August 29, 2003
I would love to know who I used to be. On drugs, on kinky sex, on the strange green high of overworked hardcore sobriety, on a neighbor’s couch. Damnit, who is this person others know and miss? Who was I and where did I go, why did I leave me stranded here? I write down everything , every single thing sooner or later. But I lost this. I lost my rage. I lost my sureity of being, if not right, then at least aware others were wrong. I lost not caring. I lost the sadistic spring-steel strength of me, bold and bright and careless. Traded sadism for sympathy. I miss being me, being strong like me, being sharp and fierce like me. Stupid like me; taking strange and unexamined risks. But no one can be 15 for their whole lives, nor 21. So I keep telling myself, anyways, is that the balm of truth or wistfulness. Stupid, savage sophistries. Robin always said the only thing I lacked was self-confidence; I may have gained experience since then, but I’ve lost what sense of self I may have had. And this bores me. Being so constant chronic scared and anxious bores me, uncertaintude BORES ME. I should go out more…..?
I’ve always hated eating in front of others. Edith Nesbitt. Eating and reading, which is not the same thing as reading and eating. While eating. My own preference, personally, is for eating while reading. I stopped nursing at two and taught myself, obstinately, to read, at about four, what I did for the two years in between God only knows. Played with my food and looked sullen, probably, no one can really picture me as a social child, not even in babyhood. Even as a toddlerwas misanthropic, I liked babies only until they started to talk. I threw blocks and walled myself up in sofa cushion forts, drew pictures of castles so ideally impermeable they didn’t need to bother with drawbridge or moat; there were no doors. My past is as much imagined as remembered—is it like that for everyone. When did I become conscious of the existence of others? I don’t like being conscious of myself. Right now I even miss being stoned. I don’t miss--. I miss the smell of Jared’s ciggarettes. The texture of his woven black and white blanket, the particuliar flicker of candles on his walls. I don’t miss him.
I miss the way Sassi used to look at Robin, the longing look, the slow nod unself-conscious eyeful look, the look she used to give him before Kassi and Akasha, before Windy and Alyah. Before he tried to rescue everyone. Before the divorce. Sassi’s divorce and sudden full availability, real-life 24-7 complete with kids. Before he began to fost her off with Bob, Whipmaster Bob, Fiona and their whole clan. Before he changed our vows for jewelry. It made me long to join their family.
