When you were a kid, did you ever shade a piece of paper in every color of crayon you had, then cover it in a layer of black so you could carve in cool designs that would appear in a multitude of colors? That's how I feel now, the top layer peeling away and colors showing through in the shape of a still-to-be-defined me.
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« all postsp.s. i love you
This time last year, I was pondering love—what is it and how do you know? Snippets from the then mostly private journal entries:
February 10, 2009
The first time I said I love you to a boy, I was 16. I don’t remember if I said it first, or if he did, but I’m pretty sure it started as “luv ya” at the end of our IM conversations. The second time, I was 19 and it was in response to him saying it to me multiple times daily, the first time 2 weeks prior.
I was with the first boy for 2 months and the second for 5 years. I never doubted that what I felt the first time was love, even if it wasn’t true love, but what we thought was love at 16. I was sure that it was real the second time, but in retrospect, I’m not so sure anymore. Both times, I wanted to be in love. Both times, I ended it.
When I was 12 or 13 and looking ahead, I thought it would be easy to know when I was in love with someone—if I had any doubts, then I wasn’t. But it’s not that simple, everything comes with a smidgen of doubt, whether it’s actual doubt or just haziness caused by personal insecurities/fears. Or maybe it really is that simple and my teenage self was a lot smarter than I am now.
February 18, 2009
I didn’t get me back that long ago, and I don’t want to completely lose myself again. Loving someone isn’t stripping your life of everything to be just his. I don’t know how I ever confused love with someone being “my everything” but I’m pretty sure now that that’s why I’ve been so hesitant; that’s the fault that was in the second time I said I love you that wasn’t there in the first.
What I think of as love now hasn’t really changed from when I was 13. If I’m wrong, so what? I’m happy. We’re happy.
elucidate
last week.
It’s 3am, 4am, 6am and I’m waking up to your kisses & fingers dancing along my skin readying for a tickle attack. I can’t contain my laughter any longer, and you’re laughing too. Your arms wrap tight around me. 9am, 10am and we’re battling over who’s getting up first. You always win, lifting me up off the bed. We’re checking our online places and you’re updating my Twitter. Hand in hand, we head out to explore the city.
this week.
It’s 3am, 4am, 6am and I’m waking up to your scent dancing along the empty space on the other side of my bed. I can’t contain warmth without you and wrap blankets tight around me. 8am and I’m battling with the clock over getting up. It always wins and I have to pull myself out of bed. I’m checking to see if you’ve updated Twitter and you IM me. Badge and RSA key in hand, I head to work.
last week.
It’s the end of the day and we’re plopping into my beanbag chair that doesn’t really fit the both of us and watch Coupling, Burn Notice. I’m looking into your blueblue eyes and finding a stray eyelash but I’m with you, I have no other wishes. You’re holding me close and telling me how my heart is beating faster.
this week.
It’s the end of the day and I’m plopping into my beanbag chair that suddenly feels too big and watch Castle, Coupling. I’m looking at the blueblue dots of my binary clock marking 11:11 and wishing it was still this time last week, wishing you were still here. You’re so far away again and my heart feels beaten.
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After spending the whole day fighting back tears, I cried. Before we even left for the airport. Either this is getting harder or I’m getting sappier. I should eat something with more sustenance than a Double Decker bar, but food isn’t going to fill this emptiness.
—-
Last year, you gave me Paris. This year, New York as you decided to make a tradition of taking me places I haven’t been and want to go. My first time on the East Coast, meeting you at JFK after a 7am flight and no sleep, The Big Apple ready for us. Grand Central, Times Square, the Empire State Building, MoMa, Rockefeller Center, Central Park, the Statue of Liberty. And I gave you your birthday surprise early—the Rangers vs. Candiens at Madison Square Garden, 3rd row from the ice.
Then it was back here for more birthday-ing and you met my new co-worker friends and had dim sum with my family. We got you your Cheesecake Factory cheesecake, ice skated, tasted the fine art of St. George Spirits. But mostly just watched movies and tv and laid in each other’s arms.
I miss you so so so so so much.
i know people who’ve tried, but you’re the first to succeed.
I’m sorry I didn’t know you as more than just another beautiful face. I’m sorry I didn’t take a longer look when you moved behind the camera. I’m sorry I didn’t think to say hi or get back in touch when I randomly saw your comment in my friend’s old journal. I’m sorry I didn’t know.
We weren’t even friends really, so why does it hurt, why do I feel guilty for being happy, angry? He was just an older boy who made 16-year-old me feel like one of the pretty girls.
hello 2010, where’s my flying car?
Fireworks and sirens ring in the new year in the not so far off distance. I’m in bed celebrating the future by re-reading Ender’s Game. I decided I wasn’t in the mood for small parties or large crowds, or any alcohol after yesterday. So here I am, here is and here’s to 2010—may it be as wonderful as 2009.
it’s not whether you win or lose…
It’s how you play the game, and I played to defend my title. No one has won twice before and I wanted to be the first. Unfortunately, Lady Luck wasn’t on my side this time. But I did go out on a good hand—4 tables left, my chip stack comparably low, I went all in on a Flush and lost to a Full House on the river, which she didn’t even realize she had. I think I knocked her out with a Full House last game too.
Next month, that trophy will be back on my desk. Next month.
yeah, i remember that.
I opted to walk instead and instead got a walk down memory lane. I’d forgotten how much this one mile stretch holds—late mornings where the guys would down coffees and I’d drink fresh squeezed orange juice as we’d eat away hangovers, the church house where I’d spend many after school hours with my peers and the notion of bettering my community, the street where my 8th grade crush lived, the place my ex used to work (now hiring), the corner store with Melona bars that’d quell my cravings, and the place we’d get supplies for our cardboard boat and where I’d make copies of my first real set of keys.
It’s all so quiet now. So removed, far away.
stop and smell the rose-scented potpourri
i.
I’m caught between content where I am and clamoring to be on top. The view here is much nicer than I’m used to—I’ve zipped from one side of the bell curve to the other—and I want to enjoy it for as long as I can. But there’s that pressure to rushrush keep moving up and I’m afraid if I stay still, I’ll only be knocked back down.
ii.
It’s like being back in middle school—pinky swears and (not-so-)secret crushes, cliques of who can and can’t social activity x and do I trust this girl? We were friends once upon a time, sort of.
iii.
But I don’t know how to talk about how I feel and what I do, it’s always been journals and letters and I don’t even do that much anymore either. This entry was started 5 days ago.
was it only a week ago?
I crunched leaves colored autumn and meandered with pumpkin patch vines. A 4 day weekend and 18 hour train journey alongside forests and lakes brought me to friends, 3D mini-golf, bacon donuts, tea pearls and fortune sticks in a Chinese tea garden, rooftop s’mores, and other fun adventures. A small plane brought me back to 12 hour work days, though on an exciting new project well worth the exhaustion. This next week will be different.
watch what you eat
Faint stars criss-crossed patterns onto the blackblack canvas of my vision as my other senses painted out dinner and identified voices relative to their seating positions. We dined in the dark and blindly enjoyed textures and flavors and each other’s laughter and elbows. Sparks emitting from our napkins when rubbed were an initial comfort of light and the rose petals decorating the table provided a sense of color when all we could see was achromatic. Each course was passed down the table and there wasn’t as much fumbling as I’d expected, almost none even. It was a regular meal, complete with throwing ice cubes across the table, mixing sauces in unexpected victims’ drinks, and high fives. Only, in a pitch black room.
reset can’t reset the years
Every now and again, I wonder where the line was drawn and when it grew further than we could keep up with so we just stopped trying altogether. Flipping through old concert photos the other week, I think I’ve pinpointed the moment.
I was hoping that would be one of my most memorable shows. And it is, but not the way I’d hoped. That was when our friendship died, wasn’t it? I’d spent the whole night crying. Resolved. Upset. Helpless. Worried for his life.
That wasn’t the first time you guys had seen this, but it would be the last. After I so easily accepted his apology again, you said we were done. Somehow I’d managed to forget that through the years. It was easier to believe we were no longer friends because of Other Stuff.
alt title: resurfaced memories = closure
alt title: i don’t want to lose more friends.
alt title: partial Writer’s Block answer
sleeping consciousness
My dreams are off by a pixel. And the other night, I starred as a superhero clamping down on bad margins. My dreams lean to the side the way my body leans when I play beer pong, the way my handwriting leans when writing with my tablet. & drawing is hard.
I’m still holding back because the second I believe dreams come true, I’ll start waking up. But I think I am awake in the dream I dreamed when I was younger, when I was 12 and full of hope. The dreams I had before I became jaded by life.
