last glass...dusty buckets...parched e-lips...sponge...drip...drop

2003-06-25 - 8:28 a.m.: indigo ink

i read an article yesterday about seahorses--about how they are heading to extinction "because of their monogamous lifestyles"... it made me so sad... and then--to say that they are their own worst enemies?! no. a bunch of monkeys tumbling over ourselves to scoop up dry out and grind up the most fascinating creatures to extinction simply BECAUSE they're fascinating... BECAUSE they're beautiful... WE are their worst enemies. us.

we're so goddamn dumb.

i was also thinking, today, about how long it's been since i've felt scared... even by a dream or movie. things don't shock me anymore. i even tried thinking up all kinds of scenarios... horrible futures... pain-filled deaths... honestly. i can't seem to get over the idea of transition: this might be bad but it will end. this isn't everything. even if i never catch a glimpse of "everything"... the thought of it is enough to make "this thing" look small and insignificant, no matter what it is. on the flip side... it's been a while since i've been really excited about anything. i feel so detached. like i'm in a dream that i know will end soon. like i'm in a dream that i can control. lucid living.

hmmm.

i wanted to say something else, but i forgot what it was.

no i didn't. it's this: i have a very dark side that i very rarely acknowledge, though it affects me in almost everything i do. it is very closely related to my lack of frightenability. i don't know why i think this or what it means, but i know that every single one of my excursions into the land of sanity and normality is accompanied by a slightly annoying, slightly intoxicating tingling of the spine and shoulders. something inside of me WANTS to see perfection fucked up beyond recognition. in a positive or negative direction--i don't really care (and that is why i call it a dark side). if i saw people stricken with awe during the performance of brahms' german requiem i would be moved. if i saw people stricken with horror at the scene of an accident i would be equally moved. maybe more moved. what matters is that i want to see people stricken by something. struck down. made to feel small in the face of something huge and powerful. made to feel that their grocery lists or evening plans or rivalries or jealousies or fashion sense or salaries or obsessions or compulsions are suddenly and immediately irrelevent.

yes, i want to see that in other people. but most of all i want to see it happen to me. i get this sense that my life is too level, too comfortable, too fine and dandy and regular. i want to feel something tearing into it so that i can FEEL it and say "OUCH! i can FEEL my fucking EXISTENCE and i CAN'T THINK ABOUT ANYTHING ELSE BECAUSE IT FEELS SO ___________!" it is this feeling that makes me want to give everything away. to erase my reputation. to embrace everything wrong and rude and disgusting in the world so that i can finally see the difference for myself instead of taking everyone else's word for it all the time. cleanliness might be evil. filth might be the next best thing to holiness. creating a haven for microbes out of the skin of your body? what could be wrong with that? i know... i'm just saying. i feel like there are many more ways to live life than we actually acknowledge and i want to know what they are and how to do them so i feel as though i'm actually living the way i live by choice, and not because it's what i have always been taught.

you know? or am i nuts?

there's a guy at pickup who used to work in the town where i had my first four years of elementary school. he worked at the gumball factory. i think the gumballs had "ford" printed on the sides, in indigo letters... they sold for 10 cents just about everywhere out of little bubble-shaped machines. they were waxy and old-fashioned, and everybody loved them. it made me feel shy for some reason, talking to him.... as though he had known me way back then (impossible) and could recognize the first-grader in my eyes. strange strange. i wonder what it would be like to know the people you grew up with. moving around so much... i haven't known anyone (unrelated to me) for longer than about 5 years. you get used to saying goodbye. what i mean is... you get used to meaning it, whether you intend to or not.

did i say that right?

i think it makes you resist getting close to people. i think it makes you value the time you spend with those you do reach more. i think it makes it harder to let go of them. i think it makes forgetting them easier, once you have. it's like... you understand what goodbye can really mean. you prepare for it. i don't know if that's good or bad.

i think it just depends.

it's been far too nice out for me to feel so much like an envelope!

inward...outward