mainsqueeze's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- You Were Right I just wrote a long, depressing entry about the way I've been feeling lately, but I scrapped it. Kurt Vonnegut wrote this introduction to the novel "Timequake," and he talks about "The Old Man and the Sea" (which I read for the first time a few weeks ago, by the way.) He compares the problems he had writing "Timequake" to "The Old Man and the Sea," and he says that his problems with the book (and the fisherman's disaster with the huge marlin) could have been solved by filleting the fish, and throwing the rest away. So I'm gonna follow that piece of advice, and I'm gonna throw the majority of what I wrote away. Okay? Okay. I don't know if you've picked up on it from my entries, but I've been feeling like shit lately. Feeling like shit like, not answering my phone or leaving my apartment for anything besides work, like drinking myself to sleep and smoking too much and watching tv constantly. Here's what's wrong: I am lonely. My two best friends, Matt and Crystal, recently made amends for a two-year hate-fest, at my urging. I was always caught right in the middle, with her whispering in one ear and him whispering in the other, and I couldn't take it. I mediated, and I reminded each of them of the things they liked so much about the other, and now, they're friends again. This should be a good thing, right? Right? Now, I'm dealing with something else- Crystal- my beloved, wonderful, do-no-evil best friend- cannot stop talking about Matt. She was in love with him, see, probably still is, and I was too. I'm still fighting jealousy where he is concerned, and she knows it. When she calls me now, it's to ask for his phone number or to tell me about what they did together last weekend, or to go over every conversation they've ever had in painstaking detail. She tells me about how he hugged her so tightly that she couldn't breathe when she left his house, and I hear what she is really saying- She's more important to him now, and she wants me to know it. This isn't the girl I love. I'm guilty, too- Before they re-established a friendship, Crystal and I were both fighting a tiny war, consciously or not: We each wanted the other to believe that Matt loved one of us more than the other. I played the stupid games right along with her- But after awhile, it became less and less important, and I stopped. She's still playing. And she can't seem to see beyond Matt, and meanwhile I'm going a little bit crazy trying to figure out where the hell I stand in this mess. Crystal was my beacon, guys- She kept me from the dark and the loneliness and she helped me stay sane. She made me feel like I was priceless. And now, now... I'm a shadow again. Oh, man, I've got to stop this. I'm making myself into a monster. I walk into crowded rooms and I feel a thousand eyes on me and I shake and I freeze up, and me, the real me, is buried under a ton of ice. I can't do this anymore. The other day at work, I was taking a woman to her table, and when I set the menu down, she put her hand over mine and looked me in the eyes and she said, "Calm down, honey. You're going to make yourself sick." A complete stranger. I wanted to grab onto her and squeeze her and cry and let it all out, tell her how I feel dried out and brittle and ready to shatter, but instead I avoided her stare and I smiled and laughed and told her that I was fine. I've been telling everybody that I'm fine, but I'm not. I'm not. 6:05 p.m. - 2003-06-10 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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