Bathwater So Hot It Feels Cold.

Today it got colder. I tried not to be alone. I ended up folding clothes and making myself dinner. I made a telephone call that was neither brave nor regrettable.

I was as happy as I've been in a long time for about an hour.

Cheers.

To being a second best, and being best, and not being good enough at all.

To waking up at four in the afternoon, wearing the same hat and shirt for the third day in a row, the voices of strangers in my house drowning out my bad dreams with something a little worse.

To the sky, which gets far darker than your eyes ever will.

Far From the Twisted Reach of Crazy Sorrow.

In English we're reading O'Brien's The Things They Carried. Our teaching had us write lists of what we carry, physically and metaphorically. I wrote a list of memories, guilts and unaccepted apologies. I wrote that I carried a heart. When asked to circle which thing we'd be willing to drop first, I got scared.

Last night, all of the things I carry transcended me, suspended themselves in the air above my head. The detachment was slight though, and comfortable, if not a bit shaky.

There was mild surprise that I could exist without all of it. And now I know.

115th Dream.

I found my friend in her hospital bed, hair dark and uncut, shining under the fluorescent light. She shared an air-conditioned room divided by a plastic curtain with a woman who was dying.

"I don't know you, stranger," I said to her, "but I love you. Everything will be okay." I choked on the words, tears all in my mouth and she repeated them back.

When I woke, everything was still so tangible.

It Was For You, Too.

We all have a breaking point. I found mine today when my newfound apathy shattered and bled and everyone got so worried. I didn't mean to cause alarm.

But how could I stop before I cried it all out of myself? How could I stop on a day that the Orient Express is off the tracks for good and I light my patchouli incense with a bic lighter?

Sle--ee--ee--ee--eep.

and it's been a long time since before I've been touched, now I'm getting touched all the time

My grandmother bought everyone a scratch ticket. The only person who won was me. I plan to spend my two dollars on something marvelous.

Like parking in a city garage or something cold to drink on those wintery streets.

Bitter Taste.

Last night was no good. I saw the end coming from miles away, from weeks ago when I walked in the cold the same way, with my brother silently by me. He even got my coat for me, held it up for me. It was a surprisingly profound thing to happen.

I am certainly not grateful enough for the things I have: a window facing east, playing cards, honeyed tea, paper to fold into cranes, endless ink, promises to return books.

It's CDS' birthday. Hopefully a good one.

Stick-shifts and Safety Belts.

Yesterday I waited three hours at the Safety Council to take my license road test. The lobby was jammed full of anxious, fidgety people of all ages watching the parking lot from behind big glass window panes. Nervous about the falling snow and parallel parking. It's funny how such strange situations can bring humans together so quickly. I met a man from Adelaide, Australia who had just moved to the States, perfectly friendly and unafraid to break a silence. Something to appreciate.

The wait did pay off, too. Otherwise I might not have recounted the wait nearly as fondly.

My parents threw their annual "End of Season Hawkwatch Party" last night (yes, I know). There are friends that have been coming every year for twenty years that were so excited and congratulatory toward me. They don't have kids of their own, I was amazed at how proud they were of me. How is it possible that we can forget people that care so much?

And We Lose Respect So Fast.

I'm feeling accomplished because for the first time in a while I was able to sit down and really write.

In light of my recent study of the literary Brat Pack, I decided it was time to expose my own world, hidden behind the mask of fiction: our regression to decades past, the apologies we carve into our arms, the comforting myths of gods and last resorts, the nonchalant drug addictions, undefinable loves, the faith without the practice, the beautiful lies we spend our whole lives painting, the irony and symbols we string 'round our necks for the world to see, the way we throw everything we are and more at the people we meet, thinking that someone out there must be looking to take a chance too.

Forever or Until.

god, it's great to be alive, takes the skin right off my hide to think I'll have to give it all up someday

Everything in my life must be connected by magnetic charges. I am nothing but a web of my own thoughts and actions, memories attracted to the present, maybe even the future. The good and bad drawn together like keys fitting into locks, something true, tangible, fitting into an empty space.

I've been having vivid flashbacks more and more lately. Soft flooded summer skies, flight, the least sure I've ever been. There's no definite relativity to the time that's passed, each second was uniform and out of place. It's taken so long, but we've grown up so fast it's funny.

and if I ever treated you mean, you know that it was only because I'm sorry i couldn't have you for my own

- m.ward