a cruel and elaborate hoax

the stars were out again tonight. for a little while at least. haze was rolling in from the east. the light from cape lookout, normally sharp, was a dullish yellow. a few middle-aged women were laughing and talking from a balcony behind me. i'd followed a fishing boat to the fence. could see the lights from the living room. five of them: four white and one red. the last two lazily appeared and disappeared. an explosion from the southeast caught my eye. it seemed like naval warfare. the kind of thing that's spectacular but not frightening when you can observe from a great distance. the lightning lit the sky every few seconds, keeping a much more erratic pace than the lighthouse. i think every time i looked away, a shooting star would flit past. two teenagers walked behind me once, heading home. soon after, a girl walked through the lamplight far to my left and down the stairs to the sand. i wanted to chase after her, ask her where she was going after midnight and alone. if you look up, you can see the milky way. a cloudy and faded scar across the sky. you can't see it in raleigh. eventually a plane inched past at a very high altitude. it was so tiny. the fishing boat, imperceptibly moving, turned to sail away. eventually only the two lazy white lights were left on the horizon.

i wish you were here.

come around

my life revolves occasionally around, say, girls i'll see. out places. in the world. they're everywhere here at the beach. all of them walking around in bikinis. and i with nothing to say. a few weeks ago i went with my mother to martin & osa. they were closing soon and we thought there might be something interesting there. i go into a dressing room to try on a pair of green pants (i think). for once i decide that what people do is leave their clothes there and someone who works in the store will return them to the racks for you. so i left them there.

i walk out the door and have to move aside as this attractive girl stepped past me. my first thought for some reason was that she was with the guy in the next room (i would think that, yes?) but then i saw her walking back toward the front of the store with my pants. how clever, i thought. i take the pants back there, put them on, take them off, and here they are back again. very clever. anyway, the girl was quite pretty. i wish i'd gotten a better look at her. the first thing i noticed was her hair, which was about chin-length with heavy blunt bangs. she looked sort of like the christina ricci-ish girl on the peppermint patties commercials. in any case, she was slight and pretty and i liked her hair. soon after, i walked back towards the front and she passed me again. i excused myself and smiled but that was it.

i know why i didn't say anything to her. it's because i am who i am and there's no other real reason. i don't know what to say to people, especially girls i don't know, and i don't necessarily have the balls to do it anyway. i like to blame it on the fact that i was with my mother and not, say, alone or with friends. couldn't really help maybe. i kept trying to glance at her but we were leaving. i caught a last look as we walked out but she was in the back of the store. i think she saw me too.

on the way home i kept thinking of things to say. hello, i like your hair. what's your favorite movie? why? because i'm going to maybe ask you out based on your response. forget that i'm going to the beach soon and then moving a hundred miles away. shush pretty girl. someday i'll learn maybe. i just hope she's somewhere else i am.

...

last night i was sitting here in the cat's bedroom again, watching running with scissors again and texting danielle. sweet girl, i wish we talked more. she claims to want to but never really does. she was dropping innuendos like she always did, how she'd love to be in nc with me right now. all that. i had a quick vision of that idea. it ended up like no uncommon daydream of mine. i was here with headphones on, laying down. dark room. she'd quietly open the door and slip inside. i wouldn't be surprised. she walks over and lays down on the couch on top of me, buries her head in my chest, and just rests. i can feel her weight on me, her warmth. i scratch her head for a while and we fall asleep.

...

a little later, i walked outside to look at the stars. i couldn't tell if it was clouds but i think i saw the milky way, right over the ocean. like a great and tragic scar, a story to tell. i looked around and think i saw a shooting star out the corner of my eye. cape lookout lighthouse was bright. there were a few lights of boats. a couple walking on the beach in the dark. a few lights on in the complex, people drinking around tables like we used to. on the way out, i passed a girl dancing and as i was walking saw a guy dancing next to her. they were upstairs, through the blinds. someone else across the way, third floor, presumably watching me. a couple kids with flashlights at the corner of the next building over. looked like thieves.

the sky was astonishing though.

there is no last time, never will be

seems strange to have nothing to say about big news but to skip to the small stuff. i guess it's a matter of processing... and that sometimes the small stuff just means more.

part 1

the girl who sits in front of me in our daily morning english class is named emily. i know this because on the first day of classes we exchanged digits and she walked me to the bookstore. a few weeks later she walked me to the student center so i could donate blood. emily is a few years younger, tallish-thin, and studying textiles. she's blonde and pale-pinkish like a pig. i don't mean this in a negative way, just a descriptive one. she's friendly enough and all, says hello to me most mornings. she's one of the people i meet where i can't work out the fantasy. she's not perfect (like the film class girl) but there's nothing wrong with her either. she dresses variously, never quite very fancy nor ever in sweats really. usually has her hair up though.

which leaves the neck. i don't sit in class and stare at the back of her neck. but one day i looked up and there it was. pale and pink and below the blonde and above the red of her t-shirt and so close and i had this such strong desire to reach out and touch it. have that feeling of solidity and mass and the knowledge that it's part of a real person, a real girl, who is really quite kind to me. i forget these things sometimes. maybe it's a sexual tic, only coming to light for and of certain people. i don't have such realizations with many. it's just that the fantasy was mingling with the reality while she was sitting in front of me. and there was her neck. this isn't a vampire thing, i just wanted to put my fingers there and have her feel me too. it's not crazy. just a mix-up of reality and surreality.

part 2

i'm not sure why the word "convalescent" came to mind today. i suppose myself to be a romantic convalescent. or emotional or social or whatever you like. thinking mainly of kelly here. we haven't spoken in over a month, easy. she hasn't texted in weeks. and i've let her go. i mean i still think of her occasionally and it makes me sad, it does. i almost apply a sort of mindfulness principle when it happens. try and choose not to think about it. just move on. not necessarily dealing with it, you know, a more permanent solution but... letting it be such that maybe it will fade away in time. and i think it is. slowly. it certainly helps that things are happening for me now. that i have school and a few new friends and a new job and plans to move and an apartment and daydreams which aren't about her. she obviously has infiltrated my life quite completely so i can't blink twice without seeing something that reminds me of her but i'm ok for now. especially if i don't think a lot.

i'm a convalescent, right? slowly healing.

part 3

an idea for a photograph. inspired by the film Performance. utilizing mirrors. the subject, and i think my daydream earlier starred emily from english class (especially since i found out she doesn't just make clothes but does fashion stuff... go figure), has a polished mirror with no frame. holds it up to herself in the photographs, angled away from the camera so as not to show the photographer. looks like a hole in her. can do a close-up portrait where half the face is visible and half is behind the mirror. i suppose focus would be a problem with all this. in any case...

more inspired by the film, could do something with body parts. her holding up the mirror to her face or chest, the reflection showing someone else to the camera. myself holding it up to my chest, her breast reflected in the camera. ok, so that's more or less a daydream but why toss up barriers now? it could happen. she lives in winston, yeah? forgot to mention that. anyway, mirrors. tape a small round mirror to a shirt, looks like a hole. needs to be bright outside, depth of field would help the focus problem.

je m'appelle lars

no, i'm not quite that bad yet. and listening to withered hand does make me feel better. and my cat.

it shouldn't bother me now, that kelly and dave are still together. why shouldn't they be? i suppose they're approaching their one-year anniversary by now. or in the next month or so at least. i don't like to remember that. seems so significant. i can't believe i've been living with such poison in my veins for so long. and now is so much easier than before... well she's not around as often. in many ways we aren't as close. well, that's empirical i guess. we aren't as close. that's just how it is. and it makes me sad for sure. i need her around.

i texted her this weekend while in winston. we were just starting to drink and every, every time that makes me lonely. no matter what anyone does. makes me want danielle or kelly or meghan or whoever to be around. and i wrote her and told her that and she just wished i weren't lonely and said that she'd been out all day helping dave get his boat back in the water and that she was sunburned and tired but happy. and i could see the two of them doing just that. for some reason - and it was deep down because i know in my head that they're together - but i was curious and frustrated and surprised for a second in a very childlike and petulant way, thinking is that still going on? that hasn't ended yet? i suppose i just hadn't heard his name in a while because she was being kind to me. i didn't really write back after that. after a while i got so frustrated that i walked outside without telling anyone and strolled around the apartment complex parking lot seven or eight times talking to whitney on the phone. she still doesn't know about the whole fake situation but she's a good friend all the same and it was really quite useful and wonderful to be able to talk to her even about things that didn't really apply at all. and she was glad to talk to me as well which was nice.

and kelly wrote me today and didn't mention my disappearance at all. maybe she didn't notice. i'm sure she's got other things and people to be concerned with. still, i miss how things used to be. of course i do. and still, more than anything, i want dave not to exist. i want us to be friends again like we used to be and...

and i think i want to return to my daydreaming. my constant comfort of possibilities. see, i miss that as much as i miss her. i miss the thought of maybe visiting her and what would happen. i miss the idea of us being together. both of which i can't really dream of anymore. i'm sure i've thought of it before and i try not to now even and it's still difficult to write down but if they're for good then all the opportunities are gone. if she's with dave for the time being with no end in sight and no reason to stop, those dreams really are gone from me. and if it's been a year and she is still seemingly happy and... i'd love for her to be the happiest girl in the world. i'd love for her to find happiness everywhere in her life, all puppies and flowers and sunny days and beautiful photographs, just not from dave. happy from me maybe, happy from no guy at all, i don't care. i just don't want her to find all that in that boy. and that's all just selfish but... yeah, it's just selfish. so what.

i still make mixtapes and mail her and get nothing in return. in fact, since dave happened i think she's only mailed me once. can that even be true? seems impossible. christ, have we really fallen so far? it's a sobering thought.

i'd rather not think any more about it now.

idea for a photograph

i pass all these fields. everyday, all these fields. i'm attracted to the fields. ideas of laying in the fields, the little plow lines, the grasses all white swaying. hiding people.

laying in the dirt, looking down a little row. she's standing there a few feet away, barefoot and dirty. kick up a little dirt, just so it hangs in the air. her legs behind the dust, a little out of focus, the dirt valley before her is focused. it's solitary, the photo. no movement.

wow, i thought i'd have more words to describe the idea.

hold me like before; hold me like you used to

i like it when we're ironic. well, i don't really. but in a really smug way i do look up to the sky and shake a figurative fist for a moment. i like it when titles are ironic. no, that's a lie.

you don't move me anymore and i'm glad that you don't. no, that's a lie. yeah, you do. still. somehow. like when our song came on in the car and i turned onto the dead end street near the lake that i like because i didn't want it to be playing when i got to burger king because that would culturally poison it. and at the end of the road they were building a house on the empty lot that i like to look through to see the lake. and the trees were green anyway so i couldn't see much. but i pulled my phone out and tried to write you one line but couldn't decide which one. so i drove around the circle and back to the road before deciding and i texted you while cruising back out of the road and you didn't write me back until later. and you said you'd just listened to that song and smiley face but i don't know if you still associate it with me or not because i didn't ask.

i looked over when i got to the bottom of the hill where i used to get the biscuits in the morning with my dad. over at the passenger's seat of my car. it wasn't empty because my three cd holders were there and the little book where i keep more. but for maybe the first time i saw the space you would occupy if you were there. and it existed but you didn't so it was all this negative space and you should have been there. it was really unbalanced with just me. it's so strange to imagine you as a real physical person, haha. i often think of you there, semi-spiritually. like you could just ride with me and look at me and see how i drive and where i go and what i listen to and how i sing when i'm alone. but i never noticed all the space that you aren't like that.

and what i really want, right now, is to just lay on the floor with you. these dumb movies do that to me sometimes. i just want to hug you so close and tight that we melt together and are indistinguishable. like siamese twins. can't separate us or our heart will break.

hold me like before; hold me like you used to

i don't know how close we ever were. i mean in a real, empirical way. did we ever bump into each other? that one time you were around. i remember i played pong with marie because she liked me back then. i was probably real awkward about it too. that night is probably the only event from college that i can remember and can't find a single picture of. that's ironic. if anything is ironic, it's that, knowing us. did we ever hug or does it just feel like we did? have we only hugged over texts because that's a letdown. that's less than hoped for. i won't say less than we deserve because that implies that you deserve just me but i won't be self-deprecating now. did we ever speak, personally? did our eyes ever meet? it was only that once, how much could we have accomplished at all? still, you're missing tonight and that's all that matters. anytime i need you. isn't that just the way? too many goddamn questions tonight.

i should have other things to worry about than musing on a girl i met once. god, sounds so ridiculous when i tell the truth like that. just the facts. i should be worried about the cancer. i've thought about that too much, though. (i don't even know that i have cancer, just guessing. like all the diabetes speculation of years past.)

i hate how my mind always skips and hops about from i want to i want to i want and never from i have to i have to i have. i guess there are more lily pads of one sort than the other is all.

...

like so many aurelianos. i had a phrase floating around in my head earlier that i liked a lot. i think it had to do with being lonely or solitary. wait, no. it's this spot on my shirt. see, there's this dark grey spot, bullet-sized, on the right shoulder of my shirt. i think it got there while i was washing my car last week. probably washing the front wheels, which are the dirtiest part. all that brake dust on the aluminum. probably some water splashed up and landed there and the spot never came out. anyway, the spot doesn't bother me but it does make me feel marked. and i worry that someone is looking for me and will find that spot and fire a bullet through me. i tossed on some jenny lewis before i started writing and leaned my head back and closed my eyes. trying to focus on the song through the glow of the screens and my brain which always wanders to things i wish not to consider while i know i'm listening to a song i want to enjoy. and at night like this i always get afraid because i can't hear and someone is breaking in the door from the porch and walking around the corner and seeing me in this vulnerable state. and he's drawing his gun and will shoot me through this damn spot on my right shoulder.

like so many aurelianos.

absolutely zero

two months and what has changed? i'm a loser. never really thought of myself that way before but the evidence keeps adding up. i've always had a scientific bent and it would be unlike me to ignore something like that.

kelly and i have been growing apart recently, even as she pops into my dreams more often. as it is now, we only talk once or twice a week. she says she's just not online so much anymore and apologizes for not being around. i can't blame her for having a life and school and friends and dave and all. if i were to simplify this and prove myself right at the same time i'd say that dave simply stole her from me. not quite fair but not altogether inaccurate either. her story isn't unique by a long shot. everyone has enough to do that there's no time for me.

meghan has work. danielle has work. austin has school. kelly has school and dave. becca has school and mike (and we were close for a while too). danielle, god bless her, has school and rob. it's not so surprising that i fall off the map sometimes. not their fault that i can't get into school, land a job, and am lonely.

it HURTS HURTS HURTS to be left behind. get those welshrats in my chest. that's not really fair though, it's not so much a worldpain as a selfish individual sort. which of course makes it worse. nothing makes me hate myself more than feeling selfish or depressed or weak for no good reason. and what does self-loathing lead to? please.

this is all old news though. much figured out and decided. i just regret it is all. i have this sour taste in my mouth like i'm dying. i think i might be. convinced of cancer. just like diabetes. just like kidneys. something will cut me down and i won't be surprised at all.

let us wax positive for a bit. let's pretend. the job with the epa comes through. i find a place to live and move out. meet some new people. go to summer school for a few classes. get into grad school for next fall. job ends in the spring and i use some saved money to hike the appalachian trail over the summer. go to school. have a real life. somewhere along meet someone i deserve who somehow deserves me. seems impossible from here. most everything does.

now i'm reminiscing with danielle... it's nice but just makes me lonelier. i've missed her so much. she sent me a picture of chloe the cat taken on her bed this morning. reminds me of going to pick her up at the little house before going out for dinner or coffee. i didn't realize how much i needed that until a year without it. hard to believe a year can pass like it has. i asked her how rob is but she didn't answer. maybe not so well? she's hoping i'll miss that detail? she probably just forgot to respond. i know her.

i miss vienna. i miss becoming friends with her. those first conversations while walking. pictures of her in the flowy gray skirt in prague. out at the playground when i injured her on the spin machine. sitting next to her on the flight back and sharing music, writing in her sudoku book. meeting walking to class and the hugs. dinners and coffees. that hug that i still haven't gotten over outside her hotel the last time i saw her. all this and she's less compatible with me than kelly. at least i know her for real. at least i know how she feels in my arms. that's hard to let go too.

at least she is here. that's better than the long months without.

well, that was useless. at least i wrote something.

a theme

i have in my head a small loop of ambling instrumental from some wes anderson film... i'm guessing I Heart Huckabees. it's just a small thing, came to me on the couch a while back while i was reading hemingway and has stuck. it picked up momentum and added new instruments and formed itself into something recognizable after a little while. slowly dredged up from the depths for no reason at all. i did the same thing with a noah and the whale song a few weeks ago in the bathtub. not sure why.

i'm not thinking of valentines day. i'm not thinking of kelly and especially of kelly and dave on valentines day. i have to write that to be honest with myself but i really hate it. i'd really rather not write it at all because i have to think it and i've managed to avoid that all day. so here i'll leave it behind. she doesn't give a shit anyway.

one might care to make a case otherwise... she texted me the morning of my birthday on friday and wished me well. i wrote her back the exact thing she wrote me nine days earlier. she wrote on my fbook and texted again that evening hoping that i'd had a good day. i responded in kind. i haven't heard from her since. i am not fooled. she can say that she is sorry she's never around but she was around before. she was around all summer when this was going down. she was especially around when we were friends, so close. she claims we still are but i can't uncover evidence of it. if we were friends then she would be around. if we were friends she wouldn't have to apologize every time she says hello. i am convinced of the truth and that is that she doesn't need me anymore. maybe she will someday and maybe by then i won't need her. maybe i won't be around. these are things i try to believe.

i wish danielle were happier. she always seems so run-down by school. i believe her. i know it's difficult. i just wish i could make her happier. it hurts to be so useless to someone.

same with meghan. something happened with kyle and i don't know what it is and i can't ask and i just want to be there for her but i don't know how.

i spent a long morning and afternoon with becca on friday. she's a wonderful girl with a wonderful dog. she seems forgiving to me and it's welcomed. i need a good friend like her around. i need to see her on a consistent basis. i really don't need to be foolish and to get sucked in like i do with all other girls i find pleasant. it's tough not to. i need to be stronger. really, i'm glad to have her around. i hope she feels the same way.

i pray every night to learn to love myself and to not be lonely. i don't quite know how to accomplish that. self-loathing spirals in such an encompassing way... it's difficult to escape. dislike for oneself grows and dissatisfaction with everything you say. every now and then i think that if i could just pretend to be happy, pretend to be a good friend, pretend not to be lonely or a loser or too affected by others' happiness that it will get easier, come true. it's just so hard to do. there's nothing more i want to talk about than my sadness but to say the words makes it worse. convinces me that everyone else feels the same way. to speak of sadness makes one a downer, unattractive, off-putting. i want to be honest and honestly loved but how can i be loved if i'm honest?

i believe in the self-fulfilling prophecy but i haven't got the emotional maturity to make it work. maybe someday, yeah? i've set up camp in someday. i'm planning to stay a while.

...

i just realized that if i ever did find happiness with a girl that i'd have to come up with something entirely new to write about. god forbid that ever happens, hah.

joining all my thoughts to you

interesting and unsettling thought tonight. i was just about to climb into the bath to read for a while and it occurred to me. if, knowing what i know now and having survived what i have this summer and fall, i could go back in time... would i do anything different? if, given the opportunity, how would i respond? before dave, when it was just kelly and i. i could have said something back then, about us. maybe prevented all this from happening. i wonder if i could have prevented it. she's said before that i could have had her if i wanted. it's a silly thing to want, someone so far away. i think i knew, though, and treated her like a backup for danielle. someone i could keep in my pocket and take comfort in when things were going badly. i know that's unfair and i know she deserves more. i wrote it in my postcard never sent a while back how i regret my tunnel vision last year, seeing only danielle instead of giving proper judgment to my best friend. what if i'd said something? what if we'd come to a conclusion so early and what if, in this bizarro reality dave never had a chance? what if, all summer long, i hadn't been losing her but winning her? what if i'd used what little money i have to visit her in nyc for a week? where would i be now? where would she be?

...

i'm being half-mean to her now and i don't yet regret it. she came back, moving back to nyc. said she'd been with dave most of christmas which is nearly what i'd figured. i didn't hear much of anything from her so it stood to reason. him no me. me no him. now she's lonely and without confidence in her school program and is dropping out and heading home. probably driving back with her parents now. probably to be back with dave immediately.

there's something in that which helps me. i can't pick it out because i'll always tell her "i'm proud of you" because she got into school and took out loans and moved to nyc all alone and met new people and studied and... i haven't yet but i hope i can successfully accomplish all that. and there's a big part of me that believes what a former film professor told me once, not to be afraid of failure. and is she really failing, if she's correct about it being the wrong program and etc.? it's all life. it's all learning. but still... i take pleasure in her suffering. the crying i hear about. i've been the loser for so long. i try not to feel bad about it and i've been successful so far. it's not that i consciously think less of her but i think i lost some respect in the waydowndeepdown. it's not much but it helps. i'd never tell her that.

all the little things she texts me make me half-angry now. i enjoy it of course, when she sends me song lyrics or wants to be my best friend or wants to hear me play guitar. i responded that maybe only if she'd sing for me. it's the half-flirty close thing that i automatically write. i regretted it a little. i don't need quite yet to be easy and friendly and close. i need to be angry and mean a while longer. i need to shadowbox. i need to not let her get too close or i'll get fucked up again. i don't need that now. i need to be strong now.

i need a distraction.

i met becca for coffee yesterday. i need to see more of her. i mean, the last thing i really need is another girl i can't have, and she's almost certainly one of those. we get along really well though. we laugh a lot. she's a smart girl and enjoys school. and plays music. and has a dog and loves the outdoors. and she reminds me of amy adams. this is beginning to feel like a middle school diary, yes? it's a distraction though. someone else to think about. without the tease of feeling like she loves me and having that taken away. at least so far we're enjoying each other. she said we should try and get together every week. that made me smile just about everywhere.

someday, you know, i'll meet someone like becca and like kelly and like danielle and like meghan and like all sorts of girls i haven't even met yet. and she will be single and she will feel for me the way i feel for her. people keep telling me that. someday, you know.

...

i think i wouldn't change anything. well, knowing what i know now, i would probably handle it differently. i would save everyone as much heartache as possible. i would probably make it easier on kelly and let her enjoy her summer a little more. i'd probably try to keep us close.

it's... it would scare me first. and why should i choose such a ridiculous relationship? even if it's with someone so wonderful... maybe there's nothing i could do to change anything. i want to be best friends again. that's all. most of all i don't want to live through it again. even if i could stop being selfish for one instant and wish her the best, knowing that she will be happy with dave and that she deserves to be with someone she can spend time with whenever she wants to. even then, all the time she's falling for him and away from me. all the time she begins spending with him and stops with me. all the time i can feel us growing apart and all my influence and importance i can feel draining from her life. all this business of being chosen over, i wouldn't wish that on anyone.

who would you rather be?

i can see, without moving my head, looking up, a lighted doorframe, top corner, reflected in the glass of a photograph handing on the wall in our hallway. logic and a mathematical mind dictate this to be the top corner of the doorframe leading from the kitchen to the dining room. my back is nearly against the wall of the house and there's a television accommodated by a large wooden chest (better name, can't think of it), there's walls, a staircase, a bench, a refrigerator, stove etc. and yet i can see it, clear across the house. that interested me for a second.

what a terrible way to start a blog post.

i was thinking earlier... i wish i would write about something other than girls. i suppose in my heart, though, what affects me more? i could complain about applying to grad school or searching for a job but all that has no soul. i don't write for anyone else but me and if i'm writing for me, why not just sob out what means the most?

i'm generally doing ok, i think. i'm not so bothered anymore about kelly and dave nor am i so tortured by the thought that it's all that ever occurs to me. i should get away from checking my phone for messages or checking aim for messages so often but that's a product of being me in my house more than anything else. i can't figure out either whether i actually want her to write me. if she doesn't, well there's nothing to deal with but it means that she is sort of ignoring me. if she does, well there she is, but i have to deal with it and it makes me nervous and sucks me in just a little into where i was before. and i don't want to be there anymore. still... i pray every night that i may love myself and not be lonely and remain close to all those who mean the most to me no matter what. no matter what. i don't know how to make that work. i tell myself sometimes that she's so valuable that i should find some way, some internal courage, which would allow me to stay close to her. i just don't know where to find it.

an inequality that bothers me: she's found someone else yet she's the best person i've ever known. she's probably my favorite person i've ever met. how am i supposed to get past that? meeting someone better? that's hard.

come on baby, play me something (like "here comes the sun"!)

at least i would like to be rescued from my dreams. last night was good... which is almost rare. scarce. i was in a staging area for a concert and figured out i'd be going onstage with whatever the act was. i think i was half of Mates of State actually. i remember my wife/partner had short-ish platinum hair and kind of looked like kelly from the Rosebuds (i know what you're thinking and no, i hadn't made that connection before and no, i don't think it has anything to do with that kelly). anyway, we followed her onstage, bringing out our keyboards to the crowd. it was in cat's cradle i think. i was on the far right of the stage, playing along with the music and it was wonderful. i think i had a melody once when i reached up - you know those high-jump testing areas where you jump and swat the sticks on the post and the highest ones your fingers hit swing around and measures how high you reached? - i pushed a few of those around as they made noises, making a melody. then i backed away while the song continued. i had a paperclip and i tossed it into the crowd and signaled for them to toss it back. we played catch a little, me feeling like a beloved musician who does this sort of thing because it's fun and how much everyone enjoys throwing paperclips with me. it was my turn to play again so i went up and hit a few of the swingy bars although i'm sure it was different then than before because i'd forgotten the melody. as we were walking off the stage i took the paper clip, set it in my fingers, and threw it a little further so that whomever caught it could keep it. i could still hear the song when i woke up.

i wonder every now and then, when i do that, if i actually compose music in my dreams and if i could somehow remember it well enough to record it, how wonderful that would be.

that was a good dream though. the night before kelly disturbed my sleep again. the only part i remember now is being in the corner of a large room sitting on odd furniture in a circle with a few unnamed people, kelly in the middle. we were a task-force, assigned to complete a dire task. anyway, in the middle, the phone in front of her rang and the task-force had to pause while she answered it. pretty clear that it was dave and not only that but he was being flirty. they giggled over the phone and said little nothings and all and the rest of us just looked around at nothing until they finished. i bristled a little the whole time. she took her time and when she hung up the phone she just said as an explanation "oh, sorry, that was just a torrid affair i'm having." as if to me even though she wasn't looking at me. and she knew i was there and it was worse for it.

and i woke up angry.