Wow. I've been negative lately. Oy.

Life is looking a little better lately, for some reason. (I suppose I'm just entering another mood that will eventually pass.) Tonight I say goodbye to 2002 and hello to a hopefully much better year. This past one has been, well... probably the hardest year I've ever endured, at least in some ways. I grew up a lot. Hopefully it's growing up, anyway. Who defines maturity? Sometimes I think maturity is at least partially relative. I hated my sociology class, but studying that infernal book caused me to realize how many things Americans take as canon, as if it was from the Bible itself, when really the thing isn't necessarily wrong in the most elemental sense of the word. What a fine line we all have to walk. Life is hard on perfectionists.

This year, I took a good long look in the mirror and saw both the good and the bad in me. I know what I want in life now, at least to a degree, but in many ways I can't pursue it. Waiting is difficult when you finally realize what you're waiting for. I've got this hope that just won't die, though; hope that there's still something beautiful, just, and right about life. Either I'm ready for a good spanking from reality, or I'm more of a realist than most people my age. Time will tell, I suppose.

 
It irritates me to watch how much my moods change my perspectives on life. Are all these faces parts of me, or are they all masks hiding the authentic yours truly? I'm not sure I even know.

This week, I learned a hard lesson: Tot the invincible, the all-seeing, is perfectly capable of completely pulling the wool over her own eyes. I can deceive myself. I never thought I could, you know. That sounds arrogant. But really, I've always made it a point to be as honest to myself as possible. And yet, here I sit, knowing that for years the truth buried itself inside me, waiting like a time capsule to haunt my future the way the past always does. How odd.

Tot the manipulator has finally manipulated herself into the worst possible situation she could ever be in. When I was little, I thought that by now I would be married and raising horses. Why is it that everyone writes stories about life that don't really reflect life at all? Would we all be too depressed by the real thing? Is life really that ugly? Or is it too beautiful to capture in humanity's neat little boxes? I can't allow myself to forget that pain sometimes leads to beauty, and the withstanding of pain is sometimes a beautiful thing. It sure doesn't look pretty to the person stuck with it, though.

This is the result of watching more than one too many chic flicks in one evening. Introducing Tot's hopeless romantic face. Real, or not real? Is she, or isn't she? Everyone take a look and shake your heads. What ridiculousness. Give her a few years, life will break her of that nonsense. It does the same to everyone else, after all.

 
Last week was a long, dreary, hard week.

Perhaps it's simply because I'm tired. Yes... just a little sleep and I'll be fine... or maybe my eating habits are off because of the season. I haven't been getting enough exercise. Yep. That's it.

Or maybe, every now and then, my subconscious reminds me that somewhere beneath the surface lurk issues I refuse to face. Or they refuse to face me. I'm not sure which it is yet. What next? If I ignore them, will they fade with the passing of time? Will I tick away the hours like a time bomb until one day the shrapnel of my rage scatters to penetrate the fabric of friendships woven about me? Or perhaps I will rot from the inside out, the poison of bitterness and loneliness seeping into the fibers of my soul and eating away until there's nothing left. If I had a choice in the matter, I would freeze my heart to survive the winter. Just add water, Mr. Right, and maybe a little sunshine; and watch new growth consume the stored energy from the old. How conveniently efficient. If only it worked that way.

Yeah. It's been a really, really, long... month... or year... or three years...

 
Does anyone see what I see?

Silence hums and I concur, there is more to the surface than the deep beyond. Who calls? I can hear it, yet the sound evades my ears. Truth twists and turns, winding itself in and through the confusion of the soul, weaving me into a knot. Untie me, unbind me, unhand me and leave me to the wind; I would prefer to float in the fog. Who is my benefactor? Whom can I trust?

Whisper to me of the night... hover before me, whilst I listen to the music your soul sings. You know my song, you and you alone. And yet the tune fades as the music box winds down, and the hourglass sand whips about me, stinging my eyes. The water rises, the whips crack and the march is on. I walk on the edge of a knife; the tightrope stretches, threatening to snap and leave me to tumble down, ever down into the unknown. At least it will be quiet. Until the silence hums...