, how cool would that be? I mean, Dar is the person who got me into music in the first place. I think it would be really symbolic and all that jazz. *shrug* I just don't know what kind of pen to bring. But, yeah. I'm thinking about whether or not I seriously want her to sign it, and whether or not I would feel rude asking, and other fun stuff like that.

[fico]

2.23.o3

2:00am. I just had such a cool time. Okay, so, I've been having this major Bet-issue, right? Like, major. And I've been pulling my hair out over it, because it's so huge, and I couldn't think how to make it better without really screwing something up somewhere.

Anyway, I had the half-thought idea of writing a letter, 'cause that's what Bet and I do when something really big comes up. We write each other an e-mail or a letter, and then the other person responds when she can. But this letter-thingy was one of the things I ran by Chaia yesterday. Because I really didn't want to screw this up. Basically, my idea had been to say something along the lines of ''you're cool and I like you, but unless something drastic happens, I don't think we can be friends anymore. it would be cool if we were, but I don't see it happening.'' And Chaia said that I should say what I think, but I shouldn't even mention the idea that we might not be friends. (Someone else tried to tell me that basic thing too, but I can be stupid about some things, and I guess Chaia phrased it differently, or maybe I had already conceived the idea because of the other person and Chaia just made it feel ''real''. I dunno. Whatever.) So I wrote Bet this e-mail, and it basically said ''I'm sorry I've changed so much when you weren't expecting it. But I really like having you around, so can we work out a new way to hang out so that I don't go crazy anymore. Please call me.'' (that was major para-phrasing. like, i was a lot more elegant and what-not. and i didn't mention anything along the lines of crazyness. )

(Oh! I just realized that I forgot to mention -- Bet and I had sort of taken a break from each other. (My idea. ) Because I was messed up about this other thing. That was why I started it. But then I got this idea in my head that Bet and I weren't working out anymore, so I stayed away longer than I would have otherwise. (It's embarrassing how much Bet and I act like a married couple, but whatever.) So we hadn't even talked on the phone or anything for, like, a month or so? I'm not sure how long.) Bet called me tonight. We had a really good talk. Like, really good. And Chaia and that other person were completely right. 'Cause I have no right to go off telling Bet that I don't want to be friends anymore, you know? If it's gonna happen, then she has a right to say she still wants to be.

And I realized that Bet had this thing figured out a lot better than I ever did. (I hate when I assume wrongly about people. But I do it all the frickin' time anyway... I'm trying to learn not to. ) 'Cause she figures we will probably lose touch. Eventually if not this year. And she's okay with that. She doesn't want to speed it along, but she doesn't want to force it not to happen, either. (I hate when people are more mature than I am. Why couldn't I figure that out without having two people ram the idea down my throat first? ) So... yeah. We really connected. Like, a lot. We were all good and close and we had a lot to say since we hadn't spoken in a while. And it seems like we won't be hanging out a lot, but enough to really keep in touch and know what's up and be there for each other. Just not enough to cause empty parts in conversation and boredom (still can't spell that damn word ) because of differences in ways to hang out. You know? It looks pretty good. And I think I would be comfortable now in saying that I might want a longer period before hanging out. Like... Like I think she would be okay if I said that I thought we were hanging out ''too much'' or whatever. I think she would understand what I meant by that. Not that I didn't want to hang out with her, but that I was afraid we would hang out too much and get sick and bored of each other. I think I would be able to say that and she would be able to understand what I meant.

So, yeah. Good day. I mean, some weird stuff is going on with Kel, but that's besides the point. I just feel stupid, 'cause I don't know what to do to help Kel. I never have a clue what to do or say to help people who really need it. Like, I can hug my mom when she cries, but I can't say the thing that will make Kel into the kid I think she ought to be more of the time. You know? Kel's just... It's like she doesn't mind that the world made her grow up way too fast, and that just tears me up inside.

Speaking of things that tear me up -- I'm reading Lost Boys. Stupid, I know, I know. But I think I'll be okay. You have to face your demons sooner or later, right? And I think I'll be okay because of the way I'm thinking about the book. The thing that hit me before really hit me and was really painful. But that's kinda just background noise this time around. This time, this other thing is hitting me. And it's painful, but it's painful in the way of all sad things in the world. It's painful like when you see a kid who is sick or hungry. It's so sad, and it's disgusting that it happens, but it does happen. So we learn to help the people we can and we try not to focus on the people we lose. It's that kind of painful. The kind that makes us more determined to do good in the world... At least, I hope it's that kind. And I hope it makes me determined enough to maybe make a difference. A good difference.

[fico]

3.2.o3

11:47pm. You ever just look at something you did or made or even look at yourself, and you just feel big? Just like you take up way too much space. That's all. I'm kind of feeling like that right now. Like things that I do are just too big. I'm small, but I can make these things that just... Yeah. It's a weird feeling.

And I've also been thinking a lot. I've been thinking about what has been going on in my life. What's going to be going on in the near future and the not-so-near future. I've been thinking about my present and my past. Just thinking in general. And I've been thinking about what I actually want this journal to record. I mean, because this is really my only form of a journal that I've got right now. So I've been thinking about what I actually want to have in it. I want my thoughts. I figure I have to include some experiences simply because I want people to know what's up with me and because I'll want to remember later, but I mainly want my thoughts.

When I think things, I usually forget what I thought. That doesn't say what I mean. I mean that when I organize my thoughts on something, once I really have it set straight in my mind, it usually doesn't matter nearly as much as it did, so I forget about it. Some things do still matter afterward. I mean, I figured out that I love someone. That isn't sexually or platonically, it's just at all. Because I have become the epitome of green-love. I don't know if I always was and I just loved more people or if my way of loving people actually changed, but this is the first time I've loved someone in a while. About a year or so. I mean, there are people I love because I remember that I did love them, if that makes sense. There are people who are extremely important to me because I used to love them, and it's almost like I still love them, but not quite. I just... A little while back, when I was writing my essays for Coe and looking through my old writing, I came across this journal of mine from 1st grade. It was one of those mandatory ones, where you wrote something as part of the school day. And one of my entries was, "... I love you, [teacher's name]!" (Two notes: 1. I addressed all my entries toward my teacher. Like, I didn't head them, but I basically spoke to my teacher on paper. 2. I was really fond of exclamation points. I swear, I used exclamation points more than I used the letter "e", and that isn't only because I could spell worth beans. ) My teacher answered back something like "I love you too, [Gen]." And in my next entry, I said something like, "... I love everyone!!" And my teacher replied that that was a very nice thing to say. It's just... I remember that I used to love everyone. I remember I was just, just full of it. I was the bubbly little blonde kid that wouldn't shut up but that was just too cute. I remember being that kid. But... I kinda hate that I was. Maybe that's why the other loves don't feel "real" to me. Because in my mind, they're associated with being young and not thinking as much as I do now. To me, they don't seem like it takes much to love in that way. Does that make sense? Just that family and community and even spirituality, I felt all of those before I felt I started to think for myself. That isn't to say that I think other people don't think just because they love like that. It's just that it feels like if I were to do it, it would mean that. I understand that other people see it differently, but I can't understand how they see it.

Needless to say, I've been talking to Nialle and thinking about love. It's just... we got in this arguement about it. That's the first real arguement I remember having with her. It's just weird trying to figure out everything. I mean, because I'm thinking about what I said and what she said and how our friendship is different and the same because of it. All that stuff. *shrugs* Yeah.

I had this busy-as-anything day on Friday. I went out with Bet for a while. We went over to her friend's house. On the way, we discussed phsychology and guys and dating and stuff. It was cool just being with Bet again. I mean, 'cause we're sort of relearning each other, in a way. We're both going into it knowing that something's got to be different, and we're really open to what that might be. *shrug* It's just cool.

So, yeah, we went to her friend's house. Apparently, this girl is so-so-so much like me. (And Bet was laughing about how she really gets along with Champions (Keirsey) in general, and wasn't she lucky to find two of them when they only make up about 2 or 3 percent of the population?) Anway, [Kim] was so cool. She likes a lot of the same stuff I do, but she also seems to have enough differences that it wouldn't just feel like I'd developed a good relationship with myself. Anyway, I found myself spilling more beans about me than I meant to. (People who are cool and catch me off guard always make me do that. It makes me really mad at myself. I mean, 'cause I don't trust them yet, and they know more about me than most of my siblings, you know?) Anyway, Kim had to clean her room, so we just hung out on her futon as she randomly danced around us, picking things up and skipping tracks on her cd player and other fun stuff like that. And we talked about all kinds of things. Like the stupidity of boys-trying-to-act-older-than-boys (weird dating issue going on with one of them) and religion and love and parties and the size of Rue's sneakers. (heh. Kim's mom came in at one point and said, "Okay, who's got the skis disguised as sneakers in there?" erm... yeah. When I'm feeling lazy, I borrow Rue's sneakers because they don't involve laces-tying or anything like that... And because they look funny on my mini-body. ) It was just cool. Like, you know how some girls just spend hours and hours in each other's rooms, just talking about everyday stuff? I never understood that. But that's what we were doing, and it was fun. We had enough philosophical stuff thrown in to keep it interesting. But we also had enough stupid-like stuff in there to keep our brains from frying. *shrug* It was just weird connecting with girls, 'cause I haven't done that in a while. I mean, not in the sense that you hang out with a girlfriend or two and talk about... stuff. *hand-wave* You know what I mean.

We left 'cause Kim had to babysit and I had to get home in order to go to this thing with Rue at Lani's school. Lani goes to this Christian Academy thing, right? The thing he invited us to was this prayer/worship thingy. Just a neat thing for Christian kids to do on Friday nights. And it was just... weird. It was weird going into a group of people that were so actively Christian and who obviously felt this Christian-bond thing, and to feel completely out of it. I'm used to feeling like I'm outside of communities, right? I do that all the time. But I usually have some way to relate to what's going on, and to relate to indiviual people, even if I can't relate to the overall theme. But I'm not comfortable enough yet with my ideas of what I believe and don't believe. It felt kind of like I was this person standing in the middle of a stream with a wicked undertow. Not that I felt pressured or anything, just that it seemed like it would be cool to just float along for a bit, above the undertow but in the current. Does that make sense? I mean, I'm not making any reference what-so-ever to "backsliding" or "betraying beliefs" or anything. I wasn't looking at it as a religious thing. I was just looking at it as a group thing. And I remembered that I used to be able to connect to the group, and now I can't. I kind of missed that. (*rolls eyes at self* And I'm a dork, so I also felt mildly like I had to fight it simply because I missed it. But that wasn't the main reason at all.) Just weird to see people and know I used to be one of them.

After the prayer and music and worship and all that, we played hacky-sack. (Now that I can relate to.) And that was cool. We were joking around, and almost no one could really play, but that wasn't the point.

Rue and I drove Lani home. We decided to all go in for a bit. So I'm parking, right? (Side-note-to-all: don't try to park in Trenton after it's snowed; trust me.) So I'm backing up, and Lani looks behind and says "you've got room. keep going. keep going... keep going." And I'm like, "fine, but if I hit that car behind me, I'm holding you responsible." And he was like, "that's my dad's car." We laughed over that for a bit. And we went in. His dad was watching the history channel. His mom was hanging out with his dad, I guess. And one of his younger brothers was wandering around. We just sat in the kitchen for a while, discussing food and big-topics. (I have this habit of coming up with weird questions whenever there's a lull in conversation. Like... like "what do you need to feel like you lead a good life?" and "what's your definition of family? ... so then this isn't your family, you'll just make your own? ... do you think your kids will see your family as their family?" Stuff like that. I did some of that, 'cause Rue, Lani, and I have a habit of falling into comfortable silences... I'm often the one to break them.) We went up to his room so he could show us something or return something or something like that. And we just all stood around for a long while. Then we realized that standing was becoming awfully silly because we'd been there for a while and would probably stay for more of a while.

I love having talks like that. The ones where you just discuss whatever, and all of it feels full and deep and meaningful. We talked about college and marriage and whatever else kids in our positions end up thinking about. I just had a very talky-filled day, and those make me happy.

And Coe... I don't think I'll forget what happened at Coe, and I've already told almost everyone that would be interested. So I won't bother.

[fico]

3.3.o3

1:08am. I posted that, and I realized how much I had left out. Not stuff that happened; that's just whatever. I'm pretty much caught up with the stuff I think is important. But the thoughts. I didn't post about those, not really. And things that happened that made me think.

Like, I finished Lost Boys, and it didn't hurt me at all. Not beyond the fact that it's a saddish book. Mainly, it made me think more about love, since that was what was on my mind for about five days straight. Because there's all this stuff about love in there, if you're thinking about that at the time. And it made me think about bullies. I worry a lot that I'm a bully. *doesn't want to talk about that*

I've also been thinking about gender and stuff. I just finished My Gender Workbook by Kate Bornstein. (I'm reading Gender Outlaw by the same author, but I lost it. I never lose library books. Like, I can't remember the last time it happened. So I'm really mad about that. ) So I've been thinking about stuff like, like what the "perfect" physical expression of my gender would be. And I've been thinking about what I want to do with my life and how my self expression will help or hinder that. All kinds of fun things like that.

I also got this catalogue from Coe, telling its courses that are offered. (Galoshes! There's this one course! *uberexcited* I don't remember what it's called, but it is all about Hungarian myths and culture and folk tales and folk songs and songs from the three main social statuses of Hungary and, and you learn the basics of the language! *more uberexcited* Yeah. I wanna take that course so bad.) So I've been reading it (erm. *blush* cover to cover, pretty much.) and looking into what major I want and what kinds of classes I'm interested in. It's just making it all really obvious to me that I have no clue what I want to do with my life.

When I was younger, I did the classic kid-thing of changing my future profession about as often as I ate. Then I decided I would be a teacher. Okay. Teacher. That flopped about two years later when I decided to make a school. Came back to life when I decided I would teach in the school I made. I kept that idea for a long time, five years, in fact. But that's not what I want anymore. It would be cool, and I might still do it, but it's not The Thing that I want to do. I don't know what My Thing will be. I don't even know what I want it to be. And I know that I've got time to think about it; I mean, I'm not even in college yet. But still. I feel like I'm skipping over something important.

Like, I know what I'm interested in, but I don't know what to do with what I'm interested in; does that make sense? I like languages. I also like some other things like psychology and sociology and stuff, but my main thing is languages. Some history, some culture, some law, mainly languages. But I don't know what to do with languages. I don't know what's worth it. *big-sigh* So I'm thinking about that, a lot. A lot-a lot. I don't think I want to teach, really. (Not because of that whole influence-thing I had going. I'm still confused about that, but I guess I'm okay with influencing people.) I have no clue what I want to do. I thought it would be fun to be a translator. But I get bored with things that I don't find personally interesting, so I would hate translating boring books. Besides, I like working with people, cool people. *big shrug* No clue. Utter cluelessness. Complete stupid feeling.

What the hell is a person stoked with ambition supposed to do when she has no clue what she wants to do?

[En Sylvan]

Psst... John Chaimov stopped me at Old Blind Dogs last night and said, I quote, "Nialle, Nialle Nialle. One word. Gen. Tell me she's coming to Coe! I mean, I saw her tie and talked to her and I just thought, she has to come!"

I just thought you should know.

[fico]

3.4.o3

5:10pm. I have discovered the secret to making myself dream. I have. See, I love dreams like you wouldn't believe. They're great. I love going through them; I love remembering them; I love thinking about them. I love sharing them with people and listening to everyone else's. And I love thinking about why I would dream that. All of that. I just love it.

But I hardly ever dream. Seriously. I mean, I know we dream every night, but I hardly ever remember one. Other people, they, like, remember almost every night. I really can't do that. And it bothers me when I dream-share with someone, and I have almost no dream-stores to draw on, you know? But I have found out what to do.

I think it's mainly because I'm such a heavy sleeper. (Those alarms that sound like fire-drill-bells? I twitch my eyes when those go off, that's it. I don't even roll over. That's how out of it I am when I sleep.) But for the past two days, my mom has had to wake me up in the morning. First day, I had to go put tires into the trunk of the Mercedes. (The tires had been outside, partly frozen into the snow. Airlia pulled them out and we each took one. The metal was so cold that when I put it down, I could feel the outer layer or two of my skin being pulled off.) And this morning, I had to drive her to the car-place and drop her off. (We had left the Mercedes there to have its tires changed. So she took the Mercedes to a meeting, and I drove the van back home. By the way, we're not rich. People think that when they hear we have a Mercedes, but we're not. It's just that it's always been my mom's dream car, and she finally got it a few years ago. It's old and used and I hate it, but it makes my mom happy, so whatever.)

Both mornings, I would come back home and go on trapdoor for a bit. ( ) Then I would go back to bed. I hadn't showered or anything yet. I was too tired to just stay up. I couldn't think of anything worth doing anyway. So I would sleep. And it's so cool. I'll go back to sleep for only an hour or so, but I'll have a dream, and I'll remember it. (Er. I forgot mine today, but it was the kind that when you wake up, it's like holding water in your hands. It just keeps slipping away until it's gone. And Rue was talking to me, so I had to concentrate on what she was saying, and that just made me forget more.) It's too cool. So, I just have to get someone to wake me up at 9:00 every morning.

---

I had this awesome conversation with Gilt last night. It was one of those talks where you're just connecting so much that you feel like a ven (sp?) diagram. You know, the things where there are two circles that overlap. Gilt and I were seperate circles, but we just overlapped a whole lot. But it wasn't exactly like that. It was more like we were stick-figure drawings on a two-dimensional plane. And the stick-figures had been transposed on top of each other. So there were parts of us sticking out at weird angles, and we weren't connecting there, but we were pretty much one person. That's one of the biggest feelings I know.

---

I feel so random right now. I just have all these ideas that I want to get out, and they're all seemingly unconnected. But the connection is that I've been thinking about them lately. Only other people wouldn't just get that.

---

I used to have this idea that our lives weren't our lives, they were just dreams. ( I use the word "just" way too much.) Like, we would dream that we had woken up and slept and eaten and spoken and learned and all these things. It was all just one long dream. Our entire lives. Maybe these are the dreams babies have when they sleep. When they're awake, they're taking everything in, but they don't necessarily understand it yet. And they don't have context with which to mark things in their memories. So what if they just don't remember their days? What if I'm about to wake up in ten minutes, and I won't remember this dream that is my life? It could all be a major scam that my mind is playing with me. How weird would that be? I mean, because it's not even like I would remember this. So anything I might have learned over my seventeen years of life would be lost. The baby that I could be wouldn't remember. And so she would make the same mistakes I've made. Only not quite, because she wouldn't be put in the same exact positions as I've been.

You ever think about that? About how y% of someone's personality is made up of their experiences, and how things would change depending on who went through that experience? Like, it gets really intense because every choice (remind me to talk about Choose Your Own Adventure Books) would be different after the first one. Like. Okay. Let's say I went through Rue's life. I don't know everything that went on when we were younger, but one of the things that happened was that she was homeschooled. So, while she was homeschooled, she liked to play the Primes in Number Munchers. She also read a lot. If I had been homeschooled, I would probably have ridden my bike and explored the area near our house. (I got yelled at a lot for "running off" when I was younger.) This might have led me to become really interested in nature, and then the environment. On the other hand, I probably wouldn't have been given the chance to homeschool in the first place because I wouldn't have "learned" enough. Meaning that I wouldn't have done enough stuff that we could show to someone and say "she studied these topics to these degrees." We wouldn't have been able to prove what I learned, so I wouldn't be allowed to. I guess my point is that it's fun to put yourself in someone else's life and see what would have been different. See what would have changed and why. *shrug* Things I think about in waiting rooms.

---

There was this thing I saw on tv in Florida once. We were visiting my grandparents. I saw this thing that was talking about some guy. He had become a famous scientist or something. This program was interviewing his mom. And she said that he never went to school. He came home from the first day and said, "mom, I don't want to go." And after that, he was "sick" for about twelve years straight. She just kept him home entirely. And he learned all this stuff on his own, and it was okay. I saw it a long time ago, and I was kinda young when it happened. (I don't remember how old, but younger than 10, I think.) So I probably messed it up, but that was what I got out of it. That his mom just didn't make him go.

---

Choose Your Own Adventure: I hated those books. I only read one or two, but I hated them. You know why? They never had the option that I would have chosen, and I always "died" within three choices. (Not "died", but it would be the end of my story, so I would go back to the beginning and choose the other option and "die" within three choices again.) Like, there was one where I found a bag of money in some bushes, right? And this bully comes up to me and asks what I was doing in the bushes. They, like, gave me the option of fighting with him or lying to him. Something like that. What I wanted to do was try to get him to beat up on someone else. Not only would it save me from getting beaten up, but it might have given me time to get the money and go. Or maybe the option they gave was fighting him or confiding in him, and I wanted to lie to him. Something like that. It was just, they never gave the option of what I actually wanted to do, you know?

So I want to write this massive Choose Your Own Adventure book. (I just realized this as I was typing, so it's not thought out at all.) And I would get together with a few different people, say five or six of us all in all. We would all put ourselves in a basic situation. Then, we would each write the story of what would happen to us. We could, like, make a few things that would have to happen, and we would each have to find a way to make that happen in our story, you know? There would be a few, core similarities, and those would have to be included.

Oh! We could do a Hogwarts Choose Your Own Adventure book! Ha! Yeah, like, and we could use the books as a basic premise. So, like, we would each have to come up with a different way of obtaining an invisiblity cloak. And we would each have to find a reason to ride a hyppogriff (sp? blergh. *drunken face that i can't remember the code for). Things like that. How cool would that be? We could never sell it, but who cares? And because six or so people would be writing it, there would be a lot of options. Because sometimes, depending on our moods, one person would choose one of two things. So we would end up with about ten options for each split in the story, you know?

It's a buttload of work, but with six people, and with a really good story-line, I think it could both work and be worth it.

---

*feels good about getting so many thoughts and ideas on pixel*

-----
*nose-crinkle* you always know just the thing to say to make my day. thanks, nialle.

p.s. if anyone has ideas about what my ambition could be, i would honestly want to know. i feels drifty and listless and overall horrible whenever i think about "the future". you know?

[fico]

3.5.o3

11:34am. Dream.

Rue and I at the top of our street. (We live in this dinky, little street with a "no outlet" sign. It has even dinkier, even littler streets branching off of it in about three places. At the top (called "the top" because it's the entrance to / exit from the real world, and because when coming from down the street, you have to go up a steep hill to get there) is a stopsign which leads you onto Woodside Rd. Woodside Rd. The speed limit on Woodside is 35 miles per hour. Sometimes, you find yourself glancing at the speedometer and doing 45. Other times, people watch the speedometer climb to 55. We were never allowed to go to Woodside alone until they built the bikepath alongside it.

So, Rue and I at the top of the street. We have spread around us a large circle of paper and cd cases and cd's and markers and pens and other impliments of destruction. (Alice's Restaurant just came on.) We are working on a joint present which we're going to give as a joint gift to joint people. Don't ask why we're spread across half the asphalt, but it made sense at the time. Then a school bus (one of those half-sized ones) comes careening down Woodside doing about 50. It swerves into our No Outlet (not the sign; I just think it's a funny name for a street, so now that's the name of my street) doing about 40. Using the time-physics twists that you sometimes can in dreams, we somehow manage to clear our stuff into a small, manageable pile in the middle of the street. The bus doesn't hit it. But it does continue its careening way, crashing through the empty space where bushes normally are, but my subconscious must have forgotten the bushes. It careenes along through front yards (well, one front yard) and fields (er, one field, but it's a big field) and other pieces of my direct living space. It leaves big, ugly marks of where it's been, skid marks in the snow. It never goes under 40 miles per hour.

Eventually, it comes to rest (or did someone just hop out of the moving vehicle?) in front of the first house on our street. (It's actually the second house on No Outlet. It has a big number "2" written on something, the mail box, the house itself, something. But I've always thought of it as the first house. Probably because the direction we're usually approaching No Outlet from, you see that house first, or more prevalently, or something.) A woman climbs out and goes to the side-door. For some reason, the steps to the side-door are gone. Instead, there's a big slab of concrete that you have to climb up in one step, about three feet high. The woman has strange, roller-blade-like things on her feet. Hard to remember and even harder to describe. She just walks into the house, but I know she isn't supposed to be there. So I follow in order to set things to rights.

I think I then became the woman. (You know how sometimes you just randomly switch personas half-way through a dream? I do that a lot.) So I go walking through the house. (I guess the weird roller-blade-like things just disappeared off my feet. Kind of like the school bus just disappeared after its use was up.) A woman calls (the mom) from somewhere in back, asking if I'm someone; I presume she thinks she's talking to her son. She comes into the hallway and sees I am most definitely not her son.

[forgottenbit]Something about convincing her and her son about his ability in something? Something about sex? Something. Yes, something about sex, definitely. Because then the dream switched tracks and, like, it snowed a lot or something like that. Everyone was snowed in, couldn't even dig out their front doors. Women who were part of my organization (the thing I was talking to the woman and her son about was part of my job within the organization) were turning up in the weirdest places, just tunneling through the snow. And when they turned up, they told people to use contraceptives. I know, weird. But whatever. It was something like, with all the people snowed in at work together, one thing could lead to another. Something like that.[/forgottenbits]

I get into a warehouse. It's not really a warehouse, more just one, big room with workers and tables and stuff. In there, I'm preaching the safe-sex word. Somehow, it gets really rowdy and loud and soon-to-be-riot. I try to calm people down. *remembers* Right. We had moved from arguing contraceptives to arguing sexuality to arguing gender. ( ) So I stepped up on a chair and shout, "fine! what's a man? tell me the cut and dry definition of a man. c'mon!" And everyone started shouting all at once, no one listening to anyone else, all fighting to be the one to prove to me their definition of "man". It led to the soon-to-be-riot. So I'm up there, and I'm shouting at everyone. And I'm shouting about how there are more than two genders out there, so there should be more than two gender expressions. And I site Nialle as an example. And then I site myself as an example.

Behind me, I hear, "Oh, [Gen]." In an English accent that I know. (Er, it's easier to actually hear the accent when it's my IRL name.) I turn around, and there's [Hannah] from work, one of my old bosses from the library. Her head dejectedly in her hands. She says something like, she thought I had been talking about if I had kids who wanted to do that. Like, if I had a daughter who wanted to dress as a guy, fine. But she was upset that I wanted to be considered one sometimes.

In the midst of trying to figure out where the hell Hannah gets off, the alarm goes, and I wake up.

---

How cool was that? Yeah, and not only did I remember the dream, but the frickin alarm woke me up! (Most people would be really mad about that. I'm practically leaping for joy.) This so many kinds of rocks. If I can figure out some way to really get this to work, my sleeping problem will be solved. My sleeping problem is really bad. Because if I can't figure out a way to wake up in the mornings, I don't know what I'm going to do when I have to get to nine o'clock classes next year. And I don't feel like sharing a room every, single year in college. (My mom can't get up easily either, unless someone actually wakes her up. When she was in the army, she used to shine her roommates' shoes and buckles and things, because she was so good at it. In return, her roommates always made sure she was awake in time. I had been thinking of working something like that out with someone. Favor for a favor.) So I'm figuring out how much sleep I need, minimum, in order to wake up easily enough. And I'm hoping I don't need someone to wake me up halfway before I'm awake all the way. 'Cause that's what my mom did this morning. She woke me up around nine, and then I went back to sleep and the alarm woke me up around eleven. But I was sleeping much more lightly after I had been woken up.

---

I want to be as good a story teller as Arlo Guthrie. Really badly.

---

I got Fight Club from the library yesterday, the book. It's really weird/good. It's interesting to read it and compare it to the movie. Most times, I hate movies after I read the books they were based on. Not happening this time. I'm falling in love with the book for completely different reasons than the ones that made me love the movie.

It's one of those easy books that you can rush through, but it gets you thinking a lot. Kind of like how a movie only takes two hours to watch, but you can think about it for ages. The book is easy to read, but it isn't poorly written, and the content is awesome.

You know all those times in Fight Club the movie where [Jack] (the main character; I don't think we ever learn his name, so we decided to call him Jack) is talking. He's just AV dubbed over sections of the movie. And he talks pretty quickly, explaining these processes that are mildly complicated. Like how to make a plastic explosive in the comfort of your own home. (There are three ways; I actually know them.) I can read those more slowly now and really understand what he's saying.

At the same time, some of the scenes aren't as "in the moment" with the book. Like, there's the scene where Jack gets a chemical burn. In the movie, you really get into it. In the book, everything that Jack says is semi-zoney. I mean, through the whole book, he's still an insomniac. And then he starts seeing things like they're only semi-there. Like, everything is slow motion and easy and droney. In the book, he makes it feel like that, like it's slow motion. So it was harder to get a lot out of that scene in the book, especially compared to the movie.

But I never did this before, where I compare the book and movie and love them both.

[fico]

3.6.o3

1:20pm. I am Jack's complete lack of an appetite.

You get a little scared when, for the past week or so, you only know you're hungry because your stomach is making so much noise. I mean, I was up in my mom's room this morning, and I just heard this rumble, and I thought about it, and I was like, 'yeah, yeah i am hungry.' Normally, I wouldn't think anything of it, but a week is longer than I like.

But I have discovered the secret to living in this house: canned foods. (This is the stuff no one ever tells you. It's like how when they page "Dr. Blaze" or "Nurse Flamingo" in a hospital, they're really saying there's a fire somewhere. No one ever tells you this stuff. Most of the time, 'cause no one ever knows. Well, I'm telling it.) Yeah, canned foods; that's the secret to not die of starvation.

See, our house is disgusting, disgusting beyond belief. It's gotten "better" in recent years, but that's like saying the Parthenon is a year older than it was last year. Barely makes a dent in the grand scheme of things. So, like, I'll walk into the kitchen feeling hungry as all get out. Two minutes later, I'm leaving because I've lost my appetite or simply because making something to eat would take about an hour of work. (And sometimes it really does take that long. That long to wash enough dishes in the sink so that you have room to wash the dishes you actually need so that you can use those dishes to make the food you can eat so that you can eat it and then wash the dishes you used.) And I don't care what most people think, food from this white, middle-class American position that I'm in right now, it isn't worth that work. (That sounds really, horribly pompous and cruel. I didn't mean it to sound that way at all. I meant that I'm not in any real danger of starving. So it isn't worth it to me. But I understand that there are people out there who would do a lot more than an hour's worth of work for food. I was kind of saying I respect them, but I'm not one of them. It wasn't pompous.) But canned foods, canned foods are easy. You can either eat it straight from the can (as with canned fruit) or you can make it in a bowl (as with tuna fish) or you can make it in a small corningware (sp?) which is easy to wash, even if the sink is full (as with soup). You see? It's all there. All easily accessable. All easily cleaned up after. Everything. If you're ever in a house with a kitchen so nasty that you can't clear a place to cook and eat your own food, buy cans.

---

I'm an angry boy in baggy clothes. I'm that angry kid who hangs out and sounds hostile all the time. (Everyone's like, yeah, applaud the kid.) I'm the kid we all wish we'll never have. The kid who reads in hir room or leaves the house or only relates to the other kid that hates you. The one who says two words to you in a whole day. And those two words are boiled and steamed, cooked to a pulp, in hostility. Okay, so I'm not really Jack's boiling anger. But I feel like it sometimes. Like now. I've gotten to the point where I hardly even listen to my mom anymore. I just have these reflex reactions to what she says. And half an hour later, I forget that she's even spoken to me.

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Everything in my life feels like it's just becoming a story. You ever get that? Where everything is just "distant" or something. Everything I witness or do or feel, I put it into the voice of a character. I have the distinct impression that this isn't very healthy. 'Cause some of the time, I'm not the one going through it. Rowan is, or Ronny, or ersatz, or Suzi or Fritz. Or this new character who's so new he doesn't even have a name yet. All those people go through what I'm supposed to be going through. ersatz is currently enjoying the snow falling outside. It means he doesn't have to see his dad later today. Fritz is upset 'cause she wanted to go see Suzi. Maybe they'll be able to walk toward each other's houses and meet halfway... but where does Suzi live, anyway? Ronny and Rowan aren't around, 'cause their stories don't include snow. Neither did any of the other character's stories, but now they do. You see?

But at the same time, Gen is distressed because she was going to go out with Bet and Kim today, when they got home from school. Now, she might not be able to. And after that, Gen was going to go with Rue to Spanish class. And then she was going to drive to Shakespeare (the local, cultural city-palace) and see essence for $12. Gen was looking forward to that. Now, she might have to take a train, which will cost about $8. That means she only has $12 until she gets a job and, consequently, another paycheck. She's only paid up with guitar for one more week. Plus, something might be wrong with her frets. This could cost more money to fix. Plus, she has to mail at least three packages. Gen wishes the library had been a good job. Gen is stopping this ramble.

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Last night, I went on a walk. I wrote part of an entry while I was there:

3.6.o3

12:07am. Tonight is one of those cool, almost cold summer nights. The ones that come just at the end of the season, right before fall comes around. Those are my very favorite nights of the year. I go on solitary walks and sing and talk to the sky and the trees. I sit and write by the light of streetlamps, as I am now. I watch cars go by and smile because I feel more free than the people caught in their metal boxes. Only two things keep this from feeling exactly like one of those late-summer nights. The snow everywhere, and the fact that the asphalt is cold to my bare feet. (Note to self: don't walk barefoot when it's about 40* and you have to walk through snow and water.) In summer, asphalt never gets cold. It's either blistering or it's blissfully cool. Sitting on it never makes you shiver.

I drove to my guitar lesson with the window down the entire way. I played the radio very loud and laughed because no one else had windows down to hear my music. Winter is my second-favorite season, but I want my summer nights back.

[fico]

3.7.o3

1:15am. Sometimes, I get these strong, strange urges. I tend to ignore them. At least, I don't act on them. But I really want to, for various reasons. For instance, there's someone I know. I know hir pretty well. S/he's only making this one appearance in my journal; we'll call hir [Chris]. Okay, so Chris and I are friends. We sort of lost touch for a while, but whatever. For sure, we were tight for a while. Anyway, it bothered Chris that s/he hadn't had hir first kiss yet. Really bothered hir. And I wanted to give hir hir first kiss. It wasn't anything sexual. It wasn't anything personal. It wasn't anything anything. It just was. You ever read The Perks of Being a Wallflower? It was like that. When Sam is talking to Charlie and says "I want your first kiss to be from someone who loves you." 'Cause in a weird, not-love way, you could say I loved Chris. But it wasn't that I either loved or didn't love hir; it was that I wouldn't hurt hir. It would be completely understood that this was just to get hir over this, and then everything could be okay. I wanted to help make everything okay. It wasn't love. It wasn't lust. It's just... Chris had a lot of problems. And they were all these things I couldn't help Chris with, but I could have helped hir with this. I really could. *shrug* Anymore, it doesn't matter. Way back whenever, s/he got hir kiss, and it wasn't from me. And I'm okay with that... I guess. But it didn't end up going as well as it could, and I think I would have been better, you know? S/he got a little hurt, and I don't think I would have hurt hir. *shrug* Sometimes memories just come back to you for a bit, and they're hard to shake.

---

I've gotten an idea for what I want to do with my life. It's hilarious, because it's going to involve so many things I hate. Like money and numbers. Maybe I'll pay someone to do that part for me.

Gen's brilliance: I'll have an apartment building, right? Like, maybe four or five apartments. They'll all be upstairs rooms, and I'll rent those out. I'll live in the basement or something... or on the roof... or something. Maybe I'll have a little shack next door. Downstairs, there's a pub. My pub. It'll have a clever little name. It'll have neat chairs and tables. A small kitchen which specializes in soups and sandwiches and fried potatoes. And there will be a stage. And I will get cool musical artists to come play. And it'll be beautiful. That's my plan. My newest one. ... Twenty bucks says I'll have a newer one by August.

---

My latest goal: to become something other than my mother without being the opposite of her. I don't want to be a neat-freak. And I don't want to live up to every single statement I ever make. At the same time, I don't want to have a house as nasty as this one or have a kid who never trusts my word anymore.

Rue and I went to see essence today. It was cool. We talked to people. But that's more Rue's thing. Like, she's more excited about it than I am, so I'll let her rave. The point is, I was feeling really crappy earlier. (I've been on this major Chuck Palahniuk kick. I read two of his books in three days. They're easy books, but still. I don't think Chuck Palahniuk is too good for me. For sure, he gets me thinking good stuff, thoughtful stuff, cool stuff. For more sure, he gets me thinking shitty as all get out stuff.) Then I made the mistake of spending time with my mom. So we're at home, and it's been snowing, and Rue's all trying to get me to take her 45 minutes away with possibly icy conditions. Honestly, I just want to sit somewhere and do nothing. Maybe listen to music. Nothing like that. But Rue bugs me about whether we're going or not, 'cause I don't give her an answer straight out. And I realize, this is what my mom does to me all the time. She says yes, and yes turns into she doesn't know, and she doesn't know turns into no. (We live in a word of knows and nos. At least, I do.) And I decide, I will not be my mother. I will understand her better now, but I will not be her. So I take Rue. I enjoy it, like I knew I would, and I'm happy to have new cd's, and I'm glad of cool conversations and weird occurances. But I think I would have been just as okay if I'd stayed home. But Rue's happy. And I'm not less happy. That's the point. It's a good point.

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I think money is stupid and should die.