to-do list

it has been five days since i touched wet clay, four or so months since i have seen my best friend, six weeks since i have opened my economics text, and about a week since my last adventure. looks like i have some catching up to do today.

we play dress up and pretend it is fancy sunday

hey, guess what? i miss you!

Dear ____,

I got caught cheating on a test today. Except I wasn't cheating. I was writing a letter for you and staring out the window. The ripped up paper hurt, but not as much as the embarrassment. For a minute my cheeks burned red and tears came to my eyes. But then I stood up, and took the steps to get out of the door. I shook my head to dislodge the panic and bewilderment and told myself to forget it. Too late now, and it only stings worse if I brood.

Dear ____,

You would love to be on this bus right now. As far as crowds go, this one seems like a pretty normal bunch (at least compared to the 35 bus). But both you and I know about the secret worlds and secret ideas and secret doings of the general public that go on... mostly in our imaginations.

The guy with black whiskers and dirty cap is a familiar face by now. Did you know that he wore a bright purple, chin-length wig last tuesday, the day it rained 12 inches? you would have been able to think up some great stories about that one. I bet you'd have even had the courage to ask him about it. I consider asking him now, but seeing as he is wigless today, i feel the moment has passed.

"Hey Mary." pause... "It's Jose." he says to the older woman buried in her carpetbag.

she nods.

"I've been making a lot of artwork lately. But I sold it all."

"Oh, that's nice." intones Mary.

And it is nice! Part of the mystery of purple wig man is uncovered.

Jose crosses his leg to reveal black and purple striped women's stockings. The same color as his wig. The same color as the scarf I am wearing... now his bus stop stares toward me make sense.

"I'm broke." says Jose.

"mhmm." Mary, you bitch. Pay attention to him!

she scans her copy of the Santa Cruz Sentinel.

"Look, want these coupons?" she lifts the colored insert out of the paper.

Jose takes it dutifully, but throws the trash she handed him aside when she goes back to her article about striking nurses.

"All I have right now is colored pencils." He laughs. "Should sue that bitch to get some art supplies."

Mary moves to another seat, and Jose is gone at the next stop.

and mike doughty zips down the hill! he is only a blur of color now.

i will get my bicycle helmet, thick jacket, those knee pads my dad uses when he gardens, and the cardboard i keep under my mattress. i will knock on his door (someone's door)- grab his hand, wake him up, bring him in to the cold night air. i will drive out, in to those deep hills. drive out of the coast, away from the forest. drive out until we find the place the fog lifts, the trees stop growing, the people stop visiting.

when we find the tallest hill, i will stop the car. we will hike to the top, and stare out- we can see the whole world. he takes his cardboard, and i take mine. helmets click closed. jackets and pads are put in to place. our eyes close, because you can't look down at this point. you just can't.

i whisper 1,2,3. he makes the sign of the cross. and we push off!

i want to find someone i can adventure with. we don't have to be anywhere special, really. we just have to promise each other not to ask "why?" and not to say no.

he says that the answers don't come with age. they just don't come.

i don't understand the pseudo european architecture around here, i don't understand why people want to turns themselves into cartoons, and i don't understand why every guy over the age of fifteen cannot hold a conversation with me without asking if i like fucking, or if i want him to suck my titties.

i don't understand why i feel so lonely, i don't understand why i can't understand anything, i don't understand why every winter i feel so so sad, and i most certainly do not understand the nightmares that keep me awake for weeks and weeks.

i need help.

destiny delivered to my spam folder

i open up my spam folder to find an email from superiorfakedegrees: "we specialize in realistic, novelty degrees! we customize!"

my problems are solved! now, i am not only a high school graduate, i am a college grad!!! i'll leave this town under an assumed name, bourne identity style, and become who i want to be. i'll hit the road, man. get a job in each city i go to, stay for a year or so, and move on. when i am tired of so much train travel and alone time and meeting strangers (i know, it doesn't seem possible to get tired of such things) i will settle down and use some money i have saved to establish a ceramics studio. i will sell my my plates and bowls and cups and urns, and when i have the time and extra money, i will work on my sculptures. i will paint all of them in such dizzyingly bright colors, and they will hold scenes from my travels; the empty bus stations, the empty wallet, the empty heart.

the phone rings, dinner is burning, the dog is barking, and my finger moves to the "delete" button. another fantasy dashed away...

spot mystery

felton

in this town

it often seems

as if

there is no middle ground

everyone teased him about those socks

" do you love me? check 'yes' or 'no'."

Cree, the boy with the purple socks. my first grade first love.

of course, my answer was yes. it still is, even though he lives in far-off canada now.

a boring story

snuck out of my house and down to the cemetery to see him. this is the second time i'll be moaning and panting in the backseat of his shitty car in the last week. the gravestones lay their long stare straight towards us. i like to think the owners of the graves would have approved. their ghostly presence is cheering us on! whispering hints, thinking of a time when they could have snuck away and done it in the backseat.

afterwards, he takes the four AAA batteries, semi cold coke, and twenty dollars in gas money i brought for him. he plays with his phone, picking songs and telling me stories about his frat boy days, long gone now, even though he would only be a sophomore in college. the way he talks about it all, the way he laughs at his own stories, just cracks up, makes me sad. he tells me all of this, and i don't believe he thinks he will ever find happiness like that again. and maybe he won't. maybe if you live the way he did, just trying everything at once, and so early, that nothing else feels so exciting and fresh as it did that first time. maybe there is something to be said for living an average and unremarkable life. at least that way life still has the ability to surprise you in small ways, when you least expect it.

anyways, i'm not serious about him. i just get such a sad vibe off of him, no matter how much he laughs. i never know what to say around him. it seems like every time i do speak more than a few words at once, he gets annoyed. starts to look away, drops my hand. i don't understand him. not at all. but for these late, secret, cemetery nights, i don't have to.

thought experiments 1 and 3

my bus ride is the best part of my week. "her antidepressants make her... bilingual." blending conversations and distorting context is the best! so is eavesdropping! lately i have been making maps of where people sit. boy who color-coordinates his shirt and shoes always sits as near to the front as possible, on the driver's side. old woman who can barely walk usually makes the long and treacherous trek up the stairs to the back of the bus, no matter how many people offer up their seats on the way. then there is boy who i am in love with. he has dark, almost black hair and thick whiskers and primary colored t shirts. stunningly handsome, and plain too. his left arm is broken and in a sling, and he always gets on the bus after i do, and off before i make it to school. those ten minutes trying to avoid awkward stares and obvious seat changes are usually the highlight of my day. i relish everyday social anxiety! why fight it? i have yet to talk to this boy, but this way i can imagine that he is the type that reads books and wants to discuss them after making love... in heaven.

my experiment for this week: make a map of my bus ride based on the words i can see from a middle, right side seat. my plan is to record times and locations for all the words i see out the window. i did some field work last week and came up with: carpet king gross road cruz car wash photo enforced lane ends merge left live oak senior center coffeetopia mohler+sons vacuum no soliciting speed limit 35 alzheimer's association pleasure point bagelry labor ready temporary labor star of siam thai cuisine remodel units available valero corner store ATM cash cash cash liquor old republic tire co. organic jesus don't walk tenga cuidado con escalon big basin next exit time to shop free solar yes we can la madrona drive data distributing sewage emergency marlboro safety belt law enforced thrift center yo la tengo open 24 hours, and a hundred other beautiful words.

no ticket necessary

maybe tomorrow i will wake up to find air rushing past my face, so i can't open my eyes without tearing up. something won't feel right- too cold, too loud, too fast, too much. and what is supporting my body? i rumble, i shake, i need to throw up! gravel and metal and wood pass below me. above is hard black steel, warm to the touch, and i feel like i am flying.

at my favorite park in childhood, there was a huge section of a train there, just laying next to the slide, for all of the kids to climb on. i would crawl underneath it, wedging my body between the metal slats that lined the bottom of the train's cold and lifeless body. i would whistle my hobo tune and imagine what it would feel like to travel this way- better than any family car trip, that's for sure.

part of me still loves that fantasy- the grit and grime and freedom. it's such a romantic idea- such an american fantasy. travel by train, sing the blues, and smile at everyone you meet.

music wednesdays

I haven't heard his voice in months. To be perfectly honest, the last time he called, he didn't sound like he used to. I'm starting to believe that he has been killed and replaced by a far inferior version of himself, full of excuses and lies and drained of love.

The songs I send him weekly convey a subtle, almost subliminal theme to him: "A letter in your writing doesn't mean you're not dead." sings Frank Black. The words "now you're all gone/ got your make-up on/ and you're not coming back" can barely be deciphered in "Anthems For a 17 Year Old Girl," but they're there...

Then there is the guilt. The guilt, the guilt. Shit! "Everybody knows the reason for the fall, when woman tempted man down in paradise's hall. This woman tempted me, oh yes, and she took me for a ride. But like the weary fox, I need a place to hide." I took all the love that poor boy could give me and left him there like a fox on the run. I can't help but think that I was the reason that he was unhappy here; I was the reason he left the country. Now he's stuck in a place he hates, with little hope of ever leaving, and I feel like I ruined his life.

I write him every week, sometimes two or three times a week, depending on my level of desperation. He writes back, sometimes. The ecstasy I feel seeing his name in my inbox is quickly quashed when I see that he's written two sentences to me, about nothing in particular. I forget why I even liked him, but I still can't let go.

He almost just hung up the phone the first time we talked, when I told him my age. I wish he had! I wish I had never met him! I wish... I wish I could forget.

first post

This is my first ever post on Blogger, but by no means is it my first ever blog post. I've tried them all- Livejournal, Tumblr, etc... But the major problem with all the other sites that I have tried is that I had readers. The more people who read my blog, the more self conscious and contrived my posts became, until I felt I had to move on.

So why not just keep a private journal? Because for me, journaling makes me feel like a lunatic- after all, I am just talking to myself. It makes me feel so alone to write in a diary.

So this is why I am now on Blogger. Because here, at least for now, it is possible that I can write my private thoughts for an imaginary audience of imaginary readers... which I suppose in the end is even odder than talking to myself, but something about it feels right to me.