My teen-angst bullshit has a body count

The past can be very dangerous if you let it; or very funny. I'm at home tonight, bored, lonely, a little drunk on too much wine, now moving on to whisky, hoping to become much more drunk. Listening to Slowdive way too loud (am I in a Gregg Araki movie right now?). So, I started going through the junk drawer in my dresser and came across an old journal I started keeping, I would say, probably right before I moved to Austin when I was 21. None of the entries are dated, but I vaguely recall actually writing some of them. Anyway, it's been quite the trip down Memory Lane. I was so emotional (was....) and totally hung up on a friend of mine from college, and, as I note in the journal, apparently had been for the entire 3 years prior and thought my world was ending because he just had so many girlfriends. Even though I also had a boyfriend at the time, this guy ruled my world. It's so hard to think back on that now. I've been in very sporadic and superficial contact with said boy over the past few years, and it's hilarious to think back on how obsessed over him I was! Kind of puts things in perspective, I guess.

The journal is also full of lots of wonderful poems I wrote back then (Jesus, I was angry!) about being heartbroken, detesting "punk rock boys" and their $80 pants and their stupid music and their girlfriends and how fake they all are, and how in love with all of them I am (among various other topics). I would never in a million years share those poems with anyone, but I picked out the least embarrasing one, and decided that in the interest of repaying my loyal readers, I would post it here for you all to get a good chuckle. But brace yourself, because it's hilarious (and keep in mind that this is the only one I would even consider sharing. Enjoy!

Coins in my hand
ultimately mean nothing,
but flesh against flesh
Sudden shock and
disgusted stares.
Take it again and just hold it there forever.
Who cares what these people think?
Tonight it's just us
and this metal machine.
Songs on the radio,
and we're lost in the moment.
Was there a moment?
I think I just lost it.
A piercing thought,
a brief grope,
a slamming of doors,
and I'm back where I started.
Hunks of metal,
houses on stilts,
one more cigarette for the night.
Decaying lungs mean nothing to me
I can't breathe as it is.
The breeze blows
voices drift
and I wonder
who's really happier.
I need to sleep,
but I don't care.
Wandering beats,
more alcohol,
more consumption
and you'll be happier
more creative
and more...
in the moment.
Here and now.
The future is long
and the past
is meaningless.

Isn't that the best?!?? I think my favorite part is where I say, "we're lost in the moment, was there a moment?" I love it.

"He's like a cat that falls off the table and then starts licking its butt."

Last night was a night of firsts for me:

1. I brazenly gave a boy my phone number right in front of one of his co-workers, and several party guests. It was at a birthday party for this guy in his house far up in the hills west of Austin, seemingly miles above the city. The boy was a caterer at the party, and we had been making eyes at each other all evening (well, okay, I was only there for an hour), and he was hot hot hot. I also think he's about 20. Anyway, we'll see what comes of it. Probably nothing, I'm sure, but it sure was nice to be so obviously checked out by somebody, and then to act on that. Especially on a stunning multi-level deck built on the side of a sloping hill, covered with what seemed like hundreds of tiny candles and clear christmas lights and a dimmer light in the swimming pool, which is on the lower deck. The bar was set up on the upper deck, overlooking the city. Appropriately.

2. I sang karaoke at a crowded bar. Collier had rented part of the patio at Mother Egan's, and some other birthday party had rented the other part. They had the karaoke, but they let us play. After Kurt sang, and Dylan sang, I finally pulled up my nerve (along with several beers) and sang "Like a Friend," by Pulp. It was fun and kind of addictive, it seems. I was going to sing another one but we ran out of time.

All in all, a nice and interesting weekend so far. This afternoon, soccer lives again.

Happy Birthday, "Shorty!"

Today is Collier's birthday. We celebrated at midnight last night by leaving Laura's toasty house (after watching My Summer of Love and drinking copious amounts of wine) and driving down to Mozart's to get not just one, but two, different kinds of chocolate cheesecake and splitting them. Laura's friend Ruth was with us too. I don't know her well, but we all decided she's totally "Charlotte" from Sex and the City for myriad reasons too convoluted and silly to get into in this particular forum. Which naturally makes her extremely endearing to me. We also listened to that awful "It's your Birthday" song by 50 Cent in the car, like, 80 times. But it was wonderful. I love those girls. It makes me wish I was a lesbian.

So, Collier, happy 29. See ya in da club. I love you.

A few observations from my second day of school

1. I was urinating in the library between classes and noticed that to my left, built into the wall, was an ashtray. One of those cool, old-fashioned kinds that have the 2 pieces that open in the middle when you push the little lever, and then your cigarette butt falls down inside it. Obviously you can't smoke in the library now, but I found that so curious that at one point smoking was so ubiquitous that you could even stand at the urninal in the bathroom of the library and puff away. Jesus, no wonder our whole society is riddled with cancer.

2. I will never, ever work out at the gym there. It's in the gymnasium building, where the basketball court is, and it's totally open-air. There are always basketball players and stuff in there working out, and there are actually classrooms in the building too (I have a class in there; it's actually sort of depressing and feels like high school), and everyone has to walk by the gym to get to the classrooms and can see everybody in there working out. No thanks. I'm much too shy for that.

3. I was totally dreading taking Spanish, but i think I'm going to love that class. My teacher has a really fun, creative way of teaching that encourages lots of participation and she's really funny. Which is good, I need to know Spanish.

4. Drum circles are still alive and well among undergraduates on America's campuses.

5. Giant sunglasses that take up most of your face are totally in. Not that we didn't all already know that, but I'm just confirming it.

And last, but not least, I think I have my first Campus-Crush. It's this dude that I saw 3 different times yesterday. He's really tall and skinny, and has dark hair, and black-rimmed glasses and looks like a total geek. I'm sure these details are shocking. He actually looks like he could be old enough to be a grad student, too. I must try to learn more.

1 day of school down, a whole bunch more to go

So, I can now officially lay to rest my "first day of school jitters." It was great, and while it's hard to get too much of a feel for how the classes are going to be (except my American Experience class, which, I have a feeling, is going to require lots and lots of homework), I had a good time today.

The best story, I suppose, is my Gender Studies class. It was first, at 8 am, and when I walked in, there was this bald, quite old (like, 70's old) man wearing a fancy tie, totally geeking out with some girl in the class about opera: talking about their favorite ones, have they seen this or that. And yes, the flamboyant, old, gay man is the professor. Turns out, the entire semester is dedicated to "American, gay male writers," including my favorite author, James Baldwin. So naturally I go to his office after class to tell him how much I love James Baldwin and how thrilled I am that we're going to be studying him. So we end up getting into, like, a half hour conversation about writers and movies. He's awesome and slightly deaf, so he's pretty funny. He kind of makes a joke out of it.

Anyway, he was totally intrigued that I made films, and wants to see black-eyed, for a possible screening in class, in our James Baldwin discussion!!! It's a match made in Heaven, but I'm pretty reticent about showing that in class, for obvious reasons that anyone that's ever seen it would understand. So on Wednesday I'm taking him that, and my DVD copies of Burnt Money and Far From Heaven, both of which he's heard of, but never seen. (Hopefully I'll get them back.) He's bringing me a movie too, that he loves, which I saw in college and hated, but I'd already shot down several movies he mentioned, and hadn't seen most of the others. The guy wanted to share something, so I let him.

And aside from all that, I actually really enjoyed my Spanish class, and I think I'll like the other 2, but the jury is still out on my Theories of Personality teacher too. She seems a little dull, but I'm withholding judgement until further notice. The first day is always sort of boring.

But it was fun, and I'm really looking forward to getting in-depth on all of this. Right now I'm tired and slightly overwhelmed, but I'll get into the swing of things soon. Lots of possibilities....

Top 10

So, I struggled quite a bit this year with my Top 10 Movie List. On the one hand, I had very visceral, emotional reactions to several films that I didn't really feel like putting on the list for one reason or another, yet didn't get too emotionally involved in other films that I nonetheless thought were remarkable for other reasons. Maybe it's my inner critic trying to be too objective, and I'm afraid that if I pay too much lip service to my subjective voice, films that maybe I saw but few other people saw, might be ignored. There are several on my list this year that I feel were grossly overlooked by a lot of you that I think you should see, and I maybe included them for that reason, or just because I thought they were overlooked gems in general. I'm sure that makes no sense whatsoever to you, but it makes sense to me.

I also decided, through a lot of deliberation, not to actually "rank" them by number, but to just put up the 10 I thought were best and let my little capsule reviews speak for themselves. I know that's kind of "against the rules," but whatever. I make my own rules, bitch. So, without further adieu, here are the 10 movies I thought were the best this year (in alphabetical order). Feel free to comment, criticize, question or praise. Thanks for reading.

Brokeback Mountain – dir. Ang Lee
I hate to applaud this film for many of the same reasons everyone else does: for its bravery, it boldness, its hubris, almost, people seem to think. It’s only “brave” because people make it so, and frankly, I find all of that a bit insulting. (Does no one remember River Pheonix and Keanu Reeves “playing gay” in My Own Private Idaho, like, a million years ago?) What I wish to applaud this movie for is its intelligence, its innate understanding of human nature, and the power of shame and repression to ruin lives, and its humanity. This is a film, indeed, that can change America, as many critics have claimed, and I hope it does. It is profoundly important (sadly, but that’s the way it is), but again, only because of the current nature of politics, but that’s not why I think it’s a great film. It is a tragic love story in its truest and most fundamental sense, and it’s heartbreaking. Pure and simple. Heath Ledger steals the show as a man ripped apart by grief and longing, but not all at once: slowly and agonizingly over a period of years, and who only too late faces his own demons and fears.

Capote – dir. Bennett Miller
An absolute tour-de-force. This film has everything a great film should have: a flawless script, a spiritual dilemma of Biblical proportions, a gut-wrenching climax, and the performance of the decade by Phillip Seymour Hoffman. This film boldly shows that what drives a man can also destroy a man; that art can not only be redemptive, but also a force for destruction. I didn’t know going in that Capote never completed another book after In Cold Blood, but the film makes it clear that this is so, and why. Without question. The closing scene left me feeling as if my guts had been ripped out and dumped onto the floor. It took sitting through the credits, and then several minutes afterward, the theater long since emptied and now silent, for me to even collect myself enough to stand and walk, and exit the building. I felt weak and used up, like my own life had been visited by devastation. A truly unforgettable and life-changing film.

Just Friends – dir. Roger Kumble
Yeah, I know it’s retarded, but any movie that makes me laugh as much as Just Friends did deserves a place on this list. Possibly the funniest movie I’ve seen in years. Predictable, cookie-cutter and dumb, yes, but I wanted to marry Ryan Reynolds after I saw it. I watched it alone and was still in hysterics on my couch. I could probably watch this movie over and over and cry laughing every time.

Millions – dir. Danny Boyle
Simply put, one of the smartest, sweetest, and most charming kid’s films ever made. Its innocence made me weep, and I wanted everyone I knew to go see it. I think it was grossly underrated, and has the ability to make you see all the possibilities in the world. I hope lead 5-year-old actor Alexander Nathan Etel has a long future ahead of him. His wide-eyed mysticism and confusion could make all of us rethink our priorities.

My Summer of Love – dir. Pawel Pawlikowski
Like Heavenly Creatures before it, My Summer of Love tells the story of 2 girls from vastly different backgrounds (working class tomboy Mona, and the upper-class, prep school Tasmin) sharing an intense summer together, drawn together by their mutual disillusionment and abandonment by their families. Naturally, their relationship turns sexual, obsessive and bordering on the pathological, both girls getting in slightly over their heads and getting their first real tastes of love. It’s a “coming of age” film where very little actually happens, but it’s rich in character and atmosphere, and a sense of foreboding that’s both mesmerizing and almost unbearable. Both actresses are phenomenal, and the heartbreaking ending somehow manages to be both shocking and completely predictable. You don’t think they’ll go there, but they do, and it’s gut-wrenching.

Mysterious Skin – Dir. Gregg Araki
Araki (thankfully) abandons his redundant and progressively empty in-your-face, punk rock ethos, but not his style, in this sensitive, shattering portrayal of the devastating effects of childhood sexual abuse. The performances by Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Brady Corbett as the teenage victims coming to terms in ways that couldn’t be more opposite of one another (one violently and recklessly acting out, the other retreating inward into a solitary world of loneliness and delusion), were 2 of my favorite performances of the year.

9 Songs – dir. Michael Winterbottom
For anyone who’s ever loved and lost, or simply wondered what the hell happened when it was over and quietly faded away. A starkly simple film based on 2 people who seem to care deeply about one another, but eventually, in the simplest terms possible, just run out of things to talk about. Quietly devastating, and filled with an aching loneliness that will be familiar to anyone who’s ever missed a lover’s touch so much they wore their sadness like a heavy coat.

Pride and Prejudice – dir. Joe Wright
This movie made me feel like I was in love again. A perfect love story of 2 people destined to be together but fighting it desperately. Contains all the elements of the perfect romance, with one of the most fulfilling payoffs in modern cinema history. I could even forgive Mr. Darcy emerging through a post-dawn fog, his coat billowing behind him, to retrieve his woman in the shuddering climax.

Rize – dir. David LaChappelle
I have to admit to a lot of skepticism, seeing as how this was a documentary directed by LaChappelle, in my opinion, one of the most overrated photographers working today. However, I was entirely unprepared for what I saw. What I saw moved me, made me cry, absolutely broke my heart, and made me believe in the salvation of art (well, confirmed by belief in the salvation of art). This film could rouse even the most cynical of hearts and broken of souls.

The Squid and the Whale – dir. Noah Baumbach
A hilarious but ultimately heartbreaking film about a family falling apart, and the confused children left in the wake. Jeff Daniels is spectacular as the pretentious, emotionally impenetrable, liberal elitist father a breath’s whisper away from falling apart but doing everything in his power to deny it. Jesse Eisenberg, as the son, Walt, who mindlessly mimics his father, but eventually learns better, displays a wisdom and disillusionment few actors his age could convincingly pull off. Laura Linney, as always, is lovely.

Runners-up:
5x2
Batman Begins
Gunner Palace
Jarhead
King Kong
March of the Penguins
Roll Bounce
War of the Worlds

The Absolute Worst of the Worst:
Happy Endings
You, Me and Everyone We Know
Palindromes
Cursed
House of Wax

Best Director: Bennett Miller (Capote)
Best Actor: Phillip Seymour Hoffman (Capote)

Biggest Disappointment: Bad Education - dir. Pedro Almodovar

I have too been playing with 52 cards.

So, as anyone who knows me well knows, I'm a very nervous person. I'm prone to nail-biting, knuckle-cracking, constant fidgeting, twitchy eyes, insomnia, getting completely stressed out over entirely inconsequential events, thinking everything is the end of the world and that my life is ruined, and so on and so forth.

My most acute anxiety typically occurs at night after I decide to go to bed, usually because I can no longer even keep my eyes open or stop yawning. But then, like clockwork, as soon as my head hits the pillow and I turn out the light, I'm wide awake (often for hours). I've resorted to a variety of measures to try to counteract this in the last few months, the most effective being a Xanax with a glass of wine. But I'm out of Xanax, and doing that makes it almost impossible to get out of bed the next day unless I sleep, like, 11 hours. (In which case I get up feeling as if I've been sleeping for days, i.e., wonderful.)

So last night was one of those nights. I was already a little wound-up from a long day of dealing with financial aid options for school, picking out books, working, obsessing about the new boy I've met once, but nevertheless want to marry, even though I'm sure he has no interest in me, worrying about getting a job and how I'm going to pay my bills in school, and one small bout of spontaneous crying while I was sitting in traffic, because I'm just feeling really emotional right now for a lot of reasons.

About an hour before bed I took a Clonopin (mild anti-anxiety drug prescribed by my doctor; it's not as strong as Xanax) and drank a glass of wine. I read for awhile on the couch, and not in bed, as my doctor also instructed me to do (because I need to start associating the bed with sleeping only), and when I could literally no longer hold my eyes open, I went to bed and turned out the light. Open go the eyes. For 2 hours. After about an hour and 15 minutes, I finally got up, drank 2 pretty healthy shots of whisky, and laid on the couch to watch some TV to distract me from whatever it was bothering me. I couldn't really figure it out. Everything was rationalized: school was taken care of through my loans (tuition, books, insurance, and even about $1,300.00 left over just for me), I didn't really care that much about the boy, as I'm not even remotely interested in actually having a relationship with anyone at this point (he's just a fun distraction), I could survive at least a month or more (if I'm frugal) on the amount of money I'm going to receive in the next couple of weeks. I had no idea what was troubling me so much, but the whisky finally eventually kicked in, and around 2 I passed out, but not before resetting my alarm clock from 6:15 to 7:15.

Then this morning it hit me: I'm having the "first day of school jitters!" I thought that at the age of 28, I would be secure enough to be past all that, and not so worried about being judged by my peers (who, in all likelihood, will mostly be about 20), but apparently not. All those terrifying first days of junior high and high school are surging back on me, creating in me an anxiety I had totally forgotten about and put out of my mind for years. I was never popular in school. I always had a small group of friends, but there were certain classes (or entire years) all through grade school that were just unbearable, and sometimes downright terrifying (I got my life threatened by jocks on an almost daily basis). I know everyone suffered through this to some extent, and I'm not saying mine was any worse than anyone else's, but just maybe that I internalized it all a little more than I should have. So now that I've realized that's what it is, I feel terrified. I started freaking out earlier, questioning this whole decision to go back to school, wondering what the hell I was doing, and what in God's name made me think I could actually be a good therapist to someone? Am I just totally wasting thousands of dollars and years of my life on some other pipe-dream I'm going to be bored with as soon as I'm done?

But what it really all comes down to is that I'm terrified that some football meathead jock from fucking Lubbock or some shit is gonna decide he doesn't like the way I walk and start calling me a faggot every day in Spanish class. Or knock my books out of my hands in the halls. Or everyone's just going to think I'm a loser, and none of the graduate students will want to hang out with me (and I'm counting on hanging out with them). I'm afraid there won't be any free tables in the coffee shop on campus when I need to sit and do homework between classes and it's gonna be like in the cafeteria in junior high when all of your other friends had different lunches than you did, and you stood there like an idiot, tray in hand, scanning the sea of assholes for a place to sit and finding none, and just knowing that everybody was making fun of you for not having any friends.

There is pretty much nothing more terrifying to me in life than being judged by my peers, and until I was about 23 or so, it didn't usually go all that well. Even now I still get incredibly insecure and self-conscious about it, and more of my life than I'd like to admit is fairly well calculated to have what I consider to be the most prime "appearance" or outcome. I suppose that ultimately I'm inordinately afraid of rejection and humiliation, and going back to school just exacerbates those already rather flared-up fears. Just thinking about walking into that first class this coming Monday morning makes my fingers shake. I know I'll get used to it and I'm sure everything will be fine, and if nothing else, I'll totally win over my professors (one hopes), but me being me, I can't help but to constantly imagine the worst-case scenario.

Does that shit actually work?!??

I don't want to jinx anything, but last night at Little City there sat a man who literally took my breath away. he was the most devastatingly handsome man i've ever seen and i would have married him on the spot. i couldn't take my eyes off of him all night.

so, i go home and send him a Missed Connection on Craigslist and he actually responded, knew who i was (remembered me from the coffee shop), is actually a mo, is on MySpace and sent me his link. so i asked him on a date.

i'm literally trembling right now.

I'm sure it will amount to nothing, and he's 26, and I've sworn off anyone under at least 28, but if you could see this guy, you wouldn't blame me.

Fuhget about it

Mandy, Victor and I just went to see King Kong. If up until now, Brokeback Mountain was the movie where I'd actually cried the most, King Kong just surpassed it. I was a wreck. But it was beautiful.

Easy (As Falling Apart)

I wish everything in life didn't have to be so god damn painful all the time. Is it just like this forever? Do I just make things hard for myself by obsessing and being too sensitive? Is it low self-esteem? Is everyone else just a lot more detached than I am? Maybe it's just the holidays. Stupid Jesus.

Sorry. I'm just having a little self-pity party today.

Aliens and Dixie Chicks

Apparently this is the Christmas of the Dixie Chicks. I borrowed my sister-in-law's copy of Wide Open Spaces for the drive up from Little Rock to Rogers and listened to it the entire way (read: over 3 consecutive times). Then I got a copy of Home for Christmas, then bought a copy of Wide Open Spaces for myself at Wal-Mart today. They're both wonderful, and I am now officially a huge fan. I guess I always considered them sort of a "singles" band, but seriously, both records are nearly flawless.

Last night I sat in my kitchen with my dad, both brothers and my sister-in-law and had a very long conversation about aliens and the Bible. We actually discussed, in depth and with all seriousness, about why the aliens would have built Egypt, and what they must have been doing. I think we were all running on the assumption that aliens do actually exist, and did actually build Egypt. At least for the sake of conversation. I think my dad might actually believe it, I'm not sure. It was also sort of interesting to listen to him refute and explain away multiple Old Testament stories, attributing them to geologic activity. Neither of my parents have ever been Christians of the literal, fundamentalist type, but they are both avid Bible readers, church goers, and people of deep faith. The thing my dad explained in the most detail was how the parting of the Red Sea was supposedly caused by an earthquake and the tides pulling back or something. (I was fairly lit at that point after having consumed 2 whiskeys and almost 3 beers.) I guess explaining away the parting of the Red Sea due to an earthquake is still assuming the Red Sea did actually part, and that the whole exile from Egypt is also true, so maybe my dad is just the master of Intelligent Design, having found a perfect balance of his faith and his science. Or maybe the Moses story is actually historically accurate and I'm just ignorant. But we never did come to any conclusions as to why the aliens built Egypt. Obviously it has something to do with irrigation, but what? Beats the shit out of us.

On Friday before I left Little Rock I visited the Clinton Library. I have to admit that I was deeply moved and actually cried 3 times. Just thinking about America back then, and watching his speeches, and imagining how much promise there was, pre-Bush, pre-9/11. Just the things that administration did for civil rights, and the poor, and for education. My heart broke. I didn't get behind everything Clinton did, obviously, but it just seems like everyone in the White House back then was so smart, and committed, and progressive-thinking. I truly feel this country was headed towards a greatness it may now never realize. I'm not blaming it all on Bush of course, but he has certainly altered the tides and direction it may take generations to get back. In a lot of ways, the library was really depressing for that reason. But I'm happy I went, and if nothing else, it's an architectural masterpiece, truly stunning.

Overall, it's been a very nice trip. My nephew is 3-and-a-half now, and he's so much fun. He's really starting to form a real personality, and you can carry on semi-conversations with him, and he's becoming quite opinionated and big-mouthed. A true Cox. But more than that, he loves me. He always wants me to play with him, and carry him around, and his face lights up when I walk in the room. He loves to run up and wrap himself around my leg and then beg me to carry him around upside-down; he loves it. He thinks his brains will fall out, but he doesn't seem too concerned about it. I think for maybe the first time, I will be truly sad to leave him. My brother and sister-in-law are thinking about moving back up here from Little Rock and I hope they do. I might even come visit more. I think now that the nephew's personality is really starting to come out, I'm getting a little sad at how many of the things I'm going to miss: his school plays, soccer games, taking him out for afternoons at the movies. Fuck. I hate that kids can do this to you, and I hate that I'm not immune to it. Maybe when he gets older he can come stay with me a little bit in Austin during the summers or something. That might be nice. Who knows what the future holds.

It's also been more of an emotional vacation in other ways. My grandmother has Alzheimers and is deteriorating quickly. I had lunch with her on Saturday, and it was nice, but possibly one of the saddest things I've ever seen happened the same afternoon. I went to her house to give her some flowers and a vase I got her, and she wanted to show me a picture she had. She went to her class reunion this past summer and she said the picture was of her and a really good-looking fellow she met. I thought this was pretty strange and was intrigued until she showed me the picture, and it was of her and my grandfather from several years ago. They were married for almost 60 years, and he died from prostate cancer 6 years ago. She had found the picture in her bedroom, and had sort of decided, i guess (i have no idea how the Alzheimers brain really operates), that she had met this "fellow" there. When I tried to explain to her who it actually was, she had zero recollection of my grandfather, and was convinced she had only met this man this past summer and had never spoken to him again. In these situations, when dealing with this disease, you just have to acquiese and change the subject most of the time, which is about all I could do to keep from crying. And in some ways it made me really angry, but it's not her fault.

I'm leaving here tomorrow, aware of how much I'm leaving behind, and for the first time actually caring. I'm not sure how I feel about that. But I'll be glad to get back to my adopted home and my regular life. And all of my other family.

And I don't Understand Why I Sleep all Day

So today I talked to my old college friend Allie for 45 minutes on my drive to Dallas. Allie was the girlfriend of my freshman roommate, and we met through him. He ended up dropping out of college for various reasons at semester, but Allie and I remained friends. We haven't spoken since I first moved to Austin almost 7 years ago, but talking to her today, I realize very little has changed.

I actually started laughing to myself in the car thinking about her. We had so many adventures together. She was from Little Rock, so we went back there often to visit her parents and go to punk rock shows at Vino's. I remember being 18 and sitting in her Volvo outside Little Rock's only gay dance club, Discovery, and just wishing so badly that we could go inside but we were underage. We thought about trying to sneak in a few times but we never actually had the guts. And once in the snow, her windshield wiper broke on the way to the Rock, with our friend Jeff, so we stayed in a hotel, only to find out the next morning that it was just a loose screw. We laughed so hard, but had a great time in the hotel room. The 3 of us devised this incredibly elaborate story about being strung-out club kids in this incredibly sordid, bisexual, drug and sex triangle that we were going to try to use to get on Jerry Springer. There were late night "study sessions" at the Waffle House in Fayetteville playing "No Rain" by Blind Melon over and over on the jukebox. Punk shows at the Station, muddy raves out in the woods, skipping Communications class to sit in her dorm room watching reruns of My So-Called Life. Drunken 4-square games at the Greek Theatre in the middle of the night with all of the stinky crusty punk rock vegan hippy weirdo kids from Little Rock, one of which we both wanted so badly, we stayed up many nights with aching hearts discussing him and looking at his pictures.

Yeah, we had many good times. It seems her life has taken some unusual, but fulfilling and wonderful, turns and it was so great talking to her. It seems we can still make each other laugh just as much as we ever could, and she hasn't lost a single shred of her goofiness. So we're going to have breakfast on Friday morning in Little Rock before I leave my brother's house to drive up to Rogers. I can't wait. I anticipate spitting coffee out my nose and laughing so hard my guts hurt. And maybe just for good measure we'll go to Waffle House and listen to "No Rain."

There will be no white flag above my door

Goodbye Karen. I love you. Austin will never be the same without you. I'll miss you more than you'll ever know.

Love,
ryan

I is officially a student

I went in this morning, signed up for my classes, talked to the financial aid advisor (things are a little scary on that front...), and got my parking permit!

Most importantly, the classes I'm taking are:
Spanish I (since I took 2 different languages while at the University of Arkansas - don't ask! - I could either have taken the second class of one of those, but since it's been 10 years since I took either one, and you have to have 2 semesters of the same language at St. Eds, I just decided to start over with Spanish, since that will probably be infinitely more useful than either French or German, which are what I took at the U of A.)
Gender Studies (to fulfill my Literature requirement. They had many things to choose from that sounded interesting, but most of them were full, including "Southern Writers," which I think I would have liked, but "Gender Studies" will suit me just fine, I feel.)
Theories of Personality (my first Psych elective), and
The American Experience, which is sort of like an American Studies class. blech. Not looking horribly forward to that one, but whatever.

So I only got enough financial aid at this point to cover a little over half of tuition, and that's it. So I panicked a little, but that's based on the amount of money that I'm currently making, which, obviously, I won't be making once I'm in school. So I have several options, one of which is to fill out this form for the school basically telling them that, and the advisor pretty much guaranteed I will get a substantial amount more. Also, she gave me another pretty big loan I can apply for with a co-signor, that was also pretty guaranteed. So all is good. Now I just need to go find another part-time job! Yay for part time, service jobs.

But all in all, it feels a little more real now than it used to, even yesterday. I'm sort of swimming and overwhelmed, but very excited.

Ahh, Christmas.

Everyone should immediately go here. It's one of the funniest god damn things I've ever heard in my life. I was laughing before the music even started.

You need speakers or headphones.

On another note, this girl I work with told me this morning I looked like I got run over by a truck, then asked if I was sick. Geez. I didn't get much sleep last night, but I didn't think I looked that bad.

Only 11 days of work left

Thus, I'm not doing shit, and the postings have been a little heavy on here lately. For the second day in a row, I'm aping Collier by posting the results of the Ok Cupid Death Test.

Apparently, I have 19,221 days left on Earth, until I finally pass in the year 2058, age 81, of a heart attack. Better that than cancer, I suppose. But even more sobering, I have lived 35% of my life already. That's very sobering to think about.

"What is it that you really want?" "Real Estate."

Victor sent this along yesterday, and I wanted to share it. It's a Yahoo! news article about the enduring appeal of A Charlie Brown Christmas. I've seen this show every Christmas for as long as I can remember, and it still gets me a little choked up every time. Money quote:

Schulz, who died in 2000, never doubted the power of his tale of Charlie Brown's quest for the true meaning of Christmas amid the garish trappings of a commercialized holiday. "It comes across in the voice of a child," says Jeannie Schulz, the wife of the cartoonist, whose friends called him Sparky. "Sparky used to say there will always be a market for innocence."

Now that my nephew is around, we've started sharing it with him, and I love sitting and watching him watch it, wide-eyed, taking it all in. Last Christmas he was only 2, so I'm sure he didn't get much, but you gotta start em young. It makes me sad that they just don't seem to make this kind of stuff anymore. Everything now has to be so hip and reflective of pop culture, and have sexual innuendos and hip hop music. It breaks my heart. Another quote:

"A key element in all of Schulz's work is his sense of man's place in the scheme of things in a theological sense as well as a psychological sense," says Thomas Inge, an English and humanities professor at Randolph-Macon College who edited a series of interviews with Schulz released in 2000. "Then there's this slightly cynical attitude that makes everything work."

Maybe a trip home and to watch A Charlie Brown Christmas is just what I need to get back in the spirit this year.

Random Brutal Sex Master!

Ok, so I took the OK Cupid Love Personality quiz or whatever, and these were my results: (thoughts?)


Your results are in! Riotboy6, you are...


The Hornivore
Random Brutal Sex Master (RBSMm)


Don't ever marry, you're The Hornivore. Roaming, sexual, subhuman.

The Hornivores (you) are some of the most screwed up and naughty beings in the Universe. And their numbers are growing, mostly due to skipped or misused contraception. You care not. There's one thing you want, one sole need.

Half manly, half bestial, you act on instinct, and animal charisma smoothes the way. It's unlikely you're driven by much other than your own selfish, orgasmic requirements. Your appearance and personality have evolved for the hunt. Ass beckons, you oblige.

For the record, you can happily bang all personality types, however your match percentages might be low with the kinder, more sensible people of the world, purely because they all wish to avoid you. Good luck to them.

Your exact opposite:
The Slow Dancer
Deliberate Gentle Love Dreamer


"One day, the villagers came with torches to the house. In the smoldering ashes, stray dogs looked for cooked flesh."

AVOID: The Mixed Messenger, The Slow Dancer
CONSIDER: The Last Man on Earth, The Hornivore

And I'm rolling downhill like a snowball headed for Hell

So it's official: I'm an honorary St. Edwards student! Yay! I'm so excited. I have an appointment for next Monday to go in and set up all of my classes. I'm so anxious to see what I get to take, especially the electives. I'm so ready to just dive in and be really busy and be learning things and really feel like I'm working towards something real. I have so many things I want to do, like start writing for the literary journal there, join clubs, like the gay club, and the psychology club, and maybe take cello lessons. I'm bringing my cello back from Arkansas after Christmas, because I decided I want to start playing it again. My mother, of course, is totally off-her-rocker thrilled about it. It's been 10 years since I've even touched it, but I'm going to have her give me a refresher course while I'm home, and since I played for so long before, maybe it will all come back to me pretty quickly. (And after I re-master the cello, I want to learn the banjo!)

So yeah, I put in my notice at work yesterday. It looks like I'll be here until January 6th, but that's still only, like, 12 actual workdays, since there's Christmas and all. It's crazy. It's almost unfathomable, that in 3 weeks I'm going to walk out these doors for the last time, after almost 4 years! I hate to admit it, but in some small way, I think I might miss it. Not the actual job, but when you've done something every single day for 4 years, it sort of becomes a part of you, whether you like it or not. I sort of regret that I've wasted so much time here, but on the other hand, it served its purpose of lighting a serious fire under my ass and making me realize that this is NOT what I want for myself, thus I think I'll push myself that much harder in school. I'm already having fantasies of getting my Master's degree from Harvard. heh. Anyway, I'm going to theoretically work towards that, even if it's not something I would totally choose. But can you imagine me at Harvard? It's pretty funny.

Also, I had the pleasure of catching a sneak of Brokeback Mountain last night with Karen, Kat, Stacy, and her daughter, Annalise (sp?). It was beautiful and perfect and totally drained me. Karen and I stopped at La La's on the way home to have some whiskey and decompress. I loved it.

Where I hope to live my final days

This makes my heart ache. In a good way.

If I knew how to upload pictures onto this stupid thing, I would upload a picture, in the NYT, of the actual table where Collier and I had breakfast every morning we were there. So, when are we moving?

Red wine and sleeping pills help me get back to your arms. Cheap sex and sad films help me get back where I belong.

God, I hate winter. All I want to do is board up the house, crank the gas heater, drink wine, smoke cigarettes, take Xanax, and watch episode after episode after episode of Six Feet Under until I fall into a pharmaceutical-induced coma. (That show is my religion, I swear. I would totally drink the Kool-Aid with the Fishers.)

No, it's not really as bad as all that. But I do hate winter. Everything silent and frozen is the loneliest feeling in the world. I really like having Karen around. It's like we have a snug little home together. It's very comforting.

Has it been 6 months already?

I'm going to bypass the obvious topic of conversation today, and instead bring you this charming Yahoo! article about people being fed up with misbehaving children.

"It's not about the kids," says McCauley, the 44-year-old owner of A Taste of Heaven cafe, who has no children but claims to like them a lot. "It's about the parents who are with them. Are they supervising and guiding them?

"I'm just asking that they are considerate to people around them."


Amen, brother. Happy Tuesday, everybody.

Master of My Universe

A couple of weeks ago I came to the startling realization that since I started running regularly again last August or September, or whenever it was, that I've started losing a lot of weight. About 10 pounds to be exact, which I can't really afford to spare. I knew my appetite had increased: I swear that while I was running I could have eaten a full meal every 3 hours and been okay. I was just so hungry all the time, and although I consistently snacked and ate lunch and big dinners, it was never enough. I simply couldn't keep up and started to feel like my body was going to start eating itself pretty soon unless I spent every waking minute and dollar I had pursuing carbs and protein, like some caveman.

So I decided to stop running, but keep going to the gym, and start doing weights on my lower half, which i didn't do before, because I ran. And in the 2 weeks since I made that decision I've promptly gained back 6 pounds as of yesterday.

I love being right, even if it's a no-brainer.

Gettin' on the Gay

I bought the new Madonna record last weekend, and can't get enough of it! I love it. Of course the lyrics and all are retarded, but I don't listen to Madonna for her lyrics. It's a great dance record: it's one continuous mix, and it's really driving, and some of it's really dark-sounding. It's totally infectious, and there are multiple melodies that I can't ever get out of my head. Music like that is just so viscerally satisfying.

And in other news, in contrast to all those cyborgy, blinking cell-phone earpieces everybody seems to be plugging into these days, I want one of these. Courtesy of this guy.

"This is me, this is what you get!"

So, I had a dream last night that I lived next door to Brenda from Six Feet Under. Not just the actress, but the actual character of Brenda. I was hanging out at her house before work, for some reason, and we were watching The OC. I said I needed to leave to go get some coffee, but she made me some kind of crazy coffee/granola drink so I wouldn't leave. I felt very comfortable there, and just couldn't drag myself to work. I love Brenda. I wish I could be friends with her, and marry David. Although he would prolly drive me nuts.

Am I pathetic enough yet?

Capital One can suck it.

Yesterday when I pulled into my driveway, there was a large, manila envelope sticking out the top of my mailbox. Sure that it was my acceptance letter from St. Edwards, I lept from the car, not even bothering to turn it off, my heart racing, only to discover that it was nothing but the umpteenth credit card offer I'd received in the past 3 weeks from Capital One. For some reason, they've started sending them to me in large, manila envelopes. Way to crush a boy's dreams, Capital One, you rat bastards. You won't give me a credit card anyway; I tried a few weeks ago.

Other than that, life isn't too eventful. Karen has stayed with me the last 2 nights, since her bed now lives at my house, as of last Sunday. She's been very gracious about my cover-stealing, even though my house is downright frigid in the mornings. On Saturday, I got a beautiful new sheet and comforter set from Crate & Barrel, that was something, like, 60% off. A $300 set I got for $127. I was thrilled. Even though they've been washed, they're still a bit scratchy and stiff, but I'm sure that will wear off soon enough.

I had sort of a date/non-date on Sunday. It was okay; certainly no sparks, but that's all right. On the drive home I realized that, even though I really want to be, I'm just not in a dating place yet. And with school starting and all that, who wants to be attached? Not me. Last night at Stacy Schoolfield's house, she suddenly got very excited remembering 3 different guys she knew of that she wanted to hook me up with. I had to graciously decline, but it was very sweet of her to think of me. But the date/non-date guy belongs to an all-gay book club that he invited me to join, which might be fun. Their next meeting is on the 12th of December, and the reading assignment is Other Voices, Other Rooms by Capote. I've actually started this book twice, and never got very far, but I started it again yesterday, and it's started hooking me in this time. I had to set aside Tropic of Cancer to start it, but that's okay, because I'm almost 100 pages into it, and still have no idea what's going on. Has anyone else out there read it? If so, is it worth sludging through? Methinks not, but I could be wrong. And the reading assignment for January is A Million Little Pieces, by James Frey, which I've already read, so maybe if I enjoy myself at this month's meeting, I'll attend next month's as well. I didn't care much for Pieces, but I'd be very curious to hear what a big group of homos all think of it.

Thanksgiving, mm-hmm.

So yesterday was Turkey Day, and it was great. Collier graciously hosted at her place. It was her, me, Karen, Collier's mom, then eventually Ann and Dylan, then for an after-dinner treat, Nisha, with amazing chocolate chip cookies that tasted like a stick of butter with chocolate chips stuck in it. We surmised yesterday that we probably all ate about 2 sticks of butter each. Which was fine by all of us. Butter is one of the greatest things on Earth. After dinner we all just got fat and lazy; we watched part of Survivor, then Will and Grace, then some awful special on Animal Planet about cats that do funny things. Incredibly, it was an hour-long special, but was pretty much the apex of mental stimulation of which we were capable at that point. At that point we had mulled cider with whiskey. It should have been cold outside, but it wasn't. So we pretended it was, and that made the cider more special. Another thing that made this year very special was the fact that Collier, graciously again, allowed me to usurp her job as the reacher-in-the-turkey-ass and puller-out-of-everything-inside. I'd never done this before, and was hesitant (I don't know why; I have plenty of experience with sticking things up assholes), but was actually quite disappointed to find that it had already been cleaned out. Aside from the actual act of fisting the turkey, there was no joy to be had in ripping its guts out. Oh well. Maybe next year.

I also realized on Wednesday night why it's dangerous for someone like me to have cable. I basically use it for companionship, and I guess that can get dangerous, as evidenced by my newfound addiction to America's Next Top Model. It's just as vapid as anything, but for some reason, a collection of nothing but girls, with no men involved, takes the bitchiness and backstabbing and petty complaining that much more compelling. It is pretty fascinating how a bunch of beautiful bitches totally turn on one another and form their little "alliances," and how hurt they all are when any of them is "betrayed," which means Jayla actually had a conversaton with Bre, when Jayla is supposed to be on Kim's side, or whatever. Incidentally, Kim got eliminated last week, when it was down to her and Bre, which I actually found pretty shocking. Bre is such a bitch, and frankly, she seems very unstable and possibly dangerous. Furthermore, she's not that pretty. Another Naomi Campbell in the making. And I only say that because they're both black. ha ha. And INSANE!

Anyway, I'm at work today, unfortunately. My supervisor just bought everybody chips and queso from Taco Cabana at 9:30 in the morning. Weird. I think he might be providing lunch, too, but I'm not sure. But I'll be out of here at 3:30. I have a date/non-date on Sunday night, which I'm actually really looking forward to, which means I think I want it to be a date. We'll see.

and even I'm gettin' tired of useless desires

So, yeah, I guess it's been awhile. Just symptomatic of my mental state the last few weeks, I guess. I've just felt very isolated and disconnected in a lot of ways. Very in my own head, slightly hermetic. It's not necessarily a bad thing. But I'm coming back around, so you better watch out!

This last week has been filled with a lot of anticipation, not the least of which is waiting to hear back from St. Edwards regarding my application. I'm sure I'll have no problem getting in, but after my debacle with UT, I'm just worried. But I'm very excited about the prospects. I can't even begin to imagine how wonderfully amazing and liberating it's going to be the morning that I get to walk into work and put in my notice. Ah! It makes beam from ear to ear just thinking about it.

But other than that, I haven't really been up to much, honestly. Doing a lot of reading, thinking. I feel positive about most things overall, I just feel like I'm killing a lot of idle time right now, waiting for something to happen, instead of going out there and really making it happen. But in small ways, I'm making things happen. That's all I need right now: small gestures.

I'll try to post more regularly again on this thing, but as I said before, I don't even know who reads this. Should I even bother? But as I also said, I'm doing it mostly just for me, so I guess I should, even though I feel weird writing about much of what is actually on my mind these days. Another dilemma: how much am I comfortable revealing? Not very much, right now. That's why I've been so silent. But maybe forcing myself to post about things that don't necessarily plunge my psychic depths will be good for me. I spend too much time down there these days!

i'm either so sick in the head i need to be bled dry to quit, or i just really used to love him. i sure hope that's it.

KB and I had dinner and then drinks together last night and just had a giant bitch-fest, and it felt wonderful. There was no judgement, no holding back, really. We just let it all out. Not about each other, but about everything else that's been bothering, or irritating, or depressing, either one of us. Things maybe we're a little ashamed to actually be feeling, but do anyway. Jealousies, resentments, sadnesses. It's good to have friends like that, where you can just totally let it go and say whatever you want, and even if they don't feel the exact same way (but it's always better if they do), know that they won't hold it against you, or judge you for it, or think that you're a terrible, selfish, bitter, wounded person. We all have these thoughts; just no one ever wants to admit it. I hope that no matter whatever happens in my life, or how happy, or fulfilled, or whatever, I might ever become, that I never lose my fatalism. I hope I always keep that edge of cynical skepticism. For better or for worse, I think that's partially what defines me and my personality. Without it, I have no idea who I would be. Fatalism. Yeah, it's good.

At Starbucks this morning the new counter-guy was clearly flirting with me. Too bad he had a goatee and wasn't that cute. It still made my day. I got to smile and flirt back and be really friendly at 6:30 in the morning.

but the sun is still in the sky and shining above you

I found out this morning that I didn't get into UT. I felt totally deflated and called my mom crying at 7:30. It actually turned out to be a transcript problem, and they said I could appeal it, but they wouldn't guarantee anything, since it was pretty much my fault.

But on the bright side, St. Edwards University's deadline isn't until November 15th, so I'm applying there, which I meant to do anyway, and just never did. My therapist said they have a great psychology program, and he has several colleagues there and recommends it. And it's a much smaller school (only 4,000 as opposed to UT's 40,000), so I'd probably be a lot happier there anyway. It's always better to feel more like a person than a number. So I've already started my application (it's incredibly short and easy compared to UT's, also), called the University of Arkansas and Art Institute to have my transcripts sent over, and set up an appointment with an admissions counselor for next week. So hopefully everything will work out in the end, and maybe I'll be really happy at St. Ed's. It's a beautiful campus and seems to have a very active, liberal student life (even though it's a Catholic university), so I'm actually looking forward to it. Not the end of the world.

On a much lighter, and more arbitrary note, I feel like I'm in high school again: I have a pretend boyfriend. His name is David Fisher and he's a character on Six Feet Under. I'm totally obsessed, it's sick. Anyway, he's on my desktop at work, and I just sit and think about what our life would be like together. It's not the actor, Michael C. Hall, that I like, mind you. It's the character. He's so great. Is that so wrong?

when I was looking with calm affection, you were searching out my imperfections

I had one of the most fun weekends I've ever had this past weekend. I had a lot of anxiety leading up to it, for various reasons. The most obvious being my most "recent" breakup, which I am so not over. He and I were both very excited about this weekend, even all the way back in May, and had already picked out a room in the hotel we were going to get. And there's the whole, "mandy is my oldest friend, and now she's all grown up and married," blah blah blah.

I thought both of those issues were going to weigh heavily on my mind all weekend, but I was wrong. Obviously, they were both there (especially the former), but I was able to push them back and be so gloriously happy for Mandy and Victor. Getting there and seeing how radiant they both were, and how deliriously happy, it would have been impossible to wallow in any kind of self-pity, even if I'd wanted to. Ave Maria during the wedding itself hit a little bit, because that's "his" favorite song, and last Christmas, he played various versions of it repeatedly at his house. But these are the kinds of things you live with, and deal with, and get over, and attach new meaning to. During the wedding, I caught myself thinking how much I would love to have that special man there with me to share it all, that I could look up at from the altar and see him smiling at me in the crowd, when it dawned on me that I had, like, 10 special people to share that moment with. I will never forget, as long as I live, Mandy glancing over at me twice during the ceremony, and smiling the biggest, happiest, most genuine smile I've ever seen, and the way it melted my heart to see her so happy. And less importantly, but no less memorable, was the entire crowd at the reception, jumping up and down, pumping fists in the air, and singing along, everyone at the top of their lungs, to Since U Been Gone, by Kelly Clarkson. That's a dancefloor moment I will never forget. So much alcohol was consumed, so much dancing was done, and so many laughs and moments shared.

I've always been pretty ambivalent about weddings, especially my own, but if I could ever host the kind of day (entire weekend) that Mandy and Victor did, and make anyone else as happy as I was that day, I would love to. It's not just about sharing vows, or proclaiming your love in front of people, it's about everyone sharing the experience, and being a real part of your life. I was quite touched. Congratulations, you guys. I love you both.

Fool-hearted Memory

so, i started writing again tonight. It's a short story based on a short script i wrote a couple of months ago. it's totally about me and J., but the "event" in the story is completely fictionalized. it feels really good to be writing again, because I think it means that I'm finally able to start fictionalizing things between us in a really objective way that I haven't really been able to do until, well, maybe now. Even now, we'll see. But I'm happy with the way it's going so far. It's also been ages since I really tried to write actual fiction, as opposed to screenplays. Years, really. It's really hard, but I like the freedom it offers to go places that scripts just can't, partly because they have such a rigid format, and partly because you can't really bring thoughts, or feelings, to life in a script until it's filmed, and then it's the actor's job. But with fiction, you can just go wherever you want, and it's very liberating. And this particular story, in screenplay format, is a pretty terrifying prospect to film. It's very sexually explicit, and it's deeply, deeply personal, so much so that I might be betraying some intimiacies that I might someday regret betraying, but for the time being, it's working for me to exorcise them in this way, even if it is dredging up a lot of uncomfortable and painful feelings and memories.

So depending on how it all turns out, maybe I'll try to actually get it published someplace, though god only knows where. Anyway, I worked on it for about an hour and a half at Little City downtown tonight, and I've still got roughly half of it to go. I'll worry about the "publishing" aspect of it later; for right now, it's doing worlds of wonder for me to just get it out. i think. maybe i'm just rehashing a lot of stuff that just needs to die. Writing is funny that way. Well, all art, I guess, is funny that way. It's always a fine line for me between being really self-indulgent and wallowing in my own misery, and actually getting the demons out. But I guess you never really know until you do it.

And on a somewhat related note, the biggest problem with Little City is that you can't step outside to even smoke a cigarette without 18 homeless people walking up and asking you for one, or for money. the sans maison, J. used to call them. which always made me giggle. i hate homeless people.

inhale, deep breath

there was supposed to be a screening of my film Santa Ana today, as part of the gay & lesbian film festival. i had 7 friends show up at the theater, procured everyone's tickets and we went in to wait. the short film scheduled before mine played, then, tense with anticipation about my short starting, suddenly the opening credits of the feature film began. all my friends looked at me, confused, and i went outside to see what was going on.

well, the official line from the director of the festival, when i found her outside and ask what was up, was that the next feature screening didn't have a short with it, so they yanked mine out of its original program to put with that one. and no one had bothered to tell me. i was already fairly pissed about it, since i had people there, they had taken time out of their days to come see the movie, and driven all the way up to the Arbor, but there wasn't much i could do about it. so the feature it had been moved to was next, so collier and laura and i went to get lunch and come back. everybody else had stuff to do, so they all just had to leave.

so we arrive back at the theater. someone comes to find me to let me know that my short will be screening, but not until after the feature. what the fuck?!?? who shows shorts after the movie, when the credits have rolled and everybody's gone? i was spitting nails at this point, so i actually go and i find the projectionist who is lingering about in the lobby. i demand to know why they're doing this, and why they can't show it before. turns out the stupid fucker left the movie at home and actually has to go home and get it during the feature, so he can then show it afterwards. which also means that the line i got earlier about them just not having a short for that movie was a total lie to cover this douchebag's ass. needless to say, i kind of flipped out and told him how uncool that was and how angry i was, and he got very defensive and snotty in that way that people do when they know they've fucked up and don't want to take responsibility for it. he didn't even apologize, except to admit that he left it at home, which is as close to an apology as i got. so anyway, we went in circles for a bit, and i basically told him i didn't want anything from him except for him to do his job correctly, and we left.

i'm not done with this, though. i've called the director of the festival twice now and left her messages, and i'm going to pretty much demand that they show it again, in front of something big, that will draw a big crowd, and guarantee that lots of people will see my awesome movie. this happened 2 hours ago, and i'm still fairly fuming.

collier made me feel a lot better in the car driving home, though, by telling me that i was building up quite a karmic payback this summer, what with the breakup, all this stupid shit at work (which had a whole other layer added to it yesterday, which was very, very hurtful to me), and now this, and something really really great was bound to happen to me soon. i hope she's right, and it's not the other way around, where karma is now collecting its debt i owe to it. but how could that be? i haven't done anything that terrible. lately.

but on the plus side, collier and laura and i went to the opening night party last night, and it was really great for one reason. mum's the word, though, because i don't want to jinx it.

fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck

my new very least favorite thing in the world is the new feature on Friendster that allows you to see who has viewed your profile. i'm not sure how far it's going to go back, but they just started it, so it covers September.

you know what this does? it ruins everything. now you can no longer secretly stalk people you think are cute or hot. if you look at someone's profile multiple times over a week, or a day (as i have done with a certain someone with whom i've been emailing), they're gonna think you're a freak! nor can you continue to have fantasies about certain people looking wistfully at your profile and missing you, when, in fact, they haven't looked at it in at least a month, since the stupid counter started keeping track. but, you know, i haven't looked at his, either, so there. im just gonna pretend he hasn't looked at mine for the same reason i haven't looked at his.

all this does is foster and exacerbate my already inflated stalker/obsessive tendencies. i hate it. i hate you, Friendster. they should call you NoFunster.

sad day

i was listening to the news on Howard Stern this morning when they did a short piece on the passing sunday of M. Scott Peck, author of the book The Road Less Traveled, among many others. When I was 17 or 18 years old, my grandma gave me this book because i had shown some interest in the field of psychology and maybe becoming a therapist when i went to college. at the time i wanted to work with teenagers and pre-teens, particularly "troubled" ones who had bad home lives, or just couldn't stay out of trouble.

Anyway, reading this book set my brain to thinking in ways that it never had before, and though Dr. Peck is an avowed christian, what i learned from the book allowed me to question everything about myself in a way that felt safe, even my faith. he's a truly "spiritual" man, meaning that just because he's a christian, he's not a right-wing nut job. in fact, as he recounts in his book People of the Lie, he's even received numerous death threats from conservative christians all over the world, claiming his philosophy on spirituality and compassion run counter-productive to "true" christianity. go figure.

But i have read The Road Less Traveled many times in the last 11 years or so, along with a handful of his other books, and i can honestly say that Dr. Peck is more singularly responsible for shaping my current worldview than anything else. I even wrote him a letter once in college, thanking him for his wisdom and compassion on the issue of homosexuality (another reason the conservatives hated him), and how he helped give me some of my own internal strength to come to terms with that aspect of myself. i never sent it, but i used to have fantasies that we would become pen pals.

it's funny, too, that since i've decided to major in psychology in school now, i've been thinking about him a lot lately, and even had a brief conversation with my therapist about him last week. he thinks just as highly of Dr. Peck as i do.

i realize this entry is a bit disjointed and rambly, but i just wanted to throw something up real quick-like about a man who was one of my first true idols and for whom i have a tremendous respect. he truly changed my life at an age where i needed someone like him to be doing it, and not trent reznor.

rest in peace, Dr. Peck. we'll miss you.

and if you've never picked up a copy of The Road Less Traveled, i can't recommend it enough, obviously.

i prefer a sunless sky to the stinging and glitter in my eyes

i just discovered Reason #2 why i hate dating. too bad i can't reveal it in this forum.

when you're old and lonely you will wish you'd married me

i got an email yesterday from this guy on Friendster. i really haven't been in the mood to date lately, and feel like it's the last thing i really want to be doing right now. but i checked out his profile, and he was actually really cute, and seemed really smart, had good taste in things, is producing and acting in a local theater's production of BENT, and was a psych major at UT. i figured if nothing else, maybe i could just bend his ear about that. so i thought, "screw it," maybe i just need to move on and get back out there. so i replied to his email, and got a little excited at the prospect of hearing back from him.

well, i heard back from him today. i'm not really very excited anymore. for starters, he sent me a small questionnaire to fill out, consisting of 3 simple questions:

1) are you a drunk?
2) have you ever been in therapy? did you get something out of it?
3) have you ever sold real estate, or have you ever had a desire to do so?

secondly, he sent me a press release for BENT, which starts next month, along with a promotional poster featuring a very cut naked torso of a man (the head is not visible), which he took pains to point out to me, was him on the poster.

hmmm..... i wasn't really sure what to do. his email had a very friendly tone, and he was jokey about the questions, saying that if he tried to explain why he had to ask them the answers i would conceivably give would just further confound his explanations....

i deliberated for roughly 10 minutes before responding that i didn't realize i had to pass a test to get a date, but that i would answer them anyway. so i tried to give cutesy answers without seeming like a date with this stranger was so important to me that i was willing to divulge very personal and judgemental-worthy information about myself. we'll see how he responds to that. just because half of my Friendster photos prominitely feature an alcoholic beverage shouldn't lead one to draw conclusions.

god, this is why i hate dating. why does everybody have to be so fucked up and weird all the time?

the only way i'm going to find this email excusable is if his last boyfriend was a ruthless drunk that used to beat him, and also just happened to sell real estate and refused to go to therapy.

so unless i see some bruises or scars, he's an asshole.

i have known love like a whore, from at least ten-thousand more

one thing therapy has done for me that's been great, and is also, probably, just a byproduct of becoming older and wiser, is helped me to realize that i can't control everything. i'm what i guess would be considered somewhat of a control freak, and if something happens in my life that i can't either subltely (sp?) or overtly manipulate to go the way that i want it to, i panic.

it's felt really good, actually, to be able to let go of that mindset. i've come to realize that it does virtually nothing but cause frustration and anxiety. i also have a horrible tendency to compare myself to other people and feel like i come up very short, not really keeping in mind that perhaps my time just hasn't come yet. it seems like wedding fever really is in the air (sigh), with no less than 5 couples that i'm fairly close to (some more than others) getting married in the next year. i'm very glad for all of them, because they all deserve it, but it also makes me realize how much my life is changing. i guess i've been braced for it for awhile, but i didn't expect it all to happen quite so suddenly. it's a wistful, bittersweet feeling, and i honestly think i would feel that way even if i were the one getting married. and here i am going back to school in january to get my bachelors degree. in some ways i feel like i'm degressing (is that even a word?), but i know i'm not. it's good for me, and something i really need to do, and i couldn't be more thrilled about my latest decision to pursue a degree in psychology and then a masters in counseling. as karen put it the other night, "all we ever do is sit around and analyze ourselves, and each other, and our relationships, so it makes sense you would decide you want to do that as a career." or something along those lines. well said, karen.

anyway, the hurricane did not hit us today as predicted; in fact, it did the opposite of hit us. it was about a hundred degrees and sunny as hell. lucky for all the ACL-goers, i guess, but i have to admit i was a bit disappointed. i was really hoping to get pounded by a big one. no pun intended. so collier and i went shopping, and i found what might be one of the greatest shirts ever created at Blue Velvet, for only $16. it's a red and blue plaid western-style shirt with gold, shiny thread and pearl snap buttons. it's beautiful and it actually fits me. it's very exciting. and luckily i found it, b/c my heart was broken at Service Menswear by a shirt that was 50% off and might be the greatest shirt i've ever seen, but they only had it in medium. it was brown with yellow pin-stripes, but then had a white collar with sort of water-color-looking yellow birds on it. it sounds stupid, but i would be the hottest guy in the world if i only owned it. story of my life.

i don't care if you're making that sound

so, i have an email stalker. i'm pretty sure he's harmless; he doesn't even really know anything about me, but nonetheless, he's creepy and emails me every single day. he says things like, "have you left me forever, handsome?" and that he misses me and stuff. we met once.

why can't my ex-boyfriend send me emails like that? at least i would get some vindication out of deleting them, instead of just feeling like i'm being watched.

but i don't eat them

since having my nose surgery, i've noticed a lot of changes. obviously, i can breathe much better, my stamina has already improved noticeably, i don't have to carry around snotty tissues in my pockets all the time, i don't have to practically have a tampon stuck up my nose every morning for the first 2 hours while i drain from the night before. it's even given me a weird sense of confidence, since i don't feel sort of visibly sickly and runny and with a raw nose all the time. it's really great.

but one of the greatest pleasures i've discovered, is that since my sinuses can now actually dry up and retain oxygen, i have lots and lots of boogers! it's kind of exciting. instead of there just being a constant drip of wet snot, i can actually pick my nose again. it's very gratifying.

Take it Easy (Love Nothing)

going without sleep is sort of an interesting experiment, though it wipes me out emotionally. i haven't slept in almost 29 hours, and in that time i've traveled halfway across the country, and been drunk and sobered up again, and put in almost a full day of work.

for some reason, after getting home last night, i just couldn't sleep. i drank wine with collier and karen at my place, went to bed at midnight, but just couldn't fall asleep for the life of me. finally, around 4:30, i said "screw it," and got up and came into work to get the day over with. i clocked in at 5:15.

i'm sure going without sleep probably has about the same effect on everyone, but i just feel like i'm standing on the edge of a building, and at any minute, a slight breeze could come along, and my whole facade would collapse. i wanna cry my eyes out right now just thinking about how i yelled at my cat last night for meowing, i feel so guilty about it. it's totally absurd. hopefully when i get off at 1:15 and go home, i'll just be able to crash. i've had a very physically and emotionally exhausting last 4 days, and i'd rather not decompress through anger. it makes me feel so awful about myself when i lash out or lose my cool like that. everything just piles up. i need to sleep.

birds

i got up very early this morning in the hopes of being able to make it to the zoo and back to my hotel by 12:30, for a cab to pick me up and take me downtown to meet the airport shuttle at 1:40. my plans were thrwarted, however, when no one really knew how to get to the zoo, and it's a rougly 40 minute bus ride out there, apparently, with a roughly 40 minute bus ride back. no one knew how often the buses ran, and it all just seemed too risky. so i decided to explore my North Shore neighborhood a little more, since i was too afraid to at night.

the Carnegie Science Center is around here somewhere, so i headed out for that. despite there being signs for it everywhere, with arrows pointing you where to go, i never did find it, and walked in circles. i asked 3 people, but none of them seemed to know exactly how to get there. which i think is really weird. i feel like in Austin, for instance, almost anyone could tell you precisely how to get anywhere, especially if that thing happened to be in the same neighborhood where these people seemingly lived. so i tried to go to the Children's Museum, which is beautiful and old and made of stone, but it didn't open until noon. the library was also closed (incidentally, the library up here on the North Shore was the first public library in the US, donated by Mr. Carnegie, as everything up here seems to be), so i decided to go the Aviary Center, which was in the middle of a lush, green park with a gigantic fountain. i loved the Aviary, and my heart almost burst watching all these precious birds in their replicated habitats just doing their thing. and i realized that i am not, in fact, a bitter person, which was comforting, and i have tiny, adorable 7" owls to thank for that. i wanted to cuddle up with them they were so cute. and one of them was all sleepy and kept squinting his big eyes closed. the other one was staring at me. i loved all the birds, and they were just amazing.

there's a Pittsburgh Steelers game today, and the stadium is about 6 blocks from my hotel, so my neighborhood (i say "my" neighborhood) is crawling with Steelers fans, all decked out in their jerseys and carrying coolers. unfortunately, however, i was only able to find about 2 cafes within about 10 blocks of my hotel, and they were both closed! at 11 on sunday morning. only the bars were open. very weird. it must be really boring to live up here if there's nowhere to go to get coffee or breakfast on sunday morning. or maybe i just don't know where to go. as i was walking around, i passed an apartment with a big, white, very fluffly kitty poking his head underneath the curtain of the open front window to look out. it was staring at me, and i said hi to it, and it mewed at me. it was very sweet. i almost took a picture of it, but then decided not to. but it made me smile.

small moments. the older i get, the more and more i appreciate them.

Pittsburghers

people who live in Pittsburgh are called "Pittsburghers," which i find endlessly amusing. so much less dignified than, say, oh, i don't know, "Pittsburghians," maybe? maybe they don't want to be dignified, and if so, kudos to them. i'd like a Pittsburgher with cheese, please. yes, i just made myself giggle out loud.

so today was slightly more fun, for several reasons. one, is that i think i finally started to figure out the layout of this place. directionally, it's really confusing, b/c the downtown is just a big triangle, and a crooked one at that, and all the surrounding neighborhoods go around it in a circle, so there is no straight North, South, East, or West. everything is just marginally one direction. and it's very confusing. but today i discovered the South Side, which is where i would absolutely live if i were to ever move here for whatever reason. imagine the Drag in Austin, except lined on both sides, going on about 4 times as long, and all the stores being local and quirky. tons of bookstores, record stores, clothing stores, quaint cafes, and not a chain among them, except i saw one Starbucks. it runs along the river on the north side, and sits at the bottom of the South Hills on the south side, which is a residential area built into the side of a very steep mountain. it's stunningly gorgeous. i found what must the be the coziest bookstore ever, called Eljay's Books. it even beats out the one Mandy, Victor, Collier, and I found in New Orleans. it was very library-like and dark, but just thousands of books, and the owner was blaring this great bluegrass music and singing along with it at the top of his lungs (she was the prettiest girl i ever saw/ down in the Arkansas!), which just made me beam from ear to ear for a couple of reasons. i had to buy something from this guy, so i bought an Annie Proulx novel called Postcards, and a collection of Andre dubus short stories that everyone in the world has read except for me. both for only about 8 bucks.

i also did the Dusquene (prounounced "duh-keen") Incline today. i went into the ticket booth, run by this fiery-red haired middle-aged woman who was one of the sweetest ladies i ever met. when i walked in, she said, "just you, are you alone?" i said "Yes," and she replied, "well, you're not alone, but by yourself." i almost cried. it was maybe the most thoughtful thing a stranger has ever said to me. and precisely what i needed to hear.

so i spent a lot of time on the South Side, mostly, today, but also did the Strip, which was incredibly boring. but my feet were aching, and i was really hot and tired. i stopped in this very trendy bar (think 6th St) called dejAVu ("Meet. Dance. Socialize." is their motto) to have a beer and just relax my feet, which are absoultely killing me at the moment. i got my beer from the bar and walked away, totally forgetting to pay for it. after i'd sat down a few minutes, i realized and got back up to go pay for it, and the bartender, some cute-ish sorority-looking girl was all, "i was wondering about that. i was keeping an eye on you." it made me feel sort of shitty, but she grinned at me as she said it, to let me know that she knew i wouldn't walk away. some 60's song was playing on the jukebox, and this guy she was talking to turned around and asked me if i knew who sang it. i said no, and the girl said, "too bad, because you'd be a lot cooler if you did." i said, "i never claimed to be cool." they both laughed. as my card was going through, the girl went to check on the artist of the song and came back and said it was some group called Jive Five. then i said, "now i'm cool because i didn't know." both of them thought that was hysterical.

i can honestly say that Pittsburghers (chuckle) seem to be very nice people. i haven't had one bad experience with anyone. on the contrary, it seems everyone has gone out of their way to be helpful and accomodating. last night as i was taking the bus home, i was the last person on it, and the bus driver even went several blocks out of his way to drop me off closer to the bridge, so i wouldn't have to walk as far downtown since it was getting dark. it was the end of his route, and he just did it to be nice. i thought that was incredibly sweet.

one thing i've learned about traveling alone is that it forces you to interact with your environment in a much more direct way than traveling with someone else does. you have to talk to people, and rely on strangers for advice, or directions, or just to be kind. it also makes you much more observant, i think, of what's going on around you, and where you are, than you might otherwise be. it almost makes you more porous, i think (is that the correct word?), of your environment. since you have to be more alert, and figure everything out on your own, and be more trusting of your instincts, you get more of an honest feel of things. i'm really glad i took this trip. i'm ready to get home, and i think i've done about all i can do here, but i don't regret coming at all. Pittsburgh is quiet, it seems. just sort of laidback, unpretentious, not much going on. it feels more southern than northern to me. and it's reminded me a lot of Austin, but just doesn't measure up. that's the best thing about traveling: if you love where you come from, which i do, traveling gives you a renewed love and appreciation for your home. i can't wait to get back to Texas.

one whole day in Pittsburgh, and still no sign of Jordan Catalano

i'm so tired right now, i don't even know where to start. i've also about written myself out, having hand-written almost 10 pages in my journal since yesterday afternoon. but i'll fill in the big stuff.

trouble started in dallas. my 5:35 flight out didn't end up taking off until almost 8:00, b/c some part had to replaced in the cockpit. this is the second time i've flown with American Airlines and my flight has been messed up. V, can you do anything about this? so i get into Pittsburgh around midnight, and after a 25 minute, and $40 cab ride later, arrive at my hotel, not in the nicest part of town. it's not bad, but a block away are a bunch of empty, broken-windowed, Brownstone-type buildings that loom pretty large and black and sketchy at night. but it's fine. the hotel itself is beautiful. and creepy as hell. but beautiful. it's a huge, old, Victorian mansion, 3 floors, with mile-long hallways straight out of The Shining. it also appears to be totally empty except for me. and i'm on the 3rd floor, right in the middle of one of the gushing-blood, ghost-twin-infested hallways. if i see any little toddlers with bad bowl-cuts riding a tricycle down the hall, i'm so outta here. or if i see Jack Nicholson. that's just scary, regardless. the only sign i've seen so far of any other occupants was one woman in the dining room at breakfast this morning. i also noticed tonight when i was walking home that my hotel is right off of Lacock Street. i actually laughed out loud to myself in the dark, abandoned underpass i was walking through. and i tried to take a picture, but it was too dark. then i scurried away so i wouldn't get mugged and shot for the $20 in my wallet. perhaps tomorrow i'll get a picture.

i can't sleep to save my life, so i don't end up passing out until almost 4, and i have an 8:00 wake-up call, b/c they stop serving free breakfast at 9. and even the 4 hours i have are fitful, and fraught with disturbing dreams about the hotel itself. weird men in loincloths in the fetal position are scattered everywhere, and i'm stepping over them, and i vaguely understand it's some weird sexual thing, but i have no idea what, and i'm totally creeped out, then one of them grabs my ankle and laughs and i wake up, my heart racing. i also read Kafka on the entire plane ride up here, and found it totally engrossing, but appalling. i think that's what inspired the dream. so i have a hearty, complimentary breakfast, and set out to see Pittsburgh. i walk across the 9th street bridge into downtown and immediately get totally lost. well, not lost, exactly, but displaced. and my heart is sinking. the downtown of this city is totally dead. it's worse than Dallas, I think. so after about 3 hours of wandering around, i finally end up in Oakland, on the East Side, where UP and Carnegie Mellon are.

after this, not much happens. i visit the Carnegie Museum, which is lovely, poop in the UP library, have lunch at a really greasy diner, rated #1 in the city, called Pamela's Restaurant, where i'm waited on by a charming young woman who reminds me strongly of a black version of Collier. i walk all over Squirrel Hill, which is the main residential neighborhood of Oakland (think Hyde Park with lots more hills and shops), where i pass a lovely bookstore's windows and get really excited, b/c i've been trying to find "Brokeback Mountain" by Annie Proulx and can't anywhere, then get supremely pissed off when i realize I'm drooling over a Barnes & Noble. i was so irrationally angry about it, you have no idea. but luckily, a block away, there's a new, modern library with totally glass front walls looking out onto the street. i decide to kill some time in the library, find the book "Brokeback Mountain" is in, read it, then want to die. how can a 40-page short story encompass 2 men's entire lives and be so fucking devastating?!? i'm now VERY excited to see the movie.

anyway, there's still lots i didn't get to today. but i did actually navigate the bus system and land myself back downtown, so i didn't have to walk the 87 miles back, about which i was very proud of myself. i went to the Andy Warhol museum, which i liked a lot. i've never been a big fan of his before, but i think i have a new appreciation for him now. i bought a magnet with a picture of a very yound and striking Dennis Hopper wearing a cowboy hat on it. it's from a painting Warhol did of him. i was back at my hotel by 8:30, where i could barely even stand up in the shower, my legs hurt so bad from walking, so i didn't. i showered sitting down.

tomorrow there are 2 more neigborhoods i want to explore, and i want to do the Incline. then i think i'll be done, and ready to go. which is good, b/c i have to leave the day after that.

Pittsburgh is lovely, but honestly, i'm not charmed by it like i thought i would be. it doesn't seem to have a whole lot of character; it just seems sort of plopped down amid these majestic, beautiful hills, and that's the only reason anyone pays any attention to it. Austin is much more charming, though the people here have been extraordinarily friendly and kind. i was even smiled at on the street 3 separate times today by total strangers. and all 3 of them were cute girls. it's really too bad i'm not straight sometimes.

Proof

i'm watching Gwyneth Paltrow on Letterman. she seems very nice. i like her. they're playing a clip from her new film Proof. collier mentioned the other night that she saw the play a few years ago on Broadway, and didn't remember caring for it too much.

anyway, i have no idea why i'm writing about that. tomorrow i leave for Pittsburgh. i'm excited, but admittedly, a bit nervous. i tried calling Mitchell earlier this evening (the guy from Friendster), but the calls weren't going through, so i sent him an email. i hope i hear from him; i'm excited to meet him, but i guess even if i don't, it will more closely fulfill the mission of this trip, which is to be alone. i plan on using it to light a writing fire underneath me. i started a new journal tonight, separate from this blog, just for myself. i'm feeling a lot better these days; stronger, more able to stand on my own, and that i can really plan for my future as a wholely sole entity. i have some new, fun plans, things i've let lie dormant for years, that are again rearing their demanding heads. we'll see how it all goes. but i feel very hopeful. i guess i'm still very sad and regretful about a lot of things, but that's life. the sooner you realize that most things just probably aren't going to go your way (or at the very least, as you planned them), i think the easier it is to just let go, and let life do with you what it will. which is not to say you can't plan for your future, or manipulate the outcome, but invariably things are going to get skewed and go in unplanned directions. which is the way it should be, i suppose. how boring would life be if everything went exactly as we anticipated and there were no surprises? pretty boring, i would presume.

all right. hopefully i'll get some time to put up a couple of posts while i'm gone, but if i don't, i guess that's also good, because it means i'm having fun, or at least keeping myself occupied.

oh, and i found out yesterday that Pittsburgh does, in fact, have an H&M, about which i am so excited, words can't even do it justice.

i was happy to hear you remembered the view

as previously stated, friday night was insane. it all feels like a giant blur, but involves calling mark on his cell phone (twice) demanding to know why he wasn't doing with his life what he really wants to be doing, making meredith cry (in a good way), pissing in an alley, and passing along "helpful" information to one collier about her "ex," which i relayed again on saturday, and had absolutely no recollection of telling her on friday. it's the first time, honestly, that i can remember being so drunk that i didn't remember a lot about the night before, and was vaguley cathartic, even though it resulted in waking up at 7:00 on saturday morning, still drunk, and having the kinds of cramps that left me writhing naked on my bathroom floor, my intestines feeling like they were being twisted in some kind of medieval torture device. still don't know what that was all about.....

i caught 2 movies on saturday (9 Songs, which i loved, and broke my heart, and Broken Flowers, which i liked a lot, but left me wanting a bit more) with collier and karen, after which we went back to my house and each took a Xanax with a glass of red wine. i remember nothing after that, except waking up about 10 hours later in my bed, collier curled up next to me, and karen passed out on the couch. but we all agreed it was a much-needed respite from the collective agony going on in our heads.

sunday was Krouse Springs, lovely as usual, but the day being overcast like it was, made it much less fun than it could have been. Elysium sunday night, which was great until i ran into some of Joe's friends outside, with whom i did the perfunctory, "how are you?" "fine, thanks," blah blah blah. the topic of joe was conspicously avoided, and it ruined my whole night.

BBQ at the house yesterday. i was really looking forward to it, and delighted that so many of my nearest and dearest showed up, but for one of the first times in my life, the crowd was a bit overwhelming to me. i kept finding excuses to go inside and do dishes, or prepare a root beer float for someone, or go to the bathroom. it's not that i didn't want to talk to anyone, it just made me feel overtly anxious and unsettled. it was sad, actually, as i've always taken so much comfort in socializing, and just being surrounded by people that i love, even if nothing particularly interesting was going on. but all i really wanted was to be alone, and i can't quite explain what it was, exactly, that was happening to me. so many things are changing, and i have so many conflicting feelings about everything that's not only going on in my life, but in the lives by which i'm surrounded, and sometimes it just feels like it's all too much, and my head is going to explode, or i need to stand outside and scream or something. i think some of it has to do with the ways in which certain people that i've known and been close to for years, are subtly, but noticeably, shifting in weird ways, and slowly becoming somewhat unrecognizable to me. i know it's very common for people in romantic relationships to each grow in opposite directions, and even "outgrow" their need for each other, but this isn't supposed to happen with friends. maybe i'm overanalyzing it all, or just scared of the future in general and what it holds for me, but i feel at times that it takes so much more effort than it used to to feel close to certain people. it's no one's fault, and it's not necessarily a bad thing, just the nature of humanity, but it's terrifying, and i hope i'm only imagining it.

i know this is all very uneloguent and boring, but i just can't seem to come up with the correct words, or anything horribly profound to say about any of it. i feel like i'm in a fog still this morning, and just floating along, tuning out everything around me. i don't think my body has yet recovered from the abuse i put it through this weekend, maybe. i don't know. anyway, i'm really looking forward to going to Pittsburgh this weekend and getting the fuck out of town for 3 days.

i also watched the season finale of season 4 of Six Feet Under and cried my eyes out. god damn, i love that show.

oh, Danny Boy

if you're ever me, never, ever, ever drink 3 whiskeys right in a row at club DeVille.

seriously.

Loss

admittedly, i've always been a little bit obsessed with natural disasters and extreme weather. when i was a kid, i would read all kinds of books and watch all kinds of TV specials about tornadoes and earthquakes, always completely riveted by the drama unfolding, and the humbling power of nature over man. no matter how sophisticated we get technologically, it's still no match for the destructive power of Mother Nature.

when Katrina first started blowing in, i was pretty excited, i have to say. i kept my ear to the radio and my eyes on the TV, watching literally hours of footage. i watched live as the storm was passing over New Orleans and the roof was being ripped of the Super Bowl, with thousands of people inside. my heart raced like I was watching the latest Michael Bay or Jerry Bruckheimer thriller, only this was real, and unfolding immediately before me, no one sure of what the outcome would be.

for a day or so, it seemed the disaster wouldn't be so bad, and then the levees in New Orleans broke, it came to light that Biloxi, and Mobile, and multiple smaller towns were completely wiped out, leaving hundreds and thousands of people homeless, displaced and with nothing.

now, watching the apocalyptic level of choas, violence and misery that is unfolding in New Orleans is beyond terrifying. it's a level of horror on par with some of the most cynical science fiction, and it's all real. my feeling of fascination and excitement has been replaced with dread and overwhelming sadness. i cried a little this morning watching Good Morning America as reports of looting, violence and rape were carried over the wires. helicopters rescuing people from the diseased and oil-soaked water were being shot at, as were officers trying to help people. people have been savagely murdered and the suffering there is completely unfathomable. it's heartbreaking. there's no other more eloquent or poetic way to put it.

my friend megan, with whom i've been friends since high school, only this past summer moved from Biloxi to Memphis for a new job. i've been thinking about her non-stop this week, and how thankful I am that she is no longer there. but mandy told me this morning that megan hasn't heard from any of her friends or colleagues there, and she's terrified that they all stayed at the news station (megan is a news producer) to cover the storm. that hadn't occurred to me. but i'm really thinking about you megan, and praying that everyone's okay.

i've been thinking so much about loss lately. it seems that several people in my life have suffered an extraordinary amount of it this summer, from the breakup of relationships, to the deaths of friends, sometimes multiple ones in a short span of time. it's incredible to me how people just keep moving on, and no matter what happens or who you are, tragedy is always going to touch your life, and there's absolutely nothing you can do to stop it. the people i know and love are all so strong and so inspiring, and hearing what some of them are dealing with right now makes me feel almost ashamed at my little heartbreaks. i have been incredibly blessed and i'm so grateful for all of it.