It’s Time…
you’re pretty good
at a lot of things
like charming snakes
or ignoring what stings
avoiding things is
your forte
you just laugh it off
in your strangely
charming
fucked up way
if it isn’t today
and it won’t be tomorrow
why does it matter
it’s just a waste of sorrow
you just shrug it off
you know that someday
some things will happen
but it isn’t real
until its here
and you don’t feel
it’s getting near
so maybe running away
is the right way
just run away from
the day it comes true
maybe if you keep yourself
aware enough
and alone enough
you will be all you need
and will end up
with nothing but you
I know you don’t know
what the hell to do
with yourself
some of the time
how do we handle
what isn’t yours
and isn’t really mine?
we simply don’t
because we just won’t
boundaries that become
too unclear
make it too uncomfortable
for us to stay here
so we’re out
yeah, we’re gone
I know I never
seem to stay for
very long
but I’m not wrong
to use my freedom
as my own
whether you like it
or not
if I don’t like it
I’ll find my way home
to somewhere else
by myself
because I know me
better than you do
inside
and out
can’t show you
what the big picture
looks like through
my eyes
and what I think it’s
all about
we could speak
we could not speak
we could cry
hysterically
or scream and shout
and it won’t ever
amount
to anything more
than a disagreement
the same one
we had before
so skip the intensity
of stupidly chosen
emotions
save it for something
that can be changed
I can’t be changed
any more or less than you
It’s just time
time to let go of
what is over
and must be
left behind
time to find
my place in now
and who I am
to say goodbye
to who I was back then
I question everything
and trust nothing,
therefore I am……….
just a little sparkling gem
amid the cesspool
in orbit around
a mortal heat
that gives the
mortal heart its beat
just another start
of something else
that won’t last forever
victims of the never sever
the end of the world
chaos and catastrophe
time and atrophy
are somewhere next to the
apocalyptic thoughts
that have been
known to haunt
the darker alleyways
in the dazed maze of
my mind
the same mind I lost
the same one that needs
to find
its place in time
wherever it is
it’s still mine
Get Over it…
something?
you don’t
maybe just knowing
that you won’t
is freedom in
some way
all that really
happens
is the tedious
work of Time
as it takes it away
dulling it out
day by day
making smaller
the pain
it’s still there
like a scar
part of who you are
can’t escape
the parts of you
that you don’t like
can’t take any
of the wrongs
and make them right
and it’s right
beneath the surface
just gets buried deeper
as time goes by
like a corpse of something
left to dig the rest
of its own grave
Marc my words…
So about a week ago now, I caught up with Marcus again. We hadn’t seen each other at all in six months. He called me right after I went to Mike’s. Guess he was there right afterwards and Mike gave him my number. Anyways, we’ve hung out together a few times since then. We’ve managed not to fight at all yet, which is really nice. It’s like the old days. When we first met. Before all the hideous fighting, screaming, bullying, stealing, hitting and hurting. I have been trying really hard to do my part in not going down that path with him again. I think he’s been trying a lot too. I know that neither of us want to revisit any of that.
It was really good to see him again. I never stopped loving him, of course. I missed him a lot. I was really upset over some silly little things he said to me, but he explained his reason for saying them and it was actually legitimate. I had sort of forgotten about something that I had done right before that was kind of shitty of me, and I understand that he had been hurt by something I did that was careless and was saying them because of that. So I am not angry about it now at all. It feels much better to have no anger and no hurt and to have him back in my life again.
Anyways, I don’t really think I want to say much more. Well, I do…I have a lot more that I want to type here, but I think that the world should only be told so much of every story…never know who may be reading.
Love you, Marcus.
-Ashly
Rick is gone
Rick is gone. He’s been gone for weeks, maybe almost a month now. I am dead without him. A huge part of me has become roadkill somewhere between here and New Mexico. It hurts thinking about it right now, at almost two in the morning as I type this in the dark with Bub curled up under a blanket on the other end of this couch. God, I miss him. Like I absolutely cannot put into words. There are some things of an intensity that no words exist to describe them. I like to think it is because the world has never known them before, but I don’t think I really believe that. It’s just a silly egotistical thought. I guess I’m guilty of having a few of those, but at least I’m aware of it. I do think that I am able to feel more than most people. I don’t know if that’s really a good thing for me, but I am fairly certain it is the truth. For the most part, I think it blows. I would rather not have such a great capacity to feel, because the pain always swallows its happiness and leaves me with nothing to do but hurt. It’s like the better something is, the worse it eventually is for me. I tend to try and avoid relationships with people, or at least ones in which I would be vulnerable or have to trust another person with my emotions, which I rarely do. I don’t have nearly enough faith in the world to do something as stupid as that. But Rick has been the only exception to that in my entire life. He really has never let me down (still) and I have never really questioned whether or not he loves and/or cares about me, because I have just always known. He shows it well. He’s not from this world. I think he’s from mine. Or I’m from his. Or we come from the same place. I do know we happen to exist on the same wave length, I’ve known that since we met. That night when I went crazy crying hysterically and he was holding me and trying to calm me down, after telling me that he was going to go back to New Mexico, I told him that I loved him as much as I had always wanted someone to love me. I asked him if that made sense, and he said yes. I think he knew what I meant. But I wonder if he could possibly understand the importance of it to me, of how great it was, that I would do anything for him. I hope he knows how much I love him, because if he doesn’t then I am a failure at caring for someone who I care about more than almost anyone in the world.
I don’t want to go into great detail about the day he left, but it wasn’t pleasant at all. He actually hadn’t planned on leaving that day, but we got into an ugly argument, mostly because I blew up at him and acted like a total cunt, which I of course regret. It was really stupid of me. I was a hideous, it was wrong. I guess I just snapped. So saying goodbye was kind of awkward, I wanted to tell him how much I love him and hold him but I felt like I had no right to do that after making such an ass out of myself. We did remind each other that we were loved, and then he went into the bus station, and I drove off with Bub, headed to the coast to stay with my parents for a couple of days. In a fucked up way, I think we both in some way are okay with the way he left, because it certainly made it easier to say goodbye (not really easier, but superficially). I would have been nothing but a big bleeding broken heart making a mess all over the place if we hadn’t been arguing. I don’t know if I could have handled it. I’m sure Rick would have dealt with it much better than I did, but he has told me several times that he hates goodbyes too.
I have seriously been considering moving down there to stay with him. I really don’t think I would like it down there in NM, but who knows? I survived at the coast through some of the worst years of life, so I could pretty much take myself out of wherever I am and get lost in smaller realities within my own. I don’t think it would matter much where it was, it could probably be anywhere in the world and as long as he is there, I would be happy there with him. Got a few things I have to finish taking care of here first, if I decide to go. I think I will, at least just to visit. I can’t go too long without seeing him, or I will fade away completely. I really would. As strong as I am (because I am) and as bright as I glow, as vital as I may seem, he has understood me in a way that no other soul on this planet has ever come close to doing, and to have him and lose him would be more than enough to drain me dead.
I love you, Rick. I love you as much as I’ve always wanted someone to love me. Thank you…so much.
-Mona
Five hours to go…
Well, here we are at last. It’s Monday morning, about 3:20am. Have to appear in court at 9:00am. Can’t fucking wait. It’ll be like a field trip. You know, like in the third grade when my class went on a trip to the Tillamook Cheese Factory! But way cooler, and without the cheese! Anyways…
Yeah, so I’ll probably be locked up for a little while. Who knows how long…probably as long as that asshole judge can get away with keeping me in there for. I wish he would just happen to die before 9am this morning. Maybe have a heart attack or get run over or something from the sky could just fall on him and smash him like a bug. That would be fine with me. But I don’t see that happening. He’s going to crucify me in a few hours. Jail will suck. I will sleep for most of it. But it will still suck. I will miss little Bubby more than I have ever missed anyone before in my life. I know he won’t forget who I am, but I have an awful fear that somehow he will. I hope he won’t think I am abandoning him. That would break my heart, or whatever I have where a heart should be. He’s the last of it.
Rick is going to stay and take care of him over at Jim’s. Cunt-face is there, but I don’t really give a shit.
It won’t be that big of a deal. It will be a relatively short period of time, and it will only be good for me. I figured that out completely in the last twenty-four hours. Sometimes we fall into a steady and constant stream of indulgences and doing whatever we want, and you can continue down it undisturbed for a long time, in some cases. But once you get used to being carried down a stream of that sort, you don’t realize that whenever the inevitable interruption of it comes along, it is going to kick you in the balls. Hard. It’s a reality check. Going to jail for a little bit, I me an. I have managed to get out of taking much responsibility for much of anything for quite some time now, knowing all along that eventually it would come back to bite me in the ass, and I was okay with that and kept on moving towards today. So here I am. It will feel good to test my will, my strength, my everything by depriving myself of what I am used to indulging in for a little while. I have always gotten a satisfaction from proving myself to my self.
My mom is supposed to go with me. Hope she shows up on time. I was kind of surprised that she offered to go with, wasn’t planning on inviting anyone from my “social circle” (I never thought there would come a day when I would have one of those…not sure if that’s something I say with a totally positive tone…so hear the sarcasm) since that seemed stupid. But it would be nice if she was there. It’s kind of like when I had my abortions. She was the only one in the world I felt okay having there in the room with me. I don’t know why. I guess because even though sometimes I think she deserves to burn for all eternity for ever becoming a mother, she is still, my mother. There isn’t much that needs to be said or made real, the unspokens that we share and know are strong. Perhaps even stronger than all the wrongdoings and stabs at each other. All the hurt and all the pain.
I remember watching the Disney version of ‘Alice in Wonderland’ when I was a kid. Talk about a movie that’s on drugs. But I remember towards the end, when Alice is lost in the dark and that weird little creature that looks kind of like a dog, with the body made mostly of brooms or something, was sweeping the path away in front of her, until she was left on the last little square with the darkness all around her, she sat down and started to sing, saying:
“I give myself very good advice…but I very seldom follow it…”
Well I’m going to get off here for now. I’m not ready for any of this, but I want to get it over with.
So goodbye for now. If you put your ear up to the electronic ether and I seem silent for a while, you know why.
-Mona
interrupted somewhere in mid-bloom…
I know I’ve said this a million times before, but it’s really over this time. I don’t love Kevin anymore. At least not in the sense that I used to. I said I would love him forever, and I meant that. I will. But I don’t love him like I did at all anymore. I have let go. There is nothing he could do or say to me that would affect me adversely. I am free of the vulnerability that comes with loving someone as much as I did him. I’m not even sure why I decided to fall right back into the same disaster with him, after being separated for several months. As much as I may have wanted things to work with him, I had a hard time convincing myself that it would become a reality. He sure likes to talk about things and never do them. I was very patient about almost everything when it came to us. But after so long, you just start to see where something is going and where it isn’t going.
I feel like I’ve wasted a couple years of my life that I can’t have back. I spent them trying to “get somewhere” with Kevin, because I wanted to be with him for the rest of my life. That reminds me…the last time I saw him, he started talking about how lonely and bleak things were for him around the time that we met, and at other points since then. He started to cry a little even, as he told me that I had saved his life. It was precious. I loved him more at that moment than I could have felt love for anything else. So I said: “I think I saved it so you could spend the rest of it with me.” He was quiet for a second, then he repeated my words very softly and just said “wow” afterwards. I am looking for that moment right now. I’m holding onto it as tightly as I held on to him that night, the last time we saw each other. It meant something then, even if it doesn’t now.
I guess that I had hoped for progress by now. It’s been two and half years since we met and got together, or sort of got together. It was almost that long ago that he asked me to marry him, and I said yes. Obviously that never happened. I guess he didn’t take the question very seriously. Or didn’t think I would say yes. Either way, I think it was wrong of him to throw it around so carelessly. Anyhow. I didn’t have any unrealistic goals for 2 1/2 years into a relationship. I just wanted some sort of progress, whatever that would have been. Instead I have nothing.
That’s not true, actually. I have something even greater than all of that was. Something that was strong and good, and which served me well long before I ever met Kevin or anyone else. Something that will reopen like a flower now that he’s gone, starting right back up blooming like it was when it was interrupted. Me.
I remember being happy right before meeting him. Then there was a brief period of head-over-heels infatuation in which everything was ridiculously good (or seemed to be), you know the kind I mean. Then all the shit started. That’s when the ugliness and pain come into play. They sure can fuck a person’s world up, can’t they? MmmHmmm. So then there’s this long stretch that covers most of the time we spent together, where we are both more or less miserable for most of the time, getting into arguments too frequently to forgive anything before one of us took the next stab and started all over again with it. Then whatever the fuck you want to call this last little pipe-dream delusion that I allowed myself to indulge in for a little while, deciding for some fucking stupid reason that it would be a good idea for me to pour everything I have into being with him and finding a way to stay together forever. Don’t ask me why the fuck I thought that after all the moving in and moving back out, all the fighting, all the cruel words, all the carelessness with one another, I thought it was smart to give anything and everything to him, just so he would know beyond the shadow of a doubt that I love him and that it is unconditional and without end. It didn’t work. But I know it’s not me. It wasn’t because I did something wrong, or didn’t do something that I should have. I know that in my heart, and my mind agrees with it. It is something to do with him. I don’t know what it is, but it doesn’t really matter. For some reason he either doesn’t want what he claimed to want with me, or can’t deal with something necessary in order for that to happen, or maybe he’s just a fucking complete liar that really fucking got the better of me. I don’t like the possibility of that last option. I swear to fucking god, if he was another Chad or David I will hate myself for a little while for letting that happen again. It’s hard for me to believe that I could fall for something like that again. Fuck all three of them.
-Mona
questions…
What will I be like in a few years? How will I make the transition from who I am now to who I will be? How old will I live to be? How am I going to die? Will my life end when it is “supposed” to, or will my death be untimely?
I never wondered about the answer to those questions until recently. And those are just a few of them. There are a dozen others, but they’re all in the same vein (no pun intended). All of a sudden I find myself thinking about that kind of shit quite a bit, and in a way that’s slightly obsessive. I guess when I think about anything that I find interesting or worth knowing, I get a little obsessive about it. It’s always been that way, since I was a kid. Not sure why.
So, while it’s on my mind I have to mention that Jim sent me a text this morning telling me that he had finally kicked Isabelle out, along with the 5 other people she had brought with her. I was so glad to hear that. Thank god. I really don’t like her at all. I never have. I kept my mouth shut about it for a long time, because I know that Jim really liked her and I didn’t want to be rude. But I finally told him what I thought of her. He just bought his first house, and was really excited about moving into it. I was really happy for him. Then he told me that SHE was going to live with him there. Ugh. So anyhow, since they moved in he has been texting me a lot, confiding in me about how uncomfortable he has felt living with her, and with good reasons too. Apparently she had the nerve to more or less move some guy “friend” of hers into Jim’s house, which is fucking hideous of her. She knows how much Jim cares about her, and how much he wanted to be with her. I can’t even believe she would do something like that. It was fucking cruelly inconsiderate and I think it’s safe to assume she was never taught any manners at all. It’s no wonder she isn’t able to have custody of her own 3 children, she clearly is not the type of person who should be responsible for the well-being of others. She makes me sick to my stomach. And then, as if it wasn’t bad enough to have some strange dude in the house who was not only living there without contributing anything but was also helping himself to groceries that he hadn’t bought, soon after that an entire family of four fucking people just “showed up” there claiming to be friends of hers, and just sort of seemed to think that they were welcome to stay as well! Unbelievable. I felt really bad for Jim. She was so obviously taking advantage of what a good person he is. I can’t believe how much bull shit he has put up with from her. He shouldn’t have tolerated half of all she has put him through, in my opinion. It actually made me really sad a couple nights ago, when he texted me saying that he sort of wished that she was out of his life, so he could forget about her because she doesn’t want to be with him. I strongly supported that sentiment, assuring him that she didn’t deserve him at all. He deserves someone so much better than that. He truly does. He’s such a beautiful person. I don’t think I’ve ever known someone as patient, sympathetic and kind as Jim is. He is one of the best friends I have had in my life so far. Even though we are parts of very different “worlds” and lead very different kinds of lifestyles, we made a connection that was really fucking profound, and it transcended that gap between who we are. He told me a while back that I was family now. He’s mine too. I’ve definitely got his back, always. So Isahell and all her little friends were asked to be out of his place by this morning, after he found that she and her guy friend had snuck out of the bedroom window during the night. I guess she had been sneaking out through the garage before that, pretty regularly. She wasn’t even showing the courtesy of being pleasant, or making conversation with Jim. He said she usually text messaged him from the other room. Can you fucking imagine? So he asked me if I would help him watch his house for a while, now that they are going to be gone. I said that I would of course help him keep an eye on the place, and that I would pay him some rent for the time I stayed there. He could use the help, I know that a house payment is significantly greater than rent at an apartment. And I would love nothing more than to be able to help him out somehow, after all he has done for me. So Rick and I, and little Bub are going to go over there tomorrow I think. We were going to go today, but had too much time to kill and decided to stay one more night at the motel 6 here in Troutdale. Oh yeah…..which brings me to my next little story…which is also a shitty one…
Like two days go, I got pulled over getting onto the freeway. The fucked up part is that since I was stopped in Troutdale, I will be going before the same judge that put me on bench probation. Basically what that all equals, is me spending some time in jail very soon. Court date is March 24th at 9:00am. Can’t fucking wait! That judge fucking hated me. He told me if he could court-order me to not have children, he would. Pretty harsh, huh? Asshole. Oh well. The only positive thing I can find about that whole matter, is that if I’m locked up for a while (I do believe he sentenced me to 20 days in jail, if I was caught driving again while on probation) then that will mean I’m forced to take a break from the dope. And we all know what that means…? It means when I get out and get high again, I’ll really get high instead of this stupid bull shit I’ve been doing lately where I do an entire half T in one hit, and then fall asleep an hour later after eating some cupcakes. Fuck that shit. Seriously. But the really awful part will be missing and worrying about Bub every moment I’m in there. I don’t know where he will go yet. I’ve been thinking about it a lot in the last couple days, since this happened. There are only a few people I trust enough to leave him with, especially for that long. Ideally I would have Rick stay with him, I trust him & Jim with Bub the most. But he will probably not be here by the time I go to court, and if he is then I don’t know where he will stay while I’m in jail. I think Jim would take him if I asked him, because he knows how important Bub is to me and how much I love him, and I think he would understand why I couldn’t just let anyone take care of him while I’m gone. But that’s only if what’s-her-face and her friends don’t end up coming back, and none of them have keys or could just come in there at any time. I would be too worried that he could be accidentally let out or something like that. My third choice would be Kevin, but he isn’t supposed to have Bub over at his place, since the landlord received a couple complaints about his barking when we were staying there before. But that won’t keep me from missing him more than any other creature I have ever loved, or from being a nervous wreck worrying about him every second in between phone calls to check on him. Ugh…not pleasant thoughts at all. But it will sort itself out somehow. We’ll see.
I don’t want to write anymore right now. Kind of tired after telling all of that, and didn’t realize that all I had to write about was depressing shit, until I was finished writing it.
One sort of good thing….I did get the Cadillac back today. J
-Mona
It comes in waves…
I cried last night like I have not cried in…a long time. I didn’t miss it. I woke up this afternoon with my eyes swollen shut, but before I tried to open them I thought for a moment that all the crying had been a bad dream. It was, but it wasn’t.
Rick is leaving. He finally came out and said it the other night. I have been afraid of the tears I knew I would inevitably cry when I had to face that reality. I have been doing my best to distract myself from that, refusing to accept it, putting it off because I didn’t know how I would stop crying once I started. I feel like my heart has broken again, I had kept it safe for a while. Now I am reminded why. I can’t do this shit anymore. I could feel it breaking in my chest, it hurt in the dullest kind of ache that spread out until it filled my rib cage, and I think it was throbbing instead of beating. Rick held me for the longest time, he even started crying after I really lost it. I can’t stand the thought of him going a thousand miles away, I feel like I’m losing him forever. He says I’m not, that he will visit often and reassures me that he isn’t “leaving me.” I won’t let myself believe anything good, I have to prepare myself for the cruel and unmoved effects of both time and distance. They can ruin the most important things within a person’s life. I hate them for that. It’s all really fucked up actually. When I was sobbing and crying and getting my ass kicked by some invisible force that just kept tightening its hands around my heart and wringing it out like a fucking towel that was soaked in all the tears I yielded, I told Rick that I loved him as much as I had always wanted someone to love me. And I do. Because as unwise as it might be, I really do believe that he loves and cares about me. I have thought that with others before, and been tragically mistaken. So much so that I put what I had left of my heart away somewhere that it could feel for things outside of myself, without being very adversely affected by any of those things. There was nothing wrong with that, and it served me well. But Rick is very unique and too special to pass by or merely appreciate without diving head first into loving him completely. I guess I thought a head-first dive would be okay…the love I was falling into was certainly deep enough. Yeah. What I feel for him is the deep end of the pool. You shouldn’t go jumping into it without making sure you can swim all the way from one side of the pool to the other, without getting too tired. If that happens, you drown. There’s no one to save you. You just have to thrash around in that awful panic before you past the point of exhaustion, and become still as you sink to the bottom, letting your lungs fill with water and looking up at the surface of the moving water so far above you. That suffocation is the panic-inspired weight of something intense enough to fucking slay you. I felt it last night. I have felt it sneaking up on me throughout the day. I am doing my best to keep it at bay, just enough to not lose my mind because if I did, I doubt I’d be able to get it back from this sadness.
I didn’t want to be here where I’m at again ever, if I could help it. I guess I can’t. Pretty much the only person that could is going to be a thousand miles away from me soon. There’s no noise I can make, no salty ocean I might cry, no glass-shattering scream that could convey all the pain. I want to go home. Bub is going to miss him too. I trust Rick with Bub more than anyone on this planet other than myself, and that alone speaks volumes. Bub is my baby. Rick is our family. He has been since I got Bubby, over a year ago. He’s been mine even longer. God, it’s going to feel like he has died when he leaves. He will just be gone…and I’ll be stuck here with my memories. All the things we laughed at, which have been a lot. The times I most needed someone to help me in some way, that he was there to help and made me feel cared for. All the weird shit….
trailed off… now the date is February 25th…was interrupted, had to abandon this prematurely…he is leaving in only a few more days…so I’m sure I will be back to spill my fucking deformed heart out all over anyone that happens to come across this and is unfortunate to read it. I’ll probably sound like an EMO kid.
writing under the influence
sometimes when I do a hit, I get a strong urge to write. usually when that happens, I do my best to resist it. I guess I’ll never forget my very 1st experience writing something when I was higher than a fucking kite. I remember writing it…I filled page after page because I was trying to quickly handwrite my oh so “profound” observations and their subsequently revolutionary philosophy. Ha, ha, ha. I recall how fast my hand was moving, it was trying to keep up with my brain. The only problem was that it was moving really rapidly in reverse. I just kept expanding on this thought-provoking concept and hoping that I wouldn’t forget any of the details before getting them onto the paper. Well…so I finished, or thought that I had finished…at that point, I had been awake for somewhere around 5 days or so. That was really typical during that period of time. I pretty much passed out once every fucking five days, and slept like a corpse for a fuckload of hours, then woke up and did it all over again. And again. And again…so I come to some sort of conclusion or closing thought, then shortly afterwards I fade out and don’t wake again until several hours later. Not surprisingly, it wasn’t until I’d been awake for quite a while that I all of a sudden remembered that I had filled all those pages right before fallilng asleep. Upon remembering, I got all excited when I remembered how brilliant it had been, and felt really glad that I had preserved it by getting it all written down. But what’s funny is that I had no idea at all what the topic had been. Not a fucking clue. I guess that’s how goddamn tired I had been when I had written it. So I wasn’t sure what the subject of it was, but I think that made the anticipation of reading it even greater because I was so confident that regardless of what it was, it had been pure genius. I believe I was smiling in a sort of gloating sort of way, when I opened up to the first page and set out to re-visit the whole thing.
Okay…first of all, my handwriting started out as legible letters that I seemed to have put together in patterns that would be recognized as words. However, that was only true for about half of the first page. I wish that was an exaggeration or a joke. It’s not. After that, it all continued to go downhill. Oh yeah, and even the first few sentences that were actual english, they made almost no sense at all in the arrangement I had put them. So I’m not sure if that even counts as anything good. It might as well have been total gibberish. It was. But it went from that to being sloppier more slanted attempts at the letters of the alphabet (I seem to have blanked out what those were at the time, though…) that were shrinking in size. In perfect timing with the shrinking of my brain, apparently. ha.
I was shocked by the time I got to the end of the last page. And yes, my pride got its ass kicked. bad. it sucked. I was just glad I was the only person who had seen it and known that I was the one who’d written this big bunch of nothing, thinking it was worthy of an intellectual erection. It was actually really depressing in a rather significant way though, all joking aside. I mean, it totally discouraged me from ever writing anything swimming around inside my skull when I was rushing or when I was anywhere else along the long stretch of consciousness leading to delirium and ending in very deep sleep that had no room for dreams. and that was kind of gay. having discovered my pathetic scribbles, I was convinced that writing was never a good idea when my brain was a sponge soaked in a caustic chemical cocktail. seemed logical enough. Knowing that I had been really fucking high at the time, I attributed the failure of the little experiment to the ways in which I’d been altered by the drug. It was the reason that my thoughts were empty and senseless. And it definitely explaiend why I had thought something empty and senseless was worthy of making its way into textbooks around the world. hey, you’ve heard of those people that get all fucked up on hallucinogens and end up on the news for jumping off the top of a skyscraper, thinking they had superhero powers. you know the ones I’m talking about. the ones that set the fucking standard for everyone that “uses.” “Textbook Tweaker” may be a bit politically incorrect, but you get the idea. I remember in high school, our fucking health textbooks were hilarious. The stupid and completely unnecessary pictures that public school textbooks come complete with, all featured people with hair styles and fashion trends that were older than everyone in my class who was being forced to read it. Upon referring to the copyright date, the useless wastes of paper and time were in fact somewhere close to thirty years old. So…it was at least good to know that the information we were being force-fed was accurate, current, and was effective in its presentation. fucking please. It might as well have informed us that the world is in fact flatter than a fucking pancake. Most of it was too retarded to even remember anything specific, the only two examples that stick out in my memory as being particularly hilarious were the short paragraphs on the topics of homosexuality and hallucinogenic drugs. The homo paragraph, which was actually only 2-3 sentences, was rather insightful and informed its readers that the cause of homosexuality was unknown and it was uncelear why some people seemed affected by it rather than the majority of ‘normal’ people. And over in the substance abuse section of the book, we find an equally well-researched collection of about 4-5 sentences explaining that those who engage in substance abuse of hallucinogenic drugs typically experience an array of horrible and highly exaggerated symptoms, including the delusion of possessing superhuman powers, attempting dangerous and oftentimes deadly stunts believing themselves capable of supernatural things, or othewise behaving in ways which are humiliating and shameful as a result of a ‘bad trip’.
I mean…I’ve never written a high school level health education textbook before, but I HAVE done a lot of fucking drugs that would fall into their ‘hallucinogenic’ category. And I’ll just say that in the years I have spent using and around others who use as well, I consider msyelf pretty familiar with the whole environment surrounding that sort of sub-culture, if you think it could be called one. And I haven’t ever actually witnessed anyone on a ‘bad trip’ that was bad enough to think you turned into the hulk and jump off the empire state building. You know? C’mon. I know a lot of people who have tripped out real fucking bad, because I’ve heard stories from many of them about their embarassing tweaker trip. everyone has had theirs. Hell, I used to trip out pretty fucking bad…not just once either, it used to happen fairly often. That is common among anyone that clouds their cranium with speed. Duh. But anyways, even those that have been on a really bad one tend to sort of even out over time, as a result of developing a tolerance. That has been my experience. I don’t get fucked up anymore like I did back when I was new to it. I just can’t. believe me, sometimes I really want to. Heh. But over the course of a couple years during which I am using on a regular basis, my body at some point adjusts to the speed no differently than it would to an antibiotic prescribed for long-term use. Makes sense. My point was that even at my most pathetic and fucked up moment during my worst trip, I have never been found anywhere near the edge of insanity, or the roof of a building that I’m fixing to jump from, since I am spider-man. Nor do I know anyone, or know OF anyone who has been near the edge of either of those things. Oops, wait. Yes, I do. Just one person. But they suffered from a mental illness prior to ever using drugs, so that would probably amplify the mania resulting from both. Not applicable.
How the hell did I stray so far from whatever I was originally trying to say? I do that sometimes. Tangent trailing…
Oh, right. My entire reason for giving that whole weird little background info was to give a good example of the attitude I had towards the idea of tweaking and then trying to write anything with intellectual significance. I guess after my botched brilliance that was less than nothing, I sort of laughed at the idea of writing under the influence. So following this whole stupid little mistake, I didn’t write anything at all for right around a year. I think it was supposed to happen the way it all played out, actually. Because during that year I avoided pen and paper, I probably really had no business trying to do anything with either. Again, that was back when I was new to it. It was new to me too. Its effect on me was quite simply too intense for me to control at the time. The sequence of events was in some sort of harmony with my creativity that I had sort of temporarily given up on, and not bothered to go looking for. So after a year, I’m at a much different phase in my “addiction.” I have become far more functional and the effect of the drug on my mind is no longer the uncontrollable flickering of thoughts one after another as fast as you can bat your eyes. It has slowed down enough by now to finish one train of thought, and to evaluate it from the spot you’re in as you look in on it, from start to finish, not like before when I was seeing something one way and then looking at the same thing as I hung upside down over it, like riding a rollercoaster through perception.
Trying to write again hadn’t really ever crossed my mind. Since it had been so long since I had written, I suppose I had become used to doing other things. And that’s around the time when I met Kevin. Very shortly after we first met, he wrote me something really amazing that surprised me in a way I had not expected anyone would or could. That first piece made two things really obvious. He knew how to write, and rather well. That would have been apparent to anyone who knew good writing. And then there was his style, which was one that I understood and felt connected to. I didn’t just know he could write, I actually really liked what he wrote.
That’s where I trailed off…think I faded and had to go to sleep. Anyways, I usually don’t return to something I left unfinished. But I guess I was really close to being done with this, so I’ll just go ahead and say what was left unsaid, since it is all worth saying. I really loved what Kevin had written, it was not only excellent writing but it was his style that really appealed to me. I felt that I absolutely had to sit down and put something into words as a gift for him in return. I needed to, I knew I had to, and I wanted to more than anything. So I did. And the rest is history. It became a sort of ongoing exchange of writings for one another over the course of our relationship, and even up until present day it is something that we do from time to time. I believe that credit should be given where credit is due, and Kev gets pretty much all of the credit for resurrecting my flame of creativity, as well as awakening my sleeping heart and for so many other things. I love him for all of that and so much more. I love him because he is Kevin Quirke. I have loved him since I read his first email written to me, before we ever met or even spoke on the phone. I remember reading it at Brian’s desk at his apartment in Wilsonville and getting a sense of significance from what he wrote. I knew he meant something then, and it has turned out to be so much more than I could ever have imagined. Thank you, Kevin. I love you forever.
-Attro
I don’t know what to…call it, and I don’t even know what to say
this is all going to sound a little crazy, because that’s exactly what it is. I can’t imagine anyone reading this and actually believing so many different catastrophes could happen one after another in such a brief period of time. It will probably sound like a joke, or something right out of an outrageous talk show, like most of my life has turned out to be so far. but I don’t deliver 
deviations of truth, and although oftentimes a little unsettling, all that is claimed in here has actually taken place.
now, as if that isn’t bad enough…the next few days after the tempo was towed, I was stuck at the house and I slept a lot. I didn’t get high for a few days either. but after about three days in bed, I was really wanting a hit. By that time, I was dreaming about getting high. I woke up right before I was going to do the hit in the dream, which is how it always ends unless it lasts all the way through doing the hit, up until I pull the syringe out and wait expectantly for the rush to wash over me, and then I wake up. Either way, it’s fucking torture waking up from one of those just once, but I kept falling right back asleep, and the dream picked up right where it had left off and ended the same way- prematurely. so anyhow, eventually my mom made it over to jim’s that evening and brought me a hit to help me out because I felt like I was dying for one. I went in the bathroom and hit myself, and got so high after going a few days without, that it actually made me start dry heaving and I felt incredibly nauseous. anyways…since that night, it never really went away. I still felt sick to my stomach the next day, and the day after that, and all the way through the next couple of weeks. most of the time anything that I tried to eat, came right back up. I was sure that this batch of dope must have been somehow different, or stronger, or maybe that my health was declining and I wasn’t handling it so well for some reason. then finally after a couple horrible weeks of feeling miserable, my mom suggested that I go to the store and get a pregnancy test. I hadn’t even thought of that before she mentioned it, and when she did I laughed and told her that there was no way I could be pregnant, because I was on birth control, and have been for over a year. but just to be sure, I went and got one. the fucking thing tested positive. yeah…don’t have the heart left to go into the personal background on this topic, but let’s just say that two of the most traumatic experiences in my life have been abortions and things related to them. so in a way, I am very numbed to finding out that I will have to get another one. but in other ways, like when I stop to think about it (which I didn’t do much…) it is impossible to hold back tears that have been waiting somewhere very buried and almost not even existing anymore. I told Rick about it, and told him how much I wished that he could be here when I had to go to the clinic, and how much I wanted him to be with me there too. I had an appointment made for tuesday, and on saturday the possibility of asking him to fly up here monday and go with me finally showed up in my head. I didn’t expect a yes, and I would have understood if he couldn’t do it. I figured it was a long shot, especially since it was so soon and I figured a plane ticket would cost quite a bit on such short notice. I looked online, and it didn’t seem as steep as I had thought it would be. I hadn’t mentioned it to him, but the next morning when I woke up and checked my phone, he had sent me a message throwing that very idea out there, asking if he should catch a flight to portland so he could go with me. that was so fucking great. I jumped all over the opportunity, telling him yes and that I would help pay for his ticket if that was an issue. I was adamant that he not worry at all about the particulars of making it here, but just to somehow get here in time, and I would help take care of the rest. and he did. he got here. but…before he got here…only about five or six hours before he landed…I got in a bad car accident. My car was completely wrecked, and I hit some guy driving a truck. caved in the side of the truck pretty good. I guess I hadn’t seen the light change, and ended up running through a red. almost collided with a school bus, but managed to avoid that and ended up hitting the truck instead, pretty damn hard. smacked my head on my window hard enough to rattle things around in there pretty good. had a hell of a headache for the next few hours, even after popping a few aspirin. a witness to the accident called the fucking pigs right after it happened, which made me nervous. I thought they would be there pretty fast. so while I was watching her on her cell phone calling and reporting the accident and requesting that an officer, I dialed my mom and told her I had just gotten in a pretty bad accident and that the cops had been called, so I needed her to beat them to where I was, on the corner of 52nd and powell blvd. talked to the guy I hit while we were waiting for the cops to show up, and gave him all my info. told him I don’t have a license or insurance, and explained that I didn’t want to be around when the cops showed up because if I was, then I would be arrested. that didn’t seem to do the trick. I assured him that I would be able to pay cash for the necessary work on the truck, but he still wasn’t moving. so finally I offered to give him a couple hundred right then and there, as a starting payment on whatever it would cost to get it fixed. that got through to him. he wrote me a receipt and signed it, and then said “okay…let’s get out of here.” my mom had showed up right as I was giving him the cash, and we threw everything from my car into her’s and she was just getting back in the car when I saw a cop car sitting at the light on the corner, waiting to turn onto powell where my car was sitting, less than a block away. I pointed him out to her, told her to hurry the hell up and we were gone…but that was a close one. so I don’t even fucking know what is going to happen because of the accident. I know it won’t be good. I’m already in a fuckload of trouble. and it does kind of fucking suck knowing that I am going to jail for sure, and possibly for more than 20 days…what will I do with Bub? How will I stay sane in there when every fucking moment of consciousness will be spent worrying about him, wondering if he is okay and wanting to call and check on him several times every day. the longest I have ever been away from him was the two days I went to New Mexico to spend my birthday with Rick. And that was really hard for me…
but back to the good part of all this…rick is here! he is going back on sunday, and I don’t know how I will say goodbye to him and then somehow make it one more month after that until I see him again. but when he comes back in early december, it will be to stay for good. I can’t wait. I have been so fucking happy the last couple of days that we have been here at the motel 6 by mall 205 together. bub is here too. just like last summer. except totally different than last summer, because I am so in love with him and he knows that now, and he is in love with me too…but it doesn’t just stop there. such simple statements don’t hold even a fraction of the meaning involved in it. It’s…very fucking intense. I haven’t loved anyone in the way that I love him. Not a single soul. ever. I know he cares about me too, like really cares. he cares in the way that I have always wanted to be cared about, and haven’t ever felt
and that’s where I trailed off…
after making it that far, I got so tired that I fell asleep and told myself I would pick up where I left off and finish writing the rest when I woke up…why do I still believe myself when I say that?? I’m really note sure. I know myself well enough that I shouldn’t still fall for that old trick anymore. I guess I just always honestly believe that I will finish things I abandon prematurely…but it just never happens. It is impossible for me to pick up where I leave off on anything I write…but that’s okay. I am constantly reminding myself of that. The rest of the unfinished stories are always told. Just not as part of the same story, if that makes any sense. It all comes together as it goes…
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