2000-12-20 || it really is 9:23pm.

|| where should i go? ||

i haven't been able to write about being down here, about crying on the way down in my car, finding more comfort in the silences than the stations that bobbed in and out of frequency along the grapevine. about the strange phenomenon of coming home: opening the front door, the dog jumping up on me, my parents running up the stairs and rushing to give me hugs. sometimes it feels right. sometimes it feels like a cog is missing in the wheel and everything has slipped just slightly. the reactions are off. i say way too much, can't stop myself from talking, from telling my parents all about this dreadful party i had gone to the night before that had mushroom tea and pot brownies and cookies and a boy named davor who was in a bondage harness and velvet hot pants that took a strange liking to me.

d: you remind me of my friend pippa.

me: i do.

d: yes, you are both tall girls with strong facial features and you are just lovely.

me: pippa.

and then he pulled a davor trading card from inside his hotpants and gave it to me. i have it if you don't believe me.

and he was missing his left front tooth.

and i am always tall and strong. big. sturdy. i.hate.it.

and my parents smiled, offered to help me with my bag upstairs, but wouldn't look at me directly.

and i want to sit at a table and ask my parents to tell me their secrets. i want us to share secrets. i want it to be all right that i have smoked pot and they have smoked pot and we are still here. no structure has disintegrated.

i want to hear about when they were my age, so that i will know that it is true. that they were like me once. that they should understand me when i tell them i don't know what to do with my life right now. everything is so wide open and i can fall for miles and miles and miles. and am i supposed to know? should i have a plan? how did you do it? how did you know that when you saw this man, when you were exactly the age that i am now, that you would end up with him for the rest of your life? that things could possibly work out so well? that you could be standing in a supermarket check-out line with your twenty-four year old daughter and still gawk at this man from across the store, know him so well yet still be pleased by the sight of his face?

can i possibly be that lucky?

is this making any sense at all?

i just feel out of place. i don't feel comfortable with my parents. or kelly really. no where, really. i don't want to be home alone either.

and i hate driving in this city.

i miss san pablo avenue and its 35 mile per hour stability. the way the leaves hunch up against the windshield at stop lights.

p.s. hi hi elka, i'll write you back soon. xox

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