Save the Friendly for More Deserving Friends.

You make my eyes well up. On the brink of a breakdown. Pruned fingers from too many dishes, piled high from friends; friends I am not sure that I really know. The phone rings from the other room. I was sitting on the bathroom sink with a candle, a cigarette, and the winter wind blowing in through the window. Of course I would never hear it.

An e-card from you. From all of you. Loud, but not obnoxious. A blur of sound. Music. I listened three times. To three voicemails. Nine listens. Nine times the puffy eyes. Nine times how much I have already been missing you.

So another binge night begins...

I have to get out of here. I should take myself to a better place, a more deserving place.

Easy.

I've read about it all. I listened to bedtime stories last night. Jules read to me, it was awesome. Poems and short stories. Not necessarily uplifting, but they were alluring, and beautiful. And I slept well last night.

I am listening to friends' bands and smiling, hearing their voices. I miss them. I cry sometimes, I miss so much.

I'm switching the song to a voice I won't recognize. It is just easier.

I wish I could post privately. I don't know how. It is just easier to type here than to write in my little, locked journal. No one will read anyway. Deleted links. Google me, you imbecile. Bet you won't find anything quite like the pitches I'm throwing.

Here are the tragic, unedited, drunken ramblings of a young girl.


Give me a fucking break. Some idiot asshole at work tonight told me all about his daily work out schedule. And all about Jesus. Yeah, whatever. You have abs. You have an understanding. I really don't care.

Look at my fucking ribs. That's hot. I don't know whether or not Jesus actually existed. And you can't prove whether he did or not, so I don't care.

I wanted to scream. Damnit. I have to change songs again. I can't hear familiar voices.

The cat just ran across the keyboard. He is laying on me now. My hands are numb. But he is beautiful, and he knows. He gets it. He just needs to be here, laying across my forearms in silence.

Some things inspire me.

There is an amazing woman who was a mother to me, though never biologically. Her daughter said, "She believes in you more than she believes in me. She told me before I left that she has always seen a passion in you. If you could harness that, you could and you will change the world."

I will never change the world. I will never harness that raw passion. But I will fight. And I will scream. I kick and I cry, I wake up in the dead of night. I'll destroy you, I'll tear out your insides. But I will always love you. I will destroy you, but I will love you.

Maybe someone will learn to love me and my crazy. A friend to stay. Never leave.

Fairy tale endings weren't made for skeptics like me. I'll just eat you away.

This is so long, this is so rambling.

These are things that I need to get out.

I hate you, I hate you, I hate you. Please stay. Don't leave. But I hate you.

blah. Punk Rock shows, coming up. Let's laugh and sing and dance. Come to the shows. If you're reading. Come to the shows.

Drink some brewdoggs (love you), sing-a-long. Wrap your arm around me and belt it out. It's what we have to do. What we HAVE to do to get by.

www.oswegoshows.cjb.net

Enough.

I live through the words of others. I thrive underneath the actions of others. I fear everything. Standing alone is not for me.

I felt legitimately angry; knowing why and accurately directing my anger. It was the first time in years. It felt incredible, I will never be able to describe that feeling.

I am so tired of the nightmares. I am so tired of waking you up, night after night. I am sorry for the eyeliner smeared on your pillows.

I feel so much more these days. I turned the heat off in my car, the sun was shining. It was warm on my face. I missed you, vitamin D. I saw a rainbow this afternoon.

Every word in this song has been dead on. So I listen to it on repeat. Over and over again.
Rilo Kiley
"The Good That Won't Come Out"

I do this thing where i think i'm real sick
But i won't go to the doctor to find out about it
'Cause they make you stand real still in a real small place
As they chart up your insides and put them on display
They'd see all of it, all of me, all of it

All of the good that won't come out of me
And all the stupid lies i hide behind
It's such a big mistake, lying here in your warm embrace
...I think i'll go out and embarrass myself by getting drunk and falling down in the street
You say i choose sadness, that it never once has chosen me
Maybe you're right


I never make much sense.

Letters,

As fate would have it...

my entire post was just erased.

No big deal.

I was just rambling about how angry I am.

Writing letters to no one, anyone, someone, myself, you.

Done.

There is No Light Without Darkness...

Let's Not Forget...

Dreaming big, there is something to be said for that. I have been lost in a whirlwind; lately I feel more like a Hurricane than a human being.

Megan came to visit. We spent most of our time together crying and consoling. First her, then me, then me again and again, then her. Then her again, and it all ended in one of the most intense "freak outs" I have ever had. I smoked too many cigarettes, I took too many shots. I punched the refrigerator as hard as my drunken fist could. I screamed at the top of my lungs. Anyone else would have institutionalized me but she walked over, quietly. She walked up to the the refrigerator and grabbed a picture, she ripped it off of the door and threw it to the floor. "I can't do it anymore. I can't do this anymore." She pulled another picture off of the refrigerator. In a rage, I tore every thing down. I fell to the floor sobbing. A mess of family photos, friends' drawings, fliers, and home-made magnets were lying all around me. Megan, crying with me and for us both, sat next to me. "It's O.K. to let go."

Sometimes it is O.K. to forget, to destroy, to collapse.

And to a friend, who might not understand and probably will never read this...
Start small. It all starts small. Everything will grow. No one starts out big. Time is essential.

NYSACRA and Silly, Little Me

I look at myself and see a 22 year-old without a clue. This silly girl who dances too much and still draws on her arms with sharpies. I am so much more. Am I so much more?

I work for a wonderful (although I am irritated at a recent agency-wide paycut) Human Services Agency. With over 500 employees, I expected to fall in between the cracks. I am at the bottom of the food chain right now, a young, unexperienced college grad with little to no concrete plans for the future. I work overtime, I work at 3 separate locations, I work and I work. I am just another "DSP." Just another "residence counselor." Just another "caregiver."

Back in April I was invited to attend a NYSACRA conference held at a fancy hotel in downtown Syracuse. I ate lunch from fine china, I had 4 forks (they were all silver.) Who, me? But I lived in a van, but I have doven into dumpsters to find food, but I have resorted to washing my hair in the lake and brushing my teeth in public restrooms. Silver? Too much, too soon! I am just one of 500 employees. I was 1 of 5 chosen to attend. I had only worked for 4 months, not even long enough to have earned vacation time.

The Vice President of our Agency contacted my supervisor. She asked if I would submit a personal profile about the work I do, who I am, and the hardships that I face on a day-to-day basis. My profile (with a photo, yikes!) will be published in the Legislative Gazette. The information I give will be presented to New York State Legislators and Governor Paterson (my worst enemy.)

This is incredible. At 22 I will have the opportunity to respresent an entire profession in front of the Governor of New York State?!

It's funny, we never realize all that we are accomplishing as it is happening. Maybe I really can succeed? Maybe just being myself is enough.

The Free Candy

Blogging? Why not? I have, after all, been writing a lot recently.

Here we go...


There was a time, an amazing and influential time. I lived in a studio apartment with a friend, a life-saving friend. There were long, hard, bitterly cold days. It was the year Oswego was hit with 11 feet of snow in less than 48 hours. That February was the most intense February I have lived through. Blizzards and power outages. Broken spirits united with a strong bond and a sincere, untainted desire to lift each other to our feet.




And as the ice melted away, we laughed at the collage of senseless memories we had created throughout those bitter months. We cried the day we moved out of that tiny apartment. We moved into a van. A giant, red van. Maybe you have heard of it? Maybe you've even taken a ride in it. The Free Candy. Curtains in the windows, mood lighting, seats that folded into a bed. Ahhh, yes. The Free Candy. We parked The Free Candy in abandoned parking lots. We tried to live in a storage garage, but there was no vacancy. We slept on the floor of the restaurant where we worked once, maybe twice. We took any opportunity that came our way, we slept on any couch that was offered. We lived.


I learned more in those short months than I ever had. Maybe more than I ever will.