My family, it seems, has a small obsession with the three hole punch. They always want to know where it is, and somehow in the 35 minutes before they all decide they need to three hole punch something else, it is misplaced. I don't understand it, but I bet if you came over in say an hour in a half, and walked through the door, somebody would be yelling up the stairs "Where's the three hole punch?"

I like this whole vacation thing. I forgot what its like to look at myself in the mirror and not see all my worry stenciled out in my eyes. And I smile, cuz it's that great to forget about math assignments for a minute, and to not think about kids at school that I don't want to think about, and have dreams at night that don't involve someone ruining my life, or me finding dead bodies in the cupboard. Its nice to be able to wake myself up because I have, ahem, an alarm clock. "Time" has entered my bedroom, so now I can't be late for work.
Really, the only thing I want to worry about is putting enough moisturizer on my face for the sunburn.

driving home from the Garden of Eden and we're sitting in the car, listening to Tom Petty, and I really really like his song Wildflowers, because I think he's singing it to a feminist. It's nice, and I think that all boys should hear it.

I can't have imagined a happy 24 hours, because I didn't spend one minute thinking about my problems, it was like they didn't exist in the pool, in the car, in the mountains, in our gaudy apartment complex. We sat in the sauna and laughed in the steam, we made fun of the boyfriends and girlfriends, and the fat women kerplunking into the pool outside the sauna doors. We walked around in t-shirts and shorts, like the rich people do and slept in beds that were 4 feet off the floor.

I don't think I'll forget, and I like this happy radiation we all have now. It's so familiar...

This life is kind of funny. Actually, its mostly funny, unless you don't want it to be.
And I thought the 60's were sort of clean. I get you now, Pete.

The boy next to me in History class sometimes leans over, and he whispers things like we're accomplices. Like we're best buddies. Like he used to when I saw him 4 hours a day, and ate pizza with him at parties. He says things that he doesn't say to the boys next to him. To his friends. Maybe he forgets, for a moment, that he quit me? I don't regret him, just don't understand him. All he talks about is cars. So I sit back and take in only half of Vietnamese wars. Only half of hippies. Only half of the clock spinning its wheels til it makes my life 8:50 a.m. and none of us talk to each other. I'm on a caffeine high, pounding my desk. Who is he? And I'm in second period now. My bright green back is being videotaped by the girl who's last name probably stars with E or F because she sits to the right of me. My teeth start chattering. Who the heck are these people around me? I DON'T LIKE THEM. Except Carrie who sometimes whispers to me. (she's losing her voice)
and Heidi who wants to cook with me and I always walk her cousin Steve to seventh period. Just because its tradition, and also because we like the same concentration of music. I also eat with Erin every once in a while, but who are these other people? And why don't they see me banging my head on my desk? Maybe they can't hear me LAUGHING at them. Laughing at their midnight walks through the snow. Laughing at their prom dresses. Laughing at their parents, who pay for their gas. LAUGHING, because they don't know what the real world IS. They don't understand what it's like to be sitting next to people who think that you're crazy because you don't date. They don't know that what I do on the weekends, or that I'm really not a freak ( I'm trying to be somewhat normal) and that I DO rent movies from Blockbuster, and I do eat chocolate when I need it. (they don't know that. They think I have a crush on Sam Waterston. They don't know me.)

And now. I'm sitting in my hot truck, and she's telling me that she said it, for me, and I nod, in a stuff-mart parking lot, realizing I will never fill my photo album cuz I keep losing money at the gas station (I can't live without some freakin' coffee). I know that half an hour ago, I didn't have enough to say, but I've said it all, now, haven't I?

"Well, I call that a scratch."
"Why?"
"Because it went off the table, that's why."

Oh God, please don't tell me this has been in vain
I need answers for what all the waiting I've done means

I feel like a cripple. I walk like one at least. Zealous excercise. Sundays are so strange. Saturday nights make them strange. Everything is so surreal these days.

"Hey, I think we should try this new thing at our house, like sleeping at night. You know, I'm instituting a new rule. We're going to sleep when we're tired. That sounds nice." -my dad at 9:30 last night.

It takes a lot to laugh, and it takes a train to cry.

One of my all time favorite sounds is pinecones crunching. It's kind of like the sound of stepping on a bee, but less morbid because a pinecone is already dead. It's a sound you get to hear only once per pinecone, because you can't resquish them.

Here is what I dream of: I step outside, and I walk along a road of pinecones, and they all crunch. It's never winter, except when I want coffee. And my mailbox is full of chocolate, because somebody sent me some cuz they know I like it.

If you want to know a secret, it's too late. Unless you beg on your knees. I might tell you.

sign up: the picket line or the parade