SO YOU CAN GO TO SLEEP

It's been a while! But it takes a while to get things on track sometimes, I find. I moved to Toronto! It's really nice to be home, to be back. Things are good! I now see people I haven't in a while, and the change of environment is heartening. I've been speaking to people I've lost touch with, applying for jobs, and really just... loving it. I've recently begun reading Out by Natsuo Kirino, and I really loved it! It's pretty gritty and unapologetic... I'm thinking I might pick up a few more of her books. I saw Scott Pilgrim vs The World last night and it was a really cute homage to Toronto. It's nice to know I'm getting a lot of opportunity now to catch up with V now that I'm back. Wish me luck! Time to plunge back into life!

SPIDERWEBS

It's 3:30 in the morning. I'm reading Bret Easton Ellis' The Informers and working out while listening to Epik High. 2 more days. And I'll be in Toronto, seeing my mother. I'll be in the salon, getting my nails done by Chinese women that I want to talk to but I don't know how to. It's more then language - I lack the ability to understand their suffering. I was born into a blank life of privilege and know nothing of real hardship. I am... listless. Still. I'm praying this trip cures me. Saves me. I want to feel loved by someone. Not anyone. Someone who understands me. I feel blessed because J is just that, even if it's not the romantic kind of love: but having someone understand me is relieving.

GOD BLESS THE SOUL

I talk today with J. It's a good conversation, it flows nicely, and we talk about a variety of things. I'm happy. I tell her some things I haven't told other people before. I'm left thinking: I'm jealous she has a mother that's been there for her. My own was absent from a lot of the major things in my life. My life lessons were taught by a string of unrelated friends and women in my life who passed on the awkward advice of their mothers. Some of the advice, I was too young to understand. Too young to implement. I wonder if I'm the sum of those parts. I wonder if I've failed as a woman, because I lack the understanding of the word 'mother', or at least the function of one. I wonder if I've missed out. And so I continue with my resolution to tell my father everyday that I love him - because he served as both when I needed it, and he's given me everything that she couldn't.

LET THIS COLD RAINSTORM RESURRECT THE SOUL

I read these books from Ellis, and I'm reminded how my own writing seems to emulate his style. I'm both deflated and elated, because I admire him a lot. He's one of those writers that shock you with his absolute defiance of convention, and his shallow mirroring of real life. He dreams. He lets you know that. I wish I could meet him... I'm very excited for his next book, the Imperial Bedrooms, which will be out in a month. It's the sequel to Less Than Zero, which I read one weekend at the cottage and cried to, because I felt it was both good and it left me feeling emotionally violated. I think that was a weekend in which I was having problems with P, because he left me alone for hours and hours, and reading was a nice way to cope. Emotionally unsteady. I think that's a good way to describe the 'me' from then.

DANCE WITH THE INFERNAL ONE

I talk to J and she tells me she thinks I'm a 'nice' person. I wonder if this is true. Or if it's the me that works in accordance to what I feel is a good thing to do, a good way to act. What is 'nice' really? Hah... Is it how we chose to be, or the things we chose to believe? I feel resentment. I'm selfish. I'm cold. I use people. But it's human. I'm human. I don't really believe in 'nice' and 'mean'. I think you should only live the way you feel you should live. Maybe I'm nice by her standards. Maybe by society's standards. But I don't do it for society really... I'm just... living. Be positive. Be happy. Make others happy. Send your love. Be loving. Be graceful. Make errors. Be messy. Be you... just... be you.

COLD BLUE LIPS CONFESSING TO ME

For all those in my life I love...

EYES WIDE SHUT

Every day is beginning to blend and bleed into the other. Sometimes, I don't know if I'm awake or asleep. I wake up, push snooze five times until it hits nine in the morning, and then I'm up, showered, prettified, and gone. Every day I skip in, tired, and pained. I don't know when today begins, and tomorrow ends. I spend my bus rides reading, new books, old books, and one of them just finished was Glamorama. I loved it. It made me feel a lot of things of a character I wasn't even sure that I liked. But I understood his fear. I'm convinced now that Bret Easton Ellis is one of the greatest writers I've ever read. I finished it today, and I'm walking out of work, and the air, all around the area, is filled with the beautiful wisps of milk weed puffs. I'm watching them fly, try to catch them and... I felt nothing. That sense of complete apathy that has been washing over me the last couple of days has left me almost breathless. I just don't care anymore. I don't know why, and I feel a little... unsure of myself. What the hell am I doing, where am I going? From speaking with Toby, it seems he's feeling that same sense of personal listlessness. We are a lost generation, and no, this is not an exit.

But isn't that alright? I'm wondering if depth of perception, and self awareness, even vary from person to person, with some people better able to reconcile their private thoughts with their own public persona. We're just... all coming in at the same thing from different directions. How do we all sleep at night. How do we just... perceive the world? It seems somehow all foreign to me now, a picture of a picture of a picture. Fuzzy and just... kind of far off. We're all fucked up, and all pretty amazing. People fascinate me, to be honest. They're just so different, happy, uniform, dangerous. But I think that all the business in my life has kept me so preoccupied that I've forgotten what it's like to be around such humanity.

I keep watching a string of one bad movies, one after another. I'm enjoying them, and it passes the time. I let myself zone out, feel myself grow a tiny bit wearier. I'm feeling tired all the time, but more sleep isn't coming. Sidewalks of New York is sad, a good movie, but I'm sad all the same. I spent today by the river, with my aunt, my father, my brother, having a picnic, the sun setting. I wanted to be moved. My brother and I chased each other with sticks, fighting, laughing, being kids. It was pretty enjoyable. I think we're all focusing on the wrong thing. We have to bring it back, find that basic joy. The smallest things, I find, make me happy.

MAP THE SOUL

I'm feeling pretty good today. Today, I had a written report due that I had to have finished before I went to work, but I was so tired once it was all done, and went through the day with hardly any sleep in my system. To top it, my bad health compounded on itself and a caught a cold. Bleh. I come home, and my visa application process was changed, and now I have to redo it. I'll have to write it again tomorrow, and have my dad send it in the mail Thursday, so that it can reach Hong Kong in time for me to go. Complicated!

All the same, I'm feeling nice. I came home on the bus with a girl named Alison from school, who actually is quite nice. I came home, dinner is ready, I curl up, warm up, and enjoy watching the news with my dad. I think tonight I'm going to just relax, enjoy myself, sleep... really just try to feel better. Tomorrow it'll be work, application, aikido (which hurts! I have to find some athletic pants...), and maybe even writing a little. I miss writing. Hahaha, I remember the amazing stuff I would come up with Caitlin and Krista. Oh my god. The plotlines, the angst, the love. I miss it. I'm the kind of person that needs a good muse to write. And man. Caitlin could rouse some amazing flows from me. But, now we're both so busy - her with graduate school, and her final exams, and me with work and school. I miss reading her writing, sometimes. I look back on it from time to time, and find it all so fantastic. Emotional stuff, you know? It was a great outlet. I think I need another one, muse, outlet, whatever, since I have to just get some of it OUT.

I'll be going home to Toronto in two weeks. I'm happy, I want to go find some new books. I like sitting in cafes during the summer, reading outside. There's something terribly lovely about it all. Something warm... with a good book! I can't wait. I'm hoping the Canadian release of the new Dexter by Design book is out. It's out so far in the UK, but wasn't here when I checked in February. I'm hoping to also read some more Brett Elis. God, his books are great - but I'm hoping he has something in him other then how deprived pretty, rich people are.

I'm re-listening to all the Epik High albums. My god, if you actually translate the lyrics, we're talking heavy, wonderful, well-thought out rhymes. I'm in love - I can't tell you how I miss that kind of stuff. Well, I have, haha, but you know. I enjoy it a lot. It's about the music, the lyrics, the music rather than the image. And in the end, isn't that what's the most important? That, and I went back to listen to, haha, some John Mayer. I really like his music. He's a bit of an asshole in person, but the songs have this sense of longing to them that I just love. From seeing clips of him playing live, he's actually just a great artist. I'd love the opportunity to see him play sometime.

And to end things, here's a little light cuteness, a dedication to how love can change you!