01/15 Seriously stupid of it to be January 15th. I wipe the corner of my mouth with my tucked thumb, ensuring to rid my face of any toothpaste. I just threw up and while doing so, instead of registering the pain, I only felt annoyed that it was January 15th. It feels like it should be March. Or June. I dont know, just not January 15th. I said it outloud while washing my mouth out, all muffled, “January 15th” just to see if it sounds as stupid outloud as it does in my head; it does. 
—

The third street promenade is ghost town. I already knew this. Everyone knows this. 

It was at one point, sprawling. It had a brandy melville, an american apparel across from that, this vague “health” cafe that wasnt quite on the water, but close enough that you could smell the salt. The promenade was once cool, but now it isnt. 

I think of this as I walk aimlessly around it, sometimes bumping into tourist, physically, with my new purse. I say sorry but theyre all german and dont care. 

“Hi” I say to Jason who is on my phone, through my headphones, but he is actually in Brooklyn. 

We talk vaguely about my new purse, and how much I hate it. Or love it. I cant decide if I hate it or not. I cant decide if I simply dislike it because it isnt my old purse which I have some weird sort of sentimental attachment to. Its lambskin, has this cute fringe hanging off one of the flaps, and fits most things. Its been with me basically everywhere, New York, Alabama, Louisiana, Florida, Palo Alto so on. It feels weird that it isnt my bag anymore, like it is, but its falling apart. Theres flight tickets in there, tubes of lipstick Im sure I forgot about, I think I have my social security card in it. I should check on that. That seems important. 

“I’ve been meaning to ask, how do you feel about ███ ███████?” Jason cuts off my whining about the purse. I stopped walking because the question threw me off 

“Oh um… fine I guess.” I do feel fine, maybe just feel some sort of persistent disappointment. 


“Fine?”

“Yeah. I have been reading and writing a lot, so thats always good” That isnt what he asked. 

“Yay. I dont know know I just have been meaning to ask you-” He says, it doesnt sound loud wherever hes staying, it doesnt sound like New York. 

“Where are you staying in New York?” I interrupt. 

“Ridgewood.”

“Oh that makes sense.” It makes sense. Brooklyn always felt uncomfortably quiet to me. Dillon and I were once staying in an apartment above Nublu in Manhattan, every night was numbingly loud. I felt the floor vibrating once when I had a case of strep throat, which caused me to vomit nearly everything I ate the prior week. 

“It is good you’re writing and reading,” He says. 

Yeah, I guess. 

—-

Aimlessly drove down PCH, which is lush right now from all the rain. Everyone online is saying it looks like Hawaii, it doesnt. Its pretty but it doesnt look like Hawaii. Because it isnt Hawaii. 

Everyone also has been posting videos about this hiking trail in the Palisades that opened for the first time since the fires last year, and everyone always makes some spiritual comment on how this one specific tree remained intact. Everyone refers to this tree as their favorite tree. Not everybody can have same favorite tree.

Or maybe they can. I dont know, it doesnt really matter but it bothers me. I think maybe because it means the other trees arent ever claimed as a favorite. Its also a painfully obvious beautiful, picturesque tree. It resides on the peak of the trail, overlooking the santa monica pier, and if it isnt too overcast, Im sure if you looked north you could see Point Dume, and maybe even Catalina across the pacific. It just feels obvious. 

My hand is out the window, and my sunglasses are on. I think about smoking but that feels insenstive. I mean everyone just got their favorite tree back. It’d be really horrible of me to start a fire. 

The guy from the killers whines over my stereo system. My sub woofer, or whatever its called. I thought driving down here would make me happy, or at least not bored. I brought a Houellebecq book to start. I brought headphones. I feel just as aimless as I did in my bedroom. The post-rain oversaturation of the hills also is bringing on a migraine. 

I am blazing through every light, wondering why everybody is driving so slow. Its PCH, you’re meant to drive fast. I am going probably 80  for no reason other than boredom. It seems like the faster I drive, like it’ll mean something's going on, or I dont know. Or that I’ll reach a part of the coast that makes sense, that it will be less understimulating. Something. 

—-

My drive back into the city was by all accounts fine, despite my horrible mood, or maybe more so lack of mood. I went pee after the 2 hour long drive, and I started my period. Which accounts for the horrible/lack of mood. I smile.

Its a confirmation of many things: That I am not actually unhappy, I just was PMSing. That Im not preganant. That my bodys working. 

I didnt need the confirmation that I wasnt preganant. I dont really know how I could be. 

I fall asleep with my Houellebecq book planted on my chest; which by all accounts is fine so far. 

My nap starts by thinking these thoughts: In a perfect world Mary and I would lay on the couch together, while I read. In a perfect world I would talk to her all of the time with a high pitched voice, and she would not have cancer. In a perfect world Mary would somehow be able to get pregnant despite being very frail and sick (from the cancer)  and she would have ten million little baby Mary cats. And they would be so great. There would Mary one (her), Orson two (her first born), Mary three (her second born) and so on. I would feed her and her mineratures. Some would be black, sone would be white, some could be both. It really would all make me so happy.  

-----


The nap, the shower: fine.


My Houellebecq book however is superb. Its great. I am about 20 pages in. This was intentional.


I am operating like an anorexic however, with the book that is (I am not in other sense). I am rationing it, is what Im trying to say. In a long winded way, thats what I was trying to say..


The book is only around 150 pages, by which I could realistically finish it tonight. Only I dont want to. I have taken to bringing a book to work everyday, and reading it on my breaks, and during the slow hours. There is usually only one “busy” hour anyway. 


I dont know what I will do if I finish my book. Surely Ill be uneqovically bored. Which seems to be the main problem in my life right now; the boredom. 


I suppose I could just reread something I already have, but I dont want to do that. I might have to. 


Writing is fine, its going, but it isnt necessarily interesting to me, at least not right now. It tends to go that way, the more I read the less I write, and vice versa. I dont feel compelled to write about myself right now, which Im sure is a factor. 


I feel happy. The happiest I’ve been in a while. Im just bored.


01/14 Keyan, Alex and I walk through fairfax. They are trying to motivate me to manufacture Analog of thought into an actual book by myself, to skip a publisher entirely. 

To divide analog of thought into three separate books, instead of one large book. I guess this makes sense. 

I suppose this should happen, probably this year. 

When we reach Andante, I start to grow tired of talking about myself. Its really my least favorite thing to talk or think about. And it sucks that I have created this blog that perhaps makes it my job to talk about it. 

We then start talking about Megan Boyles book which you could buy on amazon for one hundred dollars because so few copies were made. 

—--

After a late lunch I find myself unable to produce anything mildly interesting in matter of conversation. Keyan heads home, along with Alex. I fall asleep around 4pm which is jarring. 

Its dark when I wake up which sucks. 


01/13 It’s all fine. And the sun is out. Which is good. 

This thing keeps happening to me: I keep lighting cigarettes and I forget that I am smoking, the ember dies and I have to relight the cigarette. Something about this is weird to me. I can’t figure out how I would be so distracted to the point that I forgot that I was smoking a cigarette. The actual act takes probably 4 minutes. Whatever.

I relight the cigarette, and nestle my phone between my shoulder and ear. 

“I’m… happy.” I say with a smile. “Obviously I don’t mean it in… well you know. But I don’t know. I just feel happy.” 

“That’s really good to hear.” He says. 

I think he is happy too. I think he said something like that. He at least seems less stressed. 

“It’s hard sometimes. In obvious ways.” I am sure my voice quivered as I said that. I don’t think I will cry. It’s just an astute disappointment, the kind you have to just accept. It makes you feel flaccid as a human being, realizing you have even less control in your life than the already perceived little amount every human being somewhat functions off the fantasy of. No amount of trying will matter. Sometimes things just are terribly sad. 

█ █████ █ ████ ████████ ████ ████████ ██ ████████ ███ █████ ████ ███ ███ ████ ██ ██ █████ ████ ████████ ████ ███ ██ ████ ███████ ███ ███ ███ ████ ██ ██ █████ ████ ███████ ██████████ ███████ ████ ███████ ████ ██ █ █████ ██ ████ ███ █ ██████████ ██████ ██ █████ ████ ██ ███████ ████ █████████ 


But it’s just not the reality. At least not right now. I try not to think those 5 words.

—-


The ladies at the animal shelter are amused by my outfit: Marc Jacobs’ heels, white tights, a black tennis skirt, and a knit pullover. Maybe it’s just the heels. I don’t know. 

We are all heading to Cafe Triste around 8, and I wanted to look nice. I look ok. I wanted to look nice, but I just look ok. Which I guess is better than “bad”. 

Tina, the woman who runs the shelter, has me sign a waiver and date it. 

“Do you know the date? Is it the thirteenth?” 

“It’s the twelfth.” She says. 

I had already checked my phone, it is the thirteenth. It’s awkward as I write “13” on the line, but ceases to matter. 

“Right through here” she opens the door for me and extends her ankle to stop any of the cats, the cats with cancer, from running out. I hear a symphony of vague cat sounds, nails digging into scratching boards, kibble being chomped down, and an occasional hiss. She tells me there 140 cats who live here. Some have it okay, and by okay I mean that they can be blind or deaf, that is the “okay” here. Some have Down syndrome. Some have cancer. 

“This is Orson, and Missy” She points to the cats in the corner who are amused by me, as I am a new character, or more so treat-giver to them. 

“And try not to give them too many treats” right. They have cancer, I am going to give them whatever they want. That seems like what you should do when something has cancer. 

You should take them to Disneyland, or let them meet their favorite NBA star who is much larger than them. You should let them go on a singing TV show and give them 10-15 minutes of airtime and a golden buzzer.
.

“That is Mary. She’s kind of shy.” Tina points to a small bulbous black ball in the corner. She, Mary,  is facing the wall. She is missing half of her tail, which I think to myself ‘must’ve been from the cancer’ but I don’t really think that’s how it works. 


—-

Mary is not friendly. She’s actually very mean and disturbed. I played with some of the other cats, Orson, Missy, this other one I never got the name of, but I kept ending up with Mary. 

In her designated corner, she has a pink blanke,t which I’m sure agitates her beyond belief. It does not match her sordid personality or circumstance at all. She sits with herself neatly wrapped up, her tail guarding her torso. Around 20 minutes ago, I gave her some treats. She licked the dusty residue 
off my finger, for scraps, and then proceeded to bite me. She is very difficult, and as I mentioned, seriously disturbed. 

We played a game, where I gave her a treat, she ate it, and got inch by inch closer to me. 

—

I am needlessly bored at Cafe Triste. I paw at some chips, and occasionally perk up when someone says something interesting, but this is few and far between, as the boys are talking about guitar stuff again. 

Occasionally, Alex will look over and ask me something, and I’ll shrug. 

I don't perk up until we all start talking about a hypothetical trip to Vegas, which we all know we will never go on, but talk about anyway. 

—

Im not sure why, but my rib always hurts worse at Keyan's apartment. We sit on the floor around his coffee table, the boys are drinking beer, and now the girls are talking about going to New York. 

“Alex has never been outside of the context of work” I say. 

“Yeah.” She seconds.

“I want to go see Jack.” I add, which I dont think anybody cares about. 

—--

A man had cornered Alex and I her small car, he’s jacking off, but all the while not really meeting our eyes. We aren't paying much mind to him, which might be concerning. But we genuinely just do not care. We talk about a lot of things. Things that are infinitely more interesting than the homeless man with his dick in his hands. 

I wonder how it feels to try to scare somebody only for them to not care. Probably demoralizing. A complete lack of motivation I imagine, would have eventually been met, but he just stays. 

“I would bring you on tour again” Alex says. Which is nice. 

I cant even imagine. It would be fun, but theres a part of me that is exhausted from the past 6-8 months. I think I can manage to go to New York for maybe a week or two , I could tend to fake las vegas plans, but I should probably stay in Los Angeles. At least for a little while. 

Things just started to get good again, or at least not bad. 


01/12 got a hojicha from andante today instead of a coffee. Had this morning and tried to write, to no avail. 

I don’t know why. 

I wondered if it was because I have been happy, in some sense of the word, the past couple of days. I disregarded that thought, I feel as though statistically I have proven to write more when happy. Just maybe don’t have anything to say 

 I still haven’t submitted to that magazine, and though they like me and have extended the deadline I’m sure I’m well over at this point. Maybe I’ll try on some of my off days.

Keyan has texted about going to Triste on Friday, but everyone essentially told him we have to go tomorrow. Which is fine. I don’t really want to go to Triste on a Friday. 

I suppose it doesn’t really matter what I want because it’s not my birthday tomorrow, it’s Keyan’s. I was supposed to make him brownies, but the gas is still off. 

We cannot go to Triste on Friday because everybody will be in Miami this weekend, he just forgot. I will not be in Miami because I don’t know the people getting married well, or at all really, also because Miami is nearly my least favorite place on earth. 

Sometimes I feel like everyone is looking at me, I can’t figure out why. 

—-

My book is dragging on horribly. There’s less than a hundred pages left but my fucking god it feels like there’s 500 pages or something.

I haven’t taken to reading it on my breaks, which I would usually do. Instead █ ██ ████ █████████ ██ ████ ███ ████ ███ ███ ██████████ █████ ████ ██████ ██ ████ ██████████

 █ ████ ██ █████ ████ ███ ████████ ██ ███████ ██ ████ █████ ████ █████ █████ ██ ████ ████ ██ █████ ████████ █ ████ ████ ██████ ██████████ ████ █ █████ ████ ████ ██ ██ █████ ████ █████ █████ ████████ ██ ████ ████ ███ ████ ███ ███ ████ ███ ████ ██ █████ ██ █ ████ █████ █ █████ ████ ██████ ████ ███████ ████ ██████ ██████ █████ ██ █████ █████ ████ ███ ██ ██████ 

█ ████ ██████ ██ █ ████ █████ ████ █████ ██ ███████████ ███ ██████████████ ██ ██████ █████ ████ ██████████ 

I need to turn off the song. It’s weirdly apt. I don’t like thinking of all of this, there’s really not much to think about. At a certain point it just becomes sulking. 

I’m going to text Noel about coffee tomorrow. 

—- 

Noel texts “yes, ma”

I finish the last 60 pages my book bent over the counter at the store, I only have two more weeks to do this. 

My manager left, however long ago, my assistant manager doesn’t mind if I read, so long as nobody is in the store. I’m lucky in that way.

When I gave my boss my two weeks notice yesterday he responded with ease. Which made me in turn respond with ease. I didn’t know what would happen, you always hear of someone trying to quit and them in turn getting fired or “terminated” (how is terminated so much more severe of a word. It offers a death that the word fired does not carry) 

I have never given a two weeks notice in person, but I was trying to do the right thing. I think I did the right thing. ███████ █ ████████ ████ ████ ███ █ █████ █████ ████████ ███ █████ ████ ██ █████ █████ 

████ ███ ██ █████ ████ ███ ██████ ████ █ ████ ██ ███████████ ██████ ██ ███ ██████ █ ████ ██ █████████ ██ ██ ██ █████ ██ █████████ █ ████ █ ██████ ███████ ███ █████ ██ █████ ███ ████ █████ ██ ███ ███ ██ █████ ███ ██████ ███ ██ ███ ██████ █ ███ ██ ██████ █████ ███ 

██ █████ ██ ██████ ████ ████ ████ ██████ ███ █ ████ ████ █████ ████ █ ████ ██ ████ █████ ██████ ███ █████████ █████ █ ███ ██ ████ ██ ████ ███ ████ █████ ████ █████████  █ █████ █ ████ ████ ██ ██████ ████ █ ████ ████ ██ ██████ ███ █ ██████ ████ ████████ ████ ███ ███████ ██████ ████ ███ █ ██████ 

███ █ ████ ██ ███ ████ ██ ████████ ████ █ █████ █████ █ ████ ███ 

This is nice though too. Reading my book at the counter. Thinking of which soup to get from Whole Foods after I am off. I don’t feel important which makes me feel at ease. 

I hope I can handle my supposed importance in life. Inevitably. 


01/12 Should Jack actually come to Los Angeles I would be the happiest person. I got the call last night, I shuffled my belongings around and put my headphones in, passing kiosk after kiosk in Nordstrom. Chanel, one ring, Mac, another, by the time I had passed the loubition heels jack had answered.

“So I might be flying to Los Angeles tomorrow.” I stopped near the red bottomed heels.

“Shut the fuck up” 

“Yeah.” He said. 

I practically started jumping up and down. I squealed, even. 

“Are you fucking serious?” I gleemed recieving looks from the older armenian women across the expanse, rolling smudges of perfume on their wrists.

I cant help it, I am so thrilled. 

I spend the next hour on the phone with him, completely amused by our hypothetical plans. We say we will obviously go to malibu despite the fact that we are in the dead of winter, we will shop on melrose, split a sundae at fluffys, and so on. We are completely engrossed by the time I had walked back to apartment. I set my things down while Jack tumbled on about the hipster aesthetic, its formation, legacy, etc. 

01/11 I wake up curled on Alex’s couch, wrapped neatly in two blankets. She doesnt have any curtains, which I have always appreciated. I must have been cold because my knees are practically up to my chin, fetal-style. 

I gather my things, and slip out locking the door behind me. 

Something happened last night: Every single person remembered that I existed. 

I was bombarded with texts, texts to come out, texts asking to call me (which I am sure if I answered wouldve just resulted in a call to come out) 

Something about this felt succinctly lackluster. Like there would be hardly anything worthwhile if I did put on my coat and go out to wherever. Probably La Poubelle. Everyone seems to care about La Poubelle lately. It felt lackluster in the sense that I was yet again afforded something I perceptively wanted that only left me feeling vacant. Disinterested. Maybe even overwhelmed. 

Two days ago I could have argued that this was exactly what I wanted. I figured the world should have known by now that I am somewhat happy, and somewhat interested in participating in it again. (I have done nothing though realistically, to give anybody this impression). 


Instead I found myself not drinking a vodka soda at La Poubelle (does La Poubelle have liquor, or only wine?)



01/9 ██████ texted me. Weird.

I dont think I will respond. I dont necessarily care. 


But I am curious as to why. I suppose it doesnt really matter. 

I wish he would ignore me, not that I even said anything to begin with, but just more so my presence generally. It usually causes just a headache. Sometimes it really feels like a curse to be remembered. But then again its a curse to not. I just dont know if I will ever be pleased in any sense of the word. 



A melodramatic calamity: I believe the world has forgotten I exist. Which is fine. This kind of thing tends to happen to me every couple of months or so. It feels like I couldnt pay somebody to care about my life. Half of the time I dont really care about my life, last year being a prime example of this, so really I cant fault anyone. 

I am admittedly mum lately. I had nothing to say in december. I do now. I have a plethora of things to say, if somebody would so listen.

These things arent new, or even necessarily interesting. maybe I will find a clever, bespoken way to say them, in some weeks or months. I dont have it in me to try to convince people to care about my life though. I havent really ever been good at this, in anyway, when I am given the attention (the attention i am clearly vying for now) I freeze up, and defer, when its withheld from me I dont do anything to regain it, I just wonder why these things work the way they do. 

It has done me no service to try to figure it out, I stopped trying a while ago. I thought it had to do with the way I look, or what I had to say. These things, I am realizing, dont play much of a part in it. Its beyond me. 

So I wont figure it out. I have also proven myself to speak, even if nobody is listening. 

I am just going to go to bed. Which feels like something that should happen. 

(EDIT: I have signed up to volunteer with cats who have Feline Leukemia on tuesday afternoon. This seemed better than sleeping. That much is to be determined. I am worried they will pay me no mind also. If they do this I will simply lose my mind. I am not sure this is good because I will surely want to take them home, especially because they have feline leukemia. Dillon would never let me get a cat, much less one who has cat cancer. I might just be signing myself up to be sad. But there are worse things, I guess. Like being a cat who has cancer. )


01/8 I feel kind of fine. Like I was being dramatic yesterday, and besides I think I have figured out why I felt so terrible: I really need to wash my hair. 

Bad.

Its quite greasy, unkept. I have too much hair at this point. I realize I need to text my hairdresser. 

Above all else I need to wash my hair. And get a coffee. But I should wash my hair first. 

My grandma was always weird about that kind of thing, going in public with wet hair. I never really understood this. She is kind of dead so I cant really ask her why this was so important to her. It obviously has something to do with manners


—
I am frozen in place, yet again. I think I am looking at the hills but that much isnt clear to me. I dont feel like I am here, I know that I dont want to be. 

He is raising his voice, steadily. Gripping the steering wheel, really pulling out all the stops. I wont look at him, mainly because I am crying. I am not even sure why, it happened very quickly. Maybe because he is yelling and cursing at me. I thought we could get a coffee, how stupid of me. It was always going to end like this. 

“Can you just please be nice to me, I am having a very hard t-” I start

“You’re always having a hard time.” Ouch. 

████ ███ █████ █ █████ █████ ███ ██ ██████████ ███ █████████████ █ █████ ██ ███ █████ ███ ████ ████ ███ ███████ ████ ███ █ █████ ███ ███ ███ ███████ ████████ ██ ███ ███ ███████ ████ ██ ██████ ██ ██████ ████ ███████ ███████████ ███ ███ ████ █ ████ ████ ███ ██ █████

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█ ████ ████ ██ ███████ █ ████ █████████ ██ ███████ ███████████ █ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ █████ ███ █████ █████ 

 I start to get nauseous, and the hills in my eye sight thin out, becoming two dimensional, flat. The air gets warm, and viscous. I need to fucking get out of this car. 

“Let me out.” 

“At least let me drop you off”

“No, I said let me out” I get out of the car, and stifle my cries until I unlock the apartment, and collapse on my bed. 

He has followed me in, and tells me to get some rest. I say something like “yeah”, or “sure” My face is in the pillow the way a childs is when they are having a tantrum, or when youre having great sex. I guess I would be the child having a tantrum. 

He left at some point, and told me again, to rest. I dont know how I can. 

----

Instead of resting I walked 3 miles to a whole foods. Why is it eight dollars for a loaf of bread?

I think of just shoving it in my bag really quick, but its a loaf of bread. Its quite large. Also something about this makes me feel like a peasant. Like comically so. The age old debate of would you steal bread for your starving family, except its just me. Maybe Dillon. But I assume Dillon wont want any of my multigrain bread. 

I grab a thing of coffee, and really feel like a peasant. Coffee and bread. Hold on.

Out of the corner of my eye I see a girl who really looks like 
██████ ███████, when I see the balenciaga city bag crutched on her elbow, I realize it is her. I have never seen her in the daytime. I wonder if she lives nearby. I live kind of near here, well more so three miles away. 

She always wears sunglasses at nightime, which I cant even fault her for because I have done the same. I do find it ironic that she isnt wearing them now, on santa monica boulevard in the wake of the sun after a dreary rain-y week. She is draped in some bright pink shirt, and then maybe some rick owens pants, paired with some avant shoes I dont understand, and i dont feel necessarily inclined to try to understand. 

She gets a phone call and answers it with “Yo” and upon eavesdropping, I realize for the first time ever that I have never heard her speak an actual word. She has a total valley girl accent. 

How funny, I was just thinking of Victoria. I should text her. 



01/7 Had horrible dreams all night. I dont even really remember what happened, or what upset me. In my half lucid state I figured turning over would help. And then to the right. 

I think █████ weirdly, was in my dream. It was supposed to be this ceremonious, homecoming or something. He came to rescue and save me from some sort of fair that was taking place near my childhood home. I remember not saying much of anything, I remember he was so happy to see me. He looked the exact same. But smiled more than usual. I remember in the dream, thinking I should have been happier, how significant it all was. I still do think it is a bit weird I havent seen him in almost a year, or that I havent at least bumped into him. 

He drove me in my own car. I did not have a phone, or a book, so I just looked out the window I think. He started to really annoy me because he wouldnt stop talking. He thought ██ █████ ███ ████ █████████ which I thought was utterly retarded, but for some reason I was completely drained of energy so I could only manage to shake my head no. This did not seem to phase him at all, and if anything only motivated him to bug me about it some more. How funny, a nightmare is being annoyed. 

I cant figure out what about this was so scary to me. Realistically I was just mildly annoyed and found his flagrant nature to be a bit pervasive. 

I had another dream I dont want to write about. That one happened on my left side, I remember turning to the right. 

—--

“I like your outfit” The man behind the counter says. He watched me eye the menu for some 15 minutes. I knew I wanted the vegetarian sandwich, the only vegetarian sandwich they offered, the perplexity came from trying to decide what to get dillon. His palette is confusing. 

My outfit is odd. I rolled out of bed, restless, and agitated , simply threw on random articles of clothing. I figured it matched since everything I own is black, white, or a drab shade of gray so dark it might as well be black. In hindisght, my pompous little equation for clothing did not work today. I am sporting my raincoat, a striped shirt, a silk skirt (which is so sheer you can see my teal lace underwear through, which apparently has a hole or two through the lace now, which apparently really upsets me because when I noticed I muttered some sorry-for-self phrase outloud, but slid them over my legs nonetheless), my ballet flats, and a pair of knee high socks. I guess all of my socks are dirty except for obnoxious ones. 

Its really quite a bizarre outfit. 

“Oh, thank you. I think I am ready now.” 

He smiles too brightly. 

“Great!” Jesus. 

I order my food, stumbling a few times.Here is what I settled on for Dillon: a chicken caprese with no tomato, no balsamic. I basically got rid of everything that make a caprese good. 

“And can I get a name for your order?”

“Ash.”

“Wow, you even have a cool name” He practically exclaims to the point that the other patrons in this small restaurant are all staring at us now. Jesus fuck. 

Hes nice, hes inoffensive. I just wanted to be the observer today. I wanted to speak as little as humanly possible, I wanted to be a completely neutral person in the grand scheme of things. Move without motion, or something. 

I say all of this with an acute awareness that this discredits what I wrote only like 2 or 3 days ago. I rebuked the sentiment I carried all last year: that I wanted to be an observer in my life, that the thought of being an active participant in it was merely too cumbersome. 

It hasnt proven to be fruitful, or even easier really. 

I still do mean this though. That I dont want to be so passive and blase about everything. I am realistic enough to acknowledge this cant be “fixed” in a mere matter of days. Maybe even weeks, or months. I kind of just have to try until I dont think of it, or something. I havent figured it out entirely. Or if I am right. Only that whatever I was doing last year, it was probably wrong. Maybe even harmful. I dont know. Maybe it wasnt. I was kind of happy for parts of it. 

This is all to be determined at some point. I dont know when, but at some point. 
But, today, while being earnest in my will to change, I had no true desire to do so. I felt this acute panic upon waking up, and the thought of sitting with myself made me want to shoot myself, or hang myself. Hyperbole. It just felt pretty unbearable for whatever reason. Not from a depreciation standpoint, I think from a fear standpoint. I find myself afraid majority of the time now. Which is foreign, and quite uncomfortable. 

I cant cope with this, so I just start walking or running until I eventually dont feel as terrible. This has proven to work for me. 

I have gotten very familiar with the geography of my new neighborhood (not really new at this point, I guess) and can direct myself virtually anywhere in the city. Or at least within 5 miles.

This is what I did today: I walked to andante, I got a coffee, I walked to the perfume store, I smelled perfumes and tried to keep my head down, I walked back to the coffee shop, I bought a water, I sat down for 2-3 minutes until I felt that sort of discomfort rise in my torso again, I exited the coffee shop, I stumbled into a store probably a mile from the coffee shop, I talked to one person, the security guard, and I said the word ‘thanks’ because he let me set my coffee down, I looked at things I did not care about like band t-shirts, vinyl records, and kitschy keychains, I walked to another store, I tried on a dress, and then another, I bought nothing, I walked to a table, I sat down, and then I felt uncomfortable again, so I left, and then I walked into this sandwich shop because I worked up an appetite after walking 5 miles for seemingly no reason other than being nervous. 

Now, this man thinks im his wife or something. I dont know. Maybe he just has exceptional customer service. It does not matter to me, at all, whether he is nice to me or not, whether he truly likes my outfit, whether he can see my teal underwear through my skirt. I feel agitated and like I want to go home, but home is now about 2.5, maybe even 3 miles away at this point. But this isnt his fault, I have nobody to blame but myself. 


01/06 Alex calls me to read me some headlines. One about rent in Los Angeles. 

I tell her Doug LaMalfa has died. She updates me on Venezuela. 

We then start talking about mini skirts. And sewing. And my stomach. 

“You’re kurt,” She jokes. “Just dont kill yourself” 

“I’d have to make like three really good albums to do that, which I have no desire to do” I respond flatly to her joke, I am joking as well though my tone might not read that way. I think she gets it, she knows me well enough. 

Realistically all three albums arent that good. One is exceptional (In Utero, majority of the credit going to Steve Albini), One is a great pop record, Nevermind, and one is frankly forgettable, Bleach. I’d have no allegiance to that first Nirvana record if not for having listened to it repeatedly in high school. Its a run of the mill proto grunge album, real sludgy, wack production. Nothing special. But good for what it is, I guess. 

Dillon and I debated purchasing a nice turntable for our living room. I thought about what albums I’d get. I can mainly only thinking of Terror Twlight by Pavement, maybe a Sun Kil Moon record. I dont know, it just seems nice to be able to listen to a record and read on the couch. 

I dont think we’d really buy a turntable for some months, so I have time to think about it I guess. 

Logged lots of things into my calender while Alex mused to me on the phone about her kitten. Smoked one cigarette and drank one small cup of coffee at the table outside. The sun is out. I think the rain is done, which is kind of sad. Theres nothing I could really do about it though. 

As I admired the makeshift bamboo wall I thought about making an appointment with Holly. I thought only of it for a couple of seconds. I miss the sound of her voice, and wish I could call her just to call her. I dont really feel like I need to go to therapy though. Maybe like ever again. Unless someone died or something. 

I dont think I see any purpose. I dont know when but apparently at some point I decided self reflection, and thinking of myself was pretty malignant in nature. It just seems useless. I feel like I understand myself entirely, maybe to a detriment, but at the same time I find myself to be utterly hypcryctical and full of anomalies. What use is there in figuring this out? 

I think Im kind, earnest. Maybe a bit distrusting and cynical. But I’d argue virtually everybody feels this way about themselves. 

Theres a part of me that feels like I should go. I think of how Alex layed it all out for me the other night, just how much has happened in the last 6 months. How the concrete under my thighs suddenly felt more cold, sharp underneath me. How I didnt feel like the person that all happened to. That I was some spectator in all of it.

I wish I could call Holly and just talk about smoothies. We used to do that when I was a teenager and didnt have anything to talk about, or more so anything I wanted to talk about. We’d talk about our favorite coffee shops, what vegetables are the best in the winter versus the summer, what goes best in a smoothie. 

Sometimes she’d force me to talk about things, she’d interrupt my smoothie list and randomly ask how my mother and I were doing, or if I at all felt anxious. It always annoyed me, terribly. I wanted to talk about smoothies, and music. Fun things. 

I really didnt much like the feeling of our in person visits when she write something on her notepad. It was always something obvious too, always right after I’d mention how ____ upsrts me, or startled me. I felt like I could really control the situation or more so the “outcome” of our sessions, to my benefit or detriment. I didnt really care to do that though. 

I just hated feeling like a patient. Its kind of the worst label you can have. 

It reminds me of that David Foster Wallace short story, Good Old Neon. Which opens with “My whole life I’ve felt like a fraud” 

It really marked something in me, made me laugh when he made the point of trying to essentially ‘win’ his psychoanalysis sessions. I’ve always felt that way, like I could outsmart whoever, my doctors, my friends, whoever. What a ridiculously bloated, self important thought. 

I dont think I feel this way as an adult. Or maybe I do. I just understand now that nobody else suffers from this except for me. 

Sean is en route to get me, take me to a cafe, where I’ll probably whine some more self important thoughts despite my supposed predilection not to. 

—

“Do you have any good band names?” Sean queries. 

“Im not sure. I havent thought of it since high school I suppose,” I close my book of essays and sit it next to me on the couch. “Do you?”

“Maybe alliance”

I shake my head. “It sounds like marvel-y” I cant think of why i dislike it other than that. 

“What about entent?” 

I nod emphatically. “Much better.” Its true. 

“Its french for like mutual understanding.” 

“Oh, thats nice.”

I know more french than I remember. I was talking to these two french women the other day, a casual conversation, obviously, but I remembered a lot more than I had initially believed. I zone out a bit.

“And I walked out at this party, hes talking to these girls, and he has a thick valley accent” Sean laughs.

“So he isnt french?” I wonder.

“No. I dont know. He is french.”

“Cool.” 

A comically happy New Order song starts as Dillon walks out a plate of waffles and bacon for them. The boys seem happy, which is always good. 


01/4 Apparently, everyone is on ketamine, except for me. They wear it much better, I guess. They dont look, like strung out.

“What did you do New Years?” Everyone keeps asking me. 

“Went to my friend Zoe’s” 

Its mellow, but kind of odd knowing basically everyone is on ketamine. Its jarring for some reason, maybe because its a sunday, maybe because its raining. 

The weather app says it will rain all week, meaning the ground will glitter for one more week, and then Los Angeles will cease to glitter until summer. And even in the summer, it only glitters at night, or if you’re near the ocean in the daytime. These are all obvious, fifth grade level observations. 

Everyone keeps offering to give me ride home, but  I dont know most of these people, and frankly I cant keep track of who is on ketamine, and who isnt. 

I’d prefer to not drive home with someone who is on ketamine. I dont think ███████ is on ketamine, but I dont know my stomach kind of hurts. 



01/3 “large strike in Venezuela” i text Alex. “this does not seem good.” 

To say the least. (hours later I read about Maduro) 

She says she heard. It’s the first thing I read when I woke up today, which didn’t aid the out of breath slightly panicked feeling that encompassed my entire body. 

“Maybe we should only send good news.” She knows she ███ ████ ██ ███ ████ ████ █████ █████ █████████ ██████████ ██ ████████ ████ ██ ████████ 

God, who do I think I am? 
---

Keyans new place is engulfed by warm ambient lighting, making the concrete flooring, and lack of furniture inconsequential. 

We sit on the floor, each a soda in hand, which was supposed to be beer, though it is clear no one is quite in the mood to drink. I think Keyan is sad, or at least disoriented. Alex seems tired, Dillon is nervous, and I don’t appear to be in any mood, which is my common modality. 

Keyan rubs his hand over a table that he made. He didn’t say this, that he made it, I only assume because he is telling me what it is made of. Concrete and various fibers. It’s gorgeous. It’s gorgeous,  and because of its composition, you don’t need to use coasters, which makes it stunning. 

Alex and I end up laying our backs flat on the concrete floor, looking at the industrial ceiling. It reminds me of when I went to Keyan's first apartment, remarking how grown up we all had become, or it felt like we were about to become. 

It’s funny how you never figure these things out, growing up, living, anything like that, you just always feel like you’re about to figure it out. 

“You have such a strong sense of self, I think that’s what is so remarkable about you” Dillon says, nibbling off a piece of the cookie Alex plated for me. 

I realize he is speaking to me. The others nod in agreement. I mean sure, I guess. 

There is some truth to this statement; I have known who I was from a young age I guess. Or rather what was important to me. And this was made obvious through stubborn displays, pompous declarations. It doesn’t feel this way right now. 

The past 6 months of my life have happened to me. I have played no sort of role in deciding anything. 

Objectively this is entirely untrue. I have made every single decision I am now paying the consequences of, I am reaping what I sowed. But I don’t remember making any of these decisions. Alex told me everything that had happened to me in the past six months, and I went “wow that’s a lot” as if I was not the person it happened to. 

I don’t feel like the person that lived these experiences, I don’t. I do not feel I was an active participant in my life. 

I used to wish for this. I wanted to stop making decisions, in hindsight I can acknowledge how juvenile this is, how completely unrealistic this is. I wanted to be a friend, a subordinate, a peer, a love interest, an enemy, a leader, I wanted to occupy roles without actually being a person. I don’t know why. Maybe sometime ago I decided in my head that it was too painful or cumbersome to be a tangible real thing. I wanted to be a passive participant in the duration of my life.

This has worked, clearly. I haven’t felt any true ramifications of anything until utter desperation to cling onto the things that I have just remembered are important to me. Writing, Dillon, Alex, I like to bake, I forgot I liked to bake.

 I am now hugging people, which I always disliked before. I am taking notes in my books again, just to remember what page to turn to, I am picking egg shells out stainless steel bowls, wiggling my fingers throughout an array of flour and baking powder. 

I have been intangible for however long. I was not stupid, I realized a human, myself, would always be tangible, I’d be filled with lipids, blood cells, tiny tiny atoms whether I liked it or not. I knew, much to my own dismay, that I would have to take up space in the world. It was realistic, and honest, but  it disappointed me entirely. My goal since I was probably twenty years old was to take up as little space as possible. I wanted to experience the world without getting my nails dirty. I did not want to be a player in it. Just an observer. I figured observers knew peace, they knew serenity. 

I unfortunately realize now that serenity is the mere precursor to death. Or defeat. Which sucks.

I can now feel Alex’s heartbeat as I hug her goodbye, it is so small and gentle which is surprising. I startled myself when I went to unlock the steel doorknob, because it was so cold against my palm.

It has probably always been this cold. 


01/2 Alex and I have started a new game where we call each other every morning and read news headlines to each other. I think this is her way of forcing me to speak.

This is all I really want to talk about anyway. 

“40 dead in a Swiss fire” I’ll rattle with my phone pressed to my ear. 

“TSU is misalocating funds” She’ll bite back. 

She forces me to have an opinion on the articles. I think this is her way of forcing me to care about things. 

My opinions are not as definitive as they once were, which was always something people had really hated about me, but an aspect of myself that I enjoyed. My opinions as of now are are synonymous with those of a child; black and white. Lacking nuance entirely. 

Most headlines can be sundered into two neatly sanctioned categories, luckily. Good or bad. 40 dead in swiss fire; bad. TSU misalocating funds; bad. 

Somethings are a bit harder to box. Like this headline from the NYT, “This Diminuntive Reptile Plays Rock-Paper-Scissors”, Cute. But I am not sure this is really a headline.. It reminded me of how great of a word diminutive is. So I guess good. 


1/1 Off to a good start. The first thing I have done this year, with my hands is brush my teeth, and then move a spider outside. Dillon always tells me to kill them and I never can. 

----

I have taken to reading reviews of Play it as it lays by didion. I have always known why I liked the book so I have never felt inclined to do this. Its interesting, and infuriating how subjective literature and really any art can be. I suppose it doesnt matter in any real way, and it doesnt derive any pleasure I obtain. 

I am referring mainly to one review which labels Maria as “fatalistic” … which is beyond me. Really, I cant understand how they would ever possibly read that character as fatalistic. I would never even think to put Didions name, muchless this specific work of hers near the word fatalistic. 

Marias main affliction, Didions main affliction, really the affliction of nearly all of her work is the plague of existential misery. There is no answer, order, logic in anything, especially in Play it as it lays… Now that word is just irritating me; fatalistic. The fucking woman drives herself in circles around Los Angeles, through the mojave, trying to constantly stay in motion to cope with this. 

Its no wonder this is my favorite book. Well up there. It feels kind of embarrassing to love Didion so much, its like saying ACDC is your favorite band or something. But I do love her, I think this much is obvious to anyone. I must be really bored because I am getting mad at strangers on the internet which seems like something a really bored person would do. 

Its fine. (For now, for today) Max is coming over tomorrow, hes in town from London. If this were eight months ago I probably would have begged him for some of his adderall. I dont really feel the need to do that anymore. If he dropped it in my lap, I obviously wouldnt mind. But i feel indifferent towards trying. 


12/31 It figures I’d start the last day of the year the same way I started the first day of the year: reading the Frank O Hara poem:

1
My heart’s aflutter;
I am standing in the bath tub
crying. Mother, mother
who am I? If he
will just come back once
and kiss me on the face
his coarse hair brush
my temple, it’s throbbing

then I can put on my clothes
I guess, and walk the streets.

2
I love you. I love you,
but I’m turning to my verses
and my heart is closing
like a fist.

Words! be
sick as I am sick, swoon,
roll back your eyes, a pool,

and I’ll stare down
at my wounded beauty
which at best is only a talent
for poetry.

Cannot please, cannot charm or win
what a poet!
and the clear water is thick

with bloody blows on its head.
I embrace a cloud,
but when I soared
it rained.

3
That’s funny! there’s blood on my chest
oh yes, I’ve been carrying bricks
what a funny place to rupture.
and now it is raining on the ailanthus
as I step out onto the window ledge
the tracks below me are smoky and
glistening with a passion for running
I leap into the leaves, green like the sea

4
Now I am quietly waiting for
the catastrophe of my personality
to seem beautiful again,
and interesting, and modern.

The country is grey and
brown and white in trees,
snows and skies of laughter
always diminishing, less funny
not just darker, not just grey.

It may be the coldest day of
the year, what does he think of
that? I mean, what do I? And if I do,
perhaps I am myself again.


I changed a lot of his punctuation because I found it to be quite gay and stupid. Gay in the literal sense; its quite cheery when in reality its a rather somber poem. Maybe liberating. Depends when you read it I suppose. 

I find myself sucking the top of my glass Mountain Spring water bottle, staring at my laptop, re-reading the first 3 stanzas. I always only cared about the fourth and neglected the rest. Its quite good, but like I said, the punctation is gay. Its always taken me out of it. That was a thing poets were doing in the 50s though, liberally using exclamation marks. I cant think of a single time I have ever used an exlclimaton mark earnestly. 

I made a list of everything I read this year:


—-

I put my coat on over my pajamas, its quite weird looking. Im wearing a matching linen pajama set . A camisole and a tiny pair of shorts. Its raining out, I turn on my windshield wipers. I left my phone on my bed because everyone is texting me about New Years Plans which makes me incredibly anxious for some reason. Well there are obvious reasons. 

At this specific 7/11 they always play classical music outside of it, through speakers. I thought initially I was hearing things because I couldnt locate the actual speaker. I found it one day and felt relieved but ultimately confused. Why would any 7/11 possinly need to play music outside of it? Let alone Bach? (edit: anti-homeless architecture. Its always anti-homeless architecture)

It makes me think of that David Foster Wallace quote on silence, or more so the lack of it. The simulacrum of ambiance. I dont think he said it that way but I have always interrupted it this way. 

“Can I get a pack of 27 shorts?” I put a 50 dollar bill down on the counter. The lady who runs this 7/11 is a very stern indian woman, I sometimes come and buy soda here. And I always forget about the classical music. 

She looks confused, I point to them behind her. 

“ID?” She asks. 

I am surprised she asks this because I look quite horrible right now. I am depleted of any sort of pigment in my face. I’ve gotten really pale from never going outside when I had the flu. I havent been able to stomach anything since like Saturday.  I had a pseudo panic attack 10 minutes ago; which is why I am here… buying the cigarettes. Its my first actual pack in a month. This makes me happy. 

I look like a fucking idiot in my ID, with bright red hair. 

I decide that I will text everyone back about New Years Eve at 1pm. I cant do it right now. I dont want to do it right now. 

—

Its raining in Los Angeles, which means it looks like theres glitter everywhere, but I might just have astigmatism. By the time I leave its dark out. And I forgot how it looks out here when its dark. Or in the rain. I hear the whirring of the machine next door, I did not forget that it soothes me. The archetype of ambiance. 

The hard thing about a simulacrum, and I guess the point is maybe that there is no true antonym to the word, just as there is no true starting point. I think at one point it may have been true that a starting point was something not so far off base, but I dont think that can ring true now. 

I light a cigarette in my car and feel better than I did two hours ago. 

—

Dillon is hesitant, but I wonder if he has ever been desperate. Maybe he would understand if he has been desperate. Regardless, he seems happy for me despite not really approving. I dont really want Dillon to experience desperation if he does not have to. 

Everyone is happy for me, they keep saying it, and meaning it. I keep thanking them and meaning it. 

I’ve been thrown a bone when I most needed it. Im just so happy I could cry. But I dont. I just kind of listen to everyone talk at the table. They are talking about interesting, happy stuff, and I wonder to myself if they have always been doing this.

I tell Reed he looks tan after his trip to Puerto Rico, he rolls his eyes, he tells everyone that Zoe learned how to surf. Dillon is sat next to me, eating something from the picturesque cheeseboard zoe has set up. It looks like something grown-ups would like, I like it. I nibble goats cheese on crackers, and small pieces of toast with fancy European butter. I get scared because its the first real meal I have had in days, but sometimes saying this outloud can be alarming. Obviously. And for the fact it isnt really a meal at all. I almost threw up on the 10 earlier, I debated pulling off into the safety lane or whatever they call that. 

New Year's Resolution: not to scare or worry anybody. Especially myself. 

Seeing Dillon's face as he drove me to the hospital made me feel bad, like I had scarred him for life or something. I was just moaning in pain and whimpering profanities. He had told me to stop talking, because I think I was scaring him, and also because I remarked how painful it was to breathe let alone speak.

I would also like to throw up less. It seems like I will be getting health insurance this year so this doesnt feel far off. 

I think about what Tom said, that I should have an easy year. Essentially that I should think less. I agree. I hope I can figure a way out to do this. I really really want to do this. 

I am exhausted. Which is good, because it will be a New Year in around 30 minutes. Too much has happened this year. I cant believe I used to beg for things to happen to me, practically pray for it. I thought boredom was the worst fate a human could face. I dont think I could ever truly appreciate boredom, but I’d like to at least be comfortable with it, stomach it. 

Maybe this is the year I learn what to do with my hands. They're resting on my steering wheel now, I just passed the Beverly Center a thousand times. 


12/30 I feel panicked in the morning. I think I had a bad dream; I know I had a bad dream. 

I get that thing where you wake up out of breath. Why does that always happen after?

I grab the bottle of extra-strength ibuprofen that I stole from my family for my fractured, or bruised rib. It doesnt really matter if its bruised or fractured; it just fucking sucks. 

“Ah” I mutter, somehow making the noise a two-syllable word as I place one on my tongue and down it with lukewarm water I had poured myself the night before. Yum, a giant pill. No, literally yum, this is all I’ve had to eat in the last couple of days. I am trying to remind myself that eventually, that nausea feeling goes away. Eventually. 

—

I listen to the My Bloody Valentine songs where nobody sings on my way over to Zoe’s apartment, passing the Beverly Center with some wall of sound thing Kevin Shields made as my background music. 

It sucks that My Bloody Valentine isn't really cool anymore. Or really that anything isnt cool anymore. I'm listening and its so great. But ultimately, it just feels immature at this point. I wonder if I will ever feel mature. Or like I can trust myself at least. To do the right thing, say the right thing, feed myself the right things, dress myself the right way. 

Rain starts to plummet onto my dashboard. I dont turn on the windshield wipers, I dont know why. I just let the rain roll down and bead off horizontally. I thought I’d be crying but Im not. Im just kind of looking at nothing. 

—

“I feel like a dog you’re going to put down” I laugh in Zoe’s car. I do. She has taken me to Brandy Melville, bought me a shirt, and is now taking me to McDonald's. I told her I am not that hungry, but she tells me I can get a soda, that I love soda, I tell her ok. She also adds that she wants to stop by a gas station to get a lighter so that I can smoke a cigarette in her car on the way home from the shopping plaza in Brentwood. At any second, someone could pull out a gun and kill me, I wouldnt be surprised. I’d just shrug. 

She plays happy music. She gleams about how great her recent trip to Puerto Rico was, and muses about work drama. Which I am always eager to hear. 

She tells me that we could watch the Kardashians, my favorite shitty reality TV show, to take my mind off thigns. I want to tell her that it wont work that way, that I kind of just have to think about it. And that that is fine. But I tell her I am going to Alex’s apartment to see Alex and her kitten. 

—-


Alex and I spend a good chunk of the night making AI images of us together, well us together in middle school. Which is humoring. For some reason it keeps making me Middle Eastern. And it gives Alex botox. Her kitten falls asleep on my lap. His chest moves up and down and up and down, indicative of how deeply he is asleep. He is so tired. 

I give him small kisses on his head which is soft, foible. Like it isnt fully formed yet. I remark the height at which his chest rises to with each breath, wondering how his tiny lungs can do this. Or how his minuscule heart is pumping blood throughout him. I wonder if his stomach is still hurting. 

Alex says he will not have kibble tonight, only wet food. I think they call that pate. 

Should probably read that Frank O Hara poem in the morning.


12/29 “I miss my old job, I love you and I just broke up with you, I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing” I say in between gasps.

“Hey, ash, breathe” Tom says and combs my hair. He’s really great. I’m the worst. But I’m trying to not be the worst. Or something like that. Something that isn’t so fucking bad. 

My room is dark. Too dark. I suppose that’s fine. I probably look terrible right now anyway. I tried to put a bit of makeup on only a couple of hours ago, to try to make myself look healthier. 

That seems so stupid right now. 

Every time I look up at him I just start crying again. I realize what a mess I’ve made. 

He gets me tissues, and rubs my back. I lay down onto him. He says nice things. We repeat this cycle for an hour and a half because we know we won’t see each other after this. I move, and feel sick. I feel sick and then I move. He says he should probably go and I say ok. 

In front of his car I can’t look him in the eye. I feel like a coward, and the truth is that I am a coward. I feel terrified of my life. Of life. Not even because I just broke up with him, obviously that is part of it, but partly because I feel like nothing makes sense anymore. 

I loved my job, I quit, I loved my boyfriend, I broke up with him. I don’t fucking know what is wrong with me. 

I claim all the time that nothing fucking matters, I am a broken record. The most bratty and privileged broken record ever. I had a job that I loved. That mattered. I had a boyfriend I love dearly; that mattered. I have these exceptional friends that I love and need desperately; that matters. 

I have a mother who sat at in the emergency room parking lot for 8 hours because I’m such a fucking weird bitch that I told her to wait outside; that matters. 

I don’t know how to interact with things that matter to me. Is what I think is the issue. I treat them so blasé.

That email was right; I poke at things but touch nothing. 
 

12/21 I keep saying things to Tom, who has his back partially turned towards me; it kind of makes me wish it was just fully turned. 

He and Dillon are screaming at each other, I don’t know what about. 

Alex and Greg are making out, or something really close to that. Jason just stares at me and doesn’t say anything. 

Sean is all the way down the table, but I don’t think it’d matter much if he were further up next to me. Occasionally, Alex and I will lock into conversation but then I assume Greg will say something. I don’t really know. 

I don’t know where to look, which is an odd sensation to feel in your own apartment. I’m eating, kind of, so my hands have something to do.

I only clarify that I am kind of eating because I cooked all day, and that tends to kill my appetite entirely for some reason; I feel like the only reason I am eating is to try the food I made. It’s fine. 

I want to get another glass of wine, but I am too lazy to grab it. I’m too lazy to ask someone to pass it to me. Wow. 

Can I seriously not enjoy myself at a party I willingly threw? At my apartment? That I cooked all day for? Guess not.

It’s not even that I’m not enjoying it; I think I’m just bored,  there’s simultaneously nothing and everything happening. Everyone is screaming, kind of. Despite it not being necessary. 

Everyone keeps doing this thing where they notice that I am upset, which makes me feel worse, maybe even just upset generally, because I wasn’t even upset to begin with, but now I am because it’s being made into a big deal. Everyone is talking about entirely different topics. I feel overwhelmed and like none of this really matters. 

“Do you want to go to your room?” Tom asks.

“Not really” I really do. 

12/18 I have clearly lost sight as far as Analog of thought extends. Think this is due to my general disinterest in life, and myself. I dont know how this got worse when it was already pretty bad before. 

This sounds depressing. Maybe it is. I dont know it doesnt feel that bad though, it doesnt really feel like much. I didnt realize the extent or lack of until last night.

Tom and I were laying in my bed, or I was laying and he was sitting over me holding my face. 

“I dont want you to feel like I dont want to hear about your life” He caressed my cheek and then cupped it.

“I dont feel that way” I didnt- I dont. 

“I know I just feel like I talked about myself all night” He said despite realizing this was a nonissue. I know by saying this he only meant that I did not talk much, so:

“I didnt have much to say today.” It was true. I dont know why but it was true. 

This somehow led into a conversation about an affliction I am sure is boring to everybody by now: my complete indifference towards everything. And how I feel that is being regurgiated back to me by my friends, random babies who used to wave at me on the street, the man at the corner store who I buy sodas from, my mother, myself, God, whoever and whatever. 

Indifference is so blissful and yet so agitating when its redirected back to me, which Im aware is a bratty, self important sentiment. I dont operate that I should receive this sort of attention for simply nothing, I just have gotten it. I guess. 

Im aware thats a really pompous sentence. Its true though. Objectively I have received the most attention in my life the past year and a half. It hasnt felt deserved most of the time. Its felt ridiculous. Curiosity provoking sometimes. I started to wonder why people feel compelled to do things, and why I usually dont. I cant remember one thing I felt deeply compelled to do this year. Like really really compelled to do. I’ve been handed things, or fallen into things. But I feel like i havent worked for anything, or any sort of minimal success that might be so classified as ‘mine’ 

Hyperbole. I have worked really hard at some things, but in a way it renders itself useless because I try very hard at almost everything. I dont do this under the guise of craving success or personal fulfillment, those are superfluous rewards, I think I mainly do it because I dont know what else to do, and I feel pretty worthless if I am not doing anything. I dont care about how things end up, I have never felt any true satisfaction, or refractory period at the end of a project. I just think about what I will do next. Its pretty fucking stupid. And only adds to a sense of never being truly content. 

It results in a sort of boredom I can never escape. Its a cycle of boredom and distraction. 
I fell asleep almost instantly after the conversation with Tom. I think mainly because it is the most i have exerted myself in the last 2-2.5 weeks. Its the most i have said by far. 

I was sick, but when am I not sick. I drank a lot of syrup medicine which is just so gross. But I am so attuned to it now. It doesnt even leave that synthetic berry aftertaste anymore. My mind might have tricked myself into believing it is real, its made of real fruit they mashed together in some factory in China. 

I worried that I had obtained scurvy from my poor diet, and lack of going outside. Jason visited me once during the tail end of the illness and smoked a cigarette in front of me which was unfair. I just stared at him. But we sat outside in the sun, which I told myself was good for the hypothesized scurvy. When I started to feel better, or at least able, I began to eat vegetables again, and I bought a small bottle of orange juice from whole foods which I told myself the vitamin D from would eradicate any possible indication of scurvy. I still feel really fatigued. I dont think its from a hypothetical case of scurvy anymore, more so:

Recovering from flu, or strep, whatever I had
Onset symptoms of premenstrual syndrome
Maybe some sort of low grade anxiety disorder

I am hoping this weekend will rectify all of these fake problems I have created for myself. I dont have the luxury to be agoraphobic at this point, not anymore. Dillon has an improv drum set tonight at the gallery, I need to prep my mise en place for the Christmas party on sunday, I told Alex I could meet her new kitten, I have plans with the Her New Knife kids while they’re here from Philly, I need to write a piece for a magazine and submit it by the end of next week, I have to write out the next interview questions, and I need to pretend to care about christmas. 

I dont care about Christmas anymore, at least not outside of the dinner party. I dont have any plans that day. I could maybe go to my familys house but I dont feel necessarily compelled to go other than seeing the cats. I cant eat anything they make. I’ll text my mom that I am not going. 

I only really care about going to see a Die Hard screening at the new beverly cinema. And probably listening to a beach boys christmas album. Or an Ella Fitzgerald christmas album which I used to do with my mother on our way to the family christmas party, that always took place on Christmas eve. 

I realistically would care about Christmas if I knew that I wanted something specific, but I dont. I dont really want anything. If anything I want to get rid of a lot of what I own. I would maybe care about Christmas if my great-grandmother were still alive, and I were still young enough to be amused by playing ‘dolls’ with her porcelain nativity scene members. I always made Joseph and Mary kiss. And then the animals were my favorite. The sheep in particular. 

Maybe I’ll feel less jaded after the weekend and seeing peoples faces. Like they’ll be real again or something. I’ll gain something. 
—

Im going to try to write more before the end of the year. I just cant keep that promise because I feel like I cant trust myself at all. That thought repeated this morning while I cleaned my coffee I spilt all over my bedroom floor, “I cant trust myself at all, I cant trust myself at all, I cant trust myself at all” I wondered how people who live this way feel. How old they get. If thats the kind of thing one can fix. Or if everyone feels that. 

And also because its frankly so fucking boring to write about yourself and your own thoughts all day. 


12/7 December seventh. How ridiculous of it to be December 7th. 

The longer time goes on, I keep hoping I will have something to write about. This hasnt proven to be fruitful in any way. 

Here is my routine:

I wake up around 8am, I make myself a cup of tea. (You know I am doing bad… or at least not good when I have tea rather than coffee)
When I am feeling okay, I go for a run around the block. I have not been feeling okay so I have not been doing this.
I email 2 billion people
I wonder if I am the only person for whom email exists. This seems to be the only logical conclusion, otherwise I would surely have had some emails back by now. 
Around 11am I wonder if I have ruined my life
By 11:30 I decide if that was all it took to ruin my life; I didnt have much of a life to begin with.
I simmer down around 1, and email some more.
I plan dinner
I sometimes will wash my hair, even if its very clean; I will wash my hair
I lay on the couch and read
I make dinner
I listen to Pablo Salas. 
I try to write; I ultimately dont. 


There are many reasons I am not writing right now. None are that interesting, or are even as debilitating as I have made them to be in my head. 

Mostly, I figure most will have to be censored. 

12/5 Seeing as it is Joan Didions birthday, I reread some of her essays. 

12/4 The living room is pale. Its asleep. 

I wish I slept in here. 

—

Startling thought: I have nothing to do with anything anymore. That feels quite scary. 

There are some obvious reasons this has transpired. Some are less obvious. And I only say this from the small smart part of my brain that can assume things without seeing them. I assume there are less obvious reasons. I’d be stupid not to. 

In my early twenties I viewed my life simply as a corollary. These things are happening, because this happened in this month, during this year, at this place, with these people. It made sense this way. I am reserved because my mother was not. Or I am better at reading because my brother was better at soccer. Everything was to move in this predated sequence, and I had little to nothing to do with this. I could not interfer. Everything had something to do with something else.

I also feel I was wrong about this. 

Nothing has anything to do with anything, like at all. 

There isnt meaning in why things happen. Or how. There really isnt much meaning in anything. Maybe small things. Like a really nice piece of toast. Or a pretty leaf you see on your walk. A  pebble at the beach thats suspiciously smooth.

I had virtually everything I had wanted for myself just some months ago. Really, I hadnt considered life could even be that good. Yet I was more miserable than when I had nothing. This is an embarrassing realization. To have at 25. That things wont make you happy. Everyone knows this. 

It was just startling because I am not particularly happy when I have things, and im also not particularly happy when i dont have things. Im maybe just not happy. Maybe not now, maybe not ever. 

12/2 I have done something bad. Which I think is fine. 

Its fine because it doesnt affect anybody but myself. In some ways I think this is rather good. It makes me understand why the last five years have been… the last five years. This whole time I might have simply just wanted a secret to have, to keep. Between myself and nobody else. 

I cant remember the last time I had a true secret; maybe high school. I dont really care to hide things from people. 

 Maybe when I lost my virginity. I didnt tell my friends for an entire three months. 


I have nothing interesting or revelatory to say about the concept of virginity; I will leave that to the substack-ers. But in hindsight, I think that losing my virginity may have been the moment in which I adopted the sentiment that life happens to people instead of for people. 

Despite however grim and embarrassing it inherently is to lose your virginity, I much enjoyed having it taken. Not the physical act of course. It was painful. I blacked out so it wasnt really that awkward, the way people always describe it. It just stung. But it left me with something, a secret. I had nothing at that point, so even a shameful secret I didnt ask to keep seemed better than nothing. 

In many ways I guess that was the only thing that kept me going for that autumn. I didnt really want to die without seeing my friends reactions to the loss of my virginity. I had to tell them at some point. Their reactions didnt disappoint. My high school friends were very prudish and therefore mortified. I knew my devoutly religious best friend thought less of me. She thought I’d go to hell. My other friend viewed it as some sort of competition. I remember when I told her I desperately wanted to respond to her tepid reaction by explaining that it wasnt even a game i wanted to play, much less win. That sometimes things just happen to people. I shrugged and wondered what if this would have happened had my family actually enrolled me in Saint Maria Goretti, the nearby catholic school. It didnt matter at that point. I won the stupid game by a fluke. 

When I was younger, I always understood a secret as a sentiment that would inevitably be aired. Whether through desperation or elation didn't matter to me; how it got revealed never held weight, just that it would be revealed. I figured nobody died with any secrets left. I feel wrong about that now. 

Not in a promiscuous or self-righteous way, but I understand how important it is to keep a secret, between just your ears, your palms. Thats the only place it can live. Its forever intangible. 

My secret, its tangible. But it isnt this way. Its not real. Its something that has never been said outloud, and never will be. There's some satisfaction in that. 


12/1 Dillon is home from Sacramento today. Hes sick, I got him peanut butter cups but hes sick so he probably wont want them. 

11/30 I immediately nuke myself upon waking up; Tylenol, Zofran, and vyvanse. Tylenol for raging headache. I wish this headache were from going to a party, maybe the Jasmin Johnson party Sean was vying to get me to attend. But it isn't. 

“Im sorry I fell asleep at 9 only to wake up and throw up again” I texted sean around 11:30pm. I meant to text him earlier that I wouldn't be going, but I forgot. 

“Girl, are you okay?” He texted back. I remember thinking his use of the word ‘girl’ was funny, it still holds up this morning. 

Zofran for the obvious remaining nausea, Vyvanse to focus. 

I didnt fall back asleep until 5 because I was throwing up. A lot I guess. I realized when I was brushing my teeth that I must have pushed my bangs back at some point; which I never do. I looked at myself, with all of my hair out of my face: I have really grown into my adult face. Its a bit swollen from the like five hours of vomiting last night, but my face makes sense now, which I could have ever foreseen as a teeanger. 

I think I look quite pretty. Or at least like I make sense now. 

I thought Alex’s face too; how she has really grown into her adult face. How this is probably indicative that we are now adults. It feels this way. We dont fight anymore either. We kind of just grew up. 

“Bug, are you okay?” She asked from my couch last night. 

“Yes.” I sat back down next to her, drawing the blanket over both of our legs.

Zoe was telling us about her first friend she had ever made in Los Angeles. She also told us we should all take sexy photographs of ourselves. That we wont be twenty-five forever. It was true, it is true, I guess.

“I feel like there are enough photos of me in a bodysuit and thigh highs to last like my entire lifetime. I should probably start taking photos of myself clothed to be honest.” I laughed, snuggling my head on Alex’s shoulder.

“Yeah thats true,” She said, understanding I was referring to my odd last job. It was really a peculiar situation. “Well, you can be clothed, but like I don't know, I have no photos of myself. I dont want to be old and like not be able to have any references for how beautiful I was”

We all just sat there.

“Yeah. I mean true.” I said, and abruptly got up, grabbing my space heater from my bedroom, plugging it in, only to then begin cleaning the kitchen, then refill the Brita water thing, then open a kombucha, then look at myself in the mirror, then sit on the floor, then sit on the couch next to Alex again. 

“Are you sure you're okay?” Alex asked again. I then realized I had completed a myriad of random, yet ultimately worthless chores. I didn't know why but It felt like I couldnt sit down. 

“Yeah, I think.”

She knows a lot about me before I know myself realize it. I asked her a really invasive question, invasive in regards to my life, because I figure she knows me better than I know myself. I asked her the question right as a sweet Chinese family took a photo of us in front of the Christmas tree at the grove. These fake nurses from Salvation Army, dressed in all red, what Zoe would refer to as ‘russ-IAN’, were ringing these fucking bells, and I felt like I was going to faint, throw up, or just flat out die. I mean, what about that really provokes holiday cheer? I have never understood this. Your bell is fucking annoying. Your bell is the worst, like ever. 

I thought of the fake russian nurses ringing their bells all night as I threw up; the noise wouldn't stop. I started to cry. Not because of the fake russian nurses, but because at a certain point I was throwing up nothing, it was just straight stomach acid. It hurt so badly. My entire body would move forward, so viciously, as if with a point to prove.  the fucking fake nurses would ring their bells, and I became so delirious that I just started to cry. 

I don't even know what the Salvation Army fucking does. 

The Salvation Army is a Protestant Christian church and an international charitable organisation founded and headquartered in London, England. It is aligned with the Wesleyan-Holiness movement. The organisation reports a worldwide membership of over 1.7 million,[4] consisting of soldiers, officers, and adherents who are collectively known as salvationists. Its founders sought to bring salvation to the poor, destitute, and hungry by meeting both their "physical and spiritual needs". It is present in 133 countries,[5] running charity shops, operating shelters for the homeless, and disaster relief and humanitarian aid to developing countries.
The theology of the Salvation Army derives from Methodism, although it differs in institution and practice; an example is that the Salvation Army does not observe sacraments. As with other denominations in the Holiness Methodist tradition, the Salvation Army lays emphasis on the New Birth (first work of grace) and entire sanctification (second work of grace).[6][7] A distinctive characteristic of the Salvation Army is its use of titles derived from military ranks, such as "lieutenant" or "major". The Army's doctrine is aligned with the Wesleyan–Arminian tradition, particularly the holiness movement. The Army's purposes are "the advancement of the Christian religion... of education, the relief of poverty, and other charitable objects beneficial to society or the community of mankind as a whole".[8]
The Salvation Army was founded in 1865 as the "East London Christian Mission" in London by one-time Methodist preacher William Booth and his wife Catherine. It can trace its origins to the Blind Beggar Tavern. In 1878, Booth reorganised the mission, becoming its first general and introducing the military structure, which it has retained as a matter of tradition.[9] The Salvation Army's highest priority is its Christian principles. As of 2023 the international leader and chief executive officer (CEO) of The Salvation Army is General Lyndon Buckingham.[10]


Ok. Like they're British. Doesn't change anything. Point remains; These fake British nurses need to fucking leave the apartment. Like its not their apartment. I don't know what I even did between 12 am-5 am. I think I watched a documentary with a heating pad nestled between my ribs, which were needlessly sore.

 
I have been brushing my teeth for ten minutes. Ok.

I spit the foam that I’ve created, like a small machine, into Dillon and I’s porcelain sink. Theres blood; which isnt inherently shocking. He stood in the door way the other day as I brushed my teeth, when I went to spit there was also blood, not this much, but some. 

“Oh. Im bleeding.” I said before he could notice and therefore embarrass me. Which in hindsight is something he would never do. 

“Oh shit. Are you okay?”

“Need to floss” I muffled because I was using mouthwash. He has revoked showing any sense of worry towards me because I react poorly to it. 

The vyvanse has kicked in and I can work on what I need to now. I’ll finish it all today. I’ll drink more water to nurse the headache. I’ll call Jason in twenty minutes, we will probably add Alex to the call, I will thank her needlessly for her kind text this morning, I will assure her I am fine. I will go to Whole Foods at 1pm, I will buy 3 bananas, a pack of thin brown ricecakes, unsalted broth,  a small pack of peanut butter candies to welcome Dillon home from Sacremento, maybe a thing of flowers. I will text back the people from New York. I will text back the people I need to. I will become normal again within 4 hours. 

11/27 Its somehow Thanksgiving. Somehow.I didnt realize it was so soon. I dont know if I would have done anything differently had I realized sooner. Not really, the more I think of it. 

“Hey, where’d you go?” Dillon calls from the living room. He must’ve heard me sneak through the back door, setting my groceries down. 

“Grocery store” I point to my French tote bag, that I am not entirely sure what it reads, I think its some cute saying against imperialism. My vague anti-imperialism French tote bag. What the hell, sure. 

I think it reads: What are you doing to fight hunger? End Imperialism! 

I cannot ignore the irony of the bag. That I got this bag from a cute market- an organic, cute market, my favorite. How they sell overpriced north african chili paste, they sell it for 30 dollars, because its in a… glass jar… I guess? And then I put that into my 30 French dollar tote bag. They also do not accept EBT at this market. They also have really uncomfortable outdoor seating. On Larchmont. They are also selling a French tote bag and foods native to like Africa. Africa as in like the Africa that France colonized. It's just a bit funny. 

I dont know how I didnt think of this ironic serendipitous mess when I bought the bag. I was maybe happier then and thought a lot less. Now I am a little less happy, and I guess thinking of… French Imperialism. 

I should be thinking of like family. And like friends.

“What’d you get?” Now we are both in the kitchen. He’s dressed nice. He's asking if I want my hoodie back, which he has clasped between his two hands. He’s been borrowing it for some days. I really dont care at all. I mean I will want it back at some point.

“Thanksgiving stuff, like vegetables, and no I don't need it now” I know he is asking me in a veiled way if I would mind that he took it up to Sacramento for the weekend. Answers no. Obviously. 

“Are you sure you don't want to come? What vegetables?”

“Carrots and sweet potatoes. Im sure”

Answer is “I’m sure” 
obviously.

—-

I am bored so I walk to Erewhon. Beverly is basically empty. Its kind of off-putting, all of the cafes have their curtains drawn, but you can see all of the chairs on top of the tables. The Jewish schoolgirls are missing. They usually walk in big groups, and one girl always looks painfully left out. Its sad. I guess I'm happy they’re missing today because it means I don't have to see this.

But by the time I reach Erewhon, I am just thinking of some hypothetical Jewish girl bored at a family party. Her face is unremarkable, because she isn't real. Shes some imagined thing. Yet she's still sad. So sad. 

“Welcome” A security guard nods towards me. I smile. Its weird. Like why are these people here? This sweet old lady, hunched over her cart with hardly anything in it, alone. Shouldnt she be with like her grandkids or something? 

Then there is this very bizarre family. The father is wearing joggers. I didn't take what the mother was wearing into account. They had one child with them, maybe twelve years old. What a weird life, being at Erewhon on Thanksgiving. 

Oh. I am at Erewhon on Thanksgiving. Ok but its kind of funny. Right?

I just wanted mac and cheese. I didnt want to make it myself, not really. Im already making things. Right?

—

My meal is fine. I eat probably 6-8 bites. I chew roughly 240 times. I will say 250. This is under the guidance that you chew roughly 30 chews per bite. According to the internet. That seems really fucking stupid. 

I threw more than half of my plate away. I don't have an appetite at all lately. When Dillon and i went to dinner last night I ate my food, I dont even think because I was necessarily hungry, but so that my hands had something to do. 

“He said she was weird to you” Dillon said about my ex-boyfriend, who said something about me. I guess this was at some party I did not attend. I guess it had to have been a couple of months ago. 

I wondered why he would defend me all of these years later. What was the point in that? Like at all? 

He and I aren't even friends. Not really. We almost were. I don't really know what happened. There isn't really a point in wondering. Like at all. We will just say hi at parties, and it will be slightly awkward except for the times that it isn't, until we die, I guess. He will lose his hair; I’ll get fat. 

I start doing the dishes as if I am competing with some woman next to me, a woman who has longer hair than mine, much thinner than I am, and a lot nicer. Her hair is so long. She is so thin. And she is just so so nice. 

“Happy Thanksgiving.” I text my mother. I add the period. 

“Happy Thanksgiving,” She texts me back, dropping the period. “Love U”

I have always really hated when people will text ‘u’ instead of just typing out ‘y-o-u’

“You too.” I keep the period in. 


11/19  “█ █████ ”I shrugged. I didn’t even really know I was going to do that; I just grabbed my bag and threw my coffee away. I guess I am doing this now, right now 



██ ████ █████ ██ █ █████ ██████ ███ ████ ██████ ███ ████████ ████ ████████ ████ ████ ██ ███ ██ █████ █████████ ███ ███ ████ ███ █████ ███ ███████ ███████ ███████ █████ █ ██████ ████ █████ ███ █████ ██ ████ ████████ ██ ██ ████ █████ ████ ████ ████ █████ ██████ ████ █████ ██ ███ ████ ████ █ ██████ ████████ ████ ██████ ███████ ████ █████████ ███ ████ ██████ ████ ██████ ███████ ██ ██ ████ █████████████

“Thanks” I say and walk out. 

I call my grandfather, I don’t know why, because he isn’t necessarily comforting. I guess I should let him know. I don’t know why I feel this way, given it has nothing to do with him. But maybe because I feel like a child still. 

“I just never want to disappoint you,” I said between gasps, god this is so dramatic. 

“Ok.” He says.

“Are you disappointed?” I plead.

“Where are you?”

“I’m on the 110. North” my knuckles are turning white, they almost look like marbles as I loosen and tighten my grip on my steering wheel over and over. This feels like all I have done for the past week.

“Okay.” He offers nothing. 

I have no idea why I called him. It isn’t like he can help me; in really any way. There’s nothing to help. He can’t even sit down to have lunch with me. Much less just be, I guess, a parent. 

In many ways I feel like his parent now. And I am a bad one. Well, I am only twenty five. I guess. 

“What are you doing for Thanksgiving?” I ask, suddenly calm. Eerily calm.

“Nothing” he says. 

“Okay. I’ll talk to you later, bye.” I hang up. 

—-

██████ █████████ ██ ████████ █████ ██ ███ ████ ██ ██████ █ ██████ ███ █████████ █ █████ ██████ ████ ██ █████ ████████ █ ████

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███ ██ █████ ██ ████ ████ ███ ██████ █████████ 

███ █ ███ ████ ████ █ █████ █████ █ ███████ █ ████ ███ ████ ██ ████ ███ ████ █ ███  █████████ ███████ ███ ██ ███ █████ ██ ████ ██████

We both laugh at how ridiculous it is. But part of me still feels uneasy. And like this all isn’t very funny. Usually, I’d laugh along. But I don’t know.

“Well how do you feel?” She probes

“Fine. I guess” this isn't necessarily lying. Because I do feel fine, on all accounts, but I don’t know. It doesn’t feel accurate, maybe. 

█ █████ █ ██ ████ █████ ███ ████ █████████ ██ ███ █████████ It feels like I should care about what is happening more, but I don’t know how to do that without it being so overwhelming that it ruins my life and leaves me debilitated in an array of useless ways. I only really know how to mute things. 

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11/18 cried in the office bathroom while listening to a Microphones song; like a loser. I thought of how I didn’t even cry when my great-grandmother died. Felt more loser-ish. 

I ran my hands under the sink water, probably filled with lead, and ran my palms over my eyes and neck. To make it look like I wasn’t crying, but whenever you try to cover up the fact that you were crying, it always somehow makes it look worse. My face is swollen. Has been for some weeks, I don’t know why. It’s worse after the crying. 

Tom texts me and asks to call me, I say I don’t want to or that I can’t. It’s interesting how many different ways there are to say no. 

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---

Zoë and Alex texted me about the Hellp album listening party we are going to tonight, which I was initially really excited for when Noah invited me. Now I feel like it doesn’t matter. Or just like something I’m going to be acting weird at.

—-

It’s kind of near the chateau but not quite. Everyone is laughing from their bellies despite not really having one. 

Everyone is crowding Noah. And Chandler, I assume. I can only really see Noah. 

I can kind of see everything, downtown is kind of puzzled between trees but I can still see it. Tom texts me “How is the party?”

“Great” I say. I lie. 

I think it’s great. I can’t tell. I don’t really know. The album was really great. After I put this cigarette out I think I will talk to Noah; I think the album really taps into the transgressive nature of California that I am always trying to write about; unsuccessfully of course. He nailed it. I want to know how. 

Its  great. I think. I feel invisible. Not to anybody new, but to my friends. Which is making it kind of worse. I tell ████ ████ ███ ███ █ █████ ███ ██████ ███ ██████ ████████ ███ ██ █████ █████ ██. I brought it up because I wanted to talk about I think. I am kind of drunk so I don’t really know if I wanted to talk about it. I just know I brought it up. I know ██ ██████ ████████████ ███ ████ ████ ███ ████████ I know I am now sitting outside alone looking at the skyline writing on my iPhone. I know I’m glad to be back home.


The guy who let me borrow his lighter just stares at me. As if I should be saying something.

“I know you.” He says. I notice now that he isnt smoking.
I shrug. Probably met him at a party or something. “Maybe. Yeah” 

“Were you at that 4th of july party?” He sits closer. Nobody is sitting. Everyone is standing. Some people are wiping their nostrils which makes me get second-hand embarrassment for some reason. This really isnt that kind of party, I dont think. Unless it is, and I am the only one oblivious. 

“The Marina del Rey one? At that, like fucked up mansion?” I laugh. 

“No.” He tells me he was at some party in the valley. I almost went to that one. But I didn't. 

He asks me what I do. I say that I am a writer. And then he asks me what I do for work. Haha. I tell him. 

“Cool. So like, what do you write about?” He is genuine. But he is also fiddling with his straw. Hes either bored or nervous. Both of those options really suck, at least for him I guess.

“I mean I’ll probably write about this.” 

“Really?” he sits up.

“Yeah” 

“What will you say?”

“Im not sure yet.” Im not.

“Can you say I wore a sick outfit? Or that Im really cool?”

“Yeah, I can say that.” I laugh. 

“Awesome.”

Its awkward and quiet after this, mostly because there isnt much to say about being a writer. Theres more to write about. I guess. Theres really only stuff to say about other peoples writing. And, while he is wearing a ‘sick’ outfit, and is really ‘cool’ I dont pin him as a writer. He seems like a total LA creative director type. He is still trying. Which is sweet enough. I cant figure out why he is still talking to me really, and I feel quite awkward. 


“Did you like the album?” I say looking up. There are these pine trees that optimally frame the hotel balcony. 

“Yeah, it was great.” He smiles, twirling his straw. Its  open bar. But I finished my glass of champagne within the first 20 minutes of having it. Which probably isnt very classy. 

 I can feel him looking at me, so I dont move my face.

“Me too.”

“Yeah Noah’s video was great. Where do you stay?”

“Fairfax, I guess”

“You guess?” He laughs. 

“Hey. I just moved in. Dont be mean.” I laugh, turning my face. 

I motion in a sort of, ‘and you’ kind of way. 

“Sorry, sorry. I stay in East Hollywood” He throws his hands up in a defensive way, playfully. 

“Like Silver Lake?”

“Yeah.”

“You can just say Silver Lake. I won't kill you” I put my cigarette out against the sole of my boot.

“Okay. I live in Silverlake. Im very sorry.”

“Thats fine.” I sigh but kind of laugh. He thinks I’ll prosecute him or something. 

“Oh its fine?”

“Yes. That's fine,” I get up. “Thanks for the lighter.”

“Yeah… Hey,” He says, but I don't really hear what he says next. When I look inside, Zo seems upset. Jason is sitting across from her, her head in her hands. Alex dotes on her shoulder. What the fuck is happening?

I make my way across the balcony and back into the hotel, I wish I could remember the name of the hotel, but I cant. Really, the same things happen at all of these hotels on the Sunset Strip. It doesn't really matter, at least not in a distinguishable way. Some feel more special than others. Some feel more precarious. This one feels neutral in the right way. No one is fucked up out of their mind. No one is being carried out. 

I think of getting another glass of champagne on my way to the table, but I decide against it. Everyone kept feeding me alcohol during the album. I don't know why. Jason would hold a vodka soda up to my mouth, I’d grab the straw for stability. Alex would lazily thumb her champagne glass into my hand; the receiving one. Really, all the same things happen at all these hotels. 

When I reach the table, everyone is solemn. It's quite an odd scene. All of the lights are on now for some reason, which seemingly is something nobody accounted for. 


—---

I have no idea what I am going to say in my meeting tomorrow. I have no idea how I even called a meeting. █ ██████ ████ ████ █ ███ ███████ ██ █████ █████ ████ ████ ███ ████ █████████ ███████ ██ ██ █████ 

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“Ash doesn’t want to leave yet,” Jason says. I am at the table with everyone. Supposedly. 

“I don’t care,” I spout. 

Jason takes a photo of us. What is one more photo where I’m miserable? Like really? 

Everyone looks at each other. They all leave but I don’t want to be in the car with them so I don’t go. So I am just here. 

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Dillon is picking me up now. I am on the Sunset Strip and eavesdropping on a guy and his friend. They both look pretty similar.The guy, well one is apparently a ghost writer for the rapper, Ian. At least from what I gathered. He is upset at Ian. Trying to figure out if he is valid in his anger but I am honestly cold and can’t focus. 

I had a good time. I don’t know. I think I had a good time. 

I am at a hotel across the street from the comedy store. I can hear people laughing, even from here. Nothing is funny. Nothing has really felt funny for a month or two. 

Haha. 

The palm trees are red from the brake lights. “The sunset strip; Dior” a sign reads. I’m bored, so I’m reading things while I wait for Dillon to pick me up. There is a new H&M opening on Beverly on November 20th; how thrilling.

Haha. I feel like I’ve never met anyone in my life 



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“Okay,” I said on the phone, scanning my bread at the Whole Foods self-checkout. 


11/16 ███ ███ ████ █████ █████ ██ █████ ██ ██ ████ ██ ████ ███ ████ ████ ██ ████ ██ █ ████ ███████ ███ ████████ █ ███ ██ ███ ████ ███ ████ ███ ████ ███ ██████ ███████ ███ ██████ ███ ███████ 

I am always seen as evasive when most of the time I just don’t have anything to say. I don’t think what I have to say matters most of the time. Potential sentences sprout up, but I wonder what they serve. Most of the time, nothing; a sentence can’t change much. At least it doesn’t feel this way. 

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But now it isn’t fine. In fact, it’s really bad. Or something close to really bad. Maybe even terrible. It’s probably terrible. ███ ███████ ██ ███ ████ ███ █ ██ ███ █████ █████ ███ ████████ █████ ███ ██ ███████ ███ █████ ██████ ███████ ██ ███ ████████ ██ ███ ██ ███████ ██ ███ I think I’m in Fresno, I really don’t know. 

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11/14 the rain stopped, I don’t know how long ago. █ ███ ████████ ████ ███ ████ ████ ████████ █ ████ ███ █ █████ █████ ████ █ ███ ██████ ███████ ██ ████ ██ ████ ████ ██████████ █████ ████ ██ ██████ ██ ██████

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It doesn’t really matter. 

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then I made the fatal flaw of opening my iPhone, and playing the Natural Bridge album. 

I haven’t listened to anything Silver Jews or Dave Berman related in weeks; really since the perfectly imperfect essay came out. It felt happy. Everyone congratulated me; saying they liked it and whatnot. It’s quite a sad essay in all actuality. That’s what kickstarted me accepting i will be depressed on and off for the rest of my life, and that statistically I have more of a chance of committing suicide than other people. According to my doctor, and I guess… aspects of relatability. I don’t know.

I came to the conclusion that as much as I love David Berman, right now, his music is not good for me. I have been happy the last week; truly. Got a lot of laughs at the office. Had a lovely dinner with Alex and Zoë. Not now - not this. 

Not right before a six-hour drive in the pouring rain. 

---

The drive is relatively fine. Like by all accounts its okay. It was raining really hard in Fresno. And down the grapevine. I pulled off and got some really terrible food, not even because I was hungry, but because I couldnt focus, which meant I was hungry. Every time a semi would merge in front of me, a small curtain of water would bead against my windshield, rendering me blind. It didn't even look like water past a certain point; it looked like powder. Or snow. It looked dry. 

I am an hour out and I stop to pee. I dont know where I am. Just that its dark, Im at a random gas station in central California, and the woman in front of me in line is obviously a drug addict. And homeless. 

She has to be on meth, the way she keeps swaying, rubbing her thumb against her pointer finger knuckle. She looks out the window as if they are out there. I am quite bored so I’ve taken to observing her, I have fuck all to do besides this. The line is taking forever. Like really, a long time. 

Too long. 

Long enough for her to drop her kit while she attempted to fuck with her jacket. Because theres nothing else to do. A clean cotton ball drops to her feet. It looks like a rabbit's tail. A small black box drops, and nothing falls except for the cotton ball. You cant see the needles, but you can hear them when the box hits the floor. Its such a delicate sound. A small, unechoed rattle. 

She seems painfully embarrassed. She doesnt make eye contact with anyone. Not that she has to, but she doesnt. I want to tell her it doesn't matter, that I dont think less of her. That it isnt my first time seeing a kit. 

This isnt even a lie. I saw ████‘s at a party a year ago. He was a lot more forthright with it. It was a group of us, and everyone pressaumnly was in the bathroom to do some sort of powdered drug. Maybe 3 or 4 of us crowded in the bathroom, which was lit red for some reason. The women's bathroom; at Pour Vous. I remember noting how counterintuitive this seemed. To have a red-lit women's bathroom. 

He took out a small black box, and in it held needles, cotton balls, weird rubber strings, which I assumed to be ties for his arm; making it easier to find his vein. A small bag with a sticky substance. Everyone was appalled. I probably looked stupid, my mouth agape.

“Where did you even get that shit, man?” Someone asked, their voice constrained. As if they were watching someone vomit. 

He didn't say anything, just tied the rubber strap around his upper arm before we all dispersed. No one ever talked about it, not really. Only D***** and I once at another party. 

Someone walks out of the bathroom

I motion for her to go 

“You were first right?” I say, realizing she isn't going to go before me. Shes nervous cause she knows that I know she's going to do drugs. I could give a shit. 

“It doesn’t matter” She mutters.

“Are you sure?”

She seems shy to do her heroin. 

Shes probably coming down and she probably feels terrible. I can wait. I guess. 


11/13 “What are the only two things certain in life?” The health insurance lady asks.

My department and I are at a seminar to acquire health insurance. We are sat auditorium style, assembly style.

“Death.” I say. 

“Close, Ashley! There is one more, any other guesses?” I dont know how she knows my name but she does. Maybe it is her job. 

“Taxes.” A girl spouts from a seat to my left. Oh. Yeah. I guess that is true. 

I mean not really though, because you can just not pay them. Like yeah, you’ll go to jail. But the sentiment of them being ever-present is true I suppose. What depressing things, death and taxes, these are all that we are promised. The death part doesnt bother me as much as the taxes. 

—

I am at a makeshift desk with a Filipino lady who is wearing cheap lipstick, she has really cute freckles and a myriad of packets for me to fill out. 

Health insurance, vision, dental, and life insurance. I opt in for health insurance, skip vision and dental. I don't care. 

She tells me I should care, I dont, but that isnt an acceptable answer so I say that I will think about it. She tells me I will have one week to change my mind. Cool, I won't. 

“Now in regards to life insurance, which option would you like?”

“Oh. Do I have to have it?” 

“I mean, no. But it's good. In case you have cancer, do you have cancer, any heart problems?”

I dont have cancer but it feels like everyone treats me like a Make-A-Wish kid instead of, I dont know, an actual adult. I do have heart problems. Kind of. My doctor, or old one I guess, said I show symptoms of having a murmur. Or something. I cant remember. I just remember feeling like I wasnt working properly in some way.

“No I dont have cancer.” I laugh. “I don't think I really need life insurance.” Im like two years old. 

“Its always a good idea, Ashley,” She says. How the fuck do these people know my name. 

I mean I guess its on a paper right in front of them. Hi, yeah. 

“I mean Im twenty five.” I laugh. “Also arent life insurance policies what husbands take out on their wives before they kill them?” 

“Dont say that.” She is mad at me now. I guess that was kind of rude of me. It isnt necessarily unture though.  They do like do that. People kill each other. 

I didnt get life insurance, and I did not make a friend today. 


11/12 I feel fine after eating. But I am stuttering more than usual. A trait that is only noticeable when I am nervous. I am not nervous though. 

—

“Do you mind if I smoke?” I shyly ask, Kevin, the mechanic who is doing my oil change. Im really not in the mood to get lectured about how smoking is terrible, the way old people usually always do, because people my age have the data, etc to know smoking is terrible for you and will kill you.

Whenever somebody ends on that note I always feel compelled to say: “Promise?”

Instead he reaches for his pocket and pulls out a pack of Marlboro lights. I smile warmly. 

We sit at at table. He explains cars to me. I nod along aimlessly. I like hearing about things that I know nothing about. Even if they are worthless. 

He tells me everything wrong with my car. I wish somebody could do this for my personality. Instead of sulking I ask “Will I be okay to get to San Francisco this weekend?”

He scoffs as if this is a stupid question. “Of course baby”

I leave out the fact that I am driving up there to see my boyfriend because I am sure this will break his heart. He reminds of my grandfather, also. 

I dont feel alone at this mechanic. Weirdly. Its always a succinct feeling, being a woman alone at the mechanic.     You typically know exactly how it will go. 


11/11 I drive to Culver after work. I am on the 10 west, Tom is on my iPhone. And Trinity I think? But this much is unclear. 

I feel fucking weird. Like I can feel my fingertips. Like I am in the snow, despite only ever have been in the snow once, as a baby, okay maybe a toddler, its the only reference that feels accurate. 

Tom is talking to me, about a public access TV show Trinity is writing. This all sounds really cool; I am not entirely sure this is real, though. I feel like I am dreaming. I feel like I will wake up tomorrow and email Tom:

“Had the weirdest dream. Trinity was writing a public access TV show with an old lady. Anyhow, have a great day baby. 

Love, 
Button Two”

I try to tell him a story. About work. I think. But I stutter, terribly

“Fuck” I mutter, and begin trying to retell my story. I get off of the freeway. I am on a hill, driving up. What the fuck is this hill? I used to live in this neighborhood. I’ve never seen this fucking hill. Focus.

“Sorry ok so basically,” I restart my story. 

No, but seriously, where did this hill come from? Like genuinely? Did they just place it here? What the fuck.

Snow. Fingertips. Baby laughs with ice lining nails bed. A thermal soaked against my four-year-old chest from falling skiing. My mother trying desperately to warm me. The anguish in her eyes as I laughed at her efforts. Snow. Nailbeds. Crying. Breathing. 

“Ok fuck I have to go,” I say to Tom. Not even sure if I am really speaking. 

“Oh oka-”

“Love you bye” I interrupt him. 

Seriously, where the fuck did this hill come from? 

“Ash?” Alex beckons from my iPhone. 

“Alex?” I look down, and I guess I’ve called her. I dont remember doing that. 

“Are you here?” She asks, obviously confused on why I called her. 

“Um.. No.” Im trying to figure out how to get off of this hill. “I have no idea why I called you”

Shes silent.

“I feel really weird. Can you drive us to the market instead?” 

She says yes. 

—-

I pass the Beverly Center two thousand times.

11/10 I put on the ugliest, most psycho outfit because I am running out of clean clothes. I had on oil change appointment in Culver which was set to take place in ten minutes. I locked myself out of the apartment on accident, and by proxy my car. Which, has you know like, the oil that needs to be changed.

I didnt know what to do so I did what I did last time I got locked out; I walked to Erewhon. I bought myself a black cold brew, nitro, which will be terrible. I bought myself a glass bottle of sparkling Evian water because I liked the way it looked. I plan to use it as a vase. █ ████ ████████ ██████ ████ ██ ██ █████ ██████ ███████ █ ██████ ██████ ███████ ███ █ ██████ ██████ ████ ██████ ██ ████ ██ ██ ████ ███ ███████ █████ █ ████ ████ ███ ████ ███ █████ █ ██████

█ ████ █ █████ ██ ███ ███ ██ ███████ ██ ███ ███████ ██████ ████ ████ ██ ███ ██ ███ ███████ ███ █ █████ █████ █████ █████ █ ████ ████████ ████ ████ █ ████ █████ ██ ██ ██████ █ ████ ███ █████ ██ ██████████ 

█ ████████ ████ ██ █████ ███████ ██████ ██ ████ ██ ██ █████ ███████ ██ ███████ █████ █████ ███ ████ ██ ██ ████ ███ ███ ██ █████ ██ █████ ████ ████ ███ This all seemed fair. 

None of this really matters. Like at all. Maybe in a stupid way, sure. 

---

“Tom really loves you” Jason says as he turns left onto Fairfax. He also complains about turning left on Fairfax

“Yeah… I know” 

“Like really loves you”

Am I dying? Is Tom dying? What’s going on? 


11/9 it is hard to care about anything, but especially things that require a significant amount of effort. Or justification.
‘
I started reading Imperial Bedrooms today after hearing Vivi rave about it. After this I am not reading any of Bret’s other books. I imagine it cant be helping me any way, shape or form. I suppose a book doesnt have to help you. All it really has to do is be enjoyable. Maybe not even that. 

It should just teach you what you like, or what you dont like. Maybe this is only applicable if youre a writer. Maybe they do have to be enjoyable. I dont know.

I want to read a philosophy book  again after this. I sat down the other day and realized I havent read a philosophy book in a little less than a year. Which is ironic. Because I had an issue with divulging into fiction a year ago. You couldnt pay me to do it. I just didnt enjoy it for whatever reason anymore.

Same issue. I guess. 

—

I am looking forward to driving down the 5, even with as flat as it is now. I actually cant wait until Friday. If I didnt have work, I would go now. I’d lay in Tom's bed. He would order me soup. 

But I do have to wait. I sat in traffic for an hour today, which is now the new normal for me given my new schedule and apartment. I just cant wait to leave here. 

I feel like I dont understand why I am here anymore. I dont understand my allegiance to this place, or these people. I cant understand why I care about these things; at all. Everyone is fighting all of the time. Its a hassle to get literally anywhere in the city. I cant recall a single thing that I like about this city, or these people. 

11/8 I got coffee with Vivi, Lindsey, and Taylor at Fig earlier this morning. This kind of thing would have made me shy as a teenager. It helps that they are all so charming, smart, and personable. But you also realize when youre an adult that you cant really afford to be shy anymore. You’ll get left behind. Or life will just happen in front of you instead of to you. 

We talk about a myriad of things. Mutual friends we have either in Los Angeles, New York, or San Francisco, Bret Easton Ellis, Tao Lin, ETC. I particularly enjoyed bonding over B.E.E with Vivi as I am on real kick of his lately. 

I finished my reread of Less than Zero before coffee. I feel like its a testament to how great of a novel it truly is; that I live here in Los Angeles. I have been in these hyper-specfiic he writes about: hearing your friend is slutting themselves out for drugs, albiet its usually coke or ketamine rather than heroin- wait but no I do know ████ ███ Who fucks for heroin, rooms at the chateau, and flights to Paris. I havent seen ████ ███in a long time. And I am now wondering if she is ok.

I should call ██████ and ask. 

Regardless, these hyper-specific situations that are only relative to Los Angeles, after every re-read, I am still left shocked. Maybe it has the opposite effect he didnt intend for. I am shocked to see most of my life, my friends' lives, displayed so accurately on a page. Its supposed to be punchy, unbelievable, larger than life, fiction. But its real. I feel like only people who live here understand that Bret Easton Ellis, while he uses hyperbole amongst his other novels, the most glaring example being American Psycho, he skipped hyperbolizing or satirizing Less Than Zero entirely. It doesn't call for it, really. Los Angeles satirizes itself.  

Vivi said she “loves that shit” that reading about what she referred to as ‘disaffected Los Angeles youth’ is her bread and butter. I wondered if I was a disaffected youth in Los Angeles, but then remembered that I was twenty-five. 

—

I am driving home from a shoot in the Valley at 10 pm, taking the 270 to the 101. Weird. I am never on the 270, I dont even know where it goes. 

I call Tom, who I am worried about. I try to be comforting but I dont know if i am doing it right. My main advice is usually that nothing matters. But you cant exactly say that to somebody who is in law school. Because it kind of does matter. 

The city is glittering but not empty which makes it difficult to enjoy.


11/7 I figured the fight last night maybe would have caused some sort of emotion. Relief, more anger, vindication. It brought nothing; yet again.

It didn’t even feel good to yell, really. All I kept saying was “what the fuck is wrong with you” because I wanted to know what the fuck was wrong with him. Neither one of us had an answer. It felt bad; and wrong. Like scolding a child or a small dog. 

He just kept apologizing. And I kept saying “what the fuck is wrong with you” and then he apologized again. I said I didn’t care. That it didn’t matter. I was telling the truth. 

“I know I’m debased. I act like I don’t notice these things that you guys say to me, or about me. As if I am not even there, like I am sort of third thing other than a person” I didn’t even know where I was going when the words were leaving my mouth, “but I notice them. I tally them in my head, which is fucked up of me. I usually don’t care to fight back. But stop fucking doing it. I don’t want to be around you peopl.e” 

I meant it. It’s inconceivable that we can’t even go out with our friends, have a drink, maybe two, and laugh. Instead, everyone is saying these passive-aggressive nothings, or trying to steal opportunities from another. 

There's an alarming amount of unharboured jealousy or annoyance. Everyone feels it but no one will address it in a real way; other than these useless comments made in green rooms or places that sound made up like “pour vous” nightclub. I thought it was just the inherent transgressive nature of Los Angeles, that yes, obviously, it will seep into our friend group. Naturally. We are all up for the same jobs, and such. 

It’s natural, I thought. Despite feeling immune to it; the overwhelming insecurity I felt radiating, practically brimming from underneath the tables at these fake dinner parties, it was natural.

I’m not sure if I feel this way anymore. I feel like some people are just miserable. I am. But not in this way. I guess. Or id at least like to not be
. 
I don’t understand commiseration. I guess. I’d rather do that alone.

I feel like I am being strangled, in this way where you smell something sweet, and at first it’s nice, exciting even. And then it becomes overwhelming. And causes a choking sensation between your throat and nose. 

As much as I feel Los Angeles is genuinely home. I wonder what my life would be like if I did move to New York at the beginning of the summer. I wonder if I even do like it here, as much as I proclaim to. I don’t understand my alliance to this place, or these people anymore. Aside from Alex, Sean, a few others I guess. 

Things are becoming contorted here in a perverse and ugly way. 

I tear a hang nail of my ring finger. I think of a Silver Jews lyric. Something something “tan line on your ring finger.” I book a flight to go to San Francisco next Friday. 

----


I obviously start listening to the Silver Jews. I hear my favorite lyric “No I don’t really want to die, I only want to die in your eyes” 

And then realize I have been dead in Dillon’s eyes for a long time. And maybe that’s why he says the things that he says.

I’ve become a sort of comatose version of myself, at least compared to how I was when I was a teenager; when he met me. I read as a Xanax addict. I kind of wish this were true, but it isn’t. Xanax is actually incredibly difficult to find in Los Angeles. Another reason to be jaded off the city. 

There is no doubt I care about things significantly less, if at all, than I did when I was younger. I’m not necessarily the social butterfly I once was. I’m not particularly friendly or welcoming. I am perpetually stressed out, hungry, in pain. I think I’m fine, or something close to that. But objectively, I have shed some personality traits that are seen as universally good. And picked up some ones that are less than desirable. Sometimes I wonder how I was like that. I guess when things keep happening these kinds of things happen where you don’t even realize. 

I don’t have any feelings about this. I still don’t think it justifies what ██████ █████ ██ ███. I don’t know why but my ambivalence towards life seems to irritate them. I don’t think they understand I don’t necessarily want to be this way. 



—-

I’ve mellowed out a little bit. I’m exhausted. I shouldn’t have gone out last night, but that much was obvious to me as I grabbed my keys and left the apartment last night. 

Running to a haircut appointment after work, if I didn’t have that to do I’d probably nap. I figure since I am already going to be on the east side I will take sean to a late birthday dinner. And because I miss him. I feel as though I never see him anymore. I didn’t see him at all over Halloween weekend. 

The problem with my exhaustion is that there is no end, at least not one in sight for the next two weeks. Doesn’t really matter, it just all has to get done I guess.

And I suppose I will have to drive to San Francisco next Friday, rather than fly. Since my work is behind on direct deposit, that is. 

Maybe if the invoice from the shoot on Saturday goes through relatively quickly, I can still get a flight for a decent price. But I don’t think that will happen. 

I am thrilled to go spend time with my boyfriend. I am thrilled to lie in his bed. I am thrilled for him to touch me. I am thrilled to go to lunch with him. 

I am dreading the drive up. Not for any other reason other than the fact that it’s a lot of thinking time. And you have to pass the sad cows on the side of the highway, at a plantation that kills them. It’s very flat along the five north too. There’s next to nothing to look at for miles and miles. 

I also got pseudo-held at gunpoint on my drive back to Los Angeles last time I visited him. It didn’t traumatize me; it was more so just annoying. I would prefer to get robbed… well ,any other time than after having driven for 7 hours. 

—-

Everyone asks how I am; I’m fine. 

The last two hours of work were lovely despite my lack of sleep, food, and general malaise from fighting with ███████ 

My boss comes up to my desk, she’s smiling, “What days did you need off again?”

“Just next weekend, I was going to go up to Palo Alto to visit my boyfriend.”

“Boyfriendddd,” she says. I giggle. We do really get along, which makes me happy.

“Yea” I laugh. 

“What’s his name?”

Tom.

—

When I am leaving the office, I bump into Dov, who has been around. He smiles very brightly at me, which catches me off guard. I smile and wave. He waves back. 

Maybe today doesn’t have to be god awful. Maybe I’ll get my haircut and feel pretty. Maybe dinner with Sean will be great.

—-

Shakers is occupied by its timely audience; geriatric people. They came out in the dozens tonight. Probably in light that the diner is closing. 

Shaker's serves good food for old people. It’s mostly bland. Potatoes, chicken-fried steak, and soups. It’s good for their digestion, I imagine.

“Just a salad for me” I say, feeling like an asshole “shoot tomorrow” I mumble to sean. 

I told him I needed to eat clean, so as not to be fat. It doesn’t really matter. I order a diet soda, and the waitress, who has a blue streak down the two front strands of her gray hair, keeps refilling once I finish my glass.

I asked Sean pretty imminently after sitting down, in maybe a less aggressive and forward way ‘are you happy’ 

And he said he was happy. 

He isn’t acting like a happy person 40 minutes into our dinner. I debate ordering a glass of shitty white wine, shitty white wine from shakers, because the conversation has become so stimulating.

We talk about basically everything that one might imagine to pressing for a 25 and 22-year-old. We discuss our friendships, our friends' jobs, our proclivities. Our eyes remain glued on the game between USC and Northwestern on a weathered TV hung above the barstool seating.

I imagine Tom in his apartment in Palo Alto keeping score. Making imaginary bets in between legal analyses. 

Sean says it is a good thing his girlfriend is definitive and opinionated about virtually everything, that it keeps things interesting. I wonder if Tom would agree. 

Sean's girlfriend seems to care about thing,s though. I don’t really care about much. I wonder why I find myself to be so definitive and concise on things I don’t even care about. 

11/6 In all honesty, I don’t want to go to Bar Italia tonight. I feel weirdly antisocial. Maybe exhausted too. 

I feel compelled to go though, for some reason. I can’t figure out why. As much as I don’t want to go tonight, I would prefer going over sitting in my bed, resting. I probably need the rest. But it just seems miserable. I figure I’d be thinking alongside resting. I can’t figure out what it is that I don’t want to think about, necessarily. 

I just don’t want to, is all I know.

It seems tiring. What I am doing now; going out nearly every night, and then working 8 hours the next day, writing for two hours upon arriving home, and making more social plans is tiring. But I guess Im doing things. I guess this is objectively something. 

11/5 I text Alex to see if we’re still on for Bar Italia on Thursday. I am getting myself quite excited. They used to be my favorite band, some years ago. And then I just forgot to listen, but I quite like their new album.

I hum the lyrics to a particularly catchy song at my desk in between bouts of nausea. I try to drink my coffee but its making it worse. 

Alex says we are still on. 


11/4 Worst UTI I have ever had in my life. Like ever. 

The pain is spreading to my sides and my back. I dont really understand UTIs. I just know it isn't good if you can feel it in your sides, or your back, because it means its causing duress on your kidneys. 

We have a meeting which I am practically squirming through the whole time. Waiting to pee. And trying to not cry. Am I really that much of a bitch that I am going to cry from a UTI? I didnt know they could ever hurt this bad. Wait, yes, we need to get our margins up. 

“Ash, are you ok?” My new coworker says, or I guess he is an intern. He says a lot of vaguely spiritual things I wish I could believe in. I’d probably be a lot happier of a person.

“Yeah, Im fine.” I smile. Probably look crazy. I imagine my kidneys turning gray. I remember that Jack always thought there was something wrong with my liver. 

“You will get through this. We will all get through this.” He says his vague spiritual statement for the day.

Does the office have a communal UTI I am unaware of? 

In all honesty, I dont mind his misplaced and nebulous mantras. His personality is the antithesis to mine. Which keeps the days interesting. I wonder when he is interning until. 

—

“And cat if you can add her name as well” I text Travis. 

I go back forth all day debating whether I should go see everyone play the lodgroom again. I just had so much fun last night. Everyone has been sending me photos they took of me on a myriad of cameras, and I really like the way my hair looks. I look happy too, if that counts for anything. 

“We are going?” I text Dillon. I hope we can drive together. 

“Yea. Think so.” He texts me. He lets me know he is at lunch with his Mom, that he will see me at home. 

“Do you want list for Bar Italia on thursday?” Alex texts me 

I obviously respond ‘fuck yes’ and then ask what she will wear to Bar Italia on Thursday. I am running out of clean laundry. 

—-

You would think this green room in Highland Park would make it difficult to hear whispered conversations, the one in the corner, the one between the drummer from the one band, and the guitarist from the other. 

No.

Instead of hearing the worthless kind of comments, the ones you usually hear on tour, or when your friends are on tour, involving the words ‘backline’, ‘rental’, ‘tour manager’, I hear █ ██████ █████████ ██ ████ █ █████ ██ █████████ ███ ██████████ █████████ ████████████ █████ ███ ██ ██████████ █████ ███ I dont know. Its upsetting I guess.

I move off the couch and grab a water from the fridge. Lydia tells me I can take whatever from the fridge; she's so nice. Everyone is so nice. Except for the people who are not so nice. 

“Theres beer in there too,” Seb says and motions towards the fridge.

“Im okay” I shrug, I dont want to give the answer that I don't drink beer, that I only drink vodka sodas, vodka and cokes, or champagne, because that makes me sound super LA. 

—

“You have to meet my friend Ash,” Travis says from across a lounge we have found ourselves in. “Ash is LA”

Okay. 

“Travis, No. Im not” I sigh but laugh, shaking a tattooed persons hand, who has no eyebrows. 

“You literally work for Dov Charney” He laughs and ashes his cigarette just over his shoulder, so freely. Doesnt seem to bother him the ash will end up on the floor.

If I have ever met a true rockstar, like a movie-grade rockstar, its Travis from Sword II. 

“Who is that?” The tattooed person asks looking at me. I am not going to answer that. 

“He’s the American Apparel dude” Well. Yeah. He is. 

I stop myself from correcting him, as the company has a different name now. It doesn't really matter though. I stopped correcting people on that a while ago, seeing as it was genuinely pointless.

“Yeah.” I ash my cigarette into an ashtray centered in the middle of the table.

“Ash don't fucking bluff. You’re like the most Los Angeles person I have ever met in my life.” 

I dont really think of it that way. I dont really think of myself in any way I guess.


11/3 Disoriented for some reason. I woke up at 5, gathered my things, and left for work, only realizing halfway down the 10 that I actually don’t have work today. Without really thinking, I drove home, put on a pair of jeans and my third favorite sweater, made a coffee, and left for Malibu. There was a ridiculous amount of traffic on the 10, now the 10 west, because I am on par with all the morning commuters.

——

I listened to the Replacements, which was fine. And I looked out at the sea when I neared the pier to see how many surfers were out today; a lot. They look like small birds, or seals, bouncing over and under waves in their wetsuits. Upon closer inspection, the waves are quite nice. 4-6 ft at least. Which is probably better than they have been in a while, during the summer months at least. It is officially fall or winter. It doesn’t really matter which one because they’re basically the same thing in Los Angeles. 

I roll down my window, maybe halfway to Paradise Cove, so that I can smell the seaweed and salt. But I get cold so I roll up my window and turn my heater on. When I reach Paradise Cove I laugh to myself. I am not fucking paying 15 dollars to park. Hell no. So I turn around. I have no idea why I did this because I already knew they would charge for parking. I really don’t know why I did that.

So now I am heading south down PCH, and I will go to the beach I always go to. Which has free parking. And chaise lounge chairs for a members only beach club, that I learned over the summer, you are allowed to sit in and read, even smoke, if you are pretty enough, feign enough arrogance or a radical sense of belonging, especially if your swimsuit is a nice medium of revealing yet tasteful. 

That will be good to read there. 

—

I am making good progress on my book. I typically do with anything I am rereading, probably because I already know that I like it and I get quite antsy to get to my favorite parts. I am perched under a pale yellow-and-white umbrella that I opened for myself. There is nobody on this beach. The entire stretch of sand is desolate. It’s hard to reconcile how busy this place would get during the summer. I came here often, usually alone. I came twice with people. Once with Cat and Greg, we drank cheap tequila sodas at the beach club. we bought a ridiculous amount of snacks we hardly touched. We all talked about going to a party in Echo Park after we made it back to the city, showered, etc. I don’t think any of us went. I got great sleep that night, I remember. 

I came here again towards the end of the summer with Tom, before we were dating. He seemed scared of the water, which I thought was sweet. He said it was cold, I said it felt fine. We planted ourselves in the sand and read our books we got the day before at a bookstore on Sunset. He fed me a plum he bought for me from the farmers market earlier that morning. He tried to tell me what was going to happen with us, when he left back to law school at the end of that week. We sat at a cafe, and I poked at a salad lazily as he explained things. He had to help me finish the salad. I don’t know what was wrong with me; I just stopped speaking. This seemed to confuse him. 

I’d like to think he is more used to it now. It is a critique I have received in all romantic relationships thus far; that its aggravating that I will just stop speaking during important conversations. Or fights. 

I am trying to think of why I do this; I really don’t know. 

I usually just feel like I have nothing to say or add. I remember leaving a party with Will once, he really made me irate, “Text me when you get home,” He said. I didn’t talk to him for a month or so after that. He asked me why I did that, that it hurt his feelings, and I said “I don’t know” (I didn’t know why I did that)

I would hope I do this because I am being careful with my words. I want to make sure Im sure, or something. But realistically, I have no idea why I do this. It just feels impossible to open my jaw and rub my vocal cords together for some reason. I am just speechless, which is funny given the regular aptitude of my personality.

I pause reading my book and check my phone. Alex assures me her publishing agent put her, her boyfriend, and I on the list for a show at the lodge room in Highland Park tonight. Our friends bands, Feeble Little Horse, and Sword II are in town tonight for a stop on their tour. I smile at this text because I haven’t seen Lydia in around 2 years. I saw Travis and the Sword II people recently, given the tour really only ended a few weeks ago. 

I think this will be good for me. I am becoming stir crazy again. I can’t stand being at the apartment, in my room. Maybe it’s because of the curtains, I don’t know. But it reminds me of the feeling I had when Jack and I had just broken up, and I refused to be at the Hollywood apartment. I don’t know why; it didn’t necessarily remind me of him. I think it was because I realized all we did when we were together was lie in bed, make soup, have sex, and I would cry a lot. I don’t know why I was crying all of the time. I don’t know why we never left his apartment, or why we ate soup so often. Or why perpetually him, or I, consistently had to go to urgent care. I would come here a lot after that. I don’t know the name of this beach but I know it’s mine. I know where to stop on PCH so I can find the stairs made out of cheap wood and dirt. And I know which chaise lounge chair is my favorite. 

I don’t know why he didn’t wish me a happy birthday. I thought we were going to become friendly after I congratulated him on his album release. It hurts my feelings, but I also can’t blame him if he doesn’t want to be reminded of that time in his life. I don’t really like to think of that time of my life. 

There are two months left of the year. I think of this as I turn over pebbles and pick up shells. I think this has been a year. I have really no adjective to describe it. It has been productive at least. A lot has happened, though, maybe too much. I fell out of love, then into some weird, ambiguous third thing, I hurt somebody repeatedly, I confused them. I wrote about nearly everything for no reason. I denied drugs, I did drugs. I went out, I didn’t. I fell in love again. I hurt people. I was tiny. I was healthy. I was ambitious entirely. I went on tour. don’t know, that's a lot. Right?

—-

The sun came out around noon so I left the beach. Its not too warm, but I still change into a skirt and t t-shirt from my work when I arrive home. I make another coffee and pour myself a glass of water while checking my phone. 

Tumblr

Anonymous asks (or more so states in this case)

“I don't think you realize how cool your life is”

I do. Thats entirely the issue. 

I realize how unbelievably great and privileged my life is. I feel as though I am lucky without having done anything to deserve this. Being listed to virtually anything, going on tour, having a job at a company I have adored since i was a teenager, a beautiful apartment, a boyfriend that dotes upon me. 

I have all of this, and I understand its weight, but I somehow am still depressed most of the time. It scares the shit out of me. It cements this idea that I don't suffer from circumstantial depression, but rather a genuine chemical imbalance in my brain. One option is avoidable, maybe interim. The other feels absolutely helpless.

I think this is what maybe freaked me out on my 25th birthday. It's a quarter of your life. I thought about my life thus far, and for more than most of it I have been depressed or something close to that. I thought this would be something i grew out of, as if it were something like teenage angst. 

I remembered two interactions that solidified that there was something wrong with me:

It got really bad when I was 23. I had gone to an intake psychiatry appointment for the simple task of getting on antidepressants. I had done it before. They ask you questions. You answer slightly- honest. You get your pills. You feel somewhat better after 3 weeks. 

I did my job. I answered the questions. I slated my answers slightly to not evoke too much worry. Or be sent to a psych ward. They always ask if you're going to kill yourself, even if you have the barrel of a gun to the temple of your head, everybody knows you are supposed to say no. 

I thought I did fine, and that things would go swimmingly. I would pick up my new bottle of wellbutrin in 20-30 minutes. I would take the first one tomorrow. My personality would become interesting and modern again in 2-3 weeks. 

I got my pills, but as I drove back into the city, I got a call 

“Is this Ms. Ingram?” A woman said in a professional yet brittle tone.

“Yes, this is she,” God. I always feel so old when I have to say that

“Hi, this is Kate. I am a nurse at the Kaiser location you just had your appointment at. Are you still at the facility?” She sounded rushed. 

“Hi, I am not,” I wondered if I had left my keys there, or my wallet. Both hypotheticals were impossible, given that my keys were in my ignition and I had to show the pharmacy tech my ID to get my pills.

“Okay. We just wanted to call and check on you… Your score on the mental health exam… It was rather concerning.” Her voice teetered off, indicating for me to say something. 

“Oh?” Was all I said.

“You scored very… um high… on the depression questionnaire,” She was trying to sound less clinical, more empathetic, more human, but it wasn't working. “We just want to make sure you aren't at risk of endangering yourself or others. Are you with somebody right now?”

“Oh. Yeah. Im fine.” I said mostly because i was confused. I didn't know what they wanted me to say or do. I did my part. I just got the pills. 

She, in a more professional tone, basically made me promise her that I wasn't going to kill myself. Which really confused me because I knew I was depressed, but I guess I hadn't realized how depressed I really was.. Enough for a fucking nurse to call me and act as though I was an escap-ee of sorts. 

When we got off of the phone, I felt so confused. And sort of worried about myself.

This worry was cemented when I sat in my psychiatrist's room 4-5 months later, our appointment being to talk about my quitting my wellbutrin, which I felt had completely numbed me to everything and anything. 
She asked me if I was feeling better, I said yes. She asked me what was so sure I was going to keep feeling better. I shrugged and said I will eat better, keep doing my daily runs, and regularly seeing my friends. I ended the sentence with “I will be fine, I think.”

“Ms Ingram, I don't think you realize. This is… You're going to deal with this for the rest of your life.” She sighed and put her clipboard down as if I were a child she were frustrated with. 

“The rest of my life?” I scoffed. Why was she talking to me if Ii don't know myself? I am the depressed one. I am the one in the chair. You are the one standing. You are the one who has a clipboard.

“Yes. Based off of your chart… statistically… Ms.Ingram, this isn't your typical sort of rut. You have recurrent major depressive disorder. It will come and go. I am not trying to scare you, but it's going to be something you will deal with for the rest of your life.”

I didn't say anything

“Do you understand?”

“Yes.” I said, though I did not. I don't think I understood this until October. Until my 25th birthday. I thought of it; she was right. My life was circumstantially perfect at the start of October, and I somehow still wasn't happy; in fact, I was depressed. 

I am better now. Kind of. Somewhat. I think I am ultimately fine, but in realizing that the doctor was right, I kind of spun out. 

I do not want to live the rest of my life varying between states. I dont want to always have to anticipate that. I dont want to be on and off of antidepressants for the rest of my life. I dont want to worry people, or myself. The way she said it made me so deeply uncomfortable, as if she were diagnosing me with a cancer of some sort, except she made it seem like there was no resolute. There was no chemotherapy, no medical marijuana to aid symptoms, she said it with such despair as if the only option in my life were to be inevitably commit suicide. Which frightened me terribly.

That isn't necessarily true, but the way she said it felt so finite. 

I have to come to terms with it, I think I have following my 25th birthday. I dont know. It's all quite grim. I thought a lot of this was attributed to my personality. And it feels quite scary to admit that its because of a chemical imbalance in my brain. That it just won't work properly for whatever reason. It can feel quite hopeless I guess. It feels like things are already decided for me. 

It makes me feel unreliable. To everyone. Even myself. No amount of running, eating right, or getting enough sunlight will fully eradicate the fact that it will inevitably come back. At least according to her. Who I am by all means now, more inclined to trust rather than myself. 

—

Feel anxious. Weird. That kind of escapes me as an adult. I just ate so maybe I am scared of my stomach hurting. Or something.

I am also freezing cold. I feel weird and tense. I have felt this way a lot lately. 

This is maybe bad to say because everybody was so acutely worried about me on Halloween, but it was nice to not think for some hours. I do not remember what happened. I think I feel fine and lucky that nothing bad happened, of course. But I cant remember the last time I was just kind of obliviously living. Im sure I was a total nightmare to deal with. Dillon says I was throwing up a lot. And that I kept complaining about how “cold and scared” I was. Im sure I was cold and scared. But I dont really remember it. So it doesnt really matter. I feel like everyone is surprised by how “fine”  I am from that night. It doesnt really feel all that different from the usual. 

I often feel like a dog people feel sympathy towards. Like a dog who is going to get put down, so you buy him an ice cream cone and let him eat a chocolate bar because he is going to die anyways. I don't want to think of puppies dying before this social event.

I am going to put lipstick on, a coat, and then I will go. I will listen to happy music on the way and do the things I am supposed to do.


11/2 My grandfather is over this morning to help me hang my curtain rod in my room. I’ve been at this apartment for nearly two months and I somehow still dont have curtains. Living room doesnt have curtains either. Sigh. 

Stove doesnt work either.

I have been begging Dillon or my grandfather to help with the curtains, especially given I have been at work what we feels like almost every single day. And if I am not at work it is merely because my stomach is in that distinct and familiar pain (a stabbing sensation under my right rib, so sharp it sometimes hurts to breathe).

I am reading a book on my bed, Less Than Zero by Ellis. Again. Its one of my favorite books, at least in the top 10. Whenever I talk about I call it a “magnum opus” which I find humorous because I never use that phrase in reference to anything else. My grandfather keeps muttering complaints under his breath. I keep asking if he needs any help. He says “fuck no” so I dont help him. 

He complains under his breath, again, and I ask if he needs any help, again. He says “fuck no” again. Its kind of hard to read in the midst of all of this; so I stop. Im going to check my phone. I think I was supposed to have coffee with Alex and Jason today. I was supposed to go out with Fern and Zoe last night. I was supposed to do a lot of things this weekend but friday night kind of fucked all of that up. 

I text Jason and Alex but I dont know if they’re awake. I check tumblr. 

Anonymous sent:

Its been nearly a month. Please write, please, I am tired of seeing 10/10 when I go to load your journal

Fair. 

I dont know why I stopped for this long. I havent gone this long without updating the blog since, like ever. I guess. Objectively, many interesting things have happened. Well interesting for the readers. I’ve just been busy. And sick. And busy. And on tour. And then sad. And then on a plane home. And then home. And then sick again. 

“Shitty ass screwdriver” My grandfather mutters.

I feel as though I could have hung the curtains by now, if I had any free time. I get mad and turn my phone off. 

I try to ask Dillon if he will go with me to IKEA to get curtains. He says no. Which is making me angry because I said Sunday was my only free day. And he said “well yes ash of course I will go to ikea with you to get the curtains on Sunday” 

Sunday and we won’t be getting curtains. I can’t be that mad at him because he saved my life the other night. In my defense, I never asked him to. I only really asked him to help me with the curtains. And the stove.

It’s assuring to rely solely on yourself, but really exhausting. 

—

In living room now with a stuffed golden retriever on my lap. My stomach hurts because I made the fatal flaw of eating breakfast. Whatever

Instead of yelling at the window in my room, my grandfather is now yelling at the window in living room. He is asking me about traffic. I say I don’t know. 

Alex and Jason are texting me, trying to figure out what to do. I suggested Barnsdall because it’s beautiful out this morning. It made me so happy to go there at a certain point; maybe it can again. 

Jason says Barnsdall is too far. 

I wish Tom was in Los Angeles so we can go to the farmers market together. But he isn’t. I also cried the last time we went to the farmers market, which was around 2 weeks ago. He kept asking me what was wrong but I didn’t know.

I’d like to nap on him because the coffee isn’t really working. And Mostly because I would like to restart this morning to where I can i have it be that I am not: 1. Sick to my stomach 2. Angry at dillon 3. Hung the curtains myself 

11/1 Trying to piece together last night. 

Being told about things, things I have no recollection of doing or saying. Frankly I dont even understand how I made it home. Apparently Dillon got me home, he says. 

I dont really understand what happened, or how. Isnt that kind of the point of that though?

See old entry, I dont know, probably some time in April, when Max and Brandon texted me that they believed I was roofied at pour vous the previous night. I just responded ‘ok’They seemed put off by my response. Genuinely what am I to do about being hypothetically roofiied? It didnt really matter because nothing bad happened to me. I was fine. I ended up at home regardless. So like whatever. 

I dont think anything bad happened to me last night. Aside from the obvious; being incredibly sick, losing consciousness, having to be carried around like an obese toddler etc. But I dont think I got assaulted. So terrible to say but it wouldnt really matter if it did, I would have no way of remembering it. 

Tom says I was on the phone with him, which I remember some bits of. He says that i just kept repeating that I was scared over and over. When I was leaving the party multiple people tried to help me, he could hear it in the background, and that apparently really did not like that. I was telling people to fuck off, or leave me alone. God, I have such a dazzling and welcoming personality. 

I must have thrown up a lot. I can feel my hip bones swimming under my skin, which feels oddly thin, as if I could puncture through the skin with the tip of a pencil. God. My makeup is still on. 

I count down from 50, which turns into 20, which turns into 10, and then I restart because I cannot fathom standing up. When I eventually do, I start shaking uncontrollably, reminding me of being a child in the snow, the only time I have ever seen the snow, shivering. My mother brought me to the restroom of some bed and breakfast right near where we were skiing, and she rubbed her hands against my chest desperately trying to warm me up. Somehow, small vines of ice enveloped my 4 year old flat chest. I cant remember if I fell, I dont know. But I just remember being so cold. 

I remember her giving me my grandmothers sweater, but I couldnt warm no matter her efforts. I was just crying, and saying that I was sorry. I felt as though I ruined something, I felt as if I was defunct. I couldnt become warm. And I tried. It just wouldnt work. 


When I make it to the bath, I lay my head against the porcelain tub. I let the water get up to my neck. I have no idea what time it is, I realize. I check my phone and have an overwhelming amount of notifications; everyone is asking me if I am okay. I respond to none of these. Im fine, this can be conclduded by just tracking me. 

I laid there for hours, and counted myself down to get up eventually, my wet hair dripping down my back and pooling into a small puddle on the floor. 

—

“Bro?” Dillon calls from the living room as I pour myself water in the kitchen and butter a piece of toast.

“Hey.” 

“Are you good?”

“Yeah. Im so hungry. I dont know that I have ever thrown up so much in my life” I smile to assure him im fine. Which I am. Its just double assurance.

“Yeah, do you want any real food?” Is toast not real food? 

“Im okay, I think” I butter my toast as he sits down at the table. 

“Do you want like, a meal?” Whats he on about? Where the fuck is any of this coming from. 

“I dont have money to order a meal. The stove is broken. I have my bread” I smile. Triple assurance. Lets stop talking about this. 

“I just feel worried about you” He sighs, looking out of our kitchen window. Which has quite an ugly view.

“Why??” This might be retarded of me to ask given last night, but it seems fairly obvious we arent speaking in reference to last night.

“Like are you eating? I have only seen you eat bread and apples for the last like week.” How medieval of me.

“Yeah I am fine. I have just had a horrible stomach lately. It just hurts really bad and these are supposed to like.. I dont know. Not make me throw up at least,” I shrug. 

“I know but you have to try”

I.am.trying. 

—

After Toast Gate I check my phone again. Some vague texts from other friends, forming some sort of low effort low reward intervention. “We need to start eating better” I think it just is directed at me, so I reply to everything else included in the message except… that

I am trying. I am always starting to better. I am always quitting being better. I am always fixing some aspect about myself. I am always doing something. 

I dont really understand why these pseudo-interventions are taking place. Given I don't think I am super sick right now. Maybe I am and I just cant tell. I dont know. For the past month, I havent actively thought of food. Which is good for me. It can easily become the only thing I am thinking of. With all of the stomach pain I have kind of given up. I even stopped weighing myself. Albeit, I am eating less. A lot less. But not for any other reason other than being scared of my stomach pain becoming debilitating. It has proven to be mostly as a result of eating. So, common sense, yeah Im gonna stop eating. Or avoid it as much as possible, i guess. 

 I also feel like we should maybe focus on last night which is obviously more pressing. 

It feels like everybody is talking about me behind my back, which makes me feel bad about myself. And like a little kid. 

—

After deciding today, and by proxy myself, is useless I put on Psycho by Hitchcock. Maybe I will watch the Shinning after. I like the old scary ones. I like anything that is in black and white. 

Settling into the useless feeling, its nice. I like feeling like I have nothing to do. Probably because there is always something to do. Something to do: check my phone. The dodgers won the World Series again. 

I text Tom about this, obviously. I jokingly ask if I should go light Sunset Boulevard on fire with all of my friends. This obviously read to me as a joke, given I am a woman who doesnt care about baseball at all, and its just kind of ridiculous to start lighting fires because your team won. 

Somehow, the conversation turns into him saying he is worried about me. Do I have cancer, and everybody knows except for me? Like genuinely. Do I have a tattoo across my forehead that says “dying”? Genuinely, for fucks sake.

I know its wrong, and I am the one who is wrong. But I just feel angry when people worry about me. The timing is always inappropriate. If anyone were to worry about me it should have been while I was on tour. I was not okay. I dont know how anybody couldn't see that. My 25th birthday and the following day did a number on me. I dont know why everything was so terrible, but it was. It far exceeds just generally disliking my birthday. Horrible things happened. Which is fine, but my God. I haven't even told anybody the extent of it and I probably never will, I just want the day to be forgotten. Honestly. 

Since returning home, I am somewhat better. My mood is more consistent at least. I feel okay if anything. Fine, or something close to that. I wish my stomach were better, but I’ve wished for that my entire life, it won't happen. I have given up. Which, to me, is the ultimate liberation and grants me a kind of immediate happiness. Its relieving to not have to try. Nothing can go wrong, or there's no expectation to be met, I guess. 

This latent worry is just not needed. If I am losing weight, I am not doing that purposefully, which is more than I can say for the last couple of years. Last night was a blip, that usually doesn't happen. My stomach, yeah, I can't do anything about that. I am trying to get health insurance. Ultimately, I cant fix everything, much less myself, and this realization has been good for me. Maybe bad for others. I just dont see the point in trying. 

Maybe I am acting different. I dont know. I dont feel any different. 

“I dont want to talk about this, Im going to bed, Love you” I send the text. 

I try to sleep but I cant. I just stare at Anthony Perkins face. Its almost to the shower part, where he tries to kill her. 


10/29 ██ █████ ████ █ ████████ ███ █ ███████ ████ ███ ██ ███████ █ ████ ███ █████ █ ██ ██ ███████ ██████ ███ ███ ████ █ █████ ████ █ ████████ ████ ████████ ████ █  ████ ████ █████████ ██ ██ ███████ █ ████ █████ ██████ █████ ██ ██████ ████ ████ ██ ███████ ███████ 

That would’ve been really cool thing to say if I was fifteen and an angsty teenager, but I’m a 25-year-old adult. It feels embarrassing to fight this way. I don’t want to do this; I really become the worst version of myself around him. Around any of them really. I don’t yell. I don’t call people out of their name. I think the only reason I do this is because I was raised this way, by these people. I don’t do this to my friends, or my boyfriend. 

I don’t focus on this for long. I text Mark and bug him about Halloween plans. When I saw him in Miami, in between flashes, I asked if he knew what was happening for Halloween, because I am nothing if not a beautiful subject at a party, and also an opportunist. 

That’s a bit jaded. I don’t know. He’s usually at the best parties. So. Maybe he will know where we should go.

He sends me a flyer for an invite only party Noah and chandler are DJing. This doesn’t aid in any real way given that Noah put Alex and I on the list for it already, and I am still at the issue which is that none of my other friends can get in. I don’t care to do the whole “why did he put you on the list and not us?” I don’t know. Maybe you should ask him. Literally. But also figuratively. 

I don’t know why he puts us on the list. It’s nice that he does. I don’t understand why nice things need to be explained. Shouldn’t they just be nice? 

—- 

I was put on the list for the Rachel Senott pilot screening. I don’t know why.

It’s too late to go. I’m already at Alex’s apartment in her very comfortable chair, it’s very unlikely I will get up for the next 2-4 hours. 

Besides, I am saving my energy for the bender that is Halloween weekend.


10/27 I haven’t done an update in 15 days, Jason tells me. Someone on tumblr also asked when I will update again; I guess now. 

I have done so many things yet simultaneously nothing. Horrible syntax. Feel completely demotivated by how horrible I have perceived my writing to be in the last 2-3 months. It’s all so clunky, lazy. I’ll work on it, or try to.

Realistically it’s hard to write when you get back from tour, are scheduling upcoming interviews, working 40 hours a week (sometimes more), your boyfriend is in town to visit you, you turn 25, everyone is mad at you, and you’re sick to your stomach 80% of the time.

I’m being self indulgent but I earnestly have lost count of the amount of times I’ve thrown up in the last two weeks. See, that syntax feels quite ugly. Clunky.

I realistically don’t care about throwing up. It’s as passive to me as a sneeze now it seems; which is honestly disgusting. I went to the office on Saturday morning, and while I was throwing up in the office toilet (I have thrown up so often I have started to rank which is my favorite toilet to throw up in,

My apartment. Low stakes.
Whole Foods bathroom. Fine when no one is in there I guess
Any friends apartment. Makes me anxious and embarrassed
The office bathroom. By far the worst. I just feel like everyone knows. They can hear me coughing, or at least I think.

My coworker walked in. Which was humanizing. Like why would she ever need to see my knees on the floor, hearing me cough up bile which has been burning my throat for the past hour? She doesnt, really.

—-

On my drive home I pass by a gang of catholic school girls. I think of how I once was one. Or almost. My family never sent me to catholic school despite their religion. I think they realized I had difficult socializing when I was in public school for elementary school and this wouldn’t be aided by being around a ton of other girls and nuns. I probably would have turned lesbian just to have something to do.

No. But i think they did genuinely realize I had a hard enough time enrolled in public school. I was just never able to make friends. Aside from my twin brother kind of. But he was my brother so it didn’t really count. And I was always very scared of bothering him and his friends; this was not an unfounded fear. He would literally yell at me to go hangout with other the children. So I would run away and pretend to be playing with other children during recess,  but really  I would sit at the trunk of one of two eucalyptus trees which were out of sight. I would lie to him and tell him I hung out with Makayla. Makayla was my real friend at one point; but not by third grade. She said I was mean in first grade which was honestly fair. I told her she was horrible at singing and that her mother was fat. Well she asked me if I thought her mom was fat and I said yes, because I thought her mother was fat, and she got extremely upset at me.

I thought she genuinely just wanted to know whether her mother was fat or not. Her mother was fat. I answered the question. I didn’t realize it was some kind of test.

“Well your mom is too skinny” she said to me. “Like a French fry” she said to me.

“Okay.” I said.

“She’s skinny like a French fry.” She said again.

“Yes. My mom is very skinny.” I said. I was genuinely confused.

I was not invited to her birthday party that year. Which is how I realized that we weren't friends anymore. Yes, she avoided me at recess after the skinny mom vs fat mom debacle at recess. But I just thought she was busy. At recess.

I didn’t understand why our moms were fighting. Or if they even were, really. Or why it mattered that my mom was very skinny. Or that her mom was maybe a little fat.

I never had to wear a complete school uniform like these girls crossing Beverly Boulevard.

 except in the first grade. I had to wear a skirt and a small vest. Which was quite cute. But very uncomfortable. It made d oing math somehow more difficult, I remember. I was always fine at reading. I’d place a couple of grades above my reading level which made me feel very smart. It mattered in no real way to me though, Because my brother was quite good at everything. He’d place at the same reading level as I did, but also placed above in mathematics. I was decent at science. History. 

I was horrible at soccer. And mathematics.

I feel maternal to one of the school girls who is walking alongside a nun. She seems shy. Or new. All the other girls are paired off in twos. And they look quite happy. They look happy in a way only 13 year olds can be happy. Its obvious from their body language they are gossiping.

Its making me think of an MJ lenderman song now that always makes me sad.


10/22 I decided at work, maybe on the second hour I need to make a list in order to feel happy. I do this often. There’s random lists everywhere. Lists of perfumes I like, lists of traits I like about myself, lists ranking flowers from favorite to least favorite. Lists of nail polish according to finish and shade. 

Here is a list of things I need to do to be happy I think:

Read twenty pages a day 
Drink a lot of water 
Take my vitamins even if I don’t believe in them
Say yes to more things (unless it’s modeling. Alex says I need to set a rate. I tell her I don’t think I’m pretty enough to do this) 
Go out even if I have work the next day 
Eat only healthy foods. Vegetables and such. 
Respond to more text messages 
Hang out with Max while he is here from London
Order a new French press 
Act my age

These all seem fine. Maybe I will make one more list. 26 things to do before I turn 26 

Get a passport 
Quit smoking or start smoking more 
Buy a CD player 
Swim 
Get a 2nd really good pair of jeans 
Figure some things out 
Turn the computer off 
Find a publisher (or quit doing this whole thing) 
Allow myself to be angry 
Apologize and mean it to **** 
Figure out what to do during the Christmas time
Stop buying random useless things
Get 


10/21 Contamination OCD is flaring up. It’s the first time my OCD has flared up in years. It’s in a very passive way, not as invasive, I’m just washing my hands a lot. Not too much though. The skin isn’t cracking. At least not yet.

It’s because Dillon is sick. I can hear him coughing all the way from my bedroom. I feel really nervous about getting sick again. If I get sick it will be my eighth time getting sick this year. My body feels really exhausted and warm. Could just be from extensive travel and jet lag. I don’t know how those kinds of things work really. 
. 

The extreme overstimulation from tour is really depressing to come off of. I sat in my room alone for 9 hours on Monday. I didn’t know what to do so I just sat there. I’m hoping it’s just that and that I’m not actually depressed. It’s difficult to tell with me. 

I didn’t gain much weight from tour. At least less than I anticipated. Again- you’re not supposed to think these things, say these things, write these things. But I do think these things. And sometimes I say them, I can’t help it. People get really pissy about it. 

My scale is in my bedroom which is quite weird, but something I’ve adapted to. It was in my bathroom, like a normal person, for 3 years. I lived alone for 3 years. Now it’s in my bedroom. It’s just weird thinking of dillon seeing my scale when he pisses every morning. 

Truthfully that’s not the deciding factor. It’s that I don’t want it to get uncalibrated. 

—

“It’s nice to have you back Ash” they say at the office. I smile. 

Everyone is saying my first name to me again, which is making me feel paranoid. There’s some entry on here on why I hate when people do this. But I think I am just paranoid because the emails have started again. 

It’s from a different email address but I think it’s from the same person. I didn’t even really tell anyone about the email I received during the early morning hours of Monday, or the 4 that followed the initial one. I think that was my first mistake over the summer, telling people. I didn’t know what to do though. 

Everyone told me how to act and behave which really confused me because I wasn’t doing anything. Literally anything. I just sat there and somehow I was still doing something wrong.

Certain people said I should go to the police. Which I didn’t care to do- at all. It felt way too dramatic. Other people told me not to provoke them. Which angered me. There was some sort of insinuation. An insinuation that I somehow brought it upon myself. 

I turn off the noise cancellation on my AirPods at my desk because I don’t want to startle today. And I startle pretty much everyday at this point. 

—-

Holly offers me next to nothing in our therapy appointment. Well that isn’t true; she’s much smarter and older than I am. I’m just maybe too proud to admit my stupidity. Or too stubborn to accept that things are quite simple, and that I am not a complicated person. 

I answer a lot of her questions for her before she even asks them. 

I’m a bad patient. It has to be the worst to be a therapist or psychiatrist and tend to patients who think they are in on the game. They know what to say and what not to say. They think they will win. Win what? 

Genuinely, win what? 


10/17 It’s somehow worse than I imagined. Which is a bit funny in a sardonic way. 

----


I’m taking a melatonin and going to bed. Turning 25 is the hardest thing I’ve done so far. 

I know a lot  of people say this, but I mean this very genuinely; I objectively don’t care about my birthday. (See the blog update, from, I don’t know a couple of days ago where I discuss my issues with emotional blunting) I already have a problem with caring about things generally. But I am still somewhat normal. I hope I am somewhat normal at least. I’d at least like to be somewhat amused or maybe even happy on my birthday. I’d at least like to have a good day unrelated to my birthday. 

I try to what would have made a good birthday. I really don’t know. I guess any other day that has been good and has nothing to do with me. Like maybe just a really good Tuesday Would have been nice. 

I really miss LA.