Dear diary,

Summer air tastes bittersweet

Blue blue blue

3/4/24 I always find it fascinating that when I am insecure it just seeps out my pores and I compulsively make little comments looking for reassurance. I immediately feel like a kid in adult skin, asserting my worth and hoping the people around me will agree. And then next time I'm alone, I spend some quality time being annoyed that I showed my ass rather than oh I don't know... reassuring myself perhaps?? My insecurity becomes a positive feedback loop, building and building. To what? she asks, rhetorically. Lately I've been really hung up on my age and my lack of a romantic love life. A mean little inner voice keeps hissing "insecure, immature, small problems, constipated, awkward, sad." I guess this uptick in inner cruelty is pretty normal with every novel situation I put myself in (I've been trying some new things lately), and then I gain more experience and stop thinking about myself so much. Maybe part of what feels so bad about getting reassurance is the cloying way I feel I go about it, or the fact that I seek it externally before even trying to provide it internally. I tend to take a tough love 'it is what it is' attitude toward myself. I tend to think that being mean to myself is being real with myself; that if I'm not honest with myself about how much of an immature numskull I am, who will be? It's my duty to myself to be honest, and to be honest, this guy stinks! I started thinking that way in middle school, so it's probably about time the adult part of me stepped up to the plate and provided some comfort. I think I'd rather be mean for just a second longer. Or perhaps not mean, but just vulnerable. I am worried that once I've shown my insecurities/imperfections to folks, they won't look at me as worthy or cool ever again!!!! So I walk through life pretty buttoned up, generally speaking. In my opinion. I have no idea if people perceive me as buttoned up. How much being perceived weirds me out is entry for another day. One thing I've noticed about this experiment in "writing" on my "website" is that I run out of steam and just want to be done and go to bed before I've cycled back to a positive, uplifting, mature conclusion, so as of now these entries have just been brain dumping negativity. Sorry 'bout the dump. Maybe tomorrow, I'll be profound. Or the next day. To be fair, I do love myself. I think some of my warped neuroses are hilarious because they're just so dumb, silly, numerous, some might say neverending. I know it's good that I can recognize when I'm thinking the way I did in middle school, because I can time travel in a sense and help those parts of me to mature. Being alive and rubbing elbows with other people is such a trip, what else can I really say? mmmmmmmGOODNIGHT! PS I so desperately want to look cool when I dance but I think I need to embrace that the best thing I can say about myself is I'm on beat. ugh. pisses me right off.

A quick note before bed

2/27/25... 9:01pm.... Thursday..... after work....... New Caleb Hearon podcast distracting and/or entertaining me in the background........ should I pause it? try to tune it out? find my internal fortitude and soldier on even if the "writing" and "self reflection" suffers? but here's the dang thing... there's another dang 40 minutes to this here podcast and they're talking about the half time show which happened years ago at this point (hey, it's been a month), and now a deodorant commercial is on with "my neck my back my pussy and my crack" as the background soundtrack. I guess I'll take that as my queue to pause it for real. Thanks gaudy ad. Relearning things is hard. I want to make another mix but the software I so carefully and meticulously (lol) vetted isn't working, and all of a sudden all of the language on their github page is not clicking in my brain, and I'm wondering how I got the program up and running in the first place. Boooooring... I'll try again tomorrow. Additionally, part of this 'making a website' process for me is just sifting through people's websites with the little "developer's tool" open to try to figure out how they did it and if I'd like to try to incorporate similar cool elements. Like what do I want this page to look like? I say I want poetry, scans of art and stuff, but that involves changing things, specifically the main page with my silly mug and aquarium on it. I find myself responding to other peoples' self importance with a sort of bully attitude. 'Who fuckin caaaaaares about your essay about 'Organic Abstraction' and what does that even mean?' Did I try to read it? NO... will I once I post this? Probably, because what the eff am I doing Here, writing This, if I'm not giving respect to other people writing about whatever interests them. I think I'm mostly here at this specific moment because I've missed typing. I learned how to in 2nd grade, I'm pretty fast at it, and it feels good in my hands. I also think I'm unwilling to put any sort of planning or serious, deep thought into these posts because right now I'm trying to get into the habit of doing this regularly in the first place. Although someone wise said how you practice is how you play, so huh hm... ok time to pivot I guess, fuck. BRB after some serious, deep thought to contribute something with a bit of substance.

2/26/25(at approximately 5pm) It has been a second! I got uh deep and um vulnerable in that last post (which I have since archived, sorry 'bout it). All is well though, do not fret. I'm not drinking, successfully weaned off meds, moved out of my parents' house, alive, happy, listening to jazz at my little desk in my little room at the end of a pretty good day. I love the drama of it all, I guess. It's fun to take a mood to the extreme sometimes, which explains a lot about me and my decisions, conscious and unconscious, through this life. I adore that I referred to myself as being back on the bottle when I was drinking 2-3 white claws and going to sleep. I've started referring to myself as a 30 year old even though I have 6 more months until I've passed that milestone. I'm a 353 month old. Prior to accepting my age, I was purposefully avoiding thinking about it and freezing up when asked. 'Um uh 28? Wait no 29' I'd say, which was always embarrassing because bitch how do you not know your age? Hm now on to why I've been avoiding this space. I think because I don't understand coding, and I don't like the way it looks as of now. And maybe also because I started telling people about it; giving them the URL and stuff. That sometimes is a real motivation killer. Doing this also requires I sit down at a laptop, which makes me think of college. I am such a heavy phone user. I fuck heavy with my mobile device. I was playing Stardew Valley on it for a little while. Now I'm back on Instagram, and I'm on YouTube a lot. I can while away the hours, cavorting with the powers, chipping at my brains. Is that negative manifestation? Is negative manifestation possible or is that just the seedlings of an OCD psychosis type of deal? Let me know in the comments. I'm taking a "Heart Path" class with Melissa at Synchrosoma, and one of the prompts is to write about a current dynamic of self feeling victimized. Here it goes:

I victimize myself when I treat myself as inadequate. When I take a stance with myself that I should somehow, in some way be better, more than I actually am in this moment, whether we're talking smarter, funnier, cooler, prettier, healthier, more confident, fit, fatter ass etc. etc, I am placing myself in a bullying parent/boss/tyrant dynamic with myself. How does it show up in the outside world though? Uhhhh do you see the people "in charge" making "laws"? Fuckers. Disgusting idiots. That dynamic shows up with parents and children a lot too. Or maybe rather adults and children-- Miss Emily, my former teacher self, knows that teachers can be guilty big big time. I become a victim when I take a nihilistic attitude toward the waking dream. The nihilist in me is saying that having a positive outlook about the future won't change anything; it's pointless. Bring on the collapse. Well this class is called the Heart Path, so I'm assuming the way to attend to nihilism is with HEART lol, not with positivity. I'll just take a moment and experience these internal and external dynamics with compassion, by, in Melissa's words "feeling the vulnerability of ourselves, our natural world, and her creatures." I love it all so much. Bye 4 now

same day (at exactly 8:35PM) I'm fuggin BACK! Because I forgot how to do literally everything I taught myself when I initially made this website... So for posterity and motivation, here are a few things I'd like to add and learn. I'd like to link to my Storygraph account because I've been reading up a dang STORM and really enjoying myself. I tried to make a quick little short new music mix to replace the chaos that is my first mix, but the code I have for ripping youtube audio isn't working any longer... or maybe it's because I'm using this anti tracking browser called Brave? So I'd like to update my skills on that front so I can make little bite size mixes. I am listening to the "everyone starts somewhere" and I feel weirdly proud of it. It is endearing for all its chaos, and I just adore my music taste. If I can't figure out how to get tracks, I guess I'll scrap that idea. I'd like to make a page for more abstract poetry writing, and I'd also like to scan and upload some of my artsy tings. Collages and other projects. It's a very real possibility I have to start completely over on all this. I think I'm going to stop for now and find something else to do. I posted the link to this on my instagram which is very brave of me, considering my earlier writings in which I admonished anyone I know to go away from here. If you're here, I changed my mind. Welcome.

6/21/24 I have been sharing this space with too many people I know in the real world. If you're here and you know me, go away. I would take the link back if I could, but I can't so I'm trusting you to lose it. Today I was reminded how weird I am about smells. Due to the nature of my "profession," I get to be around a wide variety of people, some of whom don't have access to showers or are physically unable to care for themselves. I will be holding a full conversation with folks while my coworkers are gagging in the background due to the smell of piss and shit. I guess there are a handful of smells that really get to me... gas exhaust makes me shudder but it's less the smell and more imagining the dirt in my lungs. The smell itself is great. Same with most cleaning products. I imagine my endocrine system endocrying. Tonight I'm nervous because the kitchen smells weird. Sort of chemically... burns my nostrils a bit. My parents aren't home so I called to see if they were cleaning anything earlier and combined products or something. They denied, and got off the phone quickly because they are on vacation from my neurosis. Oh well. I have a window open. I really hate fire season; it makes me feel claustrophobic. Hm... I guess I'd better take my mentally ill ass (also I just typed out mendally I'll, further proving the next few words) TO BED. GOODNIGHT.

6/13/24: I am really tired. My hair is pink and I don't like it very much, but a patron at the library told me that I would melt my locks if I put orange over the pink and then brown over the orange. I've been thinking lately about the function of various relationships and how we as a society try to make everyone everything. I really started feeling this when I was a teacher... they are expected to teach kids morals and good character; a role ideally parents would fill. I also feel it at the library, where we're also expected to be quasi-social workers, tech support, after school care, and probably more I'm not thinking of because I am quite tired. Ideally, we would teach people how to find information, and help them find books. I sometimes rely on my friends to give me advice and impart wisdom, but Melissa pointed out that those things are more for mentors, counsellors, teachers, elders etc. Friends are for doing fun things together. Coworkers are for mutually making the work day easier. I guess all this is to say-- I'm learning that boundaries in relationships are good things and that I should perhaps start enforcing some more robust boundaries in my life. I tend to overextend myself, but I want to respect the function and definition of different relationships. I have much more thinking to do around this topic.

6/9/24: I pulled a card from my "writing down the bonez" deck (#38): "Tell me about a pair of shoes you loved." I seem to remember white keds. Converse were a big deal. I don't think I've ever been without a pair of converse in my arsenal, or at least it's been nearly 20 years. I had a pair of suede black boots that I wore so often that holes in the heels let in rain water. This was high school, maybe freshman year. When I was very into Vampire Weekend in middle school (lol aw) I wore orangy leather boat shoes. They gave me blisters at first, but I wore them through the pain. That was, and is, a habit around footwear. Push through the pain, for fashion's sake, or just in case the pain might eventually go away. The pair of shoes that most exemplify this today are these cool nike old timey tap-looking shoes that I got when I was really inspired by Kyoka. Terribly uncomfortable, but oh so cute. What else, what else. I have a pair of shoes designed by Shaq called "Shaqnosis." I love them, but I wore them on a hike and then another time in the rain, so they are a bit beat. I have loved many a shoe. Saltwater sandals were my go-to as a bebe, and then again in high school. I've sported birkinstocks and crocs, and now adidas slides. I have these big giant stompers that I love but rarely wear. I'll wear them tomorrow. I love being tall. Did any of my shoes have platforms to them as a kid? I can't remember; I don't really think so. I wore nasty nasty ballet flats for a while that made my feet smell foul. I've also had quite a few mary janes and a couple penny loafers in college. I regret getting rid of those; I wore them through college and for years in San Francisco, and I think I just stopped wearing them or they were too beat up... maybe I do still have them. I'll have to look around. One pair of shoes that are mysteriously absent (that I need to find before Ann and I go camping) are my hiking shoes that I marble dyed with swirly colors when I was working on the goat farm. Right now I own two pairs of Danskos; I found brown ones at the thrift store soon after purchasing a pair of oil spill black beauties. This is maybe so fucking boring, but hot dang do I love getting dressed up. Makeup is a real hit and miss, but styling myself for the day has always been a source of joy!

On another note I really need to stop eating so much sugar, because I think it's making me uglier and killing me slowly. Should I go to a hypnotist? I hope I get into the shroom study... Maybe that will knock me out of this habit. Maybe I should start taking lions mane again, but I read somewhere that it can trigger psychosis so it scares me a bit.

6/4/24 Tomorrow I sacredly swear I won't post a video, but today I am feeling sentimental about the way watching dance makes me FEEL... definitely one of my favorite fixations in recent years, and there are always more styles/talent/songs/battles to discover. A list of dancers I like right now:

Scrolling back through my Youtube history was.... humbling. I've been watching a lot of Slushy Noobs lately, which is big of me to admit.