The Death of an Old Man is Not a Tragedy

i should have known better. i really should have. i should know better than to belong to a site like okcupid.com in the first place. but my masochistic streak runs strong, and i surf the net in search of, if not love, at least some easy entertainment. those of you familiar with my love of toying with people, psychologically breaking them apart like a clock, gleefully scattering the pieces about the area, and then becoming bored and moving on, will understand what i'm talking about.

at any rate, okc has a blog feature. i rarely use it. only when i feel the need to say something controversial and stir up trouble. see behavior pattern above. but when kurt vonnegut died recently, i was quite distraught, so i posted a quick sort of public service announcement saying he had passed, and that i was very, very sad about it.

the next time i logged on, someone had written their own blog entry, loosely based on mine, i like to think. it has been lodged in my brain and my craw since then, this blog entry. loosely paraphrased, it said yes, kurt vonnegut is dead, yes its sad, but he'd been ill (he fell in his apartment several days before he passed, injuring his head, hence his passing at all), and why do people feel the need to decry the passing of old men, well past their prime and livers of rich and full lives.

it would be far too polite to say that this drew my ire.

i was, and still am, fucking livid.

"the death of an old man is not a tragedy." so said virginia madsen's "angel of death" in the movie "a prairie home companion." in the end, i have to agree. kurt's passing was not the snipping of a rose in the prime of its glory. he was old, his body burned to a husk like a meteorite passing through atmosphere. the skin about his neck and jaw were slack and loose in the way of many old men and women. his eyes were sunken, and he was frail frail frail. physically, a whisper of a man. a gorgeous intellect swathed in thrift store clothes too big for his spare frame.

but he was kurt. he was my kurt. and to me, this isn't a matter of when death should come, and what deaths are worth more or fewer tears. this is the loss of a great treasure of this earth. it is the silencing of a voice and pen that could move me to weep, to laugh through tears at the folly of this stupid world, and the ridiculousness of we little people. it is the snuffing of a candle that i used for guidance through the madness.

part of it is the old fallacy, of course. what if i had met kurt vonnegut? and what if we had hit it off, and become great friends? perhaps we would have played chess in a coffee shop every thursday, drinking strong dark java and commiserating about the state of the world. perhaps we would have found each other to be kindred spirits in a way, despite our differences in age and experience. we could have sat on a park bench, killing ourselves with expensive tobaccos and sighing together at the sadness of this life.

well, i never met kurt vonnegut. as far as i know, i never came close to meeting him. and maybe we would have gotten along, and maybe we wouldn't have. and i fucking hate chess, though i force myself to play it at times in a vain attempt to acquire any skill at it, whatsoever.

but i read his words. i took them into my heart, and into my head. they meshed with cogs and wheels already within me, and created new ones. whole new circuits and mechanisms were layed, groundwork for future growth and the sites of future additions, modifications, subroutines and ticking gears. kurt's works were a consciousness-expanding event for me, and he was a gentle guide, and a caring teacher, willing to give of himself that i might become more than i was.

i suppose i could write more pretty words about it all, but it occurs to me that it is simple selfishness at its core. i don't want kurt vonnegut to be dead.

i don't meet many people who make sense to me, who smile while the band plays on. i don't know many people who make war ridiculous in its wanton destruction, and then with a turn of phrase, pierce me to the heart. i don't know many people who make me feel that i'm not insane, that i'm not the only one. i don't know many people who make light of human tragedy, only because to hurt any more would be to break. and now he is dead, and i never will meet him, and i never would have anyway. but the thought, the strange, lottery-like, one in a million chance that it COULD happen, and that kurt vonnegut could save me... now i don't even have that.

and i feel like a ship missing a sail.

and i miss kurt vonnegut.

and even if he never died, it would still be too soon.

Kitty Story Hour

i think i should instate story time for my cat. maybe not ever day, and maybe not a full hour, but i think our relationship might improve dramatically if i read to him ever few days. i don't know what he'd like to hear, but i'm sure i'll figure something out. and i'm sure he'd like the attention, even if he doesn't understand the words. this might be a failure waiting to happen, but we'll just have to see about that. i'll keep you informed.

i'm very tired. its friday night, and i actually went out after i finished work at ten. i met a friend left over from gradschool at a bar downtown for a little while. i drank diet coke and smoked cigarettes, and he had a beer. its odd. i've been spending a lot of time (all right, there were two incidents, but its a lot for me) this last week around people using substances of one sort or another. i'm not sure what that's all about. i never want to indulge myself, but its a different sort of experience. the bar was pleasant, and it wasn't a high pressure situation. and last friday, well, that was just all kinds of crazy and i don't want any sort of repeat anytime soon. but tonight was fine. but its odd. i know theoretically that i don't have a major hard time being around people drinking, but it still sets a tiny little buzzing in the back of my head. we'll see.

at work, which is from five thirty to ten at night, monday through friday, i've been promoted against my will. i've been fighting this promotion for a long time now. avoiding it. running from it. i want to be as low on the harcourt foodchain as possible. but they siezed upon tuesday of this week (a day i skipped) to elevate me to "team leader". i don't actually mind, but its funny. and its a dollar and a half more an hour. so a little more money, a greater variety of tasks to attend to, and a seat from which to exert authority in a clear and guileless manner, as my astrological profile says i will need to do in my life. sure. sounds like something that is vaguely frightening, but well within my abilities.

i made it to two lunchtime meetings this week. its hard throwing a wrench in my schedule, but its been good. i've been calmer this week, crawling the walls a bit less. and i like having a job, even if i don't particularly like the job. i need to do my fifth step this sunday. i added to my fourth step already this week, and tomorrow will involve a lot of writing to finish the sucker off so i'm ready to spill it all on sunday. i hate going through this again... it always makes me feel like a bad person, or a broken person. or any number of things that are less than pleasant. and i suppose i should keep on reminding myself, as i do every now and then, that i am in fact a good person. and i don't really go out of my way to hurt people, and i'm always sorry when i do. not sorry because i was caught, but sorry because i don't actually like causing harm. i think.

not that i don't have angry fantasies of varying degrees of illegality on a near daily basis, but i'm thinking that's pretty normal. they're brief, a part of life, and just fantasies, when all is said and done. on that note, i think a story is brewing. i think its soon going to perc, even. i'm not sure where its going to go, of course, but we'll just have to see. that's a part of the ride. and considering i've decided i'd like to be able to at least partially support myself by my efforts at writing, actually writing might be a step in that direction.

i want to do more gardening, now that all my plants from last year are dead... actually, a surprise! my kaffir lime tree died back a lot, but new leaves are emerging at the base of its tiny trunk, fresh and light green, crying for attention and love. winter kills, but not completely, apparently. so i think i should think on that, eh?

i'm in the midst of deciding that i'm not grossly overweight. and i've managed to avoid donuts for a while now, which pleases me. i need to exercise, and quit smoking, but in the meantime, i'm smoking less, and eating better. i made soup this week, and have been paying very close attention to my sugars, which is a nice change. i also cleaned my kitchen a bit, which felt good. does it mean i'm anal if cleaning my house is a cheap and effective form of therapy for me? obsessive? more important question; do i care either way?

when i went shopping this last monday night, it was very strange. i came to the register with my low-fat turkey sausage, cashews and peanuts, figs, vegan wheat roast, some fresh veggies, whole-grain crackers, and other such nonsense, all in my little hand basket. and in front of me in the checkout line was a family of a noticeably overweight middle-aged black woman and her two mostly adult overweight children. they bought three hundred dollars worth of groceries, using foodstamps for part of it. never have i seen such piles of easy-mac, canned vegetables of all sorts, canned soups, fifteen gallons of milk (at least). just acres and acres of low quality food products. they had three grocery carts between them, all of them full.

it made me think of a number of things, that family. my first thought was if they might be running an orphanage. my second thoughts started in the direction of the politics of food, the way our money and budget dictate what kind of eating is available to us. how information about healthy eating is disseminated, and who recieves it. how family traditions can create a self-fulfilling circle of poor health and disease. who is supposed to make sure people know how to be healthy and take care of themselves? who should care in the first place? i smoke cigarettes, knowing full well how absolutely horrible it is for me, and knowing full well that i am named after a cousin of my mother who died in his thirties from smoking related diseases. (proof that irony is alive and kicking in our oh so prosaic world.)

in my little brain, always spinning, always making connections, or trying to, these chains start being forged, link by link. work is no different. working for a standardized test company will make you hate standardized testing, even if you had no issue with it before. i had to tell my team today that this job is probably not good for their karma, and i wasn't lying, or just trying to be funny. you have to give scores that you don't want to give. there are stupid children who manage to do what's necessary for a better score than you want to give them. and if you think you can't tell stupid via the medium of a written page, you are dead wrong. there are smart children, creative, bright, who attack the question in a way the writers hadn't intended or thought of. and you whop them with a zero. you have to turn off you brain for this job. and at times, you have to turn off your heart. you see tests written by children who clearly suffer from dyslexia, who are clearly not native english speakers. and then you see tests written by children who have clearly been subjected to bigoted and racist role-models during their young lives. these are fifth graders, but man, do they know how they're supposed to feel about "the mexicans" across the border. (our project is from new mexico.)

i decided today that these tests are all written to get kids to fall in line so they'll be able to do a job like mine when they grow up. we write the tests that train our future work force, starting when they're in second grade. and in the midst of all this, i hear more and more on the news about the shootings at virginia tech. i always like to take a backseat during these sorts of events. because so far, i haven't been actively involved, and so i tend to discount myself from discussion. its not my place, and what does my opinion matter anyway? and in the end, considering how i do feel, its better i keep silent anyway.

except for on my blog, of course...

because these events, horrible as they are, are just another chapter in the never-ending litany of human cruelty. they are another sick person, who finally reached a breaking point, and violently ended the lives of thirty-odd people. young people, on the verge of adulthood, on the verge of their own lives, full of promise, or possibly full of sadness, but theirs to live regardless. theirs to create and inhabit. and they're dead now. before they had a chance to really begin.

and you know what, the shooter is a victim in his own right. such actions are rarely taken by healthy, happy, well-adjusted people. and while life shits on us all, the shit doesn't necessarily land evenly. a post on "the republic of t" (a most excellent blog, by all accounts) reminded me of this. as an adolescent who found safety in growing out his hair and wearing a full length trench coat to his san antonio, texas high school, i have a sympathy for the outsider. and if you think my "otherness" started and stopped with my appearance during my years of secondary education, you are sadly mistaken. (i later heard from my sister that some people were afraid i was going to show up to school one day and my friends and i were going to blow the whole place up... i'm not fully sure how i feel about this. by which i mean pride is locked in a war with wonder.)

maybe i'm just bitter enough to not be all that surprised at what humans are capable of. i'm certainly cynical enough to think that this scenario will play itself out over and over and over again. there will be outsiders. there will be disturbed individuals. there will be weapons available to those willing to look hard enough. and there will be innocents who happen to be in the wrong place at the right time. and of course this shooter's actions are unconscionable, just like those of anyone who inflicts violence upon others. and these victims are innocent. perhaps more innocent than many. but this tragedy, like those like it, implicates all of us. it implicates our society as a whole.

this doesn't mean that any amount of professional counseling or "outreach" by those who knew the shooter may have changed the course of events. but its clear that somehow, our society must change. the way our society deals with anger, with frustration, with the slow chipping away at our individuality inherent in activities as simple as walking down the street; the effacement and erasement of us as individuals, as people, it has to change. it is killing us, all of us, sometimes slowly, and sometimes ferociously quickly. and some of us, are not as able to deal with it as others. and some of us are given to violence. and some of us decide to take matters into our own hands.

i wish the families of the victims, the friends, relatives, girlfriends, boyfriends, spouses; i wish them peace and strength, and healing. to the family of the shooter himself, i wish a great strength, the strength to love their son, even as they are horrified by his actions. i wish them peace. and right now, so close to the event itself, i wish them the great courage necessary to rise and face each new day.

and to all of us, i wish the strength to examine our own actions, and the courage to change what can and should be changed.

goodnight.

Now I Am Sad

i wasn't happy before, granted. but i just found out that kurt vonnegut died yesterday, wednesday. and i'm really, really, really not all right with that.

you know that stupid game you play, where you say three people, living or dead, you would want to have dinner with? more and more of my people are dead these days...

kurt is gone.

and i'm still here. and i'm tired, i think. and i won't let myself sleep. and my cat pulled down my window blinds. and i'm thinking i'm sorta lonely...

sorta unhappy.

sorta missing kurt vonnegut.

Mann-handled

this post will be a two parter... or have two parts... or something.

first off, the dream.

i love aimee mann. i think she is the best thing fucking ever. she is mega tall (almost six feet), super talented, and a virgo (born on september 8, 1960).

so i suppose i shouldn't be surprised that i finally had a dream about her. i was somewhere. and i'm walking around. it feels plastic and flat, with lots of yellowish light, sort of like a mall. and i bump into: aimee mann. and she's tall and lanky, and looking for something. and we get to talking, aimee and i. and we very quickly skip the random bullshit and get to know you blah blah blahs, and get to the heart of the conversation. i am very clear about my love of her, and she is very clear about a great many things. in fact, i realized later on, after i woke, that it was really not just aimee, but super aimee. she is as intelligent and incisive in dream reality as she is in her songs, wonderfully wise, knowledgable, and sadly introspective and observant.

so aimee/emissary of something and i have a long conversation. we talk about life and people. i tell her how strongly i feel about her, and i even offer to help her with whatever errand she's doing. partly to help, partly to prolong my time with her. i'm afraid to let go of this moment too quickly. because how often do you meet aimee mann? and how often do you meet aimee mann crossed with hints of something larger than mere people? so i run around helping her out, looking for stationary or something equally mundane, or it might have been something full of symbolic meaning. unfortunately, i don't remember.

at the end, it seems like we're sitting on a bus, conversing again. and its so odd, because she knows how much of a rabid-crazy-fan-girl-fan i am, and it doesn't necessarily make her comfortable, but she understands. and we both understand that there will be no second time. we will not be meeting again. this is a one shot deal. and it makes me sad. and i'm not sure if she's sad, but she understands that i am. and so we chat, and the bus stops or something, but we're back at the flat plastic place we started in, and we say "i'll see you around," and i am sad because i know its not true, and she smiles wryly and knowingly, and maybe just a little bit sadly, but i'm probably making that last part up. but she half smiles, for the same reason. and we part ways, aimee and i.

i didn't remember this after i woke up. i was going through my day, doing something, and it all came back and hit me, hard. i met aimee mann in a dream. and now its a day or two after that, and i'm finally writing it down. so its incomplete, and spotty, but there it is. and it was when i was mulling it all over that i realized aimee was more than aimee in my dreams. i think she might have been an emissary of my conception of the divine (which we will not get into right now...), and i feel like her message was that, though we can be sad, and tell little lies that we know are lies, we must move on, and sometimes things only happen once. life is just that way.

i don't know though. it all sounds pompous and self-important now. but its sticking with me, this amber light and aimee mann. i really just couldn't tell you, i suppose. because i don't really know.

in other news...

work was tolerable today. i think my current tubing set for my insulin pump is dodgy, because my sugar refuses to get under control, and i haven't eaten a donut in two days now. one day. i need to stop eating donuts, period. i keep trying to tell myself i deserve more than donuts. i am the person who coined the phrase, "there is a great hole inside me, and i'm going to fill it with cake." eating, particularly sweet, sugary, carbohydrate-laden things, has long been a method of trying to fill the emptiness in me, and i think many can relate. i also marathon sleep when i'm distressed, and pretty much do anything in an addictive, binge manner. video games, knitting, reading, etc. oh, masturbating. that's a good one.

anyway, work was better, actually, and i'm trying hard to get my sugars under control. we'll check in a minute and see how we're doing. and work is having the desired effect. i'm very, very close to making a list of things i want and need to accomplish. its scary how much more productive one becomes when one makes a list. so that's a good thing. and i'm trying to write again, trying to keep a steady purge going, so i don't choke on my own bile, and maybe find the hard nuggets that have been stuck in my system and blocking me up. i'm unfortunately stuck on this snoogie business. i'm trying to get over it, but its hard. but i'm very sad about it. i'm sad i got all vulnerable and emotional with someone who lives far away and who i will never meet. it makes me foolish and silly on top of the hurt and sadness of just being rejected.

not that i feel ready for any sort of romantic involvement... but that's part of it. i'm trying to keep myself permanently off the market because i feel fucked up, and fat, but i got all mushy anyway. sigh...

i also had a strange thing with the past bubbling up today. i had a lot of random thoughts or recollections about less than savory moments from my childhood and adolescence, and my entire life, really. and i tried to imagine myself at those moments, and tell that child, that kid, that person, that its all right, that they're okay, and there's nothing they have to feel ashamed of. they didn't do anything wrong, and i love them, and they are worth love. actually, i'm adding a lot to that list right now. i really just hugged them and told them they were okay. but you know... i suppose that's what it is in long format.

one bit of the past was a story i wrote during sophomore year of college, about a romantic episode that embarasses me now, but that was important at the time. in a way. but i kept it to work on later, and i found it five years later, a few days ago. so i read it over to see what i could salvage from it. and i'm not sure yet. but its making me want to write something... anything. so that's a good thing too. but just another little bit of the past, sneaking up and confronting me. its just the name of the game today, i guess.

so anyway, i think i need to write that list. and then i might start getting things done. and wouldn't that be nice?

in the meantime, i think i'll fart around my apartment for a bit, and eventually try to sleep.

fun, right?

questions

sigh...

i've been in a funk. and its not snoogie's fault. nor is it harcourt's fault. i'm not sure who's fault it is. i'm not sure the finding of "fault" is the point of it all. in fact, i'm pretty sure its not. so what is the point? why to drain the abcess, of course! to try and bleed these feelings, this pus, this ick out of me. that's what blogging is for, and i've apparently forgotten that. i don't actually blog much anymore. or write. i used to like the feeling of putting my feelings out there to be dissolved into the seething sea that is the internet. now i hoard them like pearls. and that isn't what feelings are for.

i fear so many things these days... among them the sharing of myself and my feelings. scratch that, reverse it. i fear my feelings in the first place, and i'm ashamed of them. i feel like i'm just supposed to be this happy, serene person, bopping along, happily accepting all that gets thrown my way, learning to deal with life, being a scrappy young girl reporter in this man's city, etc. but i'm not. sometimes i'm unhappy. like recently. and you know what, being unhappy is all right. i'm okay. the point is to recognize that i'm unhappy in the first place, do what i can to remedy the situation, and just feel the rest, and let it pass. because it will pass.

i just made my cat rap along with biggie. it was great. then he bit me.

so ashamed of feelings. this is most apparent in the aftermath of snoogie. that really freaked me out. every time i start being happy, it inevitably turns into me trying to maintain it rather than letting it roll away, and roll back. snoogie fucked me up. not snoogie, but the episode. feeling all those... feelings... its so embarassing to me. so overwhelming. it was scary. and so i've been trying to ignore it, just force things along, rather than look at where i actually am. and unwilling to talk about it with anyone, analyze it, figure things out for the time being, and let it pass into the past, where it belongs. snoogie and everything. there are some people i have to call. talking to them will help. i know it.

i'm so silly... yes. so i ignore, cover over, withdraw... recently, i've been on a program of withdrawal, and it needs to stop. its not healthy. because its all right to feel, its all right to talk to people about one's feelings, and i'm okay. i mean, what else to people talk about other than their shit? sports? whatever.

so i've been funky. and i've started work. a part time night job with harcourt, scoring tests. and i knew i wouldn't like it. and i knew it would be hard. emotionally. and i don't like it, and it is hard emotionally, but i'm way more upset about it than i should be. its just a temporary job, until i find something i really want to do. and its all right not to like it. all i have to do is go and perform well, and not think about it overly much. it didn't help to be reading about our current government's education policy while i started work either. in fact, too much news. i'm going on a news sabbatical. no more current events that make me angry and that i can't actually do anything about anyway. i'm taking a break.

self help books will have to trump molly ivins for the time being.

so i am going to shift focus from irritation-inducing large picture books, and focus on my own personal health. i think that's a good plan. i'm okay. the things i decide to do are okay. but what else is going on? i've been feeling this crushing sense of history repeating. of feeling lonely, and working at harcourt, and wow, i really understand now why i was drinking before. i mean, i've always pretty much understood that. its pretty clear. but it's not the same situation. generally, i'm healthier now than i was before. i'm sober, and harcourt is temporary, and trying to rush life, to rebel against it, isn't going to help matters. forward progress is made a step at a time. and in the meantime, recognizing my unhappiness will paradoxically allow me to be happier. history is not repeating. i'm all right.

so about people... i've been avoiding school people, as i've been avoiding school in general. because it was the mental and emotional equivalent of a rape. a violation. and i probably still look at it as a failure in some way. which it wasn't. it was a success, considering how difficult it was. i passed all my classes. my work was as good as it could have been at the time. i couldn't have done any better, being where i was. and i was better than okay. and i'm okay now. with the potential to be much better than okay in the future. so whenever i'm ready, school peeps will be there. and they probably wouldn't even make me talk about school if i didn't want to. i don't have to explain anything, really. even though i feel the need. well, i tried it out, it was making me unhappy and unhealthy, and i stopped. and that's all right. and i'm all right. in fact i'm better than fine.

i have to find a meeting time that will work, since work kills my eight o'clocks. i can make it to the noons, though. and i'll learn to do that. and it will make me happy.

my sponsor... i feel as though i'm failing him. AND I'M NOT A FAILURE! AT ALL!!! i've tried to fail, all my life, and i never can manage it! i am a success! I AM A SUCCESS! and i can be successful in the future. i need to finish my fourth step. and you know what, that's a good plan for this week. that's a good goal. i can finish it this week, and vomit it up to him this weekend. and be done done done. i can be done with it. and i will feel much better. and i will be better than fine. and i'm okay right now.

i'm still a little, or more than a little, fucked up over zach. but even rachel says that she's just keeping her head down, keeping her nose out of it, and letting whatever happens, happen. its the only way. i cannot change him. i cannot rearrange him. i'll be here for him, whatever happens, whenever it happens. i love him, even though i don't think i like him. nor do i respect him. but that's not the point. he's my brother, and i love him, and there's nothing i can do, and it will all work itself out. god, grant me the serenity, to accept the things i cannot change, the courage to change the things i can, and the wisdom to know the difference. i love you zach. and i'm sorry.

so what else is there? i actually feel somewhat better already. and the blog is here should i need it again. so i think that's it for the moment. i might actually watch "a very long engagement" tonight. i've basically bought it from hollywood video, its so late at this point... might as well watch it.

it'll be good for me!

and i'm better than fine. i'm a good person, and a kind person. and i deserve better than donuts. i deserve good people in my life. and i deserve to be happy as much as anyone else. and at the very least, i'm okay.

Like a Hammer to the Skull

i feel like i just got mugged by cupid.

taken: all decency and self respect; my desire to use internet dating sites; the fledgeling serenity i was starting to develop.

really though... i talk to people online, and i don't really expect anything more than a pleasant conversation at the best, a nice little internet friend. and i have found such a one. his name is snoogie, for the sake of this post and his anonymity. he lives in brooklyn, works for a jewish non-profit, is quite cute, and hopelessly in love with his possibly deeply closeted best friend of many years.

i hear you clamoring with your questions, but i ask you to hold them until the end of this seminar.

so i've been talking to snoogie for a few weeks, maybe three months, i suppose. its very pleasant. he is witty, keen, funny, clever, quick to laugh, etc. all the things a josh maru might look for in a friend. spiff. we share time, trade fun youtube videos (the modern day equivalent, i now realize, of trading mix tapes...), etc.

a week ago, i became ill, and am still at less than 100%. aww... sad for me, i know. in addition, i fear sleep, as though to sleep is to die. very shakespearean, but not so healthy when you need rest in order to get back to functional. i will not sleep. i didn't sleep last night. and here it is, three thirty, and i'm blogging. there you go.

so in the midst of this fogginess, and general woozy strangeness, i recieve the inevitable yet unseen frying pan to the face: i have... feelings... for snoogie... those warm, oozy feelings, where all the cute little love songs you've been listening to are suddenly about one person in particular... it has been... quite some time since i felt these creepy, sneaky, and above all overwhelmingly POWERFUL feelings... and i'm gonna be honest, they fucking freaked the ever living hell out of me!

so of course, i've wigged out, had a few conversations with snoogie about this new situation (probably wrecking any friendship we had in the process...), etc. we agree that it would be miserable to try and develop anything along romantic lines. and he has a best friend to try and move things along with.

and now i'm left with questions...

am i ready for anything anyway? what the fuck actually just happened to me? what is going on? why am i so utterly dense? and when, will i learn that i need to put the internet away, and get a real life?

i just don't fuckin' know anymore. but i think i'm gonna try to sleep.

goodnight, snoogie, wherever you are.

It's not you, it's me. I hate you.

i think i might be a maneater. a ball buster. a something else that usually isn't looked upon as good. a person who doesn't let you know what they're thinking until all at once, in one big lump, and its never something good or nice.

if you can't tell, i have recently ended an internet friendship/love-interest/sex-partner/conversation thing. i don't know what it is or was. i'm speaking to him now, as a matter of fact. even though we were not going to talk as much. but he's drunk. i guess its an excuse or something... something...

but you know, i was straight up with him. i tried to be as nice as possible while remaining honest. i didn't get angry at him when he was angry, and i answered his questions as best i could. i am a very kind and humane dumper, as a matter of fact. i should put that on my resume immediately.

my mom says, in her infinite psychological wisdom, that when people are dumped, they try and get the dumper to explain their logic. and then, since they refuse to understand that logic, clearly, you can't really dump them. you aren't making sense. man did i laugh at that... as though anyone ever needed a rational and logical reason for doing anything... but there you go.

and i never want to tell people the truth about why i can't be around them anymore. its never pretty. they don't want to hear that. and yet, they ask questions... they want to know it all... ohhh no they don't. you know they don't, but still they ask... and i don't want them to feel bad about it. its the classic, "its not you, its me." because it is me. i fundamentally don't like them. that's not their fault. why should they change for me? that's silly. you're silly! so lest they think i'm being cliche, i've coined the phrase that titles this blog post.

"It's not you, it's me. I hate you."

i hate you, i invite you to hate me, and it's not your fault. you're a perfectly fine human being. and i simply don't like you. i don't know if that should reflect badly on me, if it makes me any specific sort of person, but you know what? i don't care either. its done.

and now i'm debating economic philosophy with him. what, the, fuck...

anyway... yeah. i would be glad to be labeled a maneater. i think it might be true. i would wear the badge proudly. perhaps i'm like clementine that way... i'm just a fucked up person looking for their own peace of mind. i'm not out to save anybody, to titillate them. even though i may save and titillate as a matter of course.

i don't know. i really just don't know.

and oh look. we just had our second breakup. the first one didn't take. but i think this one did the trick.

please god...

i mean really, how many times do you have to break up with the same person? in the same situation? ridiculous...

and yes, i feel like an asshole.

Lethargy

i'm tired. i'm very tired. but i don't think it's because, i dunno, because i'm not sleeping enough...

i'm at an ebb.

i don't know how to write anymore. i just watched an episode of futurama that had more emotion in it than anything i think i could write... that's not cool...

good episode though...

i feel very disconnected these days. untethered. i need to do step work. that's part of it. but i'm also just... drifting. i lost the compass that school provided. and i'm so tempted to go back to school, just because i miss knowing what i need to be doing, even if it makes me miserable. like, i sure do hate being a nazi, but i'd hate to lose the job with the economy the way it is...

i exaggerate. but you understand, right?

i don't know what to do. i don't know what i'm supposed to be doing. i can't make myself hammer out any words that i think are any good. i still need to write every day, even if its crap, but i'm just so...

bitchy...

i'm just sad. i still feel bad about quitting school. which has been delayed for the last two days due to the city being iced over... it snowed today. in texas. that's effed up. you don't have an ice-scraper handy in texas. i had to make do with an empty cd jewel case.

but i digress.

i feel shitty, and i'm not completely sure how to fix it. and i don't know how to write a story. i used to, but i don't anymore.

more stuff to work on.

somewhere along the way i forgot how to be happy. i think fixing that needs to be a number one priority.

its really dark out. i think the world is dying...

Fallout

well, for the few who read this blog, i suppose i should give a post-holiday update.

or just try to make sense of things and let you come along for the ride. let's be honest, this blog was never for you, god bless your poor hearts. its always been for me.

i tried to go home twice already. i'm still in san antonio. every time i tried to get ready to go back to austin for more fun graduate school hijinks, i panicked. fear, anxiety, the shakes, a little bit of nauseau, the whole works. i like to say i was a step away from a panic attack, but i'm a known exaggerator. but still. not fun.

as i'm sure you've gathered, this entire semester was not fun. in fact, it was really miserable. i didn't let myself know it was miserable, because to acknowledge it would have meant feeling overwhelming pressure to do something about it. and i didn't have time to both complete all my work, AND deal with my life issues. so i buried. i called my mother every night, close to tears, tried to figure out what needed to happen the next day, went home to sleep for a few hours, and got up to do it all over again.

and none of what i was doing felt real. there was no reason for it, no aim, no goal that i could understand. it was just apparently misery. because i've had some time to decompress, and there are just layers and layers of trauma... i feel hurt, i feel in pain, and i feel no closer to any sort of idea about what my life is.

and so i've decided to put off graduate school indefinitely. and it makes me feel stupid, for throwing away an opportunity i worked so hard for. it makes me feel guilty, because i feel like i'm letting myself down, as well as my family and friends, who have been so supportive. and it makes me feel like a failure, like i'm weak and couldn't hack it. it makes me feel like a large number of sad and unhappy things.

because josh is school. josh is a creature who thrives in academic environments. josh works hard to succeed, and is unhappy when he doesn't do well, and will apparently wreck himself in order to achieve. and i did achieve. i got four b minuses and a b for the semester, which still left me on academic probation. despite my body's best efforts, i remained conscious during my final studio review. and my studio professor questioned whether i really had it in me to be an architect. my projects drifted aimlessly, and well... they weren't very good.

the best part of the semester was when i wrote a short story for my final project in theory class. it was good. i read it out loud, and everyone clapped, moreso than for any other project. that felt good, even though my leg was shaking under the table from nerves while i read.

so josh completed a semester, and passed all his classes. he did it. and he is in no hurry to do it again. i can't. i can't stomach it again. even if i take fewer hours. even if i don't know what. i'm throwing in the towel for now. i can't do it anymore. and you know, i'm tough. i work hard. damn hard, if someone plants a nice kick in my ass. i put aside my personal misery so i could finish my professional responsibilities, just like adults are supposed to. and now, i need to deal with my own shit, and i can't do that if i live at school.

i want to keep some plants, and not have them die. i want to spend more time with my cat. i want to clean my apartment, and get some furniture for it. i want a stupid, brainless job that leaves me some time to write, and do things that make me happy. i want to go to more aa meetings. i want to start doing yoga again. i want to quit smoking. i want an actual life. i want the chance to be happy.

so i'm leaving graduate school for the time being. and i don't know if i'll go back. and i don't know if i care. and i know life can't stop while i sort my shit out, but i need at least a fighting chance, or this shit will kill me.

and the fuck of it is, it all leaves me back where i was before. not so lonely anymore, but drifting, unsure of where i'm supposed to be heading, or where i fit in, or if i'll ever make a life for myself that makes me happy and content. and the point is partially to be content regardless of where you are in life. but the point is also to make decisions that are good for you. and much as i desire the easy structure and straightforward demands that school provides, i can't do it right now. its not the way.

so say goodbye for now, to that longheld dream you had josh... of the idealistic and noble architect, shaping men's lives and shaping the environment as though you were the right hand of god. pack away your own dreams of being that man. you've held on to them a long time, and they may never come to fruition. but for now, you've given them the best shot that you can. and they aren't as shiney and optimistic as they once were.

i'm tired, and scared of what's ahead, but i hope to soon feel hopeful. and sometimes, when the light catches it just right, i am very, very happy to be free of school. i feel light. lighter. and i really do believe, most of the time, that this is the right decision.

i am not a failure.

i am a success.

i am doing the right thing, even when it hurts like hell, and makes me feel like an idiot, and makes me wonder if i am a failure.

i will get through this.

and from the other side, i will thank god, and glory in my freedom and love.

and the journey, will become such a wondrous story to tell...

and in each story is the world.

Pain

"i can deal with some psychic pain,
if it'll slow down my higher brain..."

when you're quoting elliott smith songs, you know you're in a bad place.

i'm tired. i'm tired of being tired. i'm sick and tired of being sick and tired.

and i'm tired of being miserable.

and i don't know how to fix it. i don't know how to let myself be something other than miserable.

this whole higher power thing... it ain't working. i can't do it. giving things up to god isn't something i do. admit i'm powerless over certain events, sure. no problem. obviously true. but believing that by putting my faith in a higher power i will find the peace to navigate life's tempestuous waters? not so much. sorry guys, but i can't do it.

i can work on my issues. i can try new ways of interacting with the world. i can try to take some deep breaths and think of how to attack the next problem. but just *poof* giving it all up... no.

and when i try to "talk to god," it helps for a little bit. but its wierd. and i'm still lonely. and i'm doing things wrong. i keep feeling like i'm supposed to get over this loneliness all by myself, with god's help. that i'm not supposed to need anybody, and i'm not supposed to feel the need for people in my life. that its a sign of weakness. and i'm still feeling like i'm too much of a wreck to insert myself into anyone's life. and right now, i desperately, desperately need someone to care about me. i want to feel something that isn't this confusion and strangeness. that isn't myself ripping myself down before i can even build myself up. i really just want to feel like a human being. and i don't remember how...

mom thinks i should let myself make some friends. and i'm so afraid to... i'm too fucked up. and i'm too scared. scared i really am too fucked up. scared of making myself vulnerable. scared of so many things that would be ridiculous if the fear weren't so crushingly potent. so omnipresent.

and if the tears weren't so close... i'm afraid if i start crying i'll never stop... i'll break into a million secret silences, a million empty hallways leading to nowhere. a million little hurts. a milliong gnawing fears and sadnesses, each needing to be bathed in my own tears, my own misery made tangible.

i don't think i'm very happy right now...

i sort of want to die...

not in a suicidal way... i just want things to stop. i want a time out from life. i want time to deal with these things. because tomorrow, i go back to school, and dive right back into work. and i have no time until three weeks from now, when the semester ends. and sleeping enough to retain sanity is a laugh since i'm so clearly already a bleeding nutcase... so that frees up my schedule a bit.

i haven't watered my plants in two weeks. they're all dead. i think the tree this blog is named after is dead.

the cat, is still alive.

i think i need to seriously start working on feeling better. this is what we like to call "an untenable situation". it can't last. something, as they say, has gotta give.

i need to sleep so i can function tomorrow.

there'll be more. but of what nature, i cannot say.

adieu.