june 9, 2004 / trip aces.

so as it turns out, i might still have something to say after all. it's four thirty-something in the morning, and i just lost twenty bucks in two hands of texas hold 'em. i held my own. but i just didn't hold enough. and now it all comes down to the real life hand, and i'm sexually inadequate and a raging insomniac. i wish life was like four years ago. and. --i take that back-- i wish life was like a real LIFE. something going. something visible. because it all comes down to "how many did you have?" and it all ends up with "i wish there were something here." wishes. something like fifteen months ago, i was describing the view from rock bottom. i'm happy to inform you that i've crawled my way out of there. because i'm in love. el oh vee ee. he's right for me. it works. he's sleeping in the other room. alone. but that's a different story. come to think of it, i was in love fifteen months ago. el oh vee ee. and when it comes to the familiarity of strangers, i'd take this a hundred times over. my cryptography is rusty, so here's twenty-four for you. nothing ventured. nothing gained. because there's nothing to venture, and absolutely nothing to gain. i'm just chasing a muse that has long since forgotten me. wondering what i gave up to be where i am. i know it's better. but i miss ... something.

and, truthfully ... as it turns out, i really have nothing to say.

m

march 11, 2003 / feels like a blue moon is coming on soon.

it's sort of weird, the way i went from eighteen to twenty-three in a proverbial heartbeat. it's weird that this heart beats at all anymore. it's safe to say that this girl knows what the view is like from rock bottom. in this world that means nightmares and blackouts and suicide letters. i never actually penned one, but i wrote them in my head all the time. but. he is my grappling hook, and i'm willing the rocks away. i just never really knew how many rocks there would be at the bottom. oh. and this one's got your name on it. it almost sort of looks like you. i've got fifty one days until the next chapter officially starts, and a gut feeling that no one is reading this novel anymore. so here's mud in your eye. like that night it all fell apart. and here's more for good measure. like those times it all comes back together, however briefly that lasts. here's all of my exes, and most of my ohs. here's where it all starts to get good.

-m.

january 7, 2003 / my not-so-happy medium

front seat of my car. driver's side, as usual. engine's running and i'm waiting. watching ice melt and drip down the windshield. each drop follows the same path. the heater's working as hard as it can. everything is familiar. nothing makes much sense. an old cassette is playing but the sound is muffled from age and neglect. i still know every word, but i'm just a stranger in my past now. i mouth the lyrics in a vain attempt to distract me from my bad mood. but there are no real distractions, as this mood has become quite permanent. like the rut my life is in. like the gloom of this winter. like the hole in my heart.

it's dark because my headlights aren't on, and the heat is making me feel a bit queasy. i've been waiting for a lifetime, but then again, this is what i do. for the first time in a very long time, i consider my so-called future. it's only loneliness in front of me. because i. can't. trust. said lack of trust makes me mean and makes me older than i am. it makes me angry all the time. it's no one in particular and it's everyone all at once. they wander around with all of their happiness while i'm on my knees searching for fragments of mine. even when i find them, i'm almost wary of putting them together because i know. i know. i know how quickly it can all just fall apart again. i am gloom. and i am doom. and my glass is half-empty all the time. and there's always something missing. nowadays i'm pretty sure that it's a part of me. i am unable to concentrate on the here and now because i'm too wrapped up in how bleak tomorrow looks...

(i can't figure out if it's devastation or desperation. i can't tie up my loose ends. i can't lie about the degree of this depression. and all of this is winding around everything else. it's intricate. like braiding and weaving. and it seems to me like the whole thing is starting to resemble a noose).

i stare at snow-covered christmas lights days after christmas and my eyes forget to blink. the ice is still melting, but it's not disappearing. as soon as it melts it all freezes again. i wipe my eyes, but i'm not crying. because i'm not feeling much of anything these days. january eats me alive. it's a new year and a new chance for new heartbreak and pain.

once again ... everything. comes. undone.

-m