summer

and he says: I'm sorry I'm an asshole.
and she says: I'm sorry I don't believe you.

In other news:

i always find myself dreaming more approaching summer.
not those big dreams that just end up disappointing, or maybe they're all the same.
mostly, i tell myself: this is the year that i do what i want to be.
and it's always lies, lies, lies.




interlude:

only 4 you
a poem by Emily Ann Allen

My whole life it seemed I would only have friends,
I thought I might end up a nun in the end.
I even read a book called "And the Bride Wore White"
and I swore to try and lead a pure life.
I prayed to God that if for me love was his plan,
that I would not go through many but instead find that one and only man.
I have faith that's what he has done,
I believe you truely are the only one.
Even though we met only 2 months ago, February?
It seemed like we knew each other already.
Anything we've done, I'm glad we did it,
and I can't wait for what might be to come, wouldn't want to miss it!!!
And because I love you so much,
I want my heart and body to only ever be yours to touch.



two months seems to have been a pretty serious amount of time back in the day.

at the end, she informed me that (I don't think I am going to read these to him), which reminded me that she did used to read her "ryan poems" to him. he had no idea what he signed up for.

there must have been hundreds of poems about him, literally.





it rains and rains and weighs branches of trees down.
i feel heavy too, little guys.
if this keeps up, we just might snap right off.




by the way, what happened to me actually trying to write? i picked up a pen today, wrote a couple of crappy sentences, then gave up.
and i've turned this little thing into an homage to my teenage blogs, where i previously bitched and bitched, and now i'm just continuing to bitch.




maybe that'll be another one of my dozens of summer plans.

smart, smart, smart, skinny, skinny, happy, happy, creative...
but i might have lost all that already.

a letter from danny

circa 10th grade, maybe:


--------------------------------------------------------------


Hey Katie, how are you? I saw you this morning... but you didn't see me so I looked like a dork. I said "Hey... wnm". It was weird though, your hair looked longer. I thought maybe your hair was like Harry Potter's, meaning it grows when he doesn't like it. I like your hair right now, but I liked it better when it was longer.

I was just thinking about last weekend when you and Maka were having issues before going to Whitney's house. Then it was like everything was better. It made me really happy and I felt really happy you two were better.

I'm leaving for Orlando today. It makes me wonder: what if this was the end for me in Tallahassee. The only thing I would have left from here is memories and telephone numbers. Memories of when I first met you and how you introduced me and Maka, and how I met Paul, Kissed him and how I met Lauren and how i've learned how to have friends and attempt to accept and embrace change. How I've grown to become someone I want to be right now, how you and Maka have grown apart but then grew on each other again. How Paul is not here anymore and how he doesn't factor in my life anymore.

How music and dramatic arts have played such a huge role in my life these past two years. How i've grown fond of one kid whose name I don't know, but when I look at him I see myself. How everything has changed:
You, Maka, Paul, Jason, me, people!

I miss the past. And I wish Orlando was the future. I wish that I could go there and live in my old house in my old neighborhood across the street from Jason and I could go to a school there where everything is so much more familiar than it is here. But I realize that when I go home to Orlando this weekend and see the Braves at spring training and hopefully see Jason, that it'll all be a glimpse of what I can only dream of having to go to right now. I wish i could tell you how empty I sometimes feel because I miss Orlando, my house, my home, Jason, and everything that left with it.

But, this weekend when I go I'm going to come back so happy that I got to just revisit all of this place and I'll have the chance to fill that void I have from time to time. And when I get back here to Tallahassee, I'm going to see you, and Mox and hear from everything that I do love and like up here and it'll make me happy to come back here and to feel that Tallahassee is my home also. Tallahassee has some amazing people, some people I wish I knew so much more and some people I wish I could never hear from again.

So sorry this note has become so "heartfelt" or "girly" or "emo". I just started writing what I was thinking and I lost track and couldn't stop writing.

Dude, I've totally felt gay lately. I only like 2-4 guys, but that's solely on looks. I'll show you sometime who I like for looks guywise. Girlwise I've not been very attracted lately but if there's a few girls they would be Lunk (because she's got a great personality), Heather (on looks... and not the skank Heather), and lately I'd say a girl named Courtney I've liked since 7th or 8th grade (because she's glamorous but still not stuck up).

I call you all the time. I'll probably call you sometime this weekend to talk. But anyway you should call me, or pick up if you aren't busy.

Later, Danny


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and i really miss him.
It took me a while to realize that he loved Jason. maybe he didn't, but his fondness for him was large.

It's weird, looking back. I always thought lauren and i were so close, but i read her notes to me and they're garbage. they mean nothing. they're full of made up names for crushes, and drawings of aquatic life.

i always thought danny's notes were a little strange. he was so open, even when we first met. in high school you weren't supposed to be honest, you weren't supposed to be forward, or talk about real human things.

if anything, danny killed the false sense of modesty i thought i was supposed to have.

but that would be a different instance, a different note, and another time.

drown kittens and sick puppies.

or dogs,

my memory fades.

and the more we talk civilly about our separation, the more solitude i find.
go find yourself, because i cannot do the same unless you're the one leaving. it wouldn't follow the rules of gender. or whichever they happen to be.

or the rules governing us.

and you imagined jealousy, you imagined inconsistency out of nothing.

[it's all Shakespearean].. and i hate it.

you know where it really grows out of, but you chose to find it elsewhere. in a name and not in body. in a 'john thomas' and not in actuality.

if i knew who he was, i would tell you. or maybe not. or maybe not.

at this moment, i could be with you. at this moment i could stay. at this moment you give me what i need.

but there's always this grinding thought. this imagined community. this feeling..

that i could take more chances, but i wouldn't.

i breathe in what you're exhaling. you've followed all the rules, you've promoted myself. told me 'go for it'. 'do it'. 'i'm supportive'.
and it's all true but still..

who am i?

and where is this all leading..

i used to think i was made for something grand. something bigger than this town, than the oak's that follow me.
i used to think that i would be different than the ghosts lingering in the moss or the homes or the memories hanging desperately to my ankle.
i used to think i could make something, not a selfless something, but a gratifying, almost sexual, response.

and i dreamed of kielbasa fingers, of shaking trains, of complete abandonment of this magnetic town.

. i still feel it in me . although muted . and i cannot silence the urge toward movement .

downer

never drink and blog. not drunk. drunk boyfriend. never blog whilst pissed off. says "i've been discussing gender and sexuality." shove it. did it. yesterday mother. and the b-lady. sure, i'll drop everything i'm doing. no i don't mind that you told me at 7 00 tonight. sure i'll skip homework. and be horribly late to work tomorrow. bring the fucking dog. at least i will get plastered tonight. fuck money. fuck it. just me, wasted dipshit, and traveler. choke everybody. was happy - unhappy - why. why. why. why.

drop out of school you good for nothing bitch, get a fucking job selling light fixtures or concrete sealer to rich lawyer eccentric assholes, have 10 fucking kids, gain 500 fucking pounds, start subscribing to home magazines, grow old and ugly and miserable.

give up.

i'm a hate apple.

i found the pile of my school stuff. from when 'wiggle factor' was a part of the curriculum. tests and tests and tests. standardized, percentile rank, and fuck fuck fucking scales from one to five.
good writer. good reader. good writer........ lacks motivation. less than 30% of homework turned in. no fucking motivation. never amount to any goddamn thing. you can do better than this. or can i... can i... i can't.

why have i been fighting mediocrity for so long. it's useless.
it's in my genes. i got my father's.. everything.

not the engineering Michael's, not the bright and tall and handsome and intelligent.
i got the dirt, the divorce, the cancer, the cancer, the cancer, the $12 an hour job, the illegitimate kids, the never never never finish school, dirty polacks.

and that's what i'll always be.

.

period.
and every sentence that i dream up with starts with and.
and i want to think of something much much better.
and wednesday night was incredibly beautiful.

all skin and hair and tongues. all warmth and sighs. or, what you will.
but, i am just a womanish-man,

"But such as are able to buy all their own charges, they swim in the excess of these vanities, and will be man-like not only from the head to the waist, but to the very foot, and in every condition. Man in body by attire, man in behavior by rude compliment, man in nature by pursuing revenge, man in wearing weapons, man in using weapons, and in brief, so much man in all things, that they are neither men, not women, but just good for nothing...
To you therefore that are fathers, husbands, or sustainers of these new hermaphrodites, belongs to the cure of this impostume. It is you that give fuel to the flames of their wild indiscretion. You add the oil which makes their stinking lamps defile the whole house with filthy smoke, and your purses purchase their deformities at rates, both dear and unreasonable."

But, no, that's not me.
for i possess breasts and a waist that men still glance toward, supposing i'm in the correct attire.
men that never glanced for more than a moment, i've seen tugging my shirt down with the sinking of their eyelids.

i hate, and love it.

And Antonio, with your high bleached socks, i see your lust. And although i should ignore it, or grind it until you no longer contrive ways in which to face me, i cannot.
because i am selfish.

but maybe that's me. for i'm either too forward, too male, and turn passion into repulsion.. or feed on the innocent.

sexuality is disgusting. and fantastic.
but maybe it's just the vanity that we're all so fond of. we love our bodies, share our bodies, long to see other bodies.

(and i'd give it all up, just to get to know the smell of your skin.)
- another sentence imagined and fondled, waiting to crawl onto a digital page -

i never felt so honest.

Hiding Spaces

When I first met Emily’s mother, she was starting over.
The family moved from Alabama to Tallahassee with two brand new state jobs, four young kids, and a dark two-story house. They had moved in about a year prior, and Nellie had yet to unpack her past life. Large pale wicker chairs sat facing each other in the hallway, crates and boxes were stacked to form monuments in corners, and a fabric chair cradled past-due bills and delinquency notices.
I never knew what to think or say around Nellie. She had a way of taking up an entire room with a story. Her large arms waved around, her faded mu-mu flapping with her, and her eyes bulged to punctuate a funny line. Nellie was almost a fixture in the living room. It seemed like everything in the house slowly crept toward her cracked couch. The burgundy phone sat on the large arm, three crates of home-recorded late night television shows were stacked on one seat, and tiger-tail rested permanently on the top of the tall seat, one cream colored leg pointing down.
I’d never known why, but for whatever reason, Nellie’s junk hadn’t made its way through the sliding glass doors and onto the back porch. Maybe she thought the grey screened walls wouldn’t prevent her incomplete collection of stackable dolls, or her piles of Disney themed plates, from being destroyed. Maybe she even thought they weren’t garbage already. The empty space tucked away behind the house was a place where Emily and I didn’t have to tip-toe past her crazy mother, or crawl under tables that held her baggage.

Nellie had stuck a taped up, unused china cabinet just in front of the sliding glass back doors. Only Emily and I could squeeze our small bodies behind it to get onto the back porch. There, we were free.
Emily had snuck into the kitchen and brought back a small yellowed broom. We spent all day sweeping up clouds of dust and dried up leaves out the rickety back door. Every day that my mother dropped me off at their dirt lawn, I would bring something to our porch; a tiny wooden alligator in my pocket, a deflated beach ball in my backpack, or a small fuchsia mirror with jewels imbedded on the back. I never felt such ownership toward a place before.
My house was so small that I couldn’t even call my room my own. Tip-toeing down the hallway would only lead me into a room full of people. Once I tried hiding in the formal living room, just to see if anyone would notice, but the open doorways left nothing a secret.
Nellie kept to herself inside the dark house, peeling price tags off of wrapped movies with chipped crimson nails. Sometimes Emily and I would lie out on the porch on our backs, watching gusts of wind slowly turn the dusty overhead fan, and make up stories. We pretended we were gypsy children on the run, or detectives outsmarting bad guys. My favorite times out there were when it stormed. The back door of the porch would rattle and slam and the sporadic wind curled around my thick hair. It almost felt like the swirls of wind would hug me by my waist and fly me right out of there.
Everything changed when Nellie lost her job at the school. My mother was making dinner when I asked her what happened. Without turning as she reached for a spice jar she said “it was just too stressful.” I was still too young to understand.
The next time I went over to Emily’s house, the bulky tanned armoire had been moved out to the porch, leaving a clean rectangular stamp where it once sat. There was a gaping hole, revealing our secret hideout. Nellie told us that enough was enough, it was time to unpack. When I went over, Emily and I spent hours moving boxes and crates. Nellie would sit on the faded wicker chair, her fatty lap filling every spot on the seat, and point with a painted nail to where she wanted a plastic crate moved to.
One by one, we moved piles of garbage from the house to the porch. Old mirrors and tall doll houses blocked out the screened walls, broken chairs cluttered the floors. Emily and I would still squeeze out there, crawling over boxes to find a clear spot to sit in, but the junk blocked out the pulsing wind and the blinding light.
Emily’s family moved from that house after a few years. They moved every year until Emily graduated. Always packing and unpacking.
Nellie must have imagined that what was missing from her life was tucked away somewhere. Maybe under an economy size pack of toilet paper, maybe in the back of a cabinet overflowing with papers. If she could just find it then everything would be fixed; no more declarations of bankruptcy, no bills or fits of anger. Emily and I shared a place once, where I felt like I could help her escape the demons of genetics. She always told me that Nellie used to be beautiful; she even tucked away her parent’s wedding photo.
Emily traced the sharp line of her mother’s nose, her face 100 pounds lighter, and repeated “she used to be beautiful.”

bacon

there's moments in which there's too much going on to allow my brain to relax enough to sleep.
it's as if there's a limit to madness. sometimes i feel like my crazy is always bogo. i wonder if i'm happy with where i am right now, if i'm getting enough out of all this shit.

when i listen to a certain lit major talk, i decide that my parents are right, that grabowski's just aren't college material. that education breeds bullshit. i have a love-hate relationship with pretension. or not. i'm probably just full of shit.
at the same time, i love that bullshit. i just hope i'll never be a chronic intellectual masturbator.

and, fuck, i hate being female about 90% of the time. part of me wants to abandon gender and societal norms, or maybe just ignore them, and part of me wants a fucking normal, bullshit, magazine-reading life. i'm aware of the inaneness of it all, but jesus it's still magnetic sometimes.

how typical of me.

and i can't help but wonder if i'm missing out on something by being tied down. but i've always fucking felt like i've been missing out on something. when i've been single, i told myself i wanted an intimate friend. there's always something that i push all of my resentments toward. if this were different, life would be perfect. it's bullshit. i don't know what i want anymore, but i cannot lie and say i'm not just a little bored.

lie.

i doubt i'll ever be satisfied. there's this image in my head of the perfect situation.. only problem is that it changes every fucking month.

now, similarly to the entirety of my life, i'm under the illusion that if i was a skinny bitch, i'd be the best and most happy bitch in the world. same bullshit i've been telling myself since 6th fucking grade.

what the fuck.

and i haven't had such a documented moment of self-importance in a while. probably since i was an angsty high schooler. as if anything has changed. i love pouting, no joke.

feels good though. i'll never be satisfied.
just try and satiate me, bitches. i love that word.