Mountain Daydream

You came to me in a daydream
carrying handfuls of sand.
You buried me underneath the weight
of billions of tiny pebbles
ground from faraway mountains
in some faraway land.
I choked under the pressure
of everything holding me down-
foreign objects filling up my eyes,
ears, nose, and mouth.
I became a mountain,
towering high and alone.
You became the wall between
what I love and what I've known.
Your body is a sieve,
filtering out the misconceptions in me
and I am a world of mistakes,
buried and towering- high, alone and free.
Should I feel ashamed,
or should I feel proud?
I've got tears in my eyes
and birds in my mouth, singing
"I am what you are, and you are
what you've always wanted to be.
We are one in the same,
dear child from the dark.
I am what you are
and we share the same heart."

Drew this today.

standing under a bridge, originally uploaded by AviaryForToday.

We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

I saw those words, Oscar Wilde's words, painted on the rusting metal of a bridge yesterday.

Did I ever think it would end up this way?
No.
But I haven't done anything right so far to make sure it didn't.

I'm going to fix things. If I can.
I'll try my absolute hardest.

I just hope someone still believes in me.

Reading in the Dark

(I've been listening to Heathers constantly.)






I just want to be home again.

Mitchell is Moving.

Conor, read me a story.

Starting to think that no one actually really cares what happens to me.

Illness.

I feel incredibly sick.
My stomach hurts and I've been freezing all day, and have the shakes.
I find it absolutely ridiculous and irritating that my nerves and anxiety can make me physically ill.
I'm tired of letting my stupid feelings and sensitivity control my life. I went through the day, hardly present in my surroundings. Staring wide-eyed and mostly lost at everyone, and slowly scrawling my notes down about democracies. I just remember being absolutely scared. I couldn't tell you a single thing I actually said today.
It all started last night, seemingly paused while I slept, and came back as soon as I awoke. I was in an inconceivable amount of pain this morning, popping Midol and Advil (the only things I could find), three full doses in two hours. It didn't go away though. When I got on the bus, I put on my iPod and stared out into the cold scenery, at all the mounds of dirty snow, and all the hopeless, frantic people living their lives in a futile repetition of tasks. I immediately began to cry. Is this all we're really here for? To live unhappily for most of our lives, doing things we're told and not really having time to do the things that make us happy, and then to die completely alone with no real proof that there is life after death? To live in fear of someday not existing, but to go about doing things in a rush, doing things to earn credit, earn money, earn a name for ourselves. Earn a living. How do you earn a living? I thought that when we are born, we have the right to life, and to live as we please? But there are so many standards to be met in order to "survive." Nothing here makes sense.
But somehow I managed to find something so stunningly real, in this vast world that makes me feel so insignificant. Somehow you ended up in my life. It's a bittersweet truth. You and I did not meet until two years ago. We had already lived at least a fourth of our lives before we even met. I wish I could have known you before then, and maybe prevented some of this stuff from happening.
As you said: "You are it... I just wish I figured that out sooner."

So here we are,
in the midst of all this-
endless chaotic gloom,
looking for some spark
in the suffocating dark.
Separate cities,
and miles apart. 

Will we ever hold hands again?

Happy Alone.

(Title is a song by Earlimart, really good. Thanks to a friend for the recommendation)

So, I'm sitting in this cold basement, nursing my split elbow, trying to remember not to lean on it. I hit it on a lightswitch of all things, but it happened to be a really old dimmer switch with the knob ripped off, so there's a big sharp piece of plastic there instead. Just so happened to hit it directly with my right elbow while coming downstairs. Ouch.

So, I'm going to post honestly. This is, as my teacher said, basically a window into my head. Only a select few know about this, unless people happen upon it. Which I don't mind, usually, because I don't know them personally.

Here goes.

I haven't been eating enough, apparently, because my parents keep commenting on how I never eat. Which, I think I do. Usually. But people keep saying how skinny I've become (which I mean, I'm not, but I guess it's skinnier than I was). Trying to be less self-conscious though. It's working, somewhat.
----
(continued the next day, at school)
Yesterday, I made a terrible mistake. I keep reverting back to my old ways.
I tell myself, and everyone that I'm trying to change. Yet there is still one consistent stabbing feeling in the back of my mind. It's tiring. Overwhelming, sometimes.
Everybody always forgives me somehow. I'm grateful, don't get me wrong. But sometimes I wonder how they can keep being so nice to me. I hope they don't ever give up on me. I don't know what I would do, then.

I keep telling myself everything's going to be fine. I keep telling myself all this waiting will be worth it. That's the only reason I'm really even still here, able to write this, able to breathe and blink.

I have found, however, I've become even more aware of things. I do not know whether it is a gift or a plague at this particular point.

Trying to make this book last, Just Kids. It's become my safe haven, where I transport myself when I am feeling like giving up. But sometimes it makes things worse; there are so many parallels between my life and Patti's. Some of them are more abstract translations, but some are startlingly similar to some of the experiences I have had, and it seems to line up as I read. The story progresses, and is matched in my progression through the days, slightly slower, but more concentrated into short amounts of days, where the skips and jumps of her paragraphs sometimes span weeks, months, years. Mine span minutes, hours, days.

Woke up in so much pain. I've already taken three doses of tylenol-ish things, since waking up, to the end of first period this morning. My eyes are seeing slower than the timing at which they turn. It's making me dizzy, and flustered. It isn't from the medicine, I know that. I'm not trying for pity. I'm trying to be completely honest with myself and the rest of the world. It's just me and my messed up mind.
I've filled pages and pages of lined paper in my composition book, writing panic attacks on paper. Do you know what they look like? Illegible nonsense, and a hand of writing that I cannot duplicate under normal circumstances. The candle light helps me to focus on just getting out all the bad things quickly, onto the pages and out of my head. Consider it a sort of cleansing. Consider it therapy.

No pain, no gain, right?

Something honest.

I'm so tired of hiding behind these words, all jumbled into metaphors and images. I'm tired of pretending everything's fine with me all the time. Because

What Could Mean More Than This

You are my sunshine.

little bird

you troubled little bird
perched on the winter branch
waiting for spring to warm you

singing a sweet sad song
waiting for the sunshine
to reach its way to you

you sit through wind
and tighten your wings
around your fragile frame

you sweet little bird
trying so hard to find
some light in the cold outside

this is still my favorite i've done.

the wind finds its way into the gaps

alone again in this silly basement.
was going to have company, but something came up. oh well, i'm sure i wouldn't have been a very interesting host anyway.

on a more lively note, i've been corresponding with the artist william schaff, as i plan to buy some art from him. he's quite amazing, and fans of okkervil river will recognize some of his work.
he puts so much emotion into his work, and his style is all his own. sometimes he addresses more obscure topics, some things not for the faint of heart. but that's what art is about. he is doing things that should not be scolded, but revered. he exposes emotions and subjects in his work in a confident, tasteful, artistic way.

i suggest that you pay him respect, and, if possible, make donations so that he can continue his work. not only is he extremely talented, but he's also very kind.

you never come home anymore...

washed my hair in the sink today.

my life is slowly becoming very similar to the book i'm reading.
i suppose next i'll cut my hair like mick jagger.

only thing missing right now is a friend.
when i said i thought it might be good if i talked to you less, it didn't mean you had to stop completely. i just meant i wasn't going to bother you as much.
i mean i know you're busy and stuff...but...



i wish you'd at least talk to me.

More words.

Washed my hair in the sin

Half dead.

I sat and read old notebooks, pages and pages of secrets.
In one you wrote "You look stunning. I didn't know what to say when you got off the bus today... Every moment with you is wonderful."

I refuse to believe you never loved me (not that you ever said that), and I am putting every single speck of myself into holding myself back from you, and letting you be free. It's difficult, when I'm used to clinging onto you like I cling to your arm on a busy sidewalk.

It's crazy to think we've only known each other for a little over two years. Maybe three. You've already made such a difference in my life. You've given me everything I could have ever wanted, and everything I never thought I would be fortunate enough to actually have.

I'm not going to give up on us, I'm just backing off. It's really hard not knowing how you are or where you are or what you're doing. It's hard being apart. For every mile marker between us, there's a tear. For every night I don't speak to you, there's a scar. We can't get those nights back. We just keep progressing, and each hour ticks away and is lost forever. We can't get those exact moments back, or re-do them. But we can make up for lost time, when the time comes. Which is why I decided to let you be you for as long as you need to. Hopefully it won't take long to untie the little knots and tangles inside you, because I miss you...
I miss you a lot.

But I will sit and make art, and write songs, and read books until enough time has passed and you call me and tell me everything's going to be alright again.
I promise I'll wait for you.
No matter how long it takes.

Peter Pan and Wendy.

You're busy chasing your shadow
trying so hard to pin it down
while I'm sitting by the windowsill
waiting for you to come back around

I belong with you in Neverland.
"You're a girl," you say.
I know I'm not a Lost Boy
but we're all lost, aren't we?

You shake your head
and say to me, "Lost girl,
will you wait for me?
I don't want to grow up this way."

I wipe my little tears away, thinking
about the adventures we've had, you say
"Just keep your window open, Wendy.
I'm only a whistle away.

Keep wishing on that second star,
I'll come back for you
when you're all grown up
I'll see you again someday."

Frozen wasteland.

Listening to the Mountain Goats album, Get Lonely and tons and tons of Okkervil River. Took a nap today, listening to Sigur Ros.
Music surrounds me.

Went on a random adventure.
Bought a yellow Suntone camera, an Aztec-esque sweater, a little kid shirt with lots of dinosaurs on it, some crazy tanktop with an elephant and palm trees and some guy who looks like Aladdin, a musty old filing box for my photos, and a brown knit pencil skirt. Drank a whole 42 oz. of Arizona Green Tea.

... and I still don't feel okay.

Score.

...

Well.

This is fun.


P.S. Wow. Pete's old. The guy playing drums had bad hair.

Promises:

#1. I'm not letting you down again.
#2. I'm never going to give up.
#3. I will always take care of you.
#4. I trust you.
#5. I believe in you.
#6. I love you.

I'm trying to distract myself. With poems and songs and abstract art.

The title is part of a song I wrote this morning.

I woke up at hour intervals last night, feeling as if my insides had gotten caught and twisted in a plant riddled with thorns. My heart raced and I was drenched in a cold sweat. I'm sick, in more than one way. I think I've been ignoring symptoms of a diagnosable illness, as well as some sort of other medical things. Numerous "real" things. I'm hoping I can self-treat them and they'll go away.
Then comes the mental side of it all, the emotional side.
All the anxiety I used to feel every night is back, ten times worse than it was a few years ago.
I feel sick to my stomach every day now.
I can barely eat. When I stepped on to the scale this morning, I was scared. I've lost five pounds or more within the last few days.
Last night I wrote a three page letter to myself, just to get all my thoughts sorted out into paragraphs, instead of letting them keep frantically buzzing in my head.
So when I woke up this morning, heart still racing, still shivering and damp, I decided to write a song.
I ate a little breakfast (two pieces of turkey bacon and half an activia yogurt =/ ) and grabbed my guitar. I listened to the Mountain Goats for a while. Then I shut it off and began to write. At first I was frustrated, I kept scratching out lines, and rewriting them. Repeat.
Then it happened. Something clicked and I found a melody. A rough three-minute-or-more summary of what's been twisting up my insides.
It's deeply personal.
Moreso than anything I've posted on here.

That's why I'm keeping it to myself.
Writing, for me, is therapy.
Sometimes people don't need to see what I do...
I think I'd scare them.

Butterflies.

I'm painting an abstract painting. It's based on the colors and shapes of a tiger lily.
Hopefully it turns out well.

Just kind of making a mess right now.

scared, originally uploaded by AviaryForToday.

I don't really know what to do.
I'm terrified. 

I'm not giving up.
I still believe... it just hurts...
I never thought this would happen.

I can't believe this is happening.