Aug. 12th, 2009
I'm in the library right now. The guy sitting across from me is, like, dying of fatigue. He keeps slumping over and sleeping and waking up fitfully every 20 minutes or so to look around, reposition himself, and sleep again. Poor guy. It's hard to nap at these desks. They're a little too low to be comfortable. I've been there, buddy, just hang on.
My defense mechanisms are flawed, but they're familiar and as far as I know, they work to cushion the short-term hurt. This is good, even if it means I'm setting myself for a long and lonely life, since the short-term is already difficult enough. I get crushed when I forget my ID card and can't see the financial aid counselor. Hahahah I'm still kinda bummed. :( Can't do anything right for the year 2009!
I forgot the simple love of finding books on your own, without recommendations or preconceptions. I haven't read books like that in a long time. I found Maile Meloy through one of her short stories and read Liars and Saints and A Family Daughter within a week. :O! This is like the first time in three years that I've read like that. Just books! That I read! For no other purpose! Than the fact! That I wanted to read them!
I remember when I was little and I would trawl the library looking for books. Remember that little teaser page children's books had at the very beginning of the books? I'd use those, the cover, and the back cover to decide whether I wanted to read the book or not. It wasn't a particularly discerning process, since I read a lot of crap. It was more important that I had something to read than whether I had something good to read. I used to read all the time. I brought a book with me everywhere. My dad sometimes got irritated with me for doing that. I read at the table and in the car and the dark, waiting for the car to pass a streetlamp so I could catch another sentence or so. I miss that feeling of knowing what I wanted to do.
It used to be pretty uncomplicated, but gradually I felt pressure to read "smart" things, and then pressure to read things "smartly." What was the point of reading things if I didn't think about them, if I didn't understand them? If I didn't enjoy them? I don't think anyone pressured me, I just thought it was something I should do to be liked or be smarter or be a better person or something. Freshman year of high school was the last year I read a lot of books. I read novels' worth in fics, and I love fic; in a lot of ways I think fic is better than ~real~ writing, but I was surprised by how much I missed just opening a book and not knowing anything or anyone inside and going in anyway, and liking it. There's a discovery to it. I missed that.
Sleepy Dude left and now a trio of annoying chatty friends are sitting across from me. Shut the fuck up, now is not the time for giggling and troubleshooting your stupid laptops together. GO AWAY. *misanthropic*
I am sad sad sad in my heart. How did I fuck this up so badly? GIANT confluence of idiocy. I'm so tired and worn out.
Over the weekend the thought occurred to me that maybe I had divorced myself so much from my wants that I don't know how to reconnect with them again. I wanted so much when I was in middle school. I made endless lists of the things I wanted to buy and get. Plus I was really really lonely then. It was overwhelming. It's why I understand how JJB feels when he like CRIES over not being able to get his Speed Racer track set or whatever. But it was bad to want so much materially, and it hurt to want so constantly. But now I feel like I don't want anything except to go home and to never want anything again, which cant be exactly healthy. And maybe that's also why I'm so idk idk all the time and I don't know what I'm feeling. Maybe I don't let myself feel or want or do anything, for fear of succumbing to my younger, needy, lonely self, the self that was so disgustingly open with want. All immature and burdensome and shit. SIGH!!!
I yam hungry.
My defense mechanisms are flawed, but they're familiar and as far as I know, they work to cushion the short-term hurt. This is good, even if it means I'm setting myself for a long and lonely life, since the short-term is already difficult enough. I get crushed when I forget my ID card and can't see the financial aid counselor. Hahahah I'm still kinda bummed. :( Can't do anything right for the year 2009!
I forgot the simple love of finding books on your own, without recommendations or preconceptions. I haven't read books like that in a long time. I found Maile Meloy through one of her short stories and read Liars and Saints and A Family Daughter within a week. :O! This is like the first time in three years that I've read like that. Just books! That I read! For no other purpose! Than the fact! That I wanted to read them!
I remember when I was little and I would trawl the library looking for books. Remember that little teaser page children's books had at the very beginning of the books? I'd use those, the cover, and the back cover to decide whether I wanted to read the book or not. It wasn't a particularly discerning process, since I read a lot of crap. It was more important that I had something to read than whether I had something good to read. I used to read all the time. I brought a book with me everywhere. My dad sometimes got irritated with me for doing that. I read at the table and in the car and the dark, waiting for the car to pass a streetlamp so I could catch another sentence or so. I miss that feeling of knowing what I wanted to do.
It used to be pretty uncomplicated, but gradually I felt pressure to read "smart" things, and then pressure to read things "smartly." What was the point of reading things if I didn't think about them, if I didn't understand them? If I didn't enjoy them? I don't think anyone pressured me, I just thought it was something I should do to be liked or be smarter or be a better person or something. Freshman year of high school was the last year I read a lot of books. I read novels' worth in fics, and I love fic; in a lot of ways I think fic is better than ~real~ writing, but I was surprised by how much I missed just opening a book and not knowing anything or anyone inside and going in anyway, and liking it. There's a discovery to it. I missed that.
Sleepy Dude left and now a trio of annoying chatty friends are sitting across from me. Shut the fuck up, now is not the time for giggling and troubleshooting your stupid laptops together. GO AWAY. *misanthropic*
I am sad sad sad in my heart. How did I fuck this up so badly? GIANT confluence of idiocy. I'm so tired and worn out.
Over the weekend the thought occurred to me that maybe I had divorced myself so much from my wants that I don't know how to reconnect with them again. I wanted so much when I was in middle school. I made endless lists of the things I wanted to buy and get. Plus I was really really lonely then. It was overwhelming. It's why I understand how JJB feels when he like CRIES over not being able to get his Speed Racer track set or whatever. But it was bad to want so much materially, and it hurt to want so constantly. But now I feel like I don't want anything except to go home and to never want anything again, which cant be exactly healthy. And maybe that's also why I'm so idk idk all the time and I don't know what I'm feeling. Maybe I don't let myself feel or want or do anything, for fear of succumbing to my younger, needy, lonely self, the self that was so disgustingly open with want. All immature and burdensome and shit. SIGH!!!
I yam hungry.