a time much different from our own

i want to know what it means to die to yourself each and every day.

a melancholy blue

i just realized what a sad person i come across as. im not really that sad. i just like to pretend im sad a lot. i pretend to be sad and i wallow in being the little bit of sad that i am because it's easy. you've got to admit, its a lot easier to be sad than to be happy. many times i just dont feel like expending the energy to be happy...or it just fits my purposes better to be sad. purposes and mood. perhaps it's because ive been depressed for a while. for a long while. im getting better, guys...i really am. i dont lose hope...sometimes i just get a little lost. dont worry too much about me, loves...i enjoy playing the melodramatic victim who has been wronged in life and in love. and im not saying my life isnt pretty shitty at times...it is. i'll be the first to say it. but my hope is not based on what happens here. my hope is based on God. ive got God, and he's all i need. dont worry about me.

i need to know we get second chances. right now i just cant believe it. there are too many things gone wrong. too many things that will never be forgotten...and most likely never forgiven. but they should be. my heart keeps crying out that they should be. tonight i can't believe in second chances, or that goodness prevails, or that what happens is for the best. i just cant believe such things tonight.

i apologize in advance for my inexcusable irritability

not that i dont love my hallmates dearly...but at the moment, i am ready to kill them all. they stormed into the hall yelling and screeching as college girls are prone to do at times. this didnt bother me too horribly (i forgot to preface this with the fact that i am sick and severely drugged at the moment). im trying to be patient, but i think if one of them so much as glances into my room, they will have their head thoroughly and completely bitten off. i have a sharp tongue when my patience has worn thin, though i truly hate using it. (Lord, give me patience, Lord, please give me patience!) they then proceeded to literally yell at the top of their voices across the hall to each other...then began to...sing...oh holy night at the very tip top of their lungs in the most vile and off key way possible. i am not insulting their singing ability, they were trying to sound as horrible as possible. they were screaming the lyrics in such a way as to grate the ears of any who were unfortunate enough to be within earshot. then the stupid, meaningless banter (usually at pitches quite above that of their normal voices) echoed through the hall. all of this culminated finally with the drunken-sounding screech of one of them asking, of all the hall, where her roommate had gone. i swear to you...if she comes in here...lets just say i pity her. i sit here and i wonder if they would be worse if they were actually drunk instead of merely acting like it.

how confusing it must be
to come across one so scarred as me
to see in one glance what took years
of pain and solitude and tears
to wonder at my wounds half healed
and marvel at these tears i've sealed
in glass jars.
my heart is scarred
and open for your eyes to see

and everyone i reached for in the swirling ocean...instead of holding me up, grabbed likewise onto me and forced my head under the waves again. so i would extricate myself from their grasp and move to the next person...that one over there seemed to be treading water pretty well. but when i reached him with my plea for help, i realized he was drowning quicker than i. reaching out for me, he grabbed ahold of my shoulder and tried to pull himself out of the choking saltwater. my head went under and the vile brine filled my eyes and nose. the roar of the water distorted the sounds of struggle above and the gasping voices sounded alien when carried through the sea. opening my eyes in the stinging ocean, i looked around. the brown water blurred my vision more and the thought flashed through my mind that i could just stay down here. just stay and rest. finally rest. pain shot through my head as the flailings of the one above me came into shocking contact with my temple. the brown water became darker and darker with black flashing across my vision.

to be continued...when i find out what happens

in over my head...

people keep asking me if i'm okay. the funny thing is that it takes me a few seconds to realize they are referring to the whole stuart thing. i kinda chuckle when i realize this and say, "i'm fine." i say i'm fine because i have pushed the real issue out of my mind. we did foster care for years. we had two little boys. eric and damien. brothers. a year apart. eric stayed with us for a few years. then he went to another home. one that had better training to deal with him. he was pretty messed up. we adopted damien. another family adopted eric. a few days ago, eric told damien he was being sexually molested. damien said that...its not abuse...its not abuse, but its bad. he was meaning abuse in the "beating up" way. my mom got a few more of the details from him. from what we can tell, eric is being sexually molested. we reported it. eric denied it. theres nothing we can do now. but i believe him. i believe it happened and is happening. and there is nothing we can do.

all i want to do right now is go home. go home and crawl into my mother's arms. cry in my mother's arms. she'll cry too. dad will try to be strong but he'll cry too. none of us know what to do. not even my uncle, the pastor. the pca pastor whose supposed to know the answers. not even him. so if you ask if i'm alright, the answer is no. i'm not. so don't ask. just help me distract myself. help me laugh and play. help me pretend that life is good right now.

...it bore repeating

I've been out walking, I don't do too much talking these days, these days. These days I seem to think a lot about the things that I forgot to do and all the times I had the chance to.

I've stopped my rambling, I don't do too much gambling these days, these days. These days I seem to think about how all the changes came about my ways and I wonder if I'll see another highway.

I had a lover, I don't think I'll risk another these days, these days. And if I seem to be afraid to live the life that I have made in song, it's just that I've been losing so long.

I've stopped my dreaming, I won't do too much scheming these days, these days. These days I sit on corner stones and count the time in quarter tones to ten. Please don't confront me with my failures, I had not forgotten them.

(nico)

a humiliation

well...here i am. ive gotten myself into this. and im ok. amazingly enough...at the moment at least...ive managed to endure what i once thought unendurable. well, it hurts me that he read it. not that he chose to read it...but that it happened. lets see...well, the frustrating thing is that i cant explain it to him and i know that he's going to take everything i say wrongly. he's going to take everything i said on there the wrong way. am i really in shock? is that why ive been laughing? eh. all i really care about is the fact that i'm going home in a few weeks. a few short weeks. life will be hell. ive come to expect that from time to time. damage has been done....i really dont ever expect it to undo itself. its ironic that at the end of it, it becomes new to him. i have a thing about burning old thoughts...or erasing them. there are things i learned through this...pain i went through. i cant erase it and pretend it doesnt exist. i cant. its stupid. i couldnt do that.
come back as often as you like...view my bruises. this serves as merely a photo alblum. i refuse to forget my mistakes, that is why i refused to delete it. i still refuse. come back as often as you like. hate me. fear me. i dont value these feelings anymore, thats why ive left them open to you and everyone i know.

its quite the comforting thought that the most closely guarded part of my self has been exposed for at least three to see and i have survived to tell the tale. quite comforting in fact. the most selfish part of myself, the most secret part of myself, the most hidden part of myself...exposed to the blinding sunlight to realize that, though it hurts the eyes, i havent melted. i havent died. in fact, i find it legitimately funny. oh come on, how else am i supposed to react? this is life, damn it! it sucks...a lot. in fact, my life will be hell for the next...oh few weeks.

::thwack::

ouch...
damn...
well i guess im listening now
...damn.

striking out on a great adventure through unknown places

im sitting here listening to "save tonight" and the line that i used to identify so amazingly with keeps repeating in my mind. "save tonight, and fight the break of dawn. come tomorrow, tomorrow i'll be gone." i dont know who or what i was fighting against when i remember loving and almost crying at that line. perhaps it was change. perhaps it was losing something i wanted to have. perhaps it was growing up. but its not as eloquent as it used to seem...or as beautifully sad. its just a line in a song. it's another person singing the lyrics...not my heart.

perhaps its because i am not sad. it's been a long time since i could say i'm not sad. losing people. hurting. missing memories. falling in love with memories and times i can't have again. i hurt myself over and over. i've been seeing change differently now...for the past few months...almost a year. not something to fight. not something to mourn. you lose so much of life when you do that. God does these things for a reason. i lose things in my life for a reason. and i dont think that reason is for me to mourn their loss. my memories are sweet (with the occasional hint of bitter)...but that's what they'll stay. memories. life is not a photo alblum...life is not some movie you watch...life is exactly that. life. a verb. a state of being. it's like asking who you are or asking why i love someone. i am. i love you because you are. there is no ending because it is not finished. life is something that is. not something you sit around and try to define. it is what it is and it is valued because of it's very existence, not because of it's content.

i am writing this to say that i'm living now. today, i am living. tomorrow, i pray that i will live again. i pray that i will live the rest of my life. i pray that my life will be just that, life. i also pray for everyone...that they may find joy in life. it's hard at times. it hurts at times. it's beautiful at times. it's hideous at times. and at times it's everything and nothing. God is the only reason i have life, in all its meanings. that's the same as saying light is the only reason i have light. but it's true.

the song is over. that's all it was. a song. there are many other songs to sing. so i leave you with a prayer. that you would find life in all its beauty and pain. that you would find God above all.

the Lord is good. His love endures forever. i praise the name of the Lord; He is good.