The only times I’ve felt remotely happy since I came home and got over the excitement of holding the people who I don’t see while I’m at school have been when I’m so fucked up I can’t feel my face and the times in the last two days when I’ve been out taking pictures with Andrew. He bought me some film. And he’s paying to develop it, too. I taught him how to use a fully manual camera. We went to high falls, and the art walk. And it’s okay, you know. But he only kind of gets it, really, and that’s okay — I don’t expect him to be getting all existential over trees like I do. But it’s weird, too, to not quite be able to talk about things that way with him when I usually can.

I feel like my limbs are filled with wet sand. Things that usually set me up to have a really amazing day, like having my hair be really smooth or waking up three minutes before my alarm or having someone tell me that I look nice or having someone laugh at a joke I make — they either aren’t really happening or they’re not making me happy like they usually do. All I want to do is sleep until autumn when I can curl up in a sweater and pretend to be melancholy in my own apartment with a cup of tea and Jack Kerouac maybe and be unbearably twee — and overwhelm myself with work like I love to do. It wouldn’t be so bad in the summer if I could spend all my time working, like I did last year. I was sad then, too, but I was alone; I had an excuse. Having free time shouldn’t be an excuse for a privileged kid like me (I don’t even know how I can call myself that when my parents can hardly pay their medical bills at all even with insurance but I don’t know what else to call myself, because I went to good schools and grew up in a good home and had enough money to eat as well as I have and I have someone who pays for me to go to lunch with him every day if I want and altogether I am far too privileged to be complaining about anything in my life when there are so many people who have it so much worse) to feel depressed.

And now I have this weird anxious feeling like something is going to happen in the morning even though I know it isn’t, I have this weird feeling like I’m going to wake up and everything will be worse even though it won’t, I have this weird feeling like I’m going to waste away unless I’m watched twenty-four hours a day.

Clarence Clemons died and I feel so stupid for being as upset as I am. I’ve cried more than once over him tonight and it hurts that he’s gone, because he’s been a fixture in my life since I was a baby. I saw him perform in Atlanta when I was thirteen and I’ll never forget that concert, I was thirteen and it was my first concert and they played Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out and I knew all the words and there was a woman three times my age at least sitting near me who didn’t know a single one, and she was so impressed with me. And I remember singing the sax lines to every Bruce song I knew and that is no small number. I remember when I first realised how old the members of the E Street Band are and feeling overwhelmed by it. Dan Federicci died last year and now Clarence and I just don’t know what to do with myself over it. I love them all so much and it feels stupid to feel my ribs get all tight around my middle and around my heart over people that I don’t know in person but I can’t help it. For so long music was the only thing that mattered to me really, sometimes still is — sometimes I wish that I could give up everything in my life and get on a train and leave everything behind but the music I’ve been listening to since I was a little girl.

I just want to go to sleep and wake up skinny and happy and feel free and have everyone live forever because I can’t take this anymore, I can’t take gaining all this weight from doing nothing but sleeping and eating and I can’t take feeling sad and anxious and feeling a cramp at the bottom of my ribs and feeling my throat get tight and itchy and feeling my head throb and I really can’t take anybody else dying because it’s too much. I just can’t right now and I don’t want to see it again and I know the only way to conquer death is not to fear it but I do, I do and I hate that. I want to not fear death, I want to take all those chances and stand on the train tracks and see what happens if you bleed for long enough and run into the street and not give a fuck how many cars beep their horns at me. But I can’t, I just get anxious thinking about it and eventually collapse myself into bed and have a sleep that doesn’t make any sense and wake up wishing I had died in it instead, so someone could explain it to me, so I wouldn’t have to fucking wonder about everything when all I want to do is know what’s happening in my own fucking head.

I’m going to bed. Okay.

It’s been a long while since I last posted here, but things have changed significantly, so I decided I should update my little corner of the internet with what has transpired.

1. I was accepted to SUNY Purchase, and subsequently canceled all of my other applications. The term started last Wednesday. I’m all moved into my room in Big Haus and have only just (read: literally tonight) hung up all my clothes. My roommate’s name is Leora, and she is very nice. And has excellent taste in music — a welcome change from nearly everyone I encountered at St. John’s.

2. My family is being put back together, though slowly. My Dad is doing fantastically, eating well and going to cardiac rehab twice a week. He’ll be doing plenty more work before he’s running again, but he’ll be able to, and that’s what matters. I’ve taken up running too, trying to get in shape, if you can really call it that.

I guess this is the point where I start whining, as that is what I’m very good at.

My classes are going well thus far, though one was canceled due to weather conditions (“Looking At Photographs”, my Tuesday class); my first class was photography, a darkroom class. The nice part about it is that a) I can call my professor by his first name! and b) he doesn’t assign creative projects. Reading this, you may think that makes the class difficult, but on the contrary; to be able to make my own stylistic and creative choices about everything I shoot, without having to focus on a creative concept, is very freeing. I was previously put in the position of having to create based on someone elses’ creative vision, but now, the only constraints are technical. Thank god.

My second class was drawing, which is a less intense class than I imagined. Granted, I have only had one class. But the professor seems open-minded, and more focused on the composition of pieces than the actual accuracy with which things can be drawn. Which is, you know, helpful. For me. Considering my level of accuracy is equivalent to that of a five-year-old.

The third class I endured (Monday) was my biology credit; something I was completely uninterested in taking, but, as I am in need of a natural science credit, I am the proverbial beggar and therefore cannot be a chooser. The class is called Human Anatomy and Physiology II: Nutrition. If you can’t imagine what this class appears to be about, I’ll give you a hint: weight loss and dieting, first and foremost, and secondly, nutrition. And then anatomy and physiology. As you can probably tell, it’s not my favourite. I find the whole thing a little pushy, especially with the implication of doing a ‘food diary’, a required project to pass the course; why should I tell a professor, who will certainly not remember my name after I leave his class, what I eat every day for a week? Furthermore, why should I allow him to judge my diet? And lastly, if he reads them aloud in class, how will I be able to keep feeling unviolated? A professor is one thing when the project is required, but if my classmates are aware of what I eat, I’m going to have an issue.

Speaking of issues, I’ve been having a few problems thus far here at Purchase. Making friends has proved possible, despite my experience at St. John’s. Living on the same campus as The Boyfriend has been doable, too, though that has required somewhat more effort — mostly effort in the direction of not clinging to each other. The real challenge has been proving to myself that I’m in control of my future. Being far away from my family makes me feel in much less control than I could have imagined, even though living at home gave me no more control than living here does. I guess it’s just a lack of contact; I would see my dad at work every day for several months, and my Mom at home. I grew even closer to my family this year than I could have thought, and now, being far away from them has proved very difficult, even though I’ve only been here without them for a week and a half.

I suppose a feeling of lack of control is coming from the inability to make my own schedule, too. My classes are fine, for now, but the inability to choose a natural science I actually would have liked to take was very frustrating. Beyond that, having two six-hour classes, both of which begin at eight thirty in the morning, is particularly frustrating to someone who is much more comfortable with a nocturnal sleep schedule.

In any case, it’s led to my more obsessive tendencies flaring up. I’ve become very intent on keeping everything I own in order, which is a huge change from the way I am at home (please note: you can see the whole floor of my room in Big Haus; this is but a fantasy in my own house). Everything has to be in its right place; my shoes are rather meticulously organised on top of my dresser, my clothes are all put away or in the hamper if they’re dirty, my movies are all lined up against the wall on my desk. Even my drawers in my desk are labeled.

So, why is this significant? It’s led to me obsessing about other things. The way my hair is dried; the way my email looks in my phone, though I have little control of that as well; the amount I eat each day; the dead skin on the bottoms of my feet; what order the scarves in my closet go in. It’s all become an issue of me controlling and obsessing over every tiny detail in my life.

My chest hurts, and I feel as though I’m getting sick, and I have an early class in the morning, so I’ll get myself to bed now. But I promise not to neglect you anymore, dear blog… until the homework piles up.

2. YELLING. NO REALLY.

3. Crying. I haven’t done nearly enough actual crying in the past few weeks. I usually cry to alleviate stress, which might be why I feel the need to not have normal bodily functions (eating, sleeping, washing, etc) near constantly and always seem to have a stomachache when I think about the decision letter that might be in the mail for me.

4. Waiting. Especially when it comes to college letters.

FRIDAY: get to the airport at about 7:45 AM. Wait around for my flight to New York at 11:35. Make said flight, fly to JFK. Sit and wait five hours, talk to Amelia on my layover until my flight to San Francisco at 5:10 EST. Arrive in San Francisco around 11:45 EST (8:45 PST). Walk around Stanford/chill out with Amanda’s friends until about 1:30 PST.

SATURDAY: sleep in until around eleven, have breakfast/brunch in Amanda’s dining hall. Go to San Francisco for the day and go to the piers and Fisherman’s Wharf, eat the legs off of a loaf of sourdough from Boudin that looks like a turtle, marvel at the fact that ‘wharf’ is a word at all, go to Ghirardelli square and eat far too much free chocolate.

Receive a voicemail from my mother telling me to call her right away, which I do, to find that my dad’s had a heart attack running in a race.

It was kind of the biggest shock I’ve ever had in my life. My dad has been running nearly every day since he was in high school. He’s in amazing shape. He’s never had a single high cholesterol reading when he’s had it tested. And, yet, there he was at Strong, cooled down to sixty eight degrees centigrade, on a breathing machine.

Have Amanda call JetBlue and change my flight to that night. Fly out at 10:40 PM PST.

SUNDAY: Arrive at JFK at 6:30 AM EST. Have trouble getting my ears to pop. Buy coffee from Dunkin Donuts and a pack of gum. Have trouble hearing because of the pressure in my ears. Get on the plane for Rochester at 7:50 AM. Wait anxiously as the flight is delayed on the runway for nearly an hour. Cry endlessly and drink complementary coffee. Get off the plane and get picked up at the Rochester airport around 10 by Bella and Anders. Cry more. Arrive home. Cry on mom. Be unable to sleep because of the two cups of coffee I’ve now had. Go to the hospital and wait. Wait more.

At this point they told us that Dad was being weaned off the paralytic and the sedatives, as well as being warmed up. He’d be at the very least conscious by early the next morning, though they had no idea how he would be mentally — whether he had been deprived of oxygen long enough to have brain damage, whether he would be able to speak.

MONDAY: go to the hospital again. Mom tells us she’s going to see if there are doctors to talk to. Wait. Wait an hour. Wait two hours. Go to find mom when Declan starts asking for food.

My dad was awake, though very tired. He looked about a thousand percent better than the day before (when he was intubated, pale, and with cold hands). Talked to him for a while, held his hand, told him how glad I was he was okay.

TUESDAY: Dad looked even better. He was still exhausted very easily, but he looked like a million bucks.

He came home yesterday. He’s really emotional and still sort of weak (and having to eat heart-healthy food is not putting him in the best mood, from what I can tell). I’m so glad he’s okay.

So… yeah. Everyone better get their goddamn cholesterol checked.

**

I’ve not been doing well. I’ve been trying; I work really hard, I’ve gotten in almost everything I need to for applying to schools for the spring, and I’m doing everything I can to get into Purchase. My bodily functions (eating, sleeping, functioning at work and not just doodling, etc) don’t like to cooperate, though.

I visited boy last weekend. After many trials in actually getting to the hotel (flight was delayed almost five hours, almost missed the train to Penn Station, found out Grand Central closes at 2:00 when we got there at 2:30, had to take an NYC cab to White Plains for $90, walked from the White Plains Metro-North station to the hotel, debit card wouldn’t work at the hotel concierge, had to call my parents at 3AM and have them pay for it, finally collapsed into bed with Boy at 4AM), we had an amazing time; we just sort of hung around, spent time together, acted domestic in our ridiculously-far-too-large-for-just-the-two-of-us hotel room. We went to flea markets and Boy bought a red beret for his Max Fischer costume (because he is actually the biggest most adorable dork in the world).

This weekend, Ari’s coming home. I’m more excited than I can really relay. I haven’t seen her since the end of summer and I need a long walk in the middle of the night in the cold and a long cuddle. And then doing some crafty things, or something. She’s incredible. I miss her so, so much. She knows everything about me, everything nobody wants to know about me. I can’t wait to see her. She comes in on the train tomorrow night, at which point I will violently assault her with hugs.

Next weekend, I’m going to California. October has five weekends this year, so I suppose you could say I’m taking advantage of it. I’m flying out next Friday from ROC to JFK, then to San Francisco. I’m going to visit Amanda at Stanford. I’ve never been west of the Mississippi, or for that matter, to anywhere interesting outside of New York, the Carolinas, Georgia, Florida, and Massachusetts. Not that I remember, anyway. I’ve never even been to Chicago. But Amanda has her car out there, and she and I are going to have fun being at Stanford (where, obviously, I’ve never been) and hugging (which we love to do) and partying in San Francisco. I’m so excited to see Amanda, since she probably won’t be home for Thanksgiving… and the closer I get to seeing her, the more it dawns on me that I’m REALLY FUCKING EXCITED.

Anyway. I’m hoping I’ll be in better condition by the holidays, but the way my emotions have been going lately (aka beginning to not exist anymore), we’ll have to see.

x

Thursday I went to sea breeze with my friends and, of course, managed to have an emotional breakdown there, by the front gate. I don’t want my friends to leave for school. And I sometimes feel left out in facing my friends because even the smallest thing they do when we’re together can bother me, if it’s them talking about something they are going to do together while I’m not there. And, because I’m not going back to school (and didn’t make a vast number of friends there anyway), that stretched to even include them talking about what they’re going to take at school, who they’re excited to see. I fought and got upset with them but managed to be a person for long enough that we worked it out, that I actually was able to tell them what was truly bothering me. I’m still terrified of being here by myself. But I think I can manage, because I have some of the best friends in the world.

Friday, said friends and I (and several other wonderful people who, despite how close I might or might not be with them, had a ‘middle school sleepover’, in which we remained sober, stayed up past our bedtimes, talked about boys, talked about our emotions. I won’t go into it, because it was a really personal night. But my emotions were close to the surface anyway, and those girls bring out the best in me because they’ll love me when I’m at my worst. I was up until seven thirty Saturday morning and slept until five in the afternoon.

Last night, went to a party… drank too much rum and smoked three cloves (and do not plan on smoking again for at least two weeks). Jumped into the pool in my underwear and was generally manic from sleeping all day. Andrew is in Toronto this weekend and so I missed him a lot, but kept myself pretty under control, didn’t talk about it too much, mostly because I was too manic and excited. But things started slowing down and I went to sit with a few people who were much more world-hatey than I was last night. I started to get emotional again, sat with a friend for a long time and just talked, took a walk around the block with him. We talked about my fear and my loneliness and my abandonment complex. We talked about things I haven’t told anybody since I was fifteen. He listened and let me talk and hugged me and generally let me be emotional but calmed me down a lot, then gave me a ride home a little while later.

Now I’m lying in bed still (even though it’s past two) and feeling a little despondent. Pandora is trying desperately to cheer me up with songs about hope on a station I created specifically to play depressing music, but all I want to do is curl up in a ball and disappear for a little while. There’s too much going on this week and next week and I just need to recharge and try not to burn to a crisp.

2// I should probably relate the story of why I’m not going back to school. When I was younger (fourth through eighth grade) I lived in Atlanta, GA. Essentially what’s happened in the past few months has been what was happening between my parents and the state revenue service there for several years (since about 2006). The state tried to charge taxes on money my dad made when working at Ticor Title in Rochester, NY, before we moved to Atlanta. He explained that we hadn’t moved to Atlanta when he made that money, gave the state his forwarding address (the house we have now lived in since 2006) rather than our first address in Rochester after we moved back here from Atlanta. They sent a letter to our old address saying that if we did not pay another, different set of taxes which were wrongfully charged to us, they would file a federal tax lien against us. State revenue letters cannot be forwarded by the post office, but in the case that there is a forwarding address on file, the letter is returned to sender.

The federal tax lien has been applied to my dad’s credit and has essentially made it a lot worse. He wouldn’t have even caught it if he didn’t have an automatic credit report sent to him. Basically, what the lien did was make it impossible for the federal government to give my dad the loan he had for my tuition. Therefore, I couldn’t go back to school (the loan was eventually approved, but only after the deadline for my financial aid had passed).

Because of this, I lost my other loan, which I only retain if I’m a full-time student, and have to start paying off now. Beyond that, I had a $12K/year scholarship, which was only good if I graduated on schedule in four years. That’s gone as well — I would have it until the last semester I was at St. John’s, and the same payment problem would arise as if I tried to go back this semester without my loan.

Long story short, now I don’t have an option but to transfer. Applied to the SUNY system but won’t hear back for some time; FIT, New Paltz, and Purchase. Also applying to Cooper Union as a reach school, and to Hunter, which is a CUNY. In the time between now and when I go back to some other school, I’m keeping my summer job at my dad’s office. It’s boring, but it pays well and I could make up to ten thousand dollars if I save my money. The problem here being that all of my friends are going to school, both those a year younger than I am and the ones my age… and I don’t really want to be alone here. I have my family, of course, and some people will be around being that they go to MCC or the U of R or RIT. But those people have other friends here… I don’t.

3// depressing playlist

1. wake – antlers
2. wires – athlete
3. no distance left to run – blur
4. okay i believe you, but my tommy gun don’t – brand new
5. poison oak – bright eyes
6. holiday in spain – counting crows
7. be good or be gone – fionn regan
8. i coulda been a contender – the gaslight anthem
9. modern chemistry – motion city soundtrack
10. get lonely – the mountain goats
11. let me kiss you – morrissey
12. hero – regina spektor
13. calling and not calling my ex – okkervil river
14. horn – nick drake
15. hurt – nine inch nails
16. fake plastic trees – radiohead
17. disarm – smashing pumpkins
18. asleep – the smiths
19. sleep tonight – stars
20. love is all – the tallest man on earth

4// I’ve been neglecting my flickr and the rest of the internet, but I promise I’m almost totally back now.

1. If you’re not interested in reporting difficult, long, or complicated documents, why are you working at the county clerk’s office as a cashier who is required to do just those things? Why take advantage of me, not knowing much about the county clerk’s office, rather than simply do your job while I do mine?

2. There is no reason to be nasty to everyone who walks into the cashier. There is one person who works in the cashier who insists on being hostile and making everyone around her feel stupid. It’s very frustrating to be treated like an idiot when 1) you are perfectly capable of understanding what she is telling you 2) you have never done the job before but are willing to learn 3) any mix of the above. Is there really any call to be nasty and sarcastic? There’s a difference between playing around with people and being a bitch, and this woman really cannot get the hang of it.

Other than that, the past howeverlongsinceI’veupdated has been good. Lots of partying (at houses, on Pinnacle Hill, everywhere). Then the job, and I am going to Toronto with my best friends and The Boyfriend on Friday for the Fringe theatre festival/Toronto pride/chillin’. I’m beyond excited. Now, though, I am doing laundry and am quite exhausted, so I will say goodnight!

I never realized how much forgiving makes you feel better about yourself. Reconnecting with some of my best friends, one of whom I was sure I would hate for the rest of my life, has honestly made me put my life in perspective. I’m happy with the way things are. I have an amazing boyfriend, I have the best friends in the world (even some who aren’t particularly close, but are still the best) and I have honestly stopped caring about people who don’t like me. They’ve stopped mattering to me. I have the people who love me, the people who will be the godparents of my children, and that’s the part that matters. I have my art, I have music and I can be comfortable with the people I’ve missed having as friends despite not wanting to be close to them.

I had lunch with an old boyfriend this week. There’s nothing between us now, but the breakup was one of the biggest tragedies I’d ever faced… because I was about fourteen. I was (am) silly and overemotional. We talked comfortably about music and our lives and our schools and how much we’ve changed since we really last knew each other, and it was great. It felt like whatever shit had gotten in the way of us remaining friends was gone, or had changed somehow.

Tonight, I went out with my best friend and two of the friends I had first made when I moved back to Rochester from Atlanta. I hadn’t been particularly close to either of them in a while, but I realized that whatever happened, they were still my friends. One told me that the old boyfriend I’d had lunch with had said nice things about me having my shit together now.

I feel… good. Really good. And not spiteful for the first time in forever.

Oh, summer.

I feel like, more than anything, I’m going to miss my living situation. It’s not like it’s been ideal over the past few weeks, but it’s gotten a hell of a lot better. I don’t know what to do with myself again.

I’m definitely still going to try and transfer; if I decide I don’t want to, I won’t have to, I know that. But I’m not excited about the prospects here. It’s documentary or nothing, really, and at FIT or Purchase I’d have a better chance of getting to know my own style. I don’t know if I want to be a documentary photographer, or just dick around with everything. I love people. That’s what I want to focus on. And I really don’t know if this is the place for me to do it. It feels so stifling.

I have a project due in the morning and more packing to do. The next time I update my blog, I’ll be home… and that’s too weird for me to think about.

I thought my freshman year would be a little more like the freshman year the rest of my friends are having; partying, making tons of friends that keep you grounded in where you are despite missing family and friends from home, more partying, getting involved in sports and clubs and unsponsored activities (read: Hampshire Easter-Keg hunt), yet more partying. But instead my average day consists of class, nap, lunch, class, printing photos or going into the city for a little while, and going home. It’s gotten to be the most boring routine that anyone living in the limits of the five boroughs could possibly have. I have been getting more and more excited about the projects I have to do and the classes I’m taking, but I feel more and more empty with every day I spend without a friend to talk to.

The Boyfriend is coming to visit tomorrow, as is BroFiendBro. They’re staying for a few days, which will be nice, for sure. Generally being a girl with Andrew is pretty lovely. He lets me shop, I let him shop, we have trying-on-clothes parties. He, Alex and I will no doubt have a minor squee party in Grand Central when we see each other. And I have somewhat willing models at my disposal when they’re around, so rest assured I’ll be dragging them to Central Park for photos in the Ramble. I’m excited to see them — they’ll be the first real physical contact I will have had since I went home for easter. I guess that might be part of the issue as well — I expected more physical affection, because I’m most certainly spoiled in that respect at home. I get hugs from my mother, The Boyfriend, friends, the Joneses… even people I don’t know very well give me hugs at home.

It might be the atmosphere of the city (New Yorkers, while largely not picky about personal space when packed into the 3 Train on a Friday evening, are most definitely picky about who gets to hug them), but it seems to be more the atmosphere of the college. It’s almost stuffy in that respect; frat brothers can hug, sorority girls can hug, but other than that, it’s a pretty stark horizon for my hugging possibilities. Someone check Leviticus, affection is probably a sin.