i was a good worker today. i read a lot. it's getting easier. it makes me wish i could go back to reed in the fall, instead of the spring. i miss it there. new books, new classes, the beginning of the rain, even the elitist intellectuals and mountains of reading. it's good that i miss it, though. until the officials forced me to go on medical leave, i had so much enthusiasm, i loved school, i had it all planned out.. only one more year! then everyone decided to "help" me, my life came to a grinding halt, and all my excitement was lost. a few weeks ago i felt completely dead when i tried to think about going back to school. for the first time in my life, i feel like i've really failed at something. this is the second time i've taken time off. *hitting myself* fuck. but i remind myself that some people leave college and don't go back. i have to go back.
i was wandering around downtown when i thought i should call him, i hadn't heard from him in almost a week. i called from a payphone across from orchestra hall. he wasn't home. instead of the normal message ("hey, this is ****. leave a message. kay bye.), it was a song, a minor-key folky ballad. i heard "did you ever hear the story bout something something.. he something something... he had a dope habit and he had it bad.. let me tell you bout a dream he had." *beep* i hung up and felt sick, a sinking feeling in my stomach. i thought, he killed himself and left this message for me. no, that makes no sense. still, it was creepy.
later i called and he was home, and alive. i could tell he wasn't clean because he sounded happy, so i didn't ask. i'm tired of promises. (this weekend, i "have to". this is it.) yeah. he said, "my new dealer is so cool! we've been hanging out a lot. he's so fuckin funny! you've got to meet him when you get back!" i said, "um, you know i can't come home until you're clean. and i don't think i want to hang out with your dealer." then i said, "your answering machine is creepy. it scared me."
at least i don't want it anymore. the first time i got clean, every time i talked to him i got so jealous when he talked about heroin, i wanted it so much i thought i'd explode. now, even if i think about it a lot, and try to imagine what it felt like, there's just a faint trace of that feeling, i almost have to force it. then i push it away again. no more.
i like gabe's friends. they are comfortingly stable compared with my close friends elsewhere. you can always count on someone to be sitting in the living room playing video games or watching a good movie and drinking black label (pabst for minneapolis. who knew punks in different cities gravitated to different brands of cheap-ass beer? i should write my anthropology thesis about this issue).
latest report from the hood: yesterday isabelle and jeremy were stopped at an intersection close to the house, and some 12 year old boy came up to the car and kept asking jeremy for a cigarette. he refused, but the boy wouldn't leave, and isabelle said something like "why don't you ask your mom?" at which point the kid punched jeremy in the stomach, through the car window. poor jeremy. getting beat up by a 12 year old.
yesterday gabe and i rode bikes to powderhorn park. all my memories of that place are hazy, sunlit little kid memories. one of my 4 year old friends lived next to the park. it's huge, and it's a valley, so there are hills going down to it on all sides. we watched some kids who could do handsprings all the way down the hill. i said "that's the most amazing thing i've ever seen!" i love hyperbole, don't you?
ps. i'm tired of people writing mean things in my guestbook. i deleted the one from today. it made that other guy (BE) look like my best friend. but i think i got over caring what anonymous readers think of me. it doesn't hurt anymore, just disgusts me. first i tried to respond, but arguing is stupid, especially with someone who can't spell worth shit and is too chicken to leave their email address. and i have supreme power to delete mean people-- there is no freedom of speech in my guestbook anymore! what i really wonder is, if this is such a waste of time, why are you wasting your precious time reading it, let alone writing half a page in my guestbook?? i think i'll stop writing about heroin, cause it seems to provoke asshole comments. it's been 3 weeks, and i am officially over it, as of right now. the dawn is breaking on another trembling world. bye bye. love, becky