So why on earth am I writing this...your guess is as good as mine...why am I pouring my soul out on the internet? I guess I'm writing this for me. I really don't care if you read it...this is for me. A journal of sorts, I guess. If you don't like it...go away. A very wise man taught me that you can always run...never let anyone tell you that you can't...sometimes you need to stay...but if this gives you the urge to bolt...if I have hit a nerve, or if you think I'm wasting oxygen...then run. There is no shame in leaving...so that is my advice.

Lets start with training myself not to feel...So many bad things have happened to me that I felt too much too soon. I had an overload and I couldn't handle it so I stopped feeling. I still feel but only when it's safe. Late at night when I have exhausted myself beyond caring I feel all the emotions that were thrown at me in the day....the feeling doesn't hurt so much then because part of it becomes distorted in that weird reality and it doesn't really matter anymore. It fades away with the last thought of conciseness. That is how escape the pain…it has worked so far but this method also takes away my happy thoughts.

I spend my days existing in a prevailing fog...just moving from one place to the next...not knowing where I'm going...dying to break the routine...but not knowing how. I hate it...I always prided myself for keeping emotions in check...but now I see how dangerous that is. I found someone who I want to feel for...I need to learn again what it is like to have feelings without processing them first...it is a hard lesson...but worth it. That's all for today...go back to the real world...it's safer there...no one shows the raw emotion demonstrated here...people in the real world are fake and that is comfortable. So leave for now......

That's another point...what is the difference between being and living? Being is floating…It is breathing and eating (although sometimes that gets cut out of the routine). There is no real joy...only plastic smiles. You just shut down...no feeling... maybe a small pang of despair occasionaly...but that is it. Living is fun and real...When you are just being you are empty but when you live...the hollow look in the eyes disappears.

So where am I now? I don't know. Most days it is both. The yo-yo movement is very hard. Some days I think I am totally crazy ...I wonder if I am ready for my very own padded room...but I can always put on my very own fake smile. So, I guess I am like the rest of the world...as a dear friend wrote in one of his poems "fake smiles, everywhere. synthetic handshakes, reaching out...but don't worry, the fancy, silicon tears will be on sale next week..." That is how I feel some days...fake...But as another friend said..."We have felt too much to ever be fake again..." That is true...I try and deny it...but I can never be fully fake again. Sure I have my fake smiles...but underneath it all...I am real...one day I will be able to accept that and through away my counterfeit smile forever. Until then...I hide under my masks...behind the voices...

(12/26/97)

who am i? that question has been haunting people as far back as people where able to speak...all those wonderful basic question...but my question has changed.....do i want to know who i am? would i be terribly disappointed...would i run away in fear or laugh at how totally weak i am? does it really even matter...i mean....i don't even know what i mean....today i made myself lay down and freewrite....2 pages front and back of absolute pure thought...what are the rules of freewriting, at least when i do it, well you can't stop....and you can't think...and that is what makes the pure thoughts come on the paper....it has everything...orange crayons, school, man vs himself, man vs authority....everything...all the archtypes...so why am i rambling...i dunno. i'm so scared...scared that i have lost who it is that began this page, scared that i lost something somewhere and i didn't even know myself enough to know that is was gone and when i figured it out i had no idea what it was...i was talking(well chatting..whatever) to a friend(ex boyfriend) from my old home town(fayetteville arkansas, lovely place, check out dickson street....) and i'm going home soon...for some reason he, of all people, makes me realise that i lost something....i mean nothing against him...he's one of my closest friends...we had 5 classes together last year...i leaned on him on the way home from long band trips...we've seen each other through break ups(including our own)....but he's not my best friend...he doesn't have a house in the "shadows" he doesn't hear the demons...but he makes me realise without even trying that i lost something...something so important that i really should have missed it...should have realised...i thought it was temporary..i thought i hated my new home(which i do *growling at texas*) but it's more...i can't write as much....can't make it make sense..i fear that the poet is dead.....i feel empty.

(2/16/97)

The harsh cold white of the walls sucks my soul out from the core. I feel myself slowly draining...the emptyness consuming. I have my cd player on(sarah mclachlin) to penetrate the silence, but i still hear it...I hear my heartbeat pounding in my ears and i feel the tears in a knot...nawing at my heart. I am so panicked. Everything i have ever trusted is fading before my eyes....frozen in horror i just watch as it all disappears. My dreams are already gone....well not gone but buried....

I was told today that i need to be happy. Why? why should i wear a mask because it makes you more comfortable. i say all this here because i couldn't say it to her...and maybe she will one day read it and recognise herself...i doubt it. this is way too deep for her...everything needs to be happy....well i am not happy...i spent 6 years being falsly happy...everyone thought i had the model childhood...yeah, right. I refuse to do it for anyone. if i choose to be a bitch...that's my right...and i never said you had to stick around. if you're gonna judge me and my reactions i'd much rather that you leave.
here are 2 different points about life...connected only in my head...if you don't understand that's ok...because neither do i.