last night i ate a pint of frozen yogurt
it was organic
stoneyfield farms
vanilla fudge swirl.
i bought it at the corner store
figured
B and F would be here when i got back
but they weren’t…
i waited a while
and then ate it
all by my self
(the fridge here has an icebox too small to fit a pint of icecream)
tonight
still no one here…
i’m eating ben and jerry’s
oatmean cookie chunk
i..
am..
Living…
HERE.
all around me is terrifying darkness
shuddering puddles
loud noises
and deafening silence
on the defensive
i have my claws out
my teeth are already bloody…
but i’m sure it’s just from biting myself
When ever i have Lived anywhere
i fall into deep sadness
the big mistake has always been that i have lived with someone
in that “lover” kinda way
someone to blame for all of my feelings
and project all of my shit onto
i was smarter this time.
in fact
when i decided i loved some one last time
and wanted to love them
i chose NOT to live with them…
even though they would have let me.
smarter i am.
Curiosity:
not being able to articulate anything
doesn’t mean you’re dumb, does it?
articulation=
dexterity=
intelligence?
oops!
staying in one place
i cannot run away
from this deep well of sadness
what’s so sad, huh?
oh, just everything
the way i love…
the way i tie my shoes…
the way i treat myself
my fears
the walls…
Existence!
politcs
television
idon’tremember
my friend West once told me
(back in ’99)
that if i stopped running long enough
sat by a river
listened
and drowned in my saddness
i’d realize it wasn’t an endless black pit
but a little puddle
but
ge-golly
it sure is scary from here
i’ve been here just two months now
and a few days.
i turn 27 on wednesday
saturn return starts july 17th
here i am!
SAD!
i’m smart
i’m not taking it out on anyone
even though it is my habit
i don’t believe it
so i’m keeping my shit to myself..
that is
unless
of course
you’re checking your friend’s list at four a.m.
and drift through this drivel…
as commissioned by dennisatl
i often tell this story to people
so i’ll write it here
the times i’ve broken my nose…
everywhere in the world has different words for “friend”
i’ve given a side-wards glance to the word “buddy”
resigning it to comic books, novels… vernacular from the past.
quaint.
but always with humour
if not completely contrived.
BUT
i’ve been changing my mind in the last year…
last September, while i was in New York (go see: i didn’t journal at all)
i was hanging out with a friend who grew up in this town
— and i laughed
how he used the word “buddy”
not because the word is absurd
but the idea of such a friend…
a Pal…
.. it’s a concept that’s nearly alien to me
a casual friend
a circumstantial friend
but a friend with intimate care and concern…
is this for real?
i grew up a lonely kid in a cornfield
no friend i trusted as a friend
for fear he’d turn on me and beat me up
or that he was only friendly with me
coz everyone else beat him up too..
i look through the city for clues…
When i arrived in the city two months ago
i noticed an ad on the subway to promote quiting smoking
“My Buddy’s a Quitter!”
two chubby men on a construction site
arms over eachother’s shoulders
big smiles
Buddy.
maybe i thought it odd from his mouth
because of the Straight connotations i give it…
that
“we don’t fuck, but we care about eachother”
is almost rare to me these days…
though, admittedly, it is something i often crave
last night
at the More Gardens meeting
a girl here…
a Native New Yorker
talks about her new Beau…
“he’s been a buddy of mine for a long time… then we started smooching a week ago…”
then he comes over
and they’re hanging out
Buddies.
Ah…
the intimacy that comes from knowing people
being with them
loving them
then? where does it go?
does the tongue pass the lips?
hand slide down the back to grip the butt?
wake up in bed in the morning
still laughing and smiling
and handing eachother a cup of coffee?
this type of casual intimacy has always seemed false to me
… only because of its foreignness…
he said
“you have a knack for attracting people to you who have the same pathologies as you
but are less aware, less in control
so you can point the finger
instead of doing your own shit”
‘i USED TO!’
i defended
‘ i am weeding them out of my life, hardly have any left ‘
i paused, my mind knowing i was not entirely being truthful about that one
‘ i’m still learning ‘
he said
” Yeah?
well
you can only do second grade so many times…
besides
you don’t need to score a 100 on every test ”
i said
‘ but i’m working on it
i got an apartment here
first one i’ve ever had like this…
not my own yet… but first rent i’ve paid since ’99
— i’m being stationary for a while
so i can acheive all the things i want to acheive
that i can only do while i’m standing still ‘
” but you’re not doing that ”
‘ what? ‘
” you’re not doing that, are you?
you haven’t been here since you’ve been here ”
‘well, i’ve been to Tennessee and boston and philly… but i’m HERE
i’m Based here
.. it’s inertia
i’ve gotta slow down before i can settle
i’m slowing… ‘
he said
“you should take some writing courses”
the idea hadn’t even occurred to me!
“that’s your passion. you want to be a writer, don’t you?”
‘ i am a writer… i don’t want to be a fucking journalist! ‘
“what, you don’t want to write editorials.. only want to write about yourself?”
he said
” it’s time you started living your passion
not just jumping into
and surfing on the passion of other people you encounter in the world ”
– i feel like he’s not known me since i was 19…
and
as i’ve often witnessed in relationships
ours will always be the same as the day we met
Fixed
but i’ve grown.
he said
” you should get yourself a therapist ”
i make snide
dismissive comments
but then say
‘ i’ve been thinking about it
everyone else seems to have one in this town … ‘
i’m scared, aren’t i?
he says
” i once told you there are those who can do it alone and others that need help…
but it’s really hard to give yourself a heart operation or brain surgery ”
he said
” it’s not healthy!
you’re having sex with these men
and that is the main event
that’s what their paying for
not how good of a massage you give
and it’s not good for your..”
he holds his hand vertical in front of his face and stammers
‘ my integrity ‘
“Yeah!”
right.
” you should be doing that with people you love and care for
and there should be no dollar amound…
anywhere NEAR it!
you’re all about pleasing these older men
and sex for sex
and it’s giving yourself away
and it’s wasting
…
and you’ve got such potential…
but maybe that’s all it’s ever gonna be
who the fuck are you?
do you know who you are?
go find out who you are!
”
“we’ve all been waiting”
they said.
hey
who are you?
who posted a comment to my last entry
saying you had lost touch with me
and found me again
and now you’re living in NewPort Oregon
restarting your business
common
give me more
send me an email
or comment to this
and leave your address
and
NAME!
…dominic
my new phone has a special buttons to make voice-notes
-riding the subway a while ago
(5:03pm 4/7/05)
i took two notes
reminding me i wanted to write about this:
so many people on the subways sleep
nodding out
from exhaustion of the day’s work?
or the lack of oxygen
in those deep tunnels
a million crammed in people
windows sealed, now
air conditioning
nodding off
are they dreaming?
i must read books
or do yoga, qi-gung
or photograph them…
think about them.
waiting is always an active process for me
…
these are the two voice records, directly transcribed
Bridget arrived back to the house the day after i did:
so much for time alone in the apartment here…
she left Phoenix, AZ at 11:30 at night
and flew
disappearing three hours in the time-change
while sleeping on the plane
she had a dream:
”
i was in the back seat of a car
it wasn’t moving, no one else in it
the radio was on
you were talking about your recent success
the column you had in the magazine
how surprised you were that the gay magazine wanted to print your writing
— you had been writing about sex you had had with two women
which might just be the same old boring
“gay man turned straight” story
but then you went on to talk about how that was just a precurser to the really amazing thing in your life:
your new lover
who is an F to M tranny
and he’s blowing your mind and satisfying you in a way you’ve never been satisfied…
”
—
which is funny
because i’ve been thinking so much about heterosexual sex lately
and had the conversation [again] about wanting to know and F to M
and understand the path they walk
… sometime recently…
i was typing in things into google
un-known numbers in my phone
other numbers i knew in my head
names that had turned into myths…
i found this:
i nominate trevis hutsell, a friend that i have lost contact with, who made up The Distance Game. at a designated time, i stood on the Hawthorne Bridge, and he on the Morrison, and we waved red flags at each other so we could see each other over the distance. trevis, i havent seen you in years, but i always think of that whenever i cross the bridges. it makes me feel like no matter if i am near a person or far away, if i know where they are or not, if we cared about each other we could wave really big red flags and see each other.
Genevieve Dellinger
Wednesday, September 25, 2002 at 13:14:38 (PDT)
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http://www.charmbracelet.org/guestbook.html
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