April 25th Journal Project

I’m thinking of quitting my job. Yes, again. This is the eighth or so position that I have held in the past four years. I was on the incline for a while, but now I’m definitely on the decline. I can’t teach kids. Especially now that I have a new pet that needs food. This salary is just not good enough. I need something substantial—something kind of full time. I’m 24 years old, and I have crawled back into my shell after three years of complete financial independence. What is wrong with me?

I need to lose weight, for sure. Maybe that’s part of the problem. How am I supposed to get myself hyped up and ready to go when I’m thirty pounds heavier? I wish my boobs would melt away first. Men expect you to be cute when you have them—not smart. Maybe that’s my problem. I have encountered too many people who get a fixed idea of who I am by my appearance. That makes sense—especially now that I am a complete recluse. Stop looking at me like that, creep-ball—I quit and will threaten you by hiding out in my room with large chunks of brie cheese.

Well, maybe it’s not completely like that. I spend a lot of time on the phone. I also saw an old friend last week. We got lunch, drinks, and coffee. I liked the drinks better than the rest of it. I forgot how much I like drinks. I think I should be sedated from now on to make me dumb enough to tolerate the men that I end up working for. I remember this girl from college who was thirty something who would carry around a flask everywhere she went. I don’t think I could go so far… but maybe someday, when I realize all my dreams have been derailed by people preventing me from achieving them in a deliberate attempt to be as douche-baggy as possible… It could happen. This isn’t a future foretold or anything. I just know my reality more than you do, Boss. Don’t try to tell me it’s like this when everything in my being says it’s like that. Do you have my eyes? Are you in my skin? Do you have a pair of my shoes on? No. I do. Notice that I said “I.” When I say something, listen carefully. I’m not trying to hypnotize you with my voice in order to make you look at my chest. My mouth does not open up and spew magically cute things all of the time either. No, I’m not a lesbian because my brow is contorted rather seriously. There are times when the world doesn’t revolve around you-YOU-you. Go star in a porno! I intend to keep my blouse and my mind on.

I haven’t been able to sleep since I found out one of my closest friends may have raped someone. I thought I trusted and loved him. Now, I’m hearing that he raped his ex-girlfriend and caused her so much pain she had to be hospitalized. I need to talk with him but I don’t know how. I’m afraid of the confrontation but I’m more afraid of silence.

I didn’t want to sleep in my own bed, or really be in my room, but by 2 or 3 this morning that is where I forced myself to fall asleep. Had dreams about being in love with that kid at school who I can barely stand and being held hostage in a really deep and narrow sand hole on the beach. Now I am just listening to music and waiting for class. Damn I am gonna be late again.

I hate when I talk too much in class because it ends up making me feel smarter than I am.

Saw M today and forgot that I shouldn’t get excited (but I wouldn’t mind if he would show up around my room, I am sure we could think up some way to entertain ourselves). It drives me nuts that everyone knows M. He’s such an awesome kinda guy, and damn sexy too. I hate sharing, not that it is really applicable in this case, since sharing implies some kind of ownership. Someone talking on a cell phone today said that New College would be a great place to live if you were a lawn mower.

Went home with L, it’s her sis’ bday tomorrow. We had a fun car ride, I love hearing people laugh, it is such a great noise. Dinner with her family was pleasant, talked a little politics, but nothing serious. I forgot to thank them for dinner because we were in such a rush to leave. I almost wanted them to notice us playing footsies under the table. I wonder if I should talk to M about this. I don’t necessarily feel like I have to, but it does bother my conscience to think I may be hurting him (all from a little game).

We saw a strange clown musical that L’s friends were in. It reminded me of my high school days in a nice sorta way—a real rarity. It was nice to have such a chill sorta day, and I am glad to get away from school, there is too much stress in that place. Ahh! Me and L are gonna crash on her bed with a movie (and yes we are going to watch it, don’t even go there). Gotta go!

I woke up incredibly tired Friday morning. I was averaging a little over 5 hours sleep a night this week. I also didn’t eat on Thursday, as part of a voluntary fast to smooth over my divine relations with Apollo. (We make good adversaries, but I have more important people to contend with.) Wasn’t very hungry in the morning, so just planned on waiting until lunch (11 am). Woke up at 7 as normal, showered, and walked to work. Checked my email and other online addictions. Took my morning break and walked down to the bay as usual. It was a wonderfully windy day. Came back and killed a few minutes before heading off for lunch at the cafeteria. My Love had brought us lunch, and we ate it while she tried to sell the last t-shirts from Fetish Ball. We were both tired silly, so we sat about making very little sense, and amusing the student body in general. I got a brief glimpse of my heart’s current pursuit, and pointed her out to my Love, as Love had thought she had seen her earlier. Love had been incorrect. Returned to work, and pulled myself through the day, typing manically or not tracking well, and staring blankly. Grabbed a Bawls on my way home, to give me the energy to play soccer. Went home, changed for soccer, and went to the field. Got there early and warmed up with the other early birds. Got hyped up for my first “real” soccer game. We played relatively well, and tied 5-5, one of which was a point I scored (made me proud). After soccer I had intended on going to a pool party, but instead passed out for a couple of hours. Woke up around 10 and went over to check on the new role-playing group I am joining. Cased them real quickly, but was too tired to really interact with anyone. Got the itch to walk around, so I did. I checked in on Love, but she was cramming last minute homework, and couldn’t be sociable. Hung out waiting for the Sexiest Man competition to start. Once it got going, I went down to the bay again to grab Jacaranda and roses to place on my Heart’s pursuit’s balcony, while she was busy watching sexy men. Got distracted, and read a friends fantasy-psychedelic-shaman quest story. Gave her a thorough critique of it, and returned to the Man Contest to watch my friends compete and listen to the lusty ladies. It was fun. After it was done, I got to send Heart’s Pursuit to bed, with a moment of weighted pause. I then went looking for chalk, to tell her to look for the flowers. Found it, left the note, and went home, where Love had just finished her homework. We crashed.

I almost got hit by a car on my way home from the light rail station. I wasn’t even jaywalking this time. The light was green and the Walk sign was lit, and a stream of cars making left turns came barreling in my direction. I got out of the way of a small red car before nearly being hit by a large, silver SUV. I yelled, ‘HEY!’ and waved my arms and ran to avoid a collision. If I hadn’t run, I would have gotten hit. It shook me up a little. I don’t even know if the driver saw or heard me. It’s times like these when I wish I carried an air horn with me, strictly for using during pedestrian violations. I’d use it to avoid getting hit by a car, and I’d use it to enforce the right of way that we pedestrians have. I would likely use it every time I walk past the Shabelle grocery store near my house, because no one who exits that place understands or cares that the exit to the street is also a sidewalk, which is something that people walk on, people who don’t appreciate having to always walk around cars. Sidewalks are for people, not cars. I’d use it on the drivers of those cars. They would get it eventually, at least I dearly hope so, or else their hearing would slowly deteriorate.

Besides an air horn, I also have visions of walking on top of the front bumpers of cars who are sitting in the crosswalk, instead of simply walking around them. It would be a real literalist, stickler thing to do. ‘Well, this is the crosswalk, and I’m a pedestrian, so here I go walking through, over, and above this crosswalk! It’s unusually hilly today!’ I can imagine that half the time I’d get the drivers to honk their horns, and the other half would probably be in too much of a daze or in too great a state of shock to notice. And then there’d be one person out of a hundred who would laugh. Those are my people. Unfortunately I don’t have nearly strong enough thighs to walk on top of the front ends of cars, nor do I have large enough balls. Instead, I get out of the way of idiot drivers, and I walk around cars, and I bitch about it to myself and think of scenarios like these in order to entertain myself.

J played Midnite Vultures by Beck at work today, and when the song Mixed Bizness came on, I prepared to become uncomfortable. I’ve had that album nearly since it came out, and in that entire time, the line ‘Freaks flock together and make all the lesbians scream,’ has always made me ’shift uneasily,’ as many fiction books say. It always makes me feel awkward, and it always has, and only in the past four years have I had any inkling that I might not be entirely straight, much less anti-straight. Something about the word ‘lesbian’ really throws me for an uneasy loop. I’m working on it in therapy, though. J knows I have a girlfriend, so I expected him to say something about that when that particular lyric was sung, but he didn’t, because he’s a better person than I think he is; because he’s professional sometimes, when he needs to be, when he wants to be. He pleasantly surprises me more often than not. I haven’t told M that I have a girlfriend yet, probably because it hasn’t come up naturally in conversation; he’s my favorite co-worker though, which is what’s interesting about it. I’d think that he would have been the first person I told, well, second to Juice, but I haven’t told M yet, and I’ve been working there for over six months. I’ll just have to see if it ever comes up and if I feel like mentioning it.

I wonder if I’ll ever find a girlfriend who I am sure that I am in love with, or a girlfriend that I will be almost totally satisfied with. I know it’s unrealistic to expect to be completely satisfied with someone. Everyone has her faults; I wonder if I’ll find a girl whose faults don’t greatly outweigh her assets. I wonder if maybe my thinking or my point of view is faulty. She didn’t know that I have always wanted to be a writer, after two years together, and that really surprised me. So whose fault is that? Hers for not remembering, or mine for not mentioning it (enough)? I mean, that’s a pretty important detail about myself, I’d say. I know I have a tendency to keep at least some defense up at all times, but that’s because I have good reasons for doing so. It’s protection. So why don’t I feel safe yet?

The kapok madness continues. All those pod panels I gathered up on Wednesday? They have coalesced into nifty things. Like a pendant with very scrolly designs woodburned into it. I’ve two necklaces done now, but only one with kapok. Acorns were later thrown into the mix. I posted pictures in my gallery.

As for the poem inscribed on kapok pods, I still can’t seem to photograph it in the right light. I’m going to try it on another day…it was a bit overcast this evening. I want to get it near sunset, when the light is all drippy gold. The lighting was right the night before, but I couldn’t get the image sharp and clear enough. I want this to be perfect.

I’m kind of scared. Of being trapped in this little town. What with rising gas prices and a looming halt on my ability to travel, I worry that I’m going to be cut off from the people that I love who live in San Francisco, Tampa, New York. I’m having trouble finding a job here. There is simply more work in cities. I won’t be a terrified little mouse. But I will be a troubled manticore. It’s been at the corner of my mind for a while now, but it blossomed into full-on gloominess today. It wasn’t helped by the other things that happened.

The people who threw the job fair I attended last week sent me a form letter which arrived today. They told me they don’t want me. I am amused and a little sad, though I’d really rather not be in a commission-based sales environment.

And I mailed off the knife today. Finally finished it earlier this week, I am very pleased with the way it came out. B and I both worked on it. 5160 steel from a lawnmower blade, stacked leather handle dyed black, based on the Fairbairn-Sykes design. Brass pommel that we made and cast ourselves. This should have been a more triumphant moment than it was, seeing as this was the first commissioned knife I’d done. But…I brought it to the pack and ship store, and the woman at the counter asked me the contents of the box, as she needed to. I answered, “A handmade knife.” There was a guy who had come up behind me in line. When I was finished and turned to go, he said to the pack and ship worker, “I wouldn’t buy a knife made by a girl.” That moment is hard to match in terms shame, discouragement and hurt—a slap in the face. I went home and I cried. I think this is the only time I’ve ever felt justified in crying (only girls cry, they tell me—tears sizzle when they hit hot metal).

Everything else today seemed kind of dull and faraway after that—a little like a laundry list. I repainted the numbers on my green D&D dice, because the original paint had worn off. Went to retrieve a boot disk for my OS (my computer remains stubbornly dead—damned corruption of necessary files—but here’s to multiple machines in the house). Read some. Wrote some. Wondered if that guy’s sentiments hold true for more than just him, if other people wouldn’t buy knives from me because I happened to have been born with two X chromosomes…all the while thinking to myself with kind of listless sarcasm, “After all, I’m just a girl. Girls apparently don’t forge acceptable knives.”

Eran and I were talking about a new method developed in Israel called “the code.” It was created by a young Israeli and it is supposed to work miracles. The process goes like this: 1. you think of someone close to you who is having difficulties in his or her life 2. you write down anything you can think of that this person is going through 3. you choose the one that appeals to you the most—hits you the most 4. imagine a situation that makes you feel the same way 5. write up a sentence that summarizes this 6. every day until the person receives peace or closure, you are to write this sentence.

I’m not sure just how much I buy this, but I gave it a try and it is supposed to create miracles. The book is in Hebrew, so I will just have to wait a while until I master the language, which should take something like 10 years.

I thought to write up a sentence about my relationship. He is going through so much right now and barely has the strength to keep himself going, let alone me. Instead of getting upset with him, which ultimately doesn’t lead to anything constructive, I thought Eran’s advice came at a good time. So I picked up the pen, wrote a few lines, and as a matter of fact, have to do that again before I go to bed.

Eran just heard that his father has prostate cancer, so he has also been doing the same, in hopes that this act will allow his father the opportunity to not feel that he has to be strong for everyone else—which can only make him weaker. As for myself, I have been thinking a lot about what I want for my own future—apart from having a family of my own—something altogether for myself. I think a life as a photojournalist is the most appealing since it will provide me the freedom I need, although perhaps not a whole lot of stability. I have been blindly going after an MA because I know that if I take anymore time off, I will most likely return to school in my 80s.

Life has taken so many unexpected turns. I only hope in the years to come, I will make some sense of it all.

It’s peculiar how differently journaling functions from talking to a therapist. Because of all of the calculatedly nebulous questions, the real strength of therapy is the fact that you have to acknowledge someone observing your innermost thoughts. It’s not so much how the therapist responds to what you have to say (as far as my experience has gone). Rather, it’s the fact that the presence of someone at “the bedside of your mind” forces you into this situation of having to think of yourself as someone who is witnessed. You’re not the version of yourself that you experience, the one wrapped up in all those normal consequentialist, exceptionalistic modes of thought. You’re not allowed the tacit understanding that your concepts of right/wrong, good/bad, generous/selfish don’t actually apply to you in all of these particular instances. It’s a situation where you have to kind of hear your own words once-removed and take on, towards yourself, the attitude that you might take on in listening to a friend describe their fairly misguided, hurt, confused attitudes towards/opinions on a break-up they just had or something. Anyway, as there’s no legitimate observer of the journal entry, the journal is much different. I had a conversation with Eric once where he asked me why I wanted to start journaling regularly. I told him that I wanted to make sure I wasn’t missing opportunities to refine a day’s half-baked thoughts, thus leaving them vulnerable to decay and/or loss. When I asked him whether he ever had that inclination he said, “No.” Moreover, it seemed like he didn’t particularly understand it. And in a way I understand that non-understanding, because if you’re not really keen to how you’re using the space, it can basically just become this site of extraordinary self-indulgence, rhetorically little different from the type of free-associative (or numbingly repetitive) conversations you might have with yourself when you’re thinking about a particular thing, where you utter your rather adroitly-phrased musings on the thing and lines of bulletproof reasoning are so pleasing to your own ear. It’s kind of the same thing.

Also, I think I allow myself to be more strongly affected by environment than I’d like. For instance, I’d like it if I didn’t kind of check out of social situations just because I’m in some shitty sports bar (or a shitty Chinese buffet) that I find to be aesthetically and/or sonically unpleasant. Simply, I wish that my ability to enjoy a social interaction was impervious to things like the presence of numerous ESPN-tuned television sets and bland corporate color palettes.

Oh, and I realized why Daniel always smells like weed and wears sports coats. In spite of the day’s heat, he wore a corduroy blazer, which I’m pretty sure was simply a comfortable means to conceal his pipe. And I’m fairly certain that the reason he always smells like weed is because he’s constantly just shoved a still-smoldering pipe back into his jacket pocket. According to the story he told tonight he once spent 13 days in jail for having a trunk full of weed because the bail bondsman in this tiny town he happened to be in was out of town on a two-week vacation.

Had to take 3 Tylenol PMs to get to sleep last night because I was so anxious about my Constitutional Law exam. I was right to be anxious, because it was brutal. Four hours of writing. There were two personal-statement type questions that I could have gone to town on had I not been completely exhausted. As it was, I just eked out some nonsense about how there should be more checks and balances on George W’s plenary executive power. Ugh. Then I went and got pretty drunk and smoked a lot of cigarettes, and now my lungs hurt and I’ve used my inhaler about 10 times in the past 2 hours. Went 7 years without smoking and then poof, I’m back in it again. Law school is bad for my health.

It’s the last day of finals week, and I’ve got some grading left, and a paper to write that was due sometime in the spring of 2007. Well. I’ve got this new idea for a campaign/ad-project/whatever wherein people all answer the question: what are you doing to impeach the president? I’d be able to honestly state that I’ve picked-up (barely) juggling in order to impeach the president. When you talk about impeachment, people’s eyes glaze and they doze off. Or, they begin, immediately, to extract their interest and generosity through any number of reflexively-logical justifications. It’s patronizing at least, and civically reprehensible at worst. I don’t know what’s wrong, what should be done, or why; I am just petitioning that it be considered. Now, to be completely honest, that is a lie. I do have ideas on what’s wrong, what should be done, and why; in fact, I’m quite certain that all others, everyone, has similar ideas. And that, given the time, space, and fealty-to-each-other to discuss it openly and democratically, we could come to a consensus on what should be done, and why. That’s why I’ve taken up juggling.