34 Excerpts from KaeLyn’s Quarter Life Crisis Livejournal, 2005-2007

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, an A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you some of our incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written down, often with actual pens. Today, KaeLyn has selected excerpts from her recently recovered Livejournal chronicling her quarter life crisis in the years immediately following her entry into the real world.

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What I know about myself in my mid-twenties is that I felt like the world was going to collapse if I didn’t find my TRUE PURPOSE IN LIFE, that I both deeply desired and vehemently resisted stability, and that I really overused ellipses wow that’s really the worst part. What I know about myself now, over a decade later, is that the world is huge and I’m a tiny speck, the future is open to a million different possibilities, and I’m going to be just fine and it’s a damn privilege to be able to believe that and I’m grateful AF. I present to you, a queer woman on the verge of a quarter-life crisis, in excerpts from my now-private LiveJournal account.

1.

In other news, everyone went back to classes on Thursday and, though I’m glad I am out of there, it was so WEIRD to not be going to class with Waffle and our friends. I can’t wait ’til Waffle graduates and we can get out of this area. I feel really… bogged down… here.

2.

Sometimes I just want to light an entire pack of cigarettes, put them in my mouth and run around naked on a bed of molten grass screaming at the top of my lungs. It has been…

…that kind of day.

[Author’s Note: WTF is “molten grass”?]

3.

Stuff with my parents is still tense. Basically, we don’t talk about it. It’s kind of like old times except now I have a girlfriend and they just pretend I don’t… or something. My grandma and grandpa on my dad’s side are having a lot of health problems, and they are stressed out with that, so I don’t want to make things more complicated for them. I don’t pretend that I am straight for them, though, and I refuse to do that ever again.

4.

Finished another job app. I’m going to walk down to the laundromat and pick up the car from Waffle and mail it! I win!

5.

I guess I’m just stuck in a rut. I know now that I want to go back to school for my Masters in Social Work.

6.

I have an interview at AmeriCorps on Wednesday. So hopefully I will be employed soon. They have a TON of positions still open, but I think they are all part-time, so I’d need to work a second job even if I do get a placement with them. I’m still excited about the opportunity, though!

7.

It’s strange. Half my friends have real jobs or at least real big people lives. The other half are still students. It’s a bizarre feeling when you find out old friends have gotten married and have children or are senior managers at some office or whatever. Especially when you’re still putting in waitress applications.

8.

So all my shit is officially in Waffle’s living room. I think her roommate is coming up today, so I’m going to make some attempt at making the apartment presentable. I am kind of free-loading for the short-term. I’ve been calling around, looking for a decent-sized 2 bedroom that takes pets. So far, it’s been OK, but everything I’ve seen so far has been a little more than I’m really interested in paying. So, if you are looking for two roommates and a cat, call me!

9.

I think I am just tired of running from one thing to another, which is what I always feel I’m doing. I mean, I’ve moved in and out what feels like ten million times this summer alone. And I went straight from high school to college and always worked during the semester and in the summers and now I feel like I have to go straight to a good job or graduate school. I am tired of always having my ducks in a row. It is kind of freeing to not know what is coming next. I wish I could learn to enjoy it and not let it freak me out. I just pray that I don’t procrastinate to the point that I end up at McDonald’s again. LOL. But it’d be my own fault of course.

10.

A sad day it is when I have to shower and get dressed for an interview at… Oswego McDonald’s. Yeah, I know. I am dying a little inside, believe me. I hate hate HATE working for a massive international super-corporation with their whole arm all up in the evil, evil, factory farming meat industry. But…I have heard nothing about the jobs I DID apply for and next month’s rent is sneaking up on me. I’m still putting out applications to other jobs and crossing my fingers. Thank god I can move out of this city in a year. What would be really sad…is if McDonald’s doesn’t hire me today. Then I may very well break down and weep.

11.

I hate being the closeted girlfriend. The weird thing is, I’m so not closeted anywhere but in my own family. And even there, I’ve been out since I was 17 to my immediate family and I am no longer hiding it from my extended family, either. If anything, I just feel like I’m back in the closet whenever I go home. It’s like taking twenty steps backwards.

12.

So in 3rd grade, back when BOCES still thought it was a good idea to bring live animals into classrooms for science projects, we raised butterflies from eggs. This was supposed to teach us about the life cycle. Like most BOCES experiments, it was fascinating to me, but most of the other kids took it as an opportunity to torture or kill the poor “specimens.” I have this awful memory of a boy in my class. I don’t remember much about him other than that he had brown hair and was slightly taller than me. What I remember is him taking the plastic container with his larvae inside and turning it slowly upside-down, then right-side-up, then upside-down, over and over. It was worse than shaking it, which would have just been mean. What he was doing was letting the larvae get comfortable and then tipping it gently and seeing how long it would cling to the top or bottom of the container before it lost its grip and recoiled, tumbling to the other side and landing on its back. It was really cruel. I believe I told him to stop. I was bossy. He probably did. I just felt so bad for that larvae.

13.

I just had my interview with APPS and I think it went very well…except that I was a 1/2 hour late! I got lost. I know. I called and told them I was late and lost, but yeah… I still got there at 11am instead of 10:30am. Fabulous first impression, I’m sure. Poor sense of direction. Check! Poor time-management skills. Check! Can’t get her own head out of her ass. Check!

14.

I know that I am ready to take Waffle and my relationship seriously, that I am willing to make sacrifices to make it work. I am only 23, and who knows if this is “it” or whatever, but I love her and I need to stop being so guarded in my relationships. Wow for getting boring and mushy. It is 3:15am and I’m still awake because I closed at work tonight. I guess I will go join Waffle and Kitty in bed and try to sleep. It feels like the page is turning.

15.

It makes me sad not to go home for Thanksgiving or Xmas, but I would rather be in Oswego with people that don’t make me feel as though I have to hide who I am. I need to distance myself from my parents until they can accept me as I am. We are not on bad terms and I love them so much, which makes it hard, but they are unwilling to deal with my sexuality and they are, I have to admit, homophobic towards me. I am now strong enough to see it and realize that they need to come to terms with them and that, if they don’t, I really might have to walk away from them.

16.

Discovered Pandora free internet radio today. Maybe I’m old and out of the loop and everyone knows about it, but if you don’t, try it! http://www.pandora.com It’s the shit! So far I’ve built a Nirvana station and an Ani DiFranco station. Cool shit.

17.

I have taken several loans from my girlfriend which I will have to repay. Well, I’m sure she doesn’t want me to, but I will.

[Author’s Note: I did not.]

18.

I minced a whole head of garlic today and I think the odor is going to haunt me for days. I hope Waffle likes the sexy smell of raw garlic. Feeling better today… and less like a desperate loser who should just go back to college…

19.

So, I haven’t posted in a while mostly because I was feeling depressed, worthless, and pathetic, and didn’t want to let everyone in on my suckiness. Truth is, I couldn’t find a job and ended up working at Oswego McDonald’s for the past two months. Yes, it was terrible. Actually, the people aren’t too bad and I guess the job is OK. Working for an evil anti-union, pro-meat industry, employee-exploiting, piece of crap international corporation was a bit… unsettling for me ethically. I was recently getting very, very depressed about it all. So I’d been applying for jobs, going on interviews just to find out that I wasn’t what they were looking for, feeling like crap about my two B.A.’s, and barely making ends meet. But this week everything turned around for me. I am finishing out my scheduled shifts at McDonald’s next week and starting two new jobs! I finally heard back from SAF and after an interview in October and a long time of waiting for their decision, I was hired to work full-time at the women’s shelter. I’m really excited about it and, though I know the kind of bull that goes on at SAF among employees, I am really looking forward to the work. Finally, a job that I am proud of, and where I can actively help other people. I had my final interview with Planned Parenthood this Friday, too, for a part-time position as their VOX Recruiter and Liaison. I heard back from them the same day and they are hiring me, too!

20.

I went out and bought some new “big kid” clothes this week, as I figured I couldn’t make it through a whole month wearing the same three or four outfits every day. Eventually, someone would catch on that I was really a poor college grad with no savvy for business casual clothes that prefers ratty jeans and oversized sweatshirts and oversize scarves.

21.

I wish my family was as warm to Waffle as her family is to me.

22.

Sarah got me a lot of cool things for my office and some vegan briefcase-style/tote bags. She majorly broke our $15 limit, but I couldn’t hate her for too long. I broke it, too, but not nearly as grossly as she did. She got me these cool hyacinth bulbs in a glass container. You just keep the roots wet and they flower for two to four weeks. They are on my office desk right now, near the window. They are just starting to open.

23.

I am at work and, as some of you may have gathered from my many bulletins on MySpace yesterday, bored out of my mind. You see, I am going through hotline training, so I am at the office a couple days a week literally waiting for the phone to ring. That is all I do all day. I have run out of things to do today unless someone brings me something. I am getting paid to update my Livejournal right now and it is not even because I am slacking off. You’d think this would be ideal, but I really hate sitting around doing nothing.

24.

Waffle moved our bed into the other bedroom yesterday and we are getting ready to move my furniture in. It’ll be nice to get settled in. Although I am anticipating that I will be going to grad school in Albany next fall, so I guess we will be packing up again in a year. Shhhh. I haven’t told either of my new employers yet. It’s still a long way off. I am hoping to get into their dual degree program in Public Policy and Social Welfare.

25.

If I’m still on your LJ list after all this time, then you know how I do. I disappear for a long period of time and suddenly resurface for a few months. It’s nothing personal. I still think you are pretty. In case you missed it, I’m in Rochester now, working at Planned Parenthood as the Community Affairs Coordinator. I absolutely love my job. For those of you that knew me in college, it’s pretty much what I did in college… except with some clout and a salary. It is really pretty fucking awesome. Sooooo… hi again! More later… maybe on the lunch break!

26.

Waffle and I have agreed on San Francisco as our next residence-of-choice. I know I have to try living in a big city before I’m ready to settle on a place to live. NYC and DC are not on the top of the list for Waffle. She’d probably be fine living where we are for the rest of our lives. Or going back to Oswego. But I need to experience something that is not Upstate NY. So we agreed that San Fran is a good compromise. She’s even looking forward to it a little, I think. I hope it lives up to my expectations. Maybe that’s why I like Rochester so much. I had no expectations…

27.

So I did something a little strange yesterday. I got my nails done. I mean, really. I have acrylic French tips on my nails now and every time I look down at my fingers furiously typing, I can’t help but feel like my hands belong to someone else. Someone with 1.5 kids, a white picket fence, and a formal dining room. It was a completely impromptu thing. Due to circumstances at home [Author’s Note: One of many breakups], I was aching to get out of the apartment.

28.

I had a dream last night that I was gnawing on the French tips and totally ruined two of them. I was so frustrated and annoyed with myself, but a little relieved. When I woke up, I immediately looked at my hands because I couldn’t remember if it had really happened or not.

29.

Had a great weekend. Did some work on the yard. Saw a movie. Invited some friends over on Saturday for an impromptu soiree. Lots of cheap wine, food, and citronella on our back deck. Who knew so many of us were losers and had nothing to do on a Saturday night? BTW, there is TONS of boxed wine left.

30.

I applied to a job in DC yesterday. I haven’t told anyone at work yet. I’m going to wait to see if I actually get an interview before I make a big deal about it. I feel a little guilty about applying, since PPRSR was so good about promoting me and paying me a really decent salary and I’ve only been in my full-time position in Rochester for 5 months. Seems a little premature…but I don’t think there is any room for advancement at this affiliate. The DC job is Youth Initiative Manager for PPFA, which is essentially what I do here, minus some of the more heavy public affairs work. I’d get to travel all around the country, plus work for a national non-profit and live in DC! It is really a step in the direction of my “dream job.”

31.

I always thought I hated fruit tea. It’s actually not that bad. I’ve been drinking it all week at work from a Celestial Seasoning multi-pack that Waffle’s mom bought for me at some family holiday. Right now, I’m drinking an orange infused tea with undertones of grapefruit. It brings back pungent memories of eating grapefruit halves coated in sugar. I really liked using the “grapefruit spoon,” the one with the serrated edge at the top, and digging out all the fleshy goodness. Then I’d squeeze all the juice out into a bowl and drink it. It was one of my favorite breakfast rituals when I had a kid. I had lots of rituals that revolved around food, actually. I’m not sure what that means.

32.

I am ridiculously obsessed with this digifilm from Korea. Please, if someone can translate the rest, I’d be forever grateful. If you don’t know any Korean, like me, then just enjoy and be filled with love and a yearning for world peace:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nKNODKWQP8

33.

I still have wanderlust creeping in at the corners, but I’m content to stay here for a few more years. I could use the job experience/stability and I’ve decided I’m applying to get my Masters of Public Administration at SUNY Brockport. It’s cheap and in the area…and it’s really just a resume builder for me, but I may as well do it while I’m here. Goddess, I’m glad I didn’t get into an MFA Writing program or MSW program. It’s definitely not what I want to do. I do think I may eventually go for a PhD in Gender Studies and try my hand at teaching and publishing. But right now I’m going to keep going with this non-profit thing. I adore my job. I like feeling like I’m making a direct difference in people’s lives… and affecting civil rights policy. My apartment is fantastic. I just was appointed to the ImageOut Board. I have a freakin’ awesome church. I have great friends and co-workers. We have the best pets (4 now)! And Waffle and I are doing well here…. well, now we are.

34.

So right now I am eating an artichoke which I really feel is one of the most pleasurable acts in life. The texture of the leaves and the satisfaction of scraping that tiny bit of “meat” with you teeth. It is very tactile and almost sensual. The fresh, raw flavor. The soft flesh nudging off so easily. And then the ultimate goal–to reach the heart, peel off the soft fibrous hairs to reach the very center, and then the warm, deep satisfaction as you smooth it against the roof of your mouth.

With a fresh artichoke, there is no shortcut. You have to take each petal off piece by piece, the leaves getting thinner and thinner, pick through the prickly tips and the layer of furry hairs bit by bit, to get to the crux, the center of the task at hand. And even I, who, like a typical American, cooked my artichoke by nuking it for 6 minutes instead of steaming or broiling it…even I, who is incapable of just eating the damn artichoke and not updating on LJ at the same time…even I, who barely makes time for anything or anyone without penciling it in in advance…has to set aside 15 minutes out of my day to eat this delicacy, to finish this task. And once you start, you really can’t stop. It is like you must get to the heart. It becomes the center of all things.

20 Excerpts From Gabe Dunn’s Baby Bi Stoner Diary 2001-2003

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, an A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you some of our incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written down, usually with actual pens. Today, Gabe has selected excerpts from his journals chronicling his baby bi days.

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1.

Crying Tears of Crimson: A Poem

My tears are cellophane (invisible)
Sunshine guards the hidden dark
Blackness haunts to cloud white
Blinding light conceals routine
I am alone.

The past consumes my mind. I yearn (for it)
The present clouds my soul. I drown (in it)
The future blinds my courage. I shiver (from it.)
The world grasps to threaten chance, I cry crimson tears alone.

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2.

Different: A Poem

Different, special, unique,
cutter, bisexual, depressed,
trembling, hidden, alone

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3.

I haven’t gone out with anyone since Jason. No one interests me, because whenever I get close to a guy, I notice all these flaws and I feel trapped and I can’t stay anymore. I think that’s part of my depression. The other part is the whole faking it thing. I have value too but no one listens to me. I try to say how I feel but it always backfires because everyone thinks I have the perfect life and I should stop complaining. Well, fuck you! Guys are even worse. I was never really feminine until this past year and then all of a sudden, all these guys say they like me but how could they even know because they have no idea who I am.

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4.

August 31, 2002

Why do people have to get old? It’s really depressing to watch people you’ve known forever, who even took care of you grow weak and helpless

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5.

My mom asks me what I’m thinking, as if she really cares. I said nothing and then my mood got better after awhile and I started talking about Avril Lavigne. She is so cool.

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6.

Brandon asked me to homecoming and I said yes because he’s nice, I guess. I don’t really know what to make of it. Really, it’s very odd.

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7.

Matt and I got in a pen fight in science. He is so much fun. I love him to death but not like that.

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8.

September 16th, 2002

I hate God. I just hate god. In fact, there is no god. It’s all a stupid fallacy. [My grandmother had cancer.] My dad says it’s God’s plan. God’s plan can kiss my ass. I am never praying again. Viva la vie Boheme.

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9.

Are there people like me out there? I hope to God there is. Will I ever be happy?

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10.

I really shouldn’t be doing what I’m doing. In a way, I feel like I’m lying to her. My problem is that I have ulterior motives for being her friend, which she has no idea of. I feel kind of guilty but also, I don’t know.

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11.

Torah classes taught me to shut up about women’s rights. I have the right to say what I feel. Women deserve more than what Orthodoxy gives them.

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12.

There was this girl who used to go to my school. I don’t know why I remember this or even think about it but her name was Amanda and she was a punk. She got picked on a lot for being who she was but she always stayed indestructible. She was a mystery to me. I never really got to know her but sometimes I wish I had. I always respected her from afar. She left the school though and I haven’t seen her since. I wonder what happened to her.

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13.

I always thought I would die young. I wonder what people will say when they read this after I’m gone. I need some alcohol or drugs. I sniffed a permanent marker.

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14.

January 6th, 2003

Had math class. My teacher is the hell bitch. I forgot my math notebook and she glared at me and said, ‘This is a great way to start off the new semester.’ Good to see winter break didn’t unfreeze her icy heart.

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15.

I saw Shauna today. She’s so pretty it’s unnatural. I gave her the shirt I got for her. She hugged me numerous times. It makes me feel good to see her happy. She is very pretty. I skipped basketball today. My parents asked if anything’s the matter.

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16.

January 15th, 2003

Been awhile. Let me catch you up. My mom: Still a bitch. My dad: Still clueless. My sister: Still annoying. My friends: Still immature. My life: Still sucks.

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17.

I read something cool today in Greek Mythology about creatures called furies. They cry tears of blood. I don’t know why but I find that really cool in a morbid way.

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18.

The government ignores the genocide in Darfur because: Racism, angering Arab oil companies, apathy, lack of troops, media attention to Iraq. RACISM. Ignorance, can’t be bothered. Right wing conservatives/big business.

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19.

Taste: A Poem

She has the taste of death in her mouth
and the love of blood in her tears
and she is not afraid because she cries for all the world to see
so they don’t have to

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20.

Reefer Madness: A Poem

Transfixed by reefer madness
Evolving into deeper sadness
Like a bomb ready to time
Like someone about to commit a crime
Falling waters meshed to one
Grass lit up by flecks of sun
Feel something!
THE SLOW BURN
Nothing to lose but green
Slow burn, slow burn. Slow down the burn
Listen to it crinkle
Feel something!

22 Excerpts From Sarah’s Diary, 2004–2006

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, a new A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you the incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written on paper with actual pens. Except today, Sarah is sharing excerpts she typed in her LiveJournal during her senior year of high school and freshman year of college. She was falling hard for her best friend, who was irreversibly straight but still totally fucking with her head.

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1.

December 22, 2004

well, first let me introduce myself. i’m seventeen, and bisexual. yeah, that’s pretty much me.

2.

January 2, 2005

i was falling off the bed because everytime our legs touched i got really nervous, so i was like “i hate to be rude but i’m like falling of the bed” and she goes “well look at how much space there is between us. you can come closer, you know?” AHHH.

3.

February 1, 2005

i didn’t even do my english paper like i planned tonight, and i’m like so unprepared. i feel spastic and drunk with love.

4.

February 2, 2005

she positioned herself beside me and started playing with my hair. not just patting it, but running her fingers through it, and lovingly touching it. AAHHAHFFUCK. do you know what a dumbass i am? i was sooo nervous when she did that, at first i smiled up at her, but as she kept doing it i was getting effing horny. and so i looked over at glennis and was like “glennis, are you going to drink your water?” and everyone was looking at me, and i was like “i like it when you drink your water! it’s entertaining.”

during english i had to give my presentation and doing it in front of sammi made me so nervous, but i did really well. i talked about emotion recollected in tranquility, and i made sure to emphasize on the words ‘pleasurable’ and ‘erotic’ when i looked into her eyes. hahaha, i’m so bad. i can’t help it.

whoa, i just saw catherine zeta-jones out of the corner of my eye on my screen and thought it was me for a second. HOLY CRAP I’M CATHERINE. she’s also eating me out under the desk. she’s like “MMMM SARAH! GODDAMN, I LOVE TO LICK YOUR PUSSY!” wait, if i’m catherine and she’s me, then i’m eating myself out. weird. okay, no she’s catherine zeta and i’m me. that’s better. hahahha so anyway, while catherine finishes eating me out i’ll tell the rest of my story slash day.

5.

February 8, 2005

she was singing today and i couldn’t help but notice how pretty her mouth was when she sang. oh i’m so weird!

6.

February 13, 2005

i was mainly jealous of him just because i could tell he wanted sammi. we went to cheddars for dinner and while we were waiting outside adam put his coat around sammi’s shoulders. aww … barf. lol. get away from my woman, bastardface.

7.

February 14, 2005

i enjoy the chase and the fight, but when i get what i want suddenly it’s not such a great thing anymore. maybe i’m just doomed to be a people eater.

8.

February 16, 2005

she was under the covers and she has this habit of playing with her belt buckle except it looks like she’s totally masturbating when you see the covers because her hand is like right there. and i noticed it and started cracking up, and she looked down at what i was looking at, and started to laugh too. but she kept doing it — of course. and i said “wow, that doesn’t look suspicious.” and she just kept on, staring me straight in the eye.

before i left we made each other friendship bracelets. aww, she has this little kit and it’s all personalized with her name and everything. it says “SAMANTHA” on the cover. gah, it was so cute for some reason.

9.

February 27, 2005

after the concert we were walking down the stairs and i stumbled a bit, so she held out her hand and i took it. we walked down two flights of stairs like that, and when i reached a railing i let go of her hand and said “thanks, but i don’t need it now.” AHHHHHHH I’M SUCH A FUCK. FUCK FUCK I AM A BIG FUCK. god fucking damn it.

10.

March 2, 2005

in enviro we were talking about how falcon babies eat each other when they are out in the wild, and i turned to sammi and went, “would we eat each other if we were out alone, together, in the wild?” and she got a gleam in her eye and we both started laughing. hopefully she got it. she also was eating an ice-cream sandwich, and i happened to glance over to see her licking the length of it, you know… where the icecream gushes out? OH MY FUCKING GOD.

oh there is this really hot girl doing costumes for the play and she’s a lesbian, i can tell… and i want to jump her. but i think lesbians think i am initially straight. maybe i’ve just gotten so good at pretending… i don’t know. i want to have a lesbian vibe! maybe i should just cut off all my hair and start wearing man clothes! haha. ok, probably not. maybe a rainbow or two. but that’s so cliche. maybe an “I AM A LESBIAN” teeshirt?

11.

March 7, 2005

ugh. i’ll just be happy when this whole thing is over and i can start thinking rationally again. i feel like i’m on sammi drugs. BLAH. there is NO REASON to be glorifying a person this much. we were talking about this in english today. it’s like the attraction and unrequited lust is more beautiful than the actual relationship itself, and it all parallels unobtainable art. sammi is my unobtainable art, and if she gets to close i get bored, but if she drifts too far i am drowning in her.

12.

April 4, 2005

i hope i can laugh, chuckle, or smirk when i think about sammi and i’s past. i can’t wait for the day when we meet for coffee midway into my freshman year and i am head over heels in love with my steady girlfriend whom i’ve been seeing for a couple months, and remember back to this moment when i longed for a straight girl’s attention. I REALLY HOPE I CAN DO THAT

13.

April 26, 2005

so saturday night i had it all out with sammi. i basically told her everything that i’ve been telling all of you. maybe not “i want to lick your pussy until you’re multi-orgasming” but i was as candid as possible.

after this whole talk i said “but if you ever want to experiment, i’m here.” i don’t really know WHY i said it, but i did. looking back on it i do feel sort of pathetic. her basic response was an amused “okay.” and me kind of laughing it off.

14.

May 16, 2005

i think the highlight of [prom] for me was pulling out a chair and offering a lap dance to anyone. sammi immediately got in the chair, and i gave her a cutesy, borderline-sexy dance. i worked that girl OUT. the stupid thing about it was that i danced to that stupid ass shania twain song about the party… hahahha. that made it even cooler.

15.

May 30, 2005

i’m supposed to be applying for college scholarships right now, but i’m too busy writing a novel about the day we spent together. when she’s already gone and forgotten about me. or i don’t know, i’m just being angsty and dumb. but there has to be a point where i just stop. i feel so obsessive. it’s so hard. i need to like… look up how to fall out of love. i’m sure there’s some kind of tutorial.

16.

May 31, 2005

i just had five orgasms.
yay.

17.

June 9, 2005

she said something like “all i’ve been thinking about is you for two days straight.” and i said “i’m sorry if this sounds condescending, but your two days are nothing… NOTHING compared to the time that i have longed and wanted you. i went to sleep wanting to wake up to see you the next morning. i dressed for you. i lived for you. you have no idea the inner turmoil i’ve gone through.”

18.

June 11, 2005

[on eating pussy] it is kind of like eating a peach… it’s so awesome. i did it again last night and i thoroughly enjoyed it. i found myself thinking “I’M HAVING SO MUCH FUN!” while doing it.

19.

June 28, 2005

i am tired of being a chivalrist. it’s BORING and ANNOYING. i want to be like shane from the l word and just fuck to my hearts content. but yea even shane gets fucked over. plus i don’t look like a total hot dyke like shane… she has chicks like flocking her cute ass. but yea i’ll pretend like i’m shane. :walks around being shane but failing miserably:… um yea i changed my mind, i will just be me for awhile. sarah w/ no action

20.

September 11, 2005

Maybe we could just stop being girlfriends/friends/whatever the FUCK we are and just go our seperate ways. I could go on and be cool and she could go on and fuck like zillions of guys cause that is her secret ambition anyway.

21.

September 9, 2005

deweysammi: I think I was also kinda jealous because you had gone all the way with them, and I felt like I wanted to be the first
LIKE OMGZ YEAAAA: But I wanted you. Even when I could have something stable and secure, all I could think about was you. If it’s any consolation you were the only girl I was with that mattered.
LIKE OMGZ YEAAAA: We have something so good.
deweysammi: I know
LIKE OMGZ YEAAAA: So pure.
deweysammi: I’m crying
LIKE OMGZ YEAAAA: Yeah, me too. We’re nerds.

22.

May 27, 2006

Although, I still wonder—if I looked good enough, if I was attractive enough… if she caught a whiff of my shampoo, perfume, saw my eyes, saw the forgotten gifts she left the last time we saw each other, felt the past… I thought if she could see all of this, feel all this, let her senses be immersed in me, she would want me more than him.

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24 Excerpts From Nikki’s Diary, 2013 – 2015

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, an A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you some of our incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written down, usually with actual pens. Today, Nikki presents some very on-brand excerpts from her colorful journals.

I didn’t figure out I was gay until 2013 when I was in my late 20’s and struggling with oh shit, I think I have fallen for my straight female friend and all the emotions that come along with that.  Here are some of my words I wrote in my diaries that range from figuring out I was gay, dealing with my friend situation, moving to a bigger city and basically just trying to deal with my tangled necklaces of emotions. 

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1.

May 30, 2014

I think I am keeping my new alternative hair cut.  More people have complemented me on my new haircut than any haircut I have ever received.

---

2.

June 16, 2014

I think I figured out this bus thing.  I Googled “How to ride a bus?” and I’m feeling pretty good about it.

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3.

October 12, 2013

Title of one of my journal entries: Feelings & Shit

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4.

MY JOURNAL ENTRY AT MY FIRST A-CAMP on October 10, 2013 is just a bunch of questions.

a. What type of underwear do I wear?

b. Am I only attracted to Abby Wambach?

c. What does anything even mean?

d. Can I have a guide book?

e. Do we have to talk about my feelings?

f. Why do I feel so different from everyone else?

g. Why can’t I follow my heart?

h. WHY MUST I MAKE THIS SO DIFFICULT?

i. Why is everyone on Autostraddle so good looking? Is it a requirement?

j. Why can’t you see that is the gayest thing you have ever written?

k. Why are you still questioning yourself?

l. WHY AM I SO AWKWARD?

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5.

November 1, 2013

I’m pretty sure I just outed myself on my own Facebook.

---

6.

I finally see why people like me. (I think?)

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7.

10/14/2014

I didn’t hold you until after your mom asked me to be your godmother. I know, I’m sorry. Babies freak me out. It’s nothing against you as a human though.

---

8.

Not wanting to burden anyone with my problems, I mean they’re my problems. I can make it better because I’m independent and strong and all those things that I strive to be.

---

9.

You were always so playful when we would drink. I would eat it all up. When you would be sitting down you would wrap your legs around me, immobilizing me from leaving. I was in heaven.

---

10.

WHY DID I DESTROY THE POEMS I WROTE YOU? (Note: They would be perfect A+ content now!)

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11.

I don’t know how this happened but one night we ended up spooning, it freaked me out. I really liked it, I never wanted it to end and I really didn’t want to dig too deep on why I liked it so much. I think I pulled away first and I told you after I didn’t like it. I didn’t want have sex with you, I just wanted to hold your shopping bags when we went shopping, have you laugh at my jokes and let me clean your apartment.

---

12.

LIST OF THE ALL THE THINGS I MADE FOR YOU (2006 – 2011) – TOTALLY NOT GAY

a. Colored you a picture of a purple Booh-Bah

b. Made you a Shadow Box gift of all of our moments & jokes for your birthday

c. Co-Organized a Surprise Graduation Party

d. Made you a dance of why we’ll miss you when you graduate

e. Jumped into Lake Superior in September in a boys’ Spiderman costume for you

f. Made you a get well soon card when you got shingles

g. When you were really mad at me I played you a song over the phone and sang along so you would forgive me.

h. When you were going through a rough patch, I drove to your mom’s house 20 min away to put a gift on your car

i. When you had surgery I made you a gift package for recovery

j. I made you 25 Things when you were sad.  It was for you to open one per day so you could look forward to something.

k. When you were moving away, I called in sick to work and made you a gift to place on your doorstep. I put ribbon on your railing so you know I had been there.

l. Made you a slideshow for your eyes only that had the song, “Wouldn’t It Be Nice.” by the Beach Boys (totally not a gay thing to do).

---

13.

When I go from regular writing to writing cursive in my journal you know I’m in an emotional downward spiral.

---

14.

May 20, 2013

I fell really hard in feelings for this person. I didn’t know what was going on. Is this normal? I called up a friend to ask about crushes. What is going on? WHAT IS HAPPENING TO ME? I can’t stop thinking about this person. She had picked me up at the end of the night. I love being picked up.

---

15.

11/30/2014

I don’t know how I got to this moment. I keep replaying how I got here in this moment. It seems illogical. Like I skipped from the Gingerbread Plum Trees directly to the Lollipop Forest.

---

16.

One of my biggest secrets that I never told anyone is: The only reason I wanted to raise money is because I was coming to terms with being gay and I didn’t know what else to do. I mean right, find out you’re gay and then raise money for special needs kids. That seems logical.

---

17.

2013 is also when I started reading Autostraddle more regularly. I found Autostraddle by typing into Google into all caps letters: AM I GAY? When I knew it as Autostraddle: the one site prettier than all the other gay lady sites.

---

18.

I have lived this life of half-truths and things I’ve done just to survive. I’ve pretended to be really happy and can usually throw on a smile whenever people are around.  I don’t want people to see my darkness.  I don’t want the light of their headlamps to find the darkness I keep close to my skin.

---

19.

In all honesty, it won’t mean anything to me.  It will just be another make-out to a face without a name. The many make-outs I’ve had in my past with boys and men I didn’t care about. The ones I just used and left for my own personal point system. It will make me feel sad the next day. Like it always does, like I have a missing piece. I can’t do that to myself anymore.

---

20.

I want to feel feelings. That is all I want. I want to feel actual feelings. I have done my time with the make-outs to nowhere. I want to have a conversation with someone I really actually like. I want to feel human instead of a version of a version of someone I think I should be.

---

21.

I don’t want straight friends anymore. I can’t emotionally do it. When I’m sad, I don’t need a fucking “you just need to be happier” speech. I want queer friendships that aren’t emotionally draining. When I’m sad I just want people to be like “Okay! Be you. I’ll be here if you need me.” I don’t need to be fixed because I’m not broken. What I need is for it to not feel like I’m a fucking stain on your life. I need to not be okay sometimes and I need for everyone to just fucking understand that.

---

22.

09/25/2015

Your laugh could fill me with the warmth of 1000 summer days and make me feel like I was the funniest person on the fucking planet. I wonder if I will ever find someone with a laugh to fill up my heart as well as you.

---

23.

12/20/2014

Six months I was in Seattle. Six months of missed birthdays, missed life events, missed conversations and laughter. Who says you can’t come home? You can come home but home won’t be the same as you left it. Things change. People move on.

---

24.

12/31/2013

I have climbed my mountain, I have made it to the top. At the top of the mountain was not the mythical beast I had imagined. There were no harsh judgements or evil stares. There was only the monster in my own head, my own thoughts, my own fears. Fear is a very strange emotion; it can control your outlook and how you react or act. I was my biggest hurdle and continue to be.

---

20 Excerpts from Kayla’s Elementary School Journals, 1998-2003

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, an A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you some of our incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written down, usually with actual pens. Today, Kayla presents some very on-brand excerpts from her elementary school journals.

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I’ve heard it said that our personalities are fully formed by around age 7. First grade. We are the people we are always going to be by the time of first grade. Now, I firmly believe that we don’t have just one fixed self. We are many versions of ourselves as we age, our lives and tendencies shaped by all that we encounter. But I do buy into the idea that our core personalities are on full display in early childhood.

I have been writing for what feels like my entire life. I have detailed records of who I am, who I was, thanks to drawings, journals, blogs. It’s strange, but when I look back on things I wrote in high school and even the early days of college, I cringe. Those versions of myself seem so distant. But I know I’m not the only person who is mortified by who I was—or at least who I tried to be through my writing—in my teen years. For a lot of us, high school and the first years of college are a time to try on new personality traits as if they’re jean jackets we just happened to pick up at the vintage shop. In high school, I thought I was going to run for President of the United States when I grew up. I have certain friends who like to remind me of this.

I barely recognize the Kayla behind my old tumblr posts and Facebook notes (remember when that was a thing?). But a few months ago, I went through my journal entries from elementary school. I was stuck by how much I related to my very young self. This was a Kayla I recognized. She wanted to be a famous actress. She wrote Boy Meets World fanfiction without knowing what fanfiction was. According to my elementary school journals, my three main interests at the time were movies/television, musicals, and food. Several journal entries were just detailed accounts of all the movies I had recently seen. In almost every entry I wrote, I mentioned what I had eaten that day even if it had nothing to do with what I was writing about. I also had a weird obsession with recapping musicals in painstaking detail. As fate would have it, at 24 years old, movies/television, musicals, and food are undoubtedly my three main interests. My elementary school self just gets me.

She also seems to have loved girls in her class and famous women a lot. The earliest volumes of my journals foretell of my future life as a freelance culture writer and also of my future life as a professional lesbian. In some ways, I was surer of myself and what I wanted then than I was later on. Back then, I didn’t really care what people thought as much. Eventually, middle school came and with it a whole slew of gendered expectations. But before all of that, I was just living my best life tbh.

Here are the excerpts from my 1998-2003 journals that best capture the person I am in 2016. All of my original punctuation and spelling errors have been preserved in the name of authenticity. Before we begin, there is one crucial event from my life that will help you better understand the bulk of these entries. At some point in 1998, my parents let me watch Grease for reasons unknown to me or anyone else. I became obsessed. You’ll see soon enough.

1.

October 15, 1998

I can read a Alex mac chaPdr book. why do I do it? becus is fun and I lik it!

2.

March 26, 1999

I’m having a Easter bonett party. Only girls are coming!

3.

March 31, 1999

I love the movey grease! I have a grease poster! I even chaned my name I chaned it to Olia notin-Jone. I LOVE GREASE!

4.

June 10, 1999

You know when you get presents? Yah. Well I am going to tell you a story abot my favorite present. It all began a long time ago. I was at my Ant Anne and Uncel Martieys house it was very late at night and we were watching the movie Grease I liked the movie. But in the midell of the movie I had to go to bed. In the morning we ate some bacon and toast the next morning I would have to leave. So when I wasent looking my mom was tapeing the movie Grease. Soon it was the day to leave. I got in the car. When I got home I wanted to finish the movie Grease. My mom surprised me. She gave me the movie. Thank you very much mom I said. The reasin she gave me the movie is becuse she wanted to be nice. THE END.

5.

September 3, 1999

One saturday morning I heard the strangese sound it sounds like my sisters friend Kayla M. I went into my bedroom and do you want to know what I saw? My Tori doll and my other barbies were talking. I said Tori? What was happening? But then I said this is cool! Tori taut me how to skate bord and roler blade like a pri. I was exsided.

6.

September 13, 1999

This summer I saw 3 movies 2 at the theater and 1 at home. The one at home was Mighty Joe Young in the beginning thar was a littel girl she was about ten years old and her mother who was Charlies Therone and her were watching goralas. They lived on a mountin in Africa. They protected the animals. Whenever pochers came they attacked one nite that happened but the girl her name was Jil she was lefed behind. The pochers killed Joes mother. Joe and his mother wer goralas. Joe bit one of the fingers the pocher only had 3 fingers. Joe ran into Jils mothers hands. I’ll stop thar. I’m not going to tell you about the other movies you can watch them. Oh did I tell you Jills mother died a pocher shot her on the leg. Now about me. I have wavey brown hair. I love the color blue. My faverit movie is GREASE! My eyes are dark brown. My favrit subject in school is histery.

[Author’s note: This entire entry is what I wrote when my new teacher asked us to write a little bit about ourselves so she could get to know us]

7.

September 23, 1999

I like reading. I get to read when ever I want. Because my mom wants me to read a lot but only at home. I love reading. At home I’m making a book. It’ll be fun. It will take a hole journal to do the book. Beacaus I’m writing every singel part of sound of music. It will be fun. I love Sound of music. My faverit charicters are Lizel and florine Meria. I like it becaus its a musical. I like learning about animals. I want to be a siecetist. Dinosaurs died out about 70 million years ago. There were sharks about 400 million years ago. A shark is a fish. It lives in water and breathes through gills like all fish. Most fish have skeletons made of true bones. But sharks are not bone fish. Their skeletons are made of something softer called cartilage.

8.

9.

October 27, 1999

For halloween this year I will be a witch. I was a witch last year and also the year before that. I will probably be a witch next year too or maybe a pink ladey from Grease if I can find the right jaket.

10.

November 22, 1999

Friday I went to my brothers play of the wizard of oz. He was a towns father and a monkey. Do you want to know waht it was like? Ok. First it was black and wite. Oh Toto Miss gates is so mad at you! Oh no shes coming on her bicecell. Uncell Henry please don’t let her take him. Dorthy she got orders from the sherif I think Toto has to go. Oh Uncell Henry! PLEASE! Dorthy why don’t you find some place where you won’t get in to trouble. Some where I can’t get into trouble? Somewhere over the rainbow. Somewhere over the seas. Some where over the rainbow is where I want to be. Toto is that you? Oh Toto! But she’ll be back we have to run away. Hello now what’s your name? Oh I’m no no no let me guess ummmmm Cathren no no no no hmmmm how about Dorthy? How’d you know? Oh it’s just my powers. Now why are you here? No no no no let me guess. Your going on a visit. No I diden’t think so your running away. Yes I knew it. Let’s take a look in the crystall ball. I see a woman oh she’s Emily. Aunt Em is what I call her. Oh my she’s holding her hand on her heart and falling on a bed she might be sicl. Oh toto we got to go back! A twisters coming wheres Dorthy? Capoom! Toto we’re over the rainbow. Well hello are you a good witch or a bad witch? Oh I’m not a witch at all I’m Dorthy. Witches are old and ugly. Who are you? I’m Glenda the good witch of the north. Oh parden me. I never seen such a buitufull witch before. I’ll stop thar. THE END

11.

12.

December 1, 1999

Mary-Kate and Ashley and the Case of the Ice-Cream Creap!

“Boo!” I shouted as my bestest friend, Ashley woke up. “I’m Mary-Kate,” she said. It was my other bestest friend, Mary-Kate who is Ashley’s twin sister. We run the Olsen and Olsen Mystery Angencie out of the Californian attak that we live in. “Todays the day” I announeced. “The day we go to Haiwi!” We started to pack our bags. Then the phone rang. “Hello? Olsen and Olsen Mystery angencie. How may I help you?” “Hello. I’m the Ice-cream truck man in Haiwi.” “Hey thats were were going in ten minutes!” blurted out Mary-Kate. “And as I was saying somebody is trying to get me out of busnnes!” the ice-cream man said. “There are 18 people at my truck complaining about the ice-cream someones trying to change the order on my ice-cream computer!” “Say no more were on our way!” I got on my skateboard and told Mary-Kate and Ashley to hop on and we went to Hawai. Mary-Kate wanted to pet a dog we saw on the way. “Please! He’s so cute!” she pleaded. But nope. I told her we had a mystery to solve.

13.

March 7, 2000

Today is Tuesday. So far, we came to school, unpacked our backpacks, copyed our homework down and now here I am writing in my journal. And soon we are going to go over our civil rights! I love school!!!

14.

April 7, 2000

I already have plans for my birthday. I want it to be all girls so I am having a sleepover and the only people that are coming are Anna, Anjali and of course Kayla M.!!!

15.

16.

17.

January 15, 2002

When I grow up I want to be a singer. I love to sing. I also might be a dancer cause I love to dance too. One of my favorite singers is Jennifer Lopez. My favorite band is A teens.

18.

April 4, 2002

The most embarrassing thing that has ever happened to me is that I missed a basket at my basketball game when my whole team was counting on me because I am supposed to be the captain.

19.

November 11, 2002

It would overwelm me to be Danielle Fishel for one whole day. Danielle Fishel is a famous actress who is mainly popular by the T.V. series, Boy Meets World, in which she plays the role of Topanga Lawrence. I would like to steal this life, because I am planning on having a career as an actress. Being able to be Danielle would show me what it would be like to be a famous or well known person. Danielle stars in other shows, but she usually sticks to comedy. I have pictures of Danielle on my walls in my room at home.

20.

[Author’s note: This following, final excerpt is a novelization of Grease that I wrote and co-illustrated in third grade. I never completed it.]

18 Excerpts from Maddie’s Babyqueer Diary, 2005-2007

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, a new A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you some of our incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written down, usually with actual pens. Today, Maddie has selected excerpts from her journals chronicling her earliest queer days.

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This week, I turn 25 and it’s the 10-year anniversary of the first time I came out as anything: when I told two of my friends on my 15th birthday that I was pretty sure I was “totally bisexual.”

My early teen years had their share of heavy angst. But that period was also one of the first times I found myself feeling really happy. Sometimes, in-between pining over girls that I couldn’t articulate my feelings for, and spending afternoons at the hospital with my mom, I got to just be an adolescent who did stupid shit with her friends and really loved Rent and the West Wing.

I compiled these journal excerpts because I find them hilarious and heartbreakingly earnest, but also because I have a lot of love for the person who wrote these things down. Reading through these old journals has viscerally transported me back to my high school bedroom where I wrote these words and then hid them under my mattress. I want to hug this version of me, and tell her that 10 years later, maybe she won’t have been John-Cusack-in-Say-Anything-ed (yet), but she’ll have a much better handle on this whole “being queer” situation, and that she’ll have had some incredible experiences of love and connection beyond what she would have ever imagined at 14 or 15. I also want to tell her that she gives 25-year-old me hope, because when I think of all the learning and growing that’s happened in the last 10-year period of my life, it makes me eager and open for what the next 10 will bring.

For now, here’s a window into my brain from eighth to tenth grade:

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1.

May 8, 2005

I canNOT believe that my best friends are who they are. [Redacted] was shocked to learn that I know and — gasp — like gay people. She thinks that people didn’t used to be gay! What the hell?!? I liked my response to that, though: “They were gay, they just didn’t say so because they were afraid of being burned at the stake!”

But seriously, the worst part is that she would disassociate herself from someone who came out. That just blew me away.

I don’t especially want to be gay, but If I was, no big deal, and who knows?

It makes me want to cry that she would dessert me if I was a lesbian. It tears my heart out and rips it to shreds.

2.

May 12, 2005

Today, Mom and I were walking in Morristown. I was talking about what I’ll be doing in 20 years (when I’m 34). I wonder if I’ll be working in politics or journalism or writing. Maybe I’ll be a teacher. Maybe I’ll be a mom and a wife. Maybe I’ll be dead. Maybe we’ll all be dead. Maybe she’ll be dead.

3.

May 14, 2005

In my West Wing fan fic, Josh and Donna need to be together, as do Toby and Amy, CJ and Danny, and Charlie and Zoe. They really should have kept Aaron Sorkin until the end of Bartlet’s second term, when the show would have ended a success.

4.

May 15, 2005

I know I believe in evolution, and I’m definitely pro-choice and pro-gay rights.

I want equal rights for EVERYONE, including homosexuals.

5.

June 1, 2005

Empress of the World is the best book. I really relate to Nic. She’s confused about her sexuality, like I am.

6.

June 10, 2005

I had my first slow dance. With [redacted]. We were dancing to a fast song, and sort of talking, and then a slow song started. He said he was going outside, but I asked him to dance. He put his hands on my hips and I put mine on his shoulders and we swayed and moved around a bit. It was sort of awkward, but not really.

7.

July 17, 2005

According to V, who was here [at sleepaway camp] last year, “the food was OK, some of the guys were nice, some of the guys were dykes, none of the guys were hot.”

8.

October 2005

[This is from a page I typed on a typewriter, written as though I were speaking from the perspective of a new high school friend, who I was, incidentally, in love with]

“Maddie once said that she’s straight, but open. I have another name for that: denial.”

9.

November 17, 2005

[above this entry I’ve written, “DON’T READ, I can’t believe I wrote this down.” Sorry, past Maddie – I’m going to expose your secrets to all of A+ now.]

I don’t know exactly what you’d call these. Friend-crushes, maybe. But anyway. There are these people in the world who fascinate me. I think it’s because they’re who I want to be. I’m so shy around these people, and I become klutzy.

I can see myself reading this years ahead and burning it.

10.

February 17, 2006

I’m so fucking confused. I don’t know if what I feel is love or crush, or just friend-love that I’m not used to. Whatever it is, it’s not helping me figure out my sexuality.

I really don’t want to be a lesbian at school. It would complicate everything. I want to be visible in our class, but I don’t want it to be because I’m a lesbian; I want it because I can do good things for the school. (Doing good things can come out of being LGBT, but still.)

11.

March 29, 2006

I’m becoming more and more convinced I’m gay. I could be wrong.

12.

April 1, 2006

SHIT! WHY MUST LOVE BE SO COMPLICATED?

13.

April 17, 2006

So yeah, I told Q I’m attracted to her. I told her first and more blatantly than X [the other girl I am attracted to], but since then, I’ve felt really really drawn to X. When I saw X this morning, my heart flipped over. Fuck I’m confused.

14.

June 17, 2006

Q got up my shirt at Relay for Life which was REALLY nice.

15.

October 11, 2006

I want to be in love and have someone love me back. I want someone to stand outside my window with a radio over their head playing “In Your Eyes.”

16.

October 23, 2006

long list of things that happened at the homecoming dance
-Drunken lesbians with [redacted]!
continue long list of things that happened at the homecoming dance

17.

October 25, 2006

[four lines of text entirely blacked out and rendered completely indescernible by my scribbling over it in pen]

18.

January 1, 2007

In 2007, I want to not get depressed and be slightly less awkward and write more and play guitar more and manage to survive oboe and get a first kiss.

23 Excerpts From Carolyn’s Diary, 2015–2016

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, an A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you the incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written on paper with actual pens. Today, Carolyn has selected some lines and paragraphs from the last 12 months.

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1.

I want kombucha. Also to live in a matriarchy.

2.

I had a tiny breakdown last night, I think — or at least I couldn’t stop feeling like everything was wrong or going wrong or going to be wrong. I didn’t even notice how loud everything has seemed lately — totally alone in this empty house — until I went into the office this morning and it sounded quiet and I could suddenly breathe.

3.

Getting up early has made me feel like I have way more time than staying up late ever did. I can journal! I can work out! I can learn tarot! I can cut and juice and freeze several watermelons for some reason! … Maybe I do not identify as a morning person and maybe I still don’t want to talk to people early in the day but maybe getting up early is a thing I can do.

4.

Maybe she will fuck and date other people and I will fuck and date work. But also other people.

5.

Yesterday I went to the doctor and now I have to go for an EKG and an MRI and bloodwork and an ultrasound. […] I spent all day yesterday evening feeling almost afraid to move and wishing I didn’t have to stay in the house alone, in case I dropped dead I guess?

I am scared, but

6.

Shannon says she can tell the minute I start going down one of those thought paths because it’s like someone is physically there and whispering in my ear.

7.

I’m wearing a heart monitor right now, which feels weird and is making me feel very conscious of my body, even more conscious than usual, if that were possible.

Is it okay to masturbate wearing a heart monitor? Will they know? (Do I have to write it in my activity log?)

8.

When I keep to a schedule each day feels more like a fresh start. I mean there are no fresh starts but each day feels like a chance to be okay.

9.

I keep weeping openly all the time, is this normal?

10.

It was hard to tell from upside down but it looked like there were two egg-shaped masses on the ultrasound. I tried to get the technician to also ultrasound the spot on the left that aches but the doctor couldn’t feel anything there so it wasn’t on the form so she wouldn’t. They are just cysts, I learned today, both “nothing to worry about” and also “find a doctor in LA to keep an eye on things soon just in case.” According to the haltor monitor, my heart has extra beats. My chest pain doesn’t exist.

11.

I wish people could just know I probably don’t feel like interacting first thing in the morning without me having to tell them in an interaction.

12.

Sometimes it is hard to be chill and not proposition everyone constantly.

13.

I am trying to lean in to friendship. As a result of leaning in to friendship last night I had two very strong gin and tonics when I should have had one and now I feel like trash.

14.

The truth is that I love LA but it also terrifies me.

15.

I feel like my body expects me — wants me — to have seasonal depression but the seasons aren’t cooperating. That isn’t keeping me from feeling sad all the time, but every time I leave the house it’s sunny and lovely and warm and there are palm trees and it takes me about 20 minutes to notice it’s not raining.

16.

I need to be less mean. Or more. I can’t tell. Definitely one of those two.

17.

I was anxious and uncertain before I immigrated and I’m anxious and uncertain now. The main difference is that Shannon is here. That helps. So do the sex parties.

18.

I am sitting here with the sun on my skin and in my eyes and it feels good, it feels so so good.

Maybe the relentless sun is why I’m having such a hard time pacing the passing of time. I mean it feels like the months are going quickly if they are even going at all, while the minutes stand out like pinpricks but also how is it almost 10 am.

19.

I want to try to do something and do it and finish it and have it stay that way forever, whether it has to do with me or work or money or people or the arrangement of books on the shelf. I am bad at seeing life as an ongoing site of change, as an art project that lasts as long as I do. (The body as art project is particularly challenging to wrap my brain around.) You can never start over and the slate will never be clear and the difference between today and tomorrow changes according to where you are standing. It’s stupid to always think that tomorrow will be better because if tomorrow can be better why can’t it start being better right now?

20.

Everything I Am Currently Anxious About (a seven-page list)

21.

Sometimes I feel high with loving Shannon. By “sometimes” I mean “most times” or maybe “always.”

22.

Last weekend we went to the woods and I got to see how she looked with her hair everywhere in the rain. I never get to see her in the rain. It was cold when we arrived and it never quite warmed up and so she hit me in front of the gas heater after we turned out to be bad at lighting fires because she is a gentleman. Actually she’s not a gentleman at all and that is why we are wed. I barely slept, it was too dark and too quiet, and the only things that made me feel like I hadn’t died were her breathing next to me and the bruises on my thighs.

23.

Today I could not leave the house. It does not matter which day today is.

22 Excerpts from Carmen’s Secret Tumblr, 2012 – 2015

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, a new A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you some of our incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written down, usually with actual pens. But today, Carmen is sharing excerpts from her secret Tumblr, all of which happen to be excerpts from her secret Tumblr that you’ve never heard her read at A-Camp and never will. But she does that, too. Just in case you wanna know.

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1.

i didn’t really have any expectations for this place when i moved here, only expectations for me, which might explain why i have trouble deciding whether or not it’s working out so far. all i have now are my new life resolutions: learn how to do yoga, take eli to the park every morning at 7AM, drive on the freeway alone, write more, cook new things, figure it out. i called my mom when i got back from canada and told her i was alone, really alone, and it feels weird, y’know, to wake up by myself and walk eli by myself and be bored by myself, and all she said was “that’s what you wanted,” and she’s right. this is the hard part i was dreaming about before i actually had to look it in the face. this is the part where i change.

2.

i’m terrified to let 2013 go so i’m spending its final hours with the person who reminded me i was alive when i was more forgetful of who i was. last night i sat next to eli in the car ride home staring out at the highway and i wondered if other people are born big, if other people feel big inside, if other people feel like manifest destiny and rare particles of energy colliding inside one skeleton. i hope in 2014 i feel bigger than ever.

3.

the first good thing and not the last. two years ago i mumbled that to myself in the middle of the night, murmured it on the way home crying on the plane, left los angeles with a pen and a journal in my hand writing about how determined i was not to forget it. the first good thing and not the last. maybe the good things have all run out.

4.

i remember when i was broke and i ate ramen six times a week with frozen spinach and onions and i remember that porch i lived in with no air conditioner where every morning i felt like i was looking out at a city that i didn’t live in and i remember crying to my mom on the phone and my bank on the phone and the water company on the phone and i remember that i hosted that brunch and i had to ask riese for money just for eggs and cheese and i remember the time marina and amanda paid my bill at the looking glass and i remember drinking leftover vodka from parties during the week and i remember it all, i really do, and i remember that it was hard but i also remember that i survived. i survived. i made it. i got out. i went on. i lived in amanda’s living room and they took my dog away and i would cry when i went to visit him and i would watch wes anderson movies on the big tv downstairs because my computer’s disc drive was broken and i couldn’t afford to replace anything and sometimes i fell asleep applying for jobs and i remember stealing from the grocery store and i also remember getting on that plane. i remember i had almost no money to my name when i bought the tickets: $129, round trip. i remember i took the bus to bwi because i couldn’t afford a super shuttle with a heavy suitcase in my hand the entire time and that i cried at every tarmac. there was a time i did what wasn’t justified and it opened up my heart and i bled and i dropped my phone in the toilet and i felt like i was born again or a little more naked or a little more light.

5.

there’s a bunch of photos on my camera that won’t come off, no matter how often i import them in and tell picasa to delete them. they’re from the grand canyon and new mexico and all the places before that, just tiny little pieces of information that set off memories that already feel too far away to touch. i don’t ever wanna forget geneva walking down the outdoor hallway at the econo lodge in abq. i don’t ever wanna forget how it felt to look at the grand canyon. i don’t ever wanna forget that night in flagstaff or the rainstorms in tennessee or the windmill farms in texas and oklahoma. but i know i will. i always do. i already can’t remember dc, not really, not like i used to when i woke up every day swimming in the past. things fade away, just like i was always worried they did. i didn’t take enough pictures. i didn’t leave enough behind. i didn’t write enough down. i’ll never remember the conversations we had or the places we went the way i thought i would when it was happening. i have to let it go instead, or cross my fingers and hope it happens again.

6.

i stood on the corner and i screamed. i just yelled. i wasn’t saying anything – i was just screaming. i was shrieking, crying, running in place. the cops asked what was wrong and i just yelled, yelling and i couldn’t stop yelling because i was convinced that was what had gotten me there, what had gotten me to a place where i was breathing again. i had everything i owned but i was empty inside and i was yelling so that people would know how that felt.

the cops thought i was hurt. i screamed anyway. i screamed because at that moment all i wanted were my primal instincts and to come back to life, to be able to remember the smell of his flesh and find him so i could remind him how he made me feel. i screamed so i could still be free.

7.

i didn’t make resolutions for 2012. i can’t decide why: maybe because 2011 was so good, because i went into 2012 grinning like an asshole at nellie’s and spilling champagne over myself, lovesick in someone else’s bed and filled with warmth and joy. maybe i thought 2012 didn’t need resolutions. maybe i thought i’d made every promise worth keeping already, to myself, to her, to my friends, to my enemies.

i was wrong.

8.

right now there isn’t much i want besides to finally make a mistake that makes me happy.

9.

the desert made me feel small, but in the good way. like maybe life would ramble on forever, like maybe some things would remain the same for miles and hours. i rode ten hours to vegas and nine back with geneva in the passenger seat, trying to DJ and trying to stay awake and trying not to cry.

10.

one of the reasons i wanna get out of here is that i can’t stop trying to piece these things back together. it’s like, when people first started leaving i looked around at all we still had and i said, ok that’ll do and now it’s so few of us and it feels so far away that being here is mostly just my own way of admitting defeat. we’ll never live in that house again. i’ll never be that person again. and the longer i stay here, the more i have to think about it. the longer i stay here, the longer i will miss her.

11.

maybe i don’t know who i am and i’ll never know and i was never anyone and i don’t exist at all. maybe i’m just dust in the wind. maybe i’ll never be enough. maybe i imagined all the sparks and the greatness. maybe it was all in my head. maybe nobody gets me. maybe nobody likes me. maybe i will never really get there because i don’t know where there is.

12.

[justin bieber’s acoustic recording of “beauty and a beat”]

13.

lately i think about it more than i used to. well, no, that isn’t true because i’ve never really stopped thinking about all of this stuff, not for years. every once in a while when i’m at work staring out the window or here in this basement i live in or standing outside walking eli i look up and out and i wish i was somewhere else. i called my mom on the phone and i told her i was moving, i said it quick like pulling off a band-aid. “i think i’m moving to los angeles around my birthday.” and now i can’t take it back.

14.

i’m turning twenty-five in two thousand and fifteen. i am a fraction of the earth and a millisecond in its time. stefanie said she turned twenty-five and looked back and thought, “i’ve done a lot of things i’m proud of.” when i close my eyes i watch myself like a figment from my own imagination. i loved who i was a few years ago and then i let her go. it felt like that was what life was supposed to be like, like something else would come, like someone else would emerge to fill the skin and bones she left me. nothing did.

15.

crossing the country was like a workshop in building myself a new heart, a new skeleton, a new soul. i think i got rounder? that’s okay. i think i reinvented my priorities and forgot how to sacrifice myself and lost touch a little with the world i thought was really important to me. one day i’m going to figure out the formula for leaving everything behind – every last speck. and i’m only taking geneva, my dog, and the pieces of my heart i shattered across the country with me.

16.

why doesn’t anyone ever make their shit look hard? my shit is all over the place. i have a million thoughts each day about tiny houses and plots of land and open windows and cars with no tops and the faint memory of what the sun feels like on my skin. i contemplate every day why it isn’t tomorrow yet but i don’t even know what that looks like. sometimes it feels like every single narrative is someone saying they “stumbled” into their dream job or “worked really hard and it worked out” and like, you know i know that’s bullshit, right? you know i know we all work hard and we all dream and somehow we’re not all getting the stuff we were working and dreaming for, at least not when we want it or need it.

17.

i told myself for months to write more, but nothing would come out, so now i am filled with words that were hidden under the floorboards in my brain and can’t wait to spill out. i challenged myself to try and peel away at the layers of what i’ve gotten myself into in this life and i think i’m a little closer to my core. i thought i knew who i was: when i was seventeen and when i was twenty but not right now. it was a nice illusion, so sometimes i fall into the rabbit hole to try to get it back.

18.

one day the only person who will need something from me, is me. one day i’ll never be tech support ever again, not a day in my motherfucking life. one day, all the people i consort with will know how to write an email. these are my dreams. not lofty, but ambitious.

19.

i keep saying to myself “i should really change my life” but then i keep waking up late and reading the paper on the train and listening to the same playlist at work and i don’t know what’s broken so it’s hard to figure out what went wrong. somewhere there is a tiny person in my heart trying to build my new life but i can’t find her. somewhere there is a light that never goes out but i’m too far in the tunnel to see it.

20.

tired of snow, tired of cold, tired of waiting, tired of blankets, tired of sweaters, tired of pants, i miss dresses and i don’t even wear them, my hair is too long, this music is sad, i’m bored, lately i feel bankrupt, i really wish it was warm outside, i miss my air conditioner humming, i miss long sessions with the sun, i miss iced coffee, i miss sweat, sometimes i don’t know if i’m gonna make it out alive.

21.

i’ve been crying on and off since 3 pm, and i come back and forth between my two options like two lives, and i alternate between things these days every second i’m awake and i’m emotionally exhausted and slightly sunburnt and i just want someone to get what i’m saying.

22.

“if i gave up on the real world i could do anything.” it’s one of those things you say out loud and then you realize it’s true.

22 Excerpts From Laura’s Misanthropic Teen Diary, 2000-2003

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, a new A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you the incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written on paper with actual pens.

Today, Laura is sharing excerpts from the diaries she kept in grades 8-10. Apologies to everyone. It was a time.

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1.

Smoking — not a good idea, but not a sin.

“Damn” and “Shit” and “Bitch” and “Asshole” aren’t swear words. They are mere vulgarities. Only using God’s name in vain is swearing!

2.

In English we typed copies of paragraphs we wrote. Since I had only four sentences my grade started at 50% but I switched it when she was turned away to six sentences. I was lucky.

The topics were so stupid it wasn’t even starting to be funny. I chose “My Favorite Meal.” Pathetic, that’s what it is. Just pathetic!

3.

[extensive quotes from all the sexy parts of The Woman Who Rides Like A Man by Tamora Pierce]

4.

I can’t remember much about my dream now. What I do remember is sitting with my back to the footrest next to Allison in the living room along with Kate, Megan, Seana and one other friend. Allison all of a sudden goes, “yea…. I think you and me are like…. best friends.” I was really flattered but then I laughed and told her me and Kate were best friends. And Kate agreed with me and said she was over here almost every day.

5.

Ash Wednesday 2001

People are a lot more mature this year. A lot. Like, last year, everybody’s like — you’ve got a black spot on your forehead. You’ve got dirt on your face. Did you get into a fight? What’s that? What’s it for?…you know, that.

This year, only Sarah was like that, and not much. She just forgot it was Ash Wednesday, so she’s like: “You’ve got a black spot….” and I’m all sarcastic “Yea,  Sarah, I do.”

Then she remembered.

6.

Let’s be realistic for a moment, shall we? It’s never gonna happen.

Unless I get in a good game of truth or dare or even spin the bottle. But in truth or dare they could make me do anything and the chances of just a kiss are slim. It would be like, make out and let his hands go up your shirt. And I’d be like NO. That was what Sarah told me she had to do once with Nick. She is such a slutty hoar [sic]. Nice, but really a skank.

7.

Kate told us the thing about Carly at track. In her lunch period, Carly had asked her table what they would say if she was a lesbien [sic]. They said like I’d say… GOODBYE! and she was quiet. Then, totally serious, she said, “I am!”

So when Kate told me and Allison, I’m like, “how does she know? Maybe she hasn’t found someone yet…. or maybe she has.”

And they’re like ew, stop Laura. And we went back as before.

8.

Sometimes I get into these long drawn out moods of almost-depression. Nothing goes my way. None of my friends notice how I feel. I put up a fake front of happiness.

I am in recovery now from one such mood. Things are beginning to look up — but nobody notices me. I’m still bogged down by past mistakes.

My life sucks!

9.

In English I painted my mask navy blue and stars and purple and blue. I was happy.

Then we got ready for gym. Tim set his bag near mine and brushed my arm. I was wicked happy. A bottle broke inside and a puddle sat by our bags. He moved his bag and [unreadable] followed it. A bottle of cologne had broken. He threw it away.

Gym was ok. We did physical fitness where we did sit and reach, then played the rest of the period.

Then we went back into the locker room. I opened my locker, and smell came out at me. I guess the cologne got on my bag too, b/c it all rushed out of my locker at me. I leaned against the bag and stared at the ceiling, ready to cry.

No one noticed.

10.

I told him his favorite orange soda tasted like Orange Clean.

11.

Broadway (is dark tonight) came on, by the Goo Goo dolls, and it just clicked. I totally got the song.

So I got on AIM and changed my colors and made a profile with some of the lyrics. Then I wrote in my journal. Then dinner.

Then I got on the comp, I put up an away message, and proceeded to rewrite like the whole profile. A *purple line* was on top of the quote of Allison (“I can’t sleep…”) w/ the %n thing, so the screen name is substituted (in dark blue w/ light blue lettering). Then a purple line. Then dark blue. Space. Line. Then in dark green with light green letters: “No one remembers when you’re right, but everyone remembers when you’re wrong.”

Or something to that effect.

12.

The girl next to him has a very high pitched voice. She looks very friendly. Her hair is a natural yellow colour, and she has clay earrings. She laughs often. It is high pitched, like her voice. She is cheerful in her anxious state, determinedly so. I like her. She reminds me of a canary. Her name is Ellie.

13.

I played Spit with Ellie. Some guy from the California group came over and sat on the armrest of my chair/bench thing. He had messy brown hair and a hard mouth. He wore a dark blue buttony shirt and cargo-ish pants. He asked where we were from. I said New York. I kind of ignored him. I was absorbed in the game. He asked what we were playing. Spit, said Ellie and me. He watched a bit. I didn’t say more. I barely looked at him (stupid me) and then he left.

I looked over and kind of went, oh! He wasn’t from our group! And I saw his face clearly and it was cute and God was pleased but I played Spit more. Ellie wondered why he came over and I wanted to go visit, but he was surrounded by girls thereafter and Ellie teased and I blushed and I lost my first game of Spit over. (But then I won two more so it’s okay.)

14.

He has light colored hair and a forgettable face. Kind of like Tom. I’ve been trying to picture it for a while, and I just can’t. I could describe its features, but I can’t pull up a picture. So anyway.

15.

We loaded the bus and listened to the day song and I had to sit next to John. He kept turning the talk to religion and politics, both of which I didn’t want to discuss. So I became defensive and snappish and surly. I continuously blew him off and disagreed with everything he said. He called me closed-minded and I said, “ok.” So he put headphones on and looked glumly resigned after having failed EVERY possible conversation topic, ruining everything.

17.

The window was cold, but the skyline was bright, and the pillow was soft. I scrunched all the way down and fell asleep listening to Leann tell her boyfriend to “shut up!” over and over, como Lizzie McGuire. It made me want to be sick.

18.

I felt like the Pillsbury Doughboy — except if anyone had poked me, there would be no woohooing. There would be kicking, screaming, and eye clawing action.

19.

We ran about and did the luggage finding dance, got our room assignments, and went to our rooms. I’m in K26 with Caitlin and Danielle (the tan, good-natured, round-faced girl with highlights in her hair who is friends with Aubrey). Becky is next door. The boys are mostly far away. Which is fine.

20.

She told us to stop flirting and go to sleep. So we giggled and fell over and laughed more and were stupid and gossiped and talked and whined and pouted and laughed and laughed for a long time, loudly. Because that’s just what you do.

21.

Ellie insisted on spots for her “buddies” and I annoyed her by saying to wait, they’re not here yet. I’m not sure, but I think we’re starting to spend a bit too much time together. I’m rather easily irritated at her. And I hate the faces she makes.

22.

So, yeah. After that was dinner on the boat that moved nowhere. The food was ok. Everyone was talking about going home. It was “so very.” Billy had a plastic shirt on. We accomplished nothing. Then we slept.

30 Excerpts From Heather’s Diary, 2010-2012

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, a new A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you the incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written on paper with actual pens. Today Heather is sharing some blurbs from her diary from 2009-2011. 

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1.

I feel like Sam Weir all the time. “I don’t need another friend. I already have two.” “Just because a girl is pretty doesn’t mean that she’s cool.” “Just keep climbing, Wonder Woman.”

2.

I bought ten pounds of chicken at Costco, and left all ten pounds in my car overnight. I guess I’ll order pizza.

3.

Well, they put onions on the pizza. I guess I’ll STARVE.

4.

He says these things like conclusions that have required a lifetime of research and critical thinking, except for I know he’s regurgitating Fox News from ten minutes ago. He wants me to help him write a letter to the editor of the local newspaper protesting marriage equality. He says “feminazi.” I keep thinking about how I found him crying while watching those Frank Capra WWII propaganda docs I brought home to write my senior thesis. I keep thinking about how he taught me to swim, to read, to walk.

5.

Her wild, unpredictable sadness is a comfort to me. Like seeing my reflection for the first time.

6.

“INFPs reveal themselves and their feelings through metaphors and relationships with fictional characters.”

7.

I’m holding onto her so tight and she’s crying like the ache of bone-on-bone, and all I can think is if my mom has ruined me for comforting the people I will love most in the world, I’ll never forgive her. Real love is not like trying to fill up the Grand Canyon with spoons full of water, is a thing I keep saying over and over in my head while I rub her back.

8.

Here’s what I did. I sat in the hotel room for about two hours pep talking myself in the mirror. And then I watched a couple of YouTube videos on how to hail a cab. I practiced that in the mirror too. I walked outside and there were about 600 cabs because it’s 5th Ave. and I’m right near Rockefeller Center and there’s the tree. The Tree. So I walked outside, bought a pretzel from a street vendor in front of the hotel, walked back inside, took the elevator up to my room, ate the pretzel, and watched a Top Chef marathon until I fell asleep.

9.

She kissed me and I did a victory air punch kind of behind her head and she said “did you do an air punch” and I said “yeah” and she said “you’re an idiot; you could have kissed me at any time.”

10.

My dad says it’s going to be a lonely life if I can’t work for people who don’t share my principles. You’re getting to write for a living, he said. And that if I keep cutting loose everyone who isn’t guided by my own sense of morality, there won’t be anyone left. I said I didn’t cut him loose when he called me a “sad, sad adult” for waiting in line at midnight for Harry Potter, which is obviously the guiding virtue of my life, so there? So there!

11.

She’s like, “What do you want from a partner in bed that you’ve never had before?” And I’m like, “Reading a book while she’s reading a book and nobody’s talking.”

12.

There’s always this moment when one of them asks if I’m seeing anyone and it’s like whoever asks it casts a Slow Time spell with the question, and it’s an echo-y tunnel and everything is desaturated and there’s no decipherable talking and everyone in the whole place turns reeeaaaallllly slooooowwwwlllly to look at me and see if I’ll still say I’m gay. Such hopeful faces that this person they see once a year will have finally folded herself into a shape that fits neatly into the family narrative that lets them sleep at night. “Still gay,” I always say. Which they hear as “single” but which means “I left my girlfriend naked in bed watching football. I told her I’ll bring her a sandwich.”

13.

Sir, the possibility of successfully navigating an asteroid field is approximately 3,720 to 1.

14.

Sometimes I feel like I’m losing everything I ever loved, and sometimes I feel like if I don’t let go of this whole thing I’m never going to figure out what I really love. Keep hanging miserably onto these monkey bars, or let go and hope it’s a bouncy castle down there and not like a pit full of clowns.

15.

I still cannot figure out why people put number signs in front of some words on Twitter. I’m never going to figure out Twitter.

16.

But like, if you read on my blog in 2005 that key lime ice cream is my favorite and now it’s 2010 and I’m telling you coconut ice cream is my favorite, who cares? I don’t even care and I’m the one eating the ice cream. I don’t have to send you a memo every time I change my mind about something. I don’t have to explain to you the process of how and why I evolved when you realize I have changed. “Baby step me through how you got from here to there so I can feel comfortable about putting the jar of your personality on a different shelf in my library of How Other People Make Me Feel About Who They Are.”

17.

My mom thinks I’m keeping a record of all the ways she’s threatened me because I don’t love her, and what crushes my spirit (and will forever, I guess) is that she doesn’t get that I love her so much, so goddamn enormously, that I have to keep records of those things so I can go back and read them and remind myself to stay away, because my heart wants to forget it and comfort her and give her everything she needs and wants, because of stupid fucking love, and my head needs the reminder that I won’t be safe if I do. She’s never even apologized. “I have a mental illness. I have not murdered anyone.” is as close as she’s gotten. “I’m sorry but I’m tired of waiting. I will find you!”

18.

I keep having these conversations with my stepmom about how I don’t want kids and it’s like every time I tell her, she reacts like it’s a brand new piece of information, even though she always leads with “Are you sure blah blah children whatever kids hulu hoop thing,” and, like, the fact that you just said “Are you sure…” means we’ve had this conversation before, so how can it STILL be shocking? After I had dinner with them last night, I had a dream that I did have a baby — and on the way home from the hospital, I traded it in for two kittens and a turtle.

19.

The dishwasher is still broken. How long can I be expected to live in this prehistoric hell?

20.

[Person] sent me a Facebook message that just sad “I’m sad,” and I normally wouldn’t have responded to some emotional baiting like that, but it was kind of the middle of the night and so I said “What’s up?” and she said she was sad because of how I’m “gay now” and she doesn’t get how I could be “all right with God” and still be “gay now.” I’m like, girl, you have an advanced degree in chemistry and just graduated from law school, how can you be such an idiot? (I didn’t say that.) (I definitely unfriended her, though.) It was my fucking birthday, dude. She used the Facebook reminder for my birthday to remember to harass me with her sadsack brainwashing. And then, get this, HER MOM friended me today. I was like “DENY, NO THANK YOU.” I honestly don’t even remember her being that dramatic in middle school. (Her mom was always that dramatic.)

21.

This support group for adult children of people with Borderline Personality Disorder is depressing as balls, man. The tears to donut ratio is like 5,000 to one.

22.

There was a grey hair in my head today! It was shocking in its greyness (silverness, actually) and shocking because it was a weird texture, like coarse and squiggly. I yanked it out. Amy said if you pull out one grey hair, seven more grow in its place, and I was like “Bullshit” but then later I definitely Googled it.

23.

Look, I’m sorry, but if you think I’m going to jump in front of you and not my dog when we see a rattlesnake on the trail, there’s not going to be a second date.

24.

I just don’t think it’s rude to take the meringue off of pie!

25.

It’s weird that in the bottle the shampoo just smells like shampoo but when I’m smelling her hair when her head is tucked under my chin the shampoo smells like heaven.

26.

I was standing in the backyard listening to Sigur Ros on my iPod and juggling some tomatoes I picked off the vine (still green) and it started raining and I kept on juggling because I was trying to sort out if I love her. Love her-love her. And I guess I do. Guess. Ha! I do.

27.

(Alternate theory: I am terrible at friendship.)

28.

First date, she’s like, “I tend to take things really personally” and right then I know I should be like “It’s not you, it’s me, even though you’ve just told me you’re not going to believe that.” But then I’m making out with her in the parking garage and why not, okay, but here is why not: Three dates later, she’s crying because I didn’t ask her what she thinks about a TV show but I asked everyone else on Twitter. Tell me on Twitter, then! It was a group ask!

29.

I ask her how to pronounce so many words. I’ve never had anyone to say them out loud to before. I’ve only ever read them in books, written them on the internet.

30.

She doesn’t make me tired. Talking to her, being with her, listening to her, chatting online with her, emailing with her, sitting across the table from her or next to her on the couch, lying beside her in bed, I never need to walk away to hide away to recharge. She fills me up with energy, but not the frantic kind. Her presence in my world sustains me. What a weird, shocking, wonderful thing. I didn’t know this existed. I’m not prepared. Thanks for nothing, Shakespeare!

23 Excerpts from Rachel’s Diary, 2013-2015

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, a new A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you the incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written on paper with actual pens. Today Rachel has made some selections from the diary she’s kept for the last two years for your consideration.

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1.

tonight my mom said “honey, do you daydream about your life after this year? do you think you’ll be able to slow down? i hope so. you’ve been working very hard for a long time.” and it made me want to cry forever

2.

the thing about sending emails you’re scared to send in a place of drunkenness/tiredness/whatever is that then they get responded to and the email from the first girl you ever loved is just sitting there in your inbox like oh hey, what’s up, what now

3.

what if i came here every day, like just showed up. by myself. if i opened my mouth up all the time and just let it hang there what would come out. what languages would i know how to speak. what would my name be if this wasn’t my name. what are all the things i can be called. when do i get to go home. soon i will remake home, the idea of home. what will it be? where will the wheel stop?

4.

i have been thinking a lot about what my mutant superpower would be if i had one and can’t really come up with anything. growing up, i wanted to be pyrokinetic; it seemed like no one could ever hurt me if i could hurt them worse, like being dangerous was the same as being safe. i don’t know that i feel that way anymore. maybe because it’s been such hard work to be vulnerable at all, it feels like i can’t backtrack now. but it doesn’t make sense either that i would walk through walls or run really fast or whatever. increasingly i feel like my superpower would be being a regular human girl who is smart and tries really hard. which is disappointing but also i guess means i’m already a superhero.

5.

so much of our stuff is packed up but there is still so much to be packed. how important can that stuff be if it doesn’t even come to mind when i think about things i own? and yet when it comes to the actual objects, I’m always like yeah, I guess I need this. i hadn’t realized until mom was here how separate our little lived lives still are. separate books, separate dvds. things i own he’s never seen. maybe that’s normal, maybe it’s not.

6.

the other night i woke up at 5 am and the downstairs lights were on, illuminating the bedroom. i went downstairs cell phone in hand, ready to find an intruder, and just found the kitchen and bathroom lights on. when i went back upstairs, everything looked like a menacing man standing over me. i swear i didn’t leave them on, and F swears he didn’t either. i feel anxious at the thought that maybe i left them on and forgot. like i can’t trust myself, like i was an intruder in my own home.

7.

this weekend was so nice? like in a way where i was just CONTENT. i am not sure when i last felt that way, rather than just like fine.

hahaha and then as soon as i wrote that [redacted] emailed me! like literally then. JUST WHEN YOU THINK THINGS ARE UNDER CONTROL (jk nothing is ever under control, has ever been)

8.

i miss [person] so much and i can’t get over that picture of us. i’m trying to think of what could have precipitated that pose but it’s so specific, so bizarre: my hands covering his eyes, his hands covering mine over his face, and me looking away from the lens, my whole upper body twisted. i get that we didn’t want to have the picture taken, but good lord.

9.

i have been feeling like i want — i don’t know what i want. it’s not quite wanting someone to take care of me; it’s like wanting to feel like i am here, like someone sees that i’m here. like if i push a glass, it will move, it will break when it hits the floor.

10.

today i was trying to steel myself to do some freelance work that i didn’t want to do and then i got criticism on the freelance work i had already done, which i didn’t want to do, and so instead of doing any (paid!) work at all, i cried for an hour and then had three glasses of wine and yelled at the contestants on Chopped

11.

i talked to my mom on the phone and i am becoming increasingly aware that when we talk, she is speaking maybe 75% of the time and 90% of what she talks about is my brother, and almost anytime i ask her about herself what she actually discusses is my brother, or her friend, or [her boyfriend], or anyone but herself

it makes me sad because my mother is important and has had a big life with big things in it, and even the little things are important because they are about her. i hope i never do that but for all i know i already do. at least i stopped apologizing as much.

12.

i think i have felt terrible because for whatever reason i haven’t been able to work, and the only way i know how to feel about myself is based on how much i work. maybe it is some part of my brain rebelling, cutting off my access to that particular road so that i am forced to take another one. i am not sure yet what that is.

13.

i am wanting to do exercises about the use of language and ways to loosen its ligaments and connective tissue. refraction; the way things get wildly abstracted but are still recognizable. renata adler. trying to teach myself a language through practice, speaking with no listener to correct me.

14.

The office is SO messy and smells like cat pee and I don’t know how to fix it and the floor is dirty and the kitchen is a mess and my skin is breaking out on the jawline again and I don’t know why, I’m doing everything right. My body feels like a pigpen, an abandoned garden.

15.

Sometimes it feels like the physical world is taking my hand and slapping me in the face with it and telling me “stop hitting yourself”

16.

i am thinking a lot also about perfectionism, or like the reluctance to do anything if it can’t be done perfectly. if the conditions aren’t ideal, if it might not shake out exactly as imagined, it’s not worth doing. sometimes not even if there’s a threat of that occurring, or a reason to believe that something might not work out totally well, but just like why do anything without a guarantee? which of course means, ultimately, why do anything ever.

17.

a list: THINGS THAT ARE GOING WRONG

18.

want to take the day off to cry tbh

19.

EVERYTHING IS STUPID I FEEL STUPID ALL THE TIME AND IT’S STUPID

20.

i had a draft started earlier this week about how i went to a bar with someone that has been hanging out with a dude that he knows sexually harasses his female friends, and how sad and scared that made me feel. i was so hypervigilant in the bar, watching everyone’s movements. my dumb reptile brain. i wanted to write more about how specifically i felt but i guess if i ever need to look back at this, the context will make it clear how i felt. or it won’t, and it will be clear how much i’ve changed. either way.

21.

who makes their subject line “dreams?” are you trying to kill me? seriously how is that legal

22.

today! is a new day! seize it! yeah!

23.

i think i have to stop watching criminal minds so much, as i was legit marginally convinced there was a serial killer in my house last night. i could try watching haven or fringe. what is it with the one-word show titles? raymond carver, we hardly knew you.

13 Excerpts From Stef’s Super Secret 8th Grade Diary

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, a new A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you the incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written on paper with actual pens.

Today Stef has chosen some selections from the only journal she salvaged from her childhood, a chronicle of the summer she was 13 years old. She was mostly into horses, the X-Files, throwing temper tantrums, not having any friends and pretending to know how to play the guitar. Not much has changed.

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1.

5/18/97

X-Files was horrible. Mulder killed himself. It was terrible. Just when he and Scully were beginning to draw close!

2.

5/26/97

I feel often that I need to  break from this horrible shell that I’ve become.

3.

6/7/97

I’m banned from the computer because I got jelly from my dinner (PBJ & half a cup of milk) on one of my dad’s papers. Also, I drank the last of the milk. So I’m banned from the computer room for the weekend… [Mom] told me I had no sense at all and was angrier still when I agreed. One day I’m going to get her back. One day, she’s going to pay.

4.

6/15/97

After a few quick minutes on the Net, we went to Uncle Vic and Aunt Beth’s. Their son Harvey was there with his fiancée. Harvey works in the music business with big time bands like 311, Cake, the Cardigans and Hanson. He’s getting me some autographed stuff. I wish Garbage was on Mercury… Anyway, I decided that I want to go into music. Maybe eventually have a spectacular job like Harvey. Or maybe (big maybe!) [my band] will gets its act together and we’ll have as much money as all the Spice Girls combined.

5.

7/8/97

Fortunately, due to the rain, our pool party was cancelled. Unfortunately, it became a 50s theme dance. I refused to dress up, because I don’t even belong in the 90s, let alone the 50s.

6.

7/12/97

OK, so here’s the biggest part of the day. Steve, who’s one of the guys we hang around with, we were talking at canteen. Tim was following us but we ditched him and went out just walking and talking together. It was amazing – we’ve got lots in common, and he’s a really great guy. So after a while, he asked me out. I said yes. Then we hugged. Everyone bugged us, but I was thrilled. I mean, I know him a little, so I feel pretty comfortable around him. And he’s goodlooking in his own way. Cindy was ecstatic. We kept walking around, except this time with our arms around each other or holding hands. When curfew came around, he walked me to the cabin, then hugged me and kissed my cheek… He’s so great. I am so thrilled.

7.

7/13/97

Steve & I made out. We frenched. It was incredibly gross, but I tried not to let on.

8.

7/14/97

I broke up with Steve. I don’t know, I felt so horrible about our relationship in general.

9.

7/22/97

We’re all staying up all night. Everyone’s in the other bathroom. We wrote BUS NOTES! Everyone’s going home. It sucks. We were gonna do Ouija board and ask Kurt Cobain if Courtney Love killed him, but considering Noreen went to bed already I don’t think it’s gonna happen.

10.

8/30/97

Tonight I attended my first concert – Jewel. It was wonderful.. Seeing the real Jewel on stage and not on TV or in a magazine was amazing.. Her version of “Foolish Games” was amazing. It got a standing ovation. When we got home, the newscaster said Princess Diana is dead.

11.

9/7/97

We went to [rich distant cousin]’s bar mitzvah. The party was a trifle boring at first, but I played some video games and drank a lot of Diet Coke. I was playing this awesome jet-ski game where you’re on a moving board and steering when they herded us into a main room. They’d hired a band. It was – no joke – the Quad City DJs. “The Train?” They played that, and three others. I spoke to the lead vocalist later, on line for the jet-ski game. He said he’d never jet-skied before.I told him I hadn’t either, but that it was awesome and he should try it. He declined.

12.

10/21/97

Nothing to say.. Life sucks.. I don’t know what to talk about. This journal is the absolute truth, and I have nothing to say. Sure, all the big stuff happened. I own a cigarette lighter, cut a class, drank a beer, wore blue lipstick, etc.

13.

11/21/97

It’s November and now I’m fourteen. I own an electric guitar, not the ’69 Fender Mustang I dreamed of but a red and white Ibanez that looks sort of like a Stratocaster. Shirley Manson got a new Strat, too, so we’re even! Oh yes, I now own a purple lipstick, I’m a 9th grade freak, I can play lots more on the guitar and I’m close friends with psychos.

34 Excerpts From Riese’s Diaries, 2008 – 2014

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, a new A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you the incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written on paper with actual pens.

Today Riese has plucked some lines from a stack of diaries spanning the years 2008 – 2014 and is presenting them here, for you. These are not in chronological order! If you think I’m talking about you, don’t worry, it’s somebody else. xoxo gossip girl

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1.

Why do I do it. Why, when nothing but temporary thrills will come of it. Because I am an animal? Because we are all animals. Because I want to feel things. Because I am a body.

2.

When he told me he didn’t “get” why I’d ever want to “be intimate” with a woman, he essentially put a stopwatch on the coffee table between us. It went off a few weeks later and I stopped taking Wellbutrin and started drinking more and went out into the night to find girls because I was in New York City and I could be anyone.

3.

This is me on an airplane descending into Oakland. I feel confused that my life is happening, going on like this, in this way. I feel that I have no idea what will happen next. Does anyone else on this plane understand this or feel this way.

4.

I think I drink and smoke alone too much. I wonder if the internet makes people drink alone more, ’cause you’re never really drinking alone. I think I need to become a better person for 2011. Like I should stop drinking and smoking alone, for starters.

5.

This is my company, this is my business, this is my brand. I am in control and I call the shots and I need to remember that. This is how I take MY LIFE back. I say no to her. I say “if you want to walk away, we will find a way to return what you put in.” You helped get us where we are now, but I can’t want it anymore. I have to be sure of this. It’s radical but I think I’m right. WE HAVE TO TRUST OUR INSTINCTS.

6.

Places that I go that are holy to me:
– The library
– The bookstore (treated as library)
– The Waverly Restaurant
– hotel rooms
– Green Lake at Interlochen
– (I used to have Columbia, but now it aches)

7.

It’s happening in a few days. Camp. This thing we’ve talked about and thought about for so long is here. I don’t even know what to expect because this has never been done before. This is the first time. I hope everybody likes me and that I like them. It has to work, right?

8.

I needed to tell stories! Being in them seemed like the easiest way to do that.

9.

She’s SO CUTE. She can write and draw and grow things and maybe this is me going back to my roots to someone who reminds me of where I came from but maybe this is me being a bird with another bird going into the future.

10.

I have a habit of wanting to predict things. I haven’t always been this way, only after the trifecta: divorce, death, mom coming out. Then you grow up, you get cheated on a few times, unexpectedly fired, kicked out of your apartment, maybe more than once. So I try to control my life by assuring myself that I always knew what was coming at the time! I just didn’t want to admit it to myself! But that’s what LIFE actually is — surprises! I can’t be prepared. I’ll always be unprepared. I wasn’t lying to myself back then, I was simply in the dark, as humans so often are. Making myself miserable now worrying about a diminished view of the future won’t make that future any more predictable. At least I can be happy in the meantime.

11.

Anxiety is a part of life. I cannot stop bad things happening by predicting them.

12.

There’s no gym, I’m gonna go broke refilling my medications, I have no income source on the horizon, and nothing promising in the works for anyone ever. But I don’t care because I have her, and every day I can see the sun rise and set so close to the ocean and I can pretend like my life is better than it actually is.

13.

She’s growing tired of me. I don’t think we even like to do the same things. I feel so sad and stressed and mad and alone, like I just want to go home and lie on my Mom’s couch until I die.

14.

Maybe that’s what we had in common, our mutual belief that I needed help.

15.

Dear interns: you are my heart’s hood. I wish I had more time to know you, but I also know that knowing people is where we start getting into trouble. All friendships eventually turn cranky, and we’re still safe. That night in August when we got high and wrote a story together reminded me of why we bother existing at all. It was nice to just be me. I wasn’t anyone’s business partner or girlfriend or roommate or co-worker. It was nice to be with people who understand what I’m talking about because to be honest most of the people in my life rarely do. It was nice to be with young people who don’t know yet how little the rest of the world will care about poetry. That adulthood is a bargain.

16.

I guess I can just keep taking Xanax until I forget. I just don’t like feeling that something changed, and maybe that something was me.

17.

I cried when the bill passed in New York. Unexpectedly — tears just appeared like someone waiting for their cue. Send in the clowns. But on Thursday it was all still just an idea. We went to the Revel & Riot party. They make t-shirts and they look really good. Marni told me afterwards that Aja said I was fun. Me! Fun! Tegan and Sara Quin were walking around in the crowd. They kept catching my eye — not because they’re Tegan and Sara but because they are exquisitely constructed human beings. They’re beautiful, like they’ve never had a pimple or a sunburn or fallen down drunk and woken up with a bruise. But they write the songs we listen to after our bruises and sunburns!

18.

19.

So it’s all been a lie, and I feel stupid again. For the first time since meeting her, I want to fuck her. Like as soon as someone fucks me over I need to open them up, like last night in the car I thought, I could do this how. I could swallow you whole. I could crawl inside you and never leave you and what then, what would I see inside you that I can’t see from here.

20.

When nobody’s knocking down my door, I have trouble opening it.

21.

When did we become so crabby? When did I start feeling so gross all the time? Why do people keep asking me for a plan. I have no plan. I have no plan. How many times do I have to tell you that I have no plan.

22.

It’s funny to just get it wrong over and over — love. I think I held on so tight because I was banking on it. I was auditioning for the role of “wife,” but I just kept getting callback after callback, and that spot on the wall where the cast list belongs, well it never went up. I could’ve asked about it but I didn’t, because I knew that asking would get an answer and that answer would be the end of me ever thinking it’d be anything but Our Town all over again. Of course I’m not Emily. Who would ever pick me to be Emily. Look at my bangs!

23.

I have one foot in this world — this new world, where everything is about my writing and my friends and t-shirts with colors like flowers and the idea of moving to California. Then there’s the root of me — drunk or stoned and alone in this dirty city I love, wondering what happened to me or when I’ll get the motivation to clean up my act. Then behind that is something worse, and old, like ghosts. I give myself a lot of room to fuck my life up and not feel guilty about it. A response, I’m sure, to remembering all the anxiety I used to have about drinking and sleeping enough hours and being skinny and accomplishing everything. I miss myself, I miss who I was before I picked up these habits, that aiming for it.

24.

She says that when she goes out of town it’s like she stops existing. It wasn’t always like this, though, not at the start. I don’t know how else to live. It’s true, I sometimes have to force myself to think of other people when I’m alone. I just really enjoy my own company! This is why everybody cheats on me. Isn’t it.

25.

I could never love a man again. But I could jerk him off, take his money, and spend it on Alex?

26.

If Autostraddle fails, I will submit to the machine.

27.

It feels this way every time — behind the curtain, she turns out to not be a wizard after all. Who are these women who come into my life and eat my brain, flip my eyeballs around, tell me dinner is on its way. They offer me what religion offers people, really: a chance to fix all my problems, a solution to what ails me. These women choose their roles and have a certain way about them. They will “make everything okay.” They have everything “on lock.” They will “take care of it.” But they can’t, really, can they? I mean, some people can barely even take care of themselves. This is the clearing I can walk through, if I want to. I can be my own wizard.

28.

I’m going to start a magazine and ideally I will then change the world. I need to go to the doctor and either be okay or get sent away. I hide so much from everyone. Oddly enough, the only thing I’m sure of is that I can change the world. That’s all I actually believe in, that’s the only thing I don’t doubt.

29.

I’m just worried if I take my life into my own hands, I could break it, or else discover that it is weightless, and has no meaning.

30.

I feel so PEACEFUL that I will be paying everybody, like I can sleep at night, even though the stress of making the money to do that isn’t peaceful at all. It’s better, this is better than before, I hated having it be so unfair. It’s emotionally exhausting, you feel so indebted to people, and so our solution was to avoid making anybody WORK for us, we stuck to activities that were fun to participate in. But still. I don’t understand these CEOs who can pay their writers, but don’t. Or pay themselves millions every year while paying their editors $25k. All I want is to pay more people more money to do more and better things. How do they sleep at night?

31.

I’m not dead yet so I have to start living soon and see who I meet along the way. Instead of continuing to save up for a dream only one of us is having.

32.

I think my goal in life might be “Revenge of the Nerds.”

33.

Welp, Abby’s it. It’s an unexpected twist but this little wing splits me right open and I should care about how young she is but I don’t. Because she wakes me right up. Thinking about this weekend — that’s what falling in love can feel like when you’re ready for it. It can feel safe and enormous instead of scary and confusing — not that scary or confusing love always ends, it’s just a different route. This kind of love is less like falling and more like love is also catching you in return. The ferris wheel kept going and going like it’d never stop, and we don’t have to, either.

34.

The day I got hit by a car was still a really beautiful day, is what I mean.

26 Excerpts From Laneia’s Diary, 2013

Welcome to Excerpts From My Super-Secret Diary, a new A+ feature for Silver & Gold members in which we publish for you the incomplete and/or highly personal thoughts we’ve written on paper with actual pens. Today Laneia has plucked some lines and paragraphs and entries from her 2013 diary for you, here, now.

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1.

“I really want to know what my actual potential is. I mean I genuinely think I could be good at this.”

2.

“I think the thing to do might be to bring myself back to where my body is, but I don’t know how. I keep making lists — things like How To Be Gone Without Really Leaving — but the defeated feeling of my body being here makes it even harder to do things.”

3.

“Just some insufficient words about Slade turning 15. I had an all-out meltdown Friday night, for the reasons moms have meltdowns about their children getting older, closer to leaving, etc. I told Megan that I’d known I didn’t deserve him since before he was born. I cried about losing him and she let me, then told me I was normal and everything was fine.

The thing is that I know he’s an amazing person, an amazing 15 year old. I watched him be so unselfconsciously gracious at the Christmas party. I see him not ever treat me like shit. I just don’t know how I got him, or if I deserve to have someone like him. And I’m always worried he’ll die young? I really am. That is a super fucked up thing to say and feel! Especially because I’m pretty sure I feel that way because I don’t think I deserve him.

But we march on! March march. Also for the record, he’s being a total asshole to his brother right now, so.”

4.

“Note: the smell of fresh wet vegetables reminds me of Bonnaroo, because that’s the only time I ever smell dirt now. This is not ok.”

5.

“Today’s goals are very simple. Complete the task list by 7pm, sit down on sofa with beer to watch my Alaska reruns.”

6.

“Figuring out a new iPhone is the loneliest feeling.”

7.

“Discussing loss of weirdness with Rachel. I proposed we take a week or a month to get weird again — try different methods, take notes, consult with one another — and then write about it.

Because what we mean when we say weird is really just ‘real’ or like, untouched/phased by the rest of the world. I actually enjoyed thinking I was the only person who thought X, and the internet made it so we could find and connect with other people who also thought X, and learn we aren’t alone. And that’s great for a little bit, but now I just want to feel unique again.”

8.

“It’s probably normal and ok that I had to take an hour long nap just now.”

9.

“Let’s live, yeah? Let’s quit hiding and not being here and let’s see what living looks like.”

10.

“It was hard not to have unrealistic scenarios playing in my head while I showered. I tried having realistic ones, but they never got very far and I kept having to start over.”

11.

“I wonder why I’m always so shocked/impressed when someone gets me? I mean I’m not that bizarre, yet it’s so impressive. Must stop this.”

12.

“A couple of months ago, I said “I’m going to remember Lemoore in the springtime,” and I have been. I think about it all the time. I might not know how to be happy right now and because of right now, but I’m really fucking good at reliving things forever and ever amen.”

13.

“I went to bed earlier than usual (12:30) and felt like a normal human beast this morning.

But now that it’s after 9pm, and I’m listening to Belle & Sebastian and occasionally accidentally clicking on the tab with the unfinished blog draft, I’m wondering. I’m wondering what success looks like.”

14.

“Today I’m going to remember spring in Lemoore — specifically that year Slade and I planted the hot pink flowers in the backyard, and driving to Emma’s house and her huge backyard and my eternally optimistic plans. And I’m going to think about the gnomes.”

15.

“The summer was a _____________. It was over too soon. It was sadder than it should’ve been. It wasn’t as sweet as I wanted. But it was mine, and I definitely made it. There are things worth talking about, and things I’ve beaten into the ground already. Paul McCartney on a stage singing Blackbird. Me not making time to see my sisters or my grandmother. Megan playing with kittens. Staying up with Mama on the back porch, playing John Prine and Paul Simon and crying when we could. Running up to the truck from the creek in the rain with Megan. Everything with Megan.”

16.

“I’m also only wearing the things I want to wear. Fuck a bunch of fucking jeans and fucking v-necks. I’d rather just not leave that house than wear that shit again.”

17.

“So far this week I’ve been unexpectedly refunded over $10 from online businesses. Considering this a win, a real victory.”

18.

“How is it possible that I am so averse to visiting the post office? Do I have a fear of completing tasks?”

19.

“I decided not be an adult last night and drank 5 or 6 beers — 6! It was 6 — AND smoked AND had some of the aforementioned granola before crawling into bed at circa 2am.

And I don’t regret a thing.

That’s the important part of the story.

Tonight I made a moderately good quiche and applied for media passes to the GLAAD Awards in NYC and secured a +1 pass for a writer at SXSW. So what I’m saying is I am very busy and important.

I read a sample of the book Closer to the Ground — about a family living semi-sustainably in Puget Sound. Is it on Puget Sound?

I still have nothing for Blog Anything and Riese is probably going to kill me.

I think I’m very smart when I’m high, but I never actually am. This is another tragic difference between Riese and me.

The new batch of toothpaste tastes like salted pot and I’m getting my hair cut to my mid-neck. Just haven’t made the appointment yet.

Strongly considering having the word “immemorial” tattooed on my person. Immemorial. I read it last night in an article on the Big Dipper, because I was looking up ‘plough star,’ because of that line in the Camera Obscura song. Maybe that should be played at my funeral. It’s terribly sad and beautiful.”

20.

“Took a nap around noon today and dreamed I was buying products for myself, but these products were aimed at tween girls, and I was older than I am now. I kept thinking “I don’t feel too old to want these things…””

21.

“And I feel like I just came to terms with having kids. Like I finally get what a big deal it is. I realize that sounds absolutely stupid, but for however many years, I just felt like YES I’VE GOT THIS, STAND BACK. And now I’m like SHIT WAIT HAVE I TOTALLY FUCKED THIS UP. This is unrelated except to say that I’m in a constant state of feeling out of time. I kinda even already feel like I’ve squandered Bonnaroo 2013 which is LUDICROUS because IT HASN’T EVEN HAPPENED YET.”

22.

“Like I want to reinvent the wheel so I can smash it with a fucking hammer etc.”

23.

“I went with her on a walk and the grass was like sopping wet shag carpet. We went to the hidden park across the street. A little girl — maybe 2 yrs old — was on the playground equipment and her tall people were sitting on a bench to the side, sort of tucked off in the corner where the little patch of trees began. The woman kept saying “We’re right here! We’re not going anywhere!.” The little girl’s named was Claire.

I gave Megan the wish to make and the she found one for me, but I must not have had the courage of my conviction because some of the fluff stayed on.”

24.

“I found a bike on CL for $225, which is approx $100 over what the internet tells me is a reasonable price. But! It’s supposedly totally tuned up and in perfect condition. So. What if I asked if we could meet around 12 tomorrow? Would it be worth it? What if Megan loved it? And we could get it! And I can ride a bike!

I HAVE WANTED A BIKE FOR SO LONG.

But it seems like probably not the best use of $225 right now tbh. I need car tires actually. I just want a bike and to be a better person!

What would a better person be doing right now? Laundry and the kids’ homework I guess. Cleaning the house. So I could do those things and then see how a better person feels about buying a bike for $100 more than it’s worth probably/maybe.”

25.

“We’ve determined that if they put something on clearance at Target, we will buy it.”

26.

“Now I’m wearing a too-small wrong-season black sundress/bathing suit coverup that I shrank in the wash last summer, my purple Anthro tights, grey knee socks, black Docs, denim jacket and the locket necklace. I have on makeup and even though my hair is generally flawed, I feel very good about this entire situation.

I will go to Starbucks I think, and then TJs where my very tall girlfriend works. And I will do it all in a too-short dress that is not in season, tights and boots, and unwashed hair. Yes I fucking will.”