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I'm starting to feel sort of bad for the way I treated Jérémie, so long ago now, it seems. I feel like I've been too harsh and rude and brute to him, and like I haven't even given him a single chance. A chance at what, though? I really don't know. But I'm just starting to feel the tip of the wave of guilt. It's like a tsunami you see in the distance. You try to run away, but part of you just keeps. looking. back. It's so stupid, but you just can't help it. Just like it's probably stupid for me to begin resenting myself now, of all times. Aren't I the one who stated that he'd become like the rest? That he was slowly--but surely!--conforming himself to the image of men I've always had and loathed?

I'm not really sure what's happening. I probably shouldn't have spoken to him that other night. I had opened the window, on MSN. I probably wouldn't ever have written anything if it wasn't for the fact that... well, the drawing I did of Cathy and him, he was using it as his display image. I've been trying my damnest to just try and shove him out of my mind and life--and heart, maybe?--but to see that he hadn't forgotten me... or that, in the least, I still had some presence in his life... well it drove me to say hi, in the most modest way ever, probably. I said something like I felt like I owed him a 'hello', and to check up on how he was doing. (If it didn't bother him.) Because my guilt complex completely disregards the person I'm talking to. It always acts despite my best efforts. Or maybe i'm just not putting in enough effort?
Well that's for another day.

I'm fairly certain I don't love Jérémie. Not anymore. Something shifted, and although I'm happy, I sort of feel like a hypocrite. I told him once, didn't I? That I was sure that the man I would marry would only be second-best to him. I told him that. But see, I don't think that statement is true anymore. I was in the throes of love! What else could I say? Everything felt like the end of the world at the time--the end, and yet the beginning all the same--and so everything felt so. exaggerated! The time I spent with Jay, the months, the years, they all went by without my noticing it. My friendliness became more and more and more until, and I confess! it became some sort of an obsession. He became something I constantly thought about, worried about, fussed over. Though I should do well to admit that worry and anxiety and dread were what filled the curriculum at the time. I was so scared, scared witless, that I would end up annoying him that I just didn't really think about what I said or did. This would probably be considered ironic, I suppose. I was scared to annoy but made no effort to prevent it from happening, should it ever happen at all. I just kept on continuously talking to him, day after day after day after day. I'm still not quite sure how he endured it all. Perhaps he's got more of a talent for dissociating himself from situations than I do. Because I know I would've killed myself if I had to bear what he did. Especially if it was on a near-daily basis!

But all that's changed now. And so I find myself wondering if he'll ever have the opportunity to see that change. It would be a shame if her never could: he's one of the fundamental elements in that entire change. Although I'm not sure if it's quite good or bad, I know he's a vital piece of the puzzle that I once was. (I'm a new puzzle, now in 3D!)

Jérémie, Jérémie, Jérémie... That's the only name I've been saying for a while now. But i've been thinking about Martin a lot. I've been thinking about a lot of people... well, no. I suppose I've been thinking of an entire era of my life. An era when my thoughts were simpler and not so dark and morbid and depressive. (I keep a smile though!) A time when friendship was easy and fun and when anxiety was a word that I didn't know. When I went to the YLC on afternoons, rode my bike there, rode my bike everywhere. The first love, the first throbbing beat of my heart when I thought he knew. (Imagine, I didn't want him to know, but everyone knew. And I thought he knew--HE KNEW--but he didn't know. He only found out much later: I was a coward and couldn't even say it to his face.) He was my first love, Martin. Something inside me still reaches out for him. But that hand's bruised and bloody and battered: I beat it back all the time. I'm no decent match for him, I know that. I'm nothing for him--not to him. I'm a friend to him. A dear friend, still, I hope. Distant, but dear. (I wonder if he'll remember me in ten years?)
Valerie called him the other day. I took the bus home with her. He said to say he said hi. (It looks more confusing than it really is.) I was so happy: that was the first sketch of any form of communication I'd had with him in a long time. Oh, he's on MSN, sometimes. But if my college life is a bit hectic, I wouldn't like to imagine what his is like. It must be... quite something, yes.

Melancholy, I suppose, would be a good word to describe this. I hate it. I completely, totally, with every fiber of my being, hate this. I hate Time. (I don't quite like offending her in such a way, but the truth is the truth, whether covered by lies or displayed to the naked eye!) I wish it would stop, or bend to my will. I wish I could go back and relive any and every moment of my younger days. I wish I could go back and live them even more fully, to appreciate every second in the presence of the company I loved and craved and adored.
I want to go back to the rainy days running outside, chasing after each other, for no other reason than boredom.
I want to go back to the summer days, outside, playing soccer or frisbee or just throwing a ball around.
I want to go back to the autumn days, walking in the streets and just walking faster to get to everyone.
I want to go back to the winter days when I would snuggle and think of him with a smile, or walk in the snow and dance and sing.
I want to go back to the spring days when we went on trips to camps, where we developed friendships thicker than blood.
I want to go back to everything.
I want to go back to him.
To her.
To them.
I want to go back to everyone, but sadly, life just doesn't work that way. Maybe it will, someday, in a few thousand years. (Or maybe we'll be surprised, and time travel will be possible in a few centuries!)

A lot of times, I find myself wondering if I'm the only one who spends so much time thinking about these things. Because, quite frankly, I'd be amazed if I could remember a day when time and past and future and eventualities never crossed my minds. I can hardly remember a time, anymore, when thinking was something I could stop. (Or, perhaps, something that was never actually conscious.) As far as I can remember, now, I've always thought this way. Only when I was young--four years old, around that time--I didn't think. If I thought about anything, I said it out loud, and that is the brilliant innocence of youth. Thoughts are never mulled over incessantly and everything is unleashed into the world. There are no burdens and there is no pain that your mother--or father!--cannot throw away, get rid of.

Now that I look back on things, I also want to go back to the time when, in elementary school, everything was easy. Everything was fun. I was a gifted child, then. I was praised for my attention in class and my grades were higher than they will ever be. Friendship was an innocent, superficial thing. No problems were shared, simply because there were no problems worthy of being shared. Nothing was wrong, and everything was easily solved. (However, sometimes one person was persistent, and the problem would go on for weeks. But never much more than that.) There was never this sense of guilt for everything I said or did. Nothing was ever so horrible that I would have to blame myself to the point of wanting someone to torture me. Much less to the point of even remotely considering self-harm. I had never, in fact, considered the latter until the late tenth grade.

Which, again, brings me to innocence.
In the tenth grade--oh! the naïveté I still displayed! I fell "in love" with another girl. In love with another person of the female gender, can you imagine? It was the most disgusting thing the school had ever seen. Aside from the other homosexual couple in the school--both girl are very close friends of mine, still today--she and I were the single most odd thing the high school had ever seen. People stared at us as though we were some kind of an attraction, freaks of nature. (This has yet to be discussed; "freaks of nature" can be either pejorative or very playful.) I was always left alone. I had exploded in fits of rage before, although only once, possibly twice. And so people knew to leave me alone. I was a vicious little thing. But she--my girlfriend of the time--was a new girl. She had just arrived at school. And already we were together! We had met through a friend at school, online, and it just clicked right then and there. But I digress. The entire school, it seems, launched itself at her. She was constantly persecuted by everyone. Only a few showed their support: those are the people I will be sure to remember my entire life.
Her utter defeat and sickening acceptance drove me to the worst addiction one could have: self-harm.
I constantly mutilated myself. I have the numerous scars to show for this. One particularly deep gash--the only one that you could see from a fair distance--is the result of my lying to the poor girl. My parents hated her. (And even now I doubt that the word "hate" is strong enough.) I take the blame for that, however. I introduced her in the worst way a child could ever introduce a same-sex partner: they came home to a foreign girl lying in bed with me. It may have been quite lighter of a situation if I hadn't rushed things and said, the moment they stepped inside, that she was my girlfriend. Insanity ensues, and months of pain--emotional and physical--mark the ending of my tenth grade in high school.

Innocence is a wonderful thing. If I'd kept it, if I hadn't been such a a liar and secret-keeper, I may have been far better off. If I hadn't been so extravagant and, dare I say it?, arrogant, I may have... Well, in fact, I've not the slightest idea of what could have happened, or what I would have been able to do at that time. I'm rather content with the choices I made, however. I must live with the decisions I've made, the events that have happened and the results that I haven't necessarily even worked for.


I've written so much so far, but I still don't really know what this is. This isn't a diary: there's nothing here that's personal enough for that. But this isn't some kind of a public reflection, either. If it was, I would've written in a much neater fashion. My thoughts would be more organized than they currently are. Black on white, all these words are just jumbled thoughts thrown together to form something like a pseudo-literary piece.

But I digress. Onward, men! We still have much to discuss.


I read something today, from a certain Lora Innes. To say she's a fan of Nathan Hale would be quite rude of me. But that really is the only way I can get my point across with less ambiguity. (Other terms may have more space for interpretation, and that just won't do.) She wrote something a rather long time ago. I haven't read it before today, because I didn't quite know her until very recently. Her comic, The Dreamer, made me check her out, and everything she's done. I almost regret reading that piece; hearing her say it was extremely personal made me feel like I was peering into a window I aught not to have. But I'm also very grateful to her for showing that particular piece of writing to the world. I've got a lot to learn from it, and I plan to meticulously dissect every part to learn as much as I can. I want to grow as a person, and maybe religion and God are a stepping stone to get closer to that evolution. Or maybe faith IS the goal, because that's as far as I can get. (For now; I'm quite certain I can go above and beyond that if I really set my mind to it.)
I've always had some belief in God and Jesus Christ. I used to go to church every Sunday, then go to lunch with my grandparents. We stopped going to church when my grandparents split. What was the point of going to church if there was no one to talk with about what was said? Was was the point of starting if there was nowhere to end up in? I guess that was the problem. We could've gone to church and come back home. It would've been quite nearly the same. So why didn't we? Maybe my mother lost her faith for a while. My father never did, but my mother rules. I won't blame her; my faith has waned a fair amount as well, over the past years. I was going to say, "I wish I could do something about that." But that isn't what I want or mean to say. I WANT to do something about this situation. I want to. I have to be determined enough to do something. I'm determined, but how much determination will it take to carry me to the end? Just how far will my willpower take me until I get tired and throw in the towel? I don't know, and I'm scared I'll do it. I'm scared I'll give up again altogether. (Giving up on studying the Bible, at any point in time!, would be considered a failure to me.)

I just picked up my father's old copy of the New Testament--this is a little ironic, I know--and a guide... I'm not quite sure what it is yet, but my aunt used it. She's a nun, and my grandfather works for the convent she's in. Sisters of Mary Reparatrix, for those who are interested. Anywho, I decided that I would read the New Testament. It's not exactly the exact one... But, I thought that since I'm a literature student, I may as well study the first piece of literature ever published. At least, that's the excuse I'm giving myself. I'll use that as a reason, for now. I'll discover why I really want to do this along the way. That,s the beauty of it, I think: you discover the bigger, better, real meaning as you walk.

That sort of reminds me of what I'm doing now. I'm not quite sure why I'm writing all of this, either. I wish I could turn this into a novel, but that's wishful thinking. I don't even have five thousand words! I don't even think I have three thousand. Though I suppose that if I keep on counting words like this, I'll eventually make to to half a million.

I just said something to someone. Another idea why I would be writing all this. To get it all out so I can stop thinking in school and just concentrate on what I have to do.
To keep a record that I existed.



Yes. That's why.
Because I want the world to know who I was. That I was a girl who was born, and lived, and died, just like anyone else. That I'm a human being, just like everyone else. I'm a woman, I'm a man, I'm black and white and Chinese and Spanish and South-American and European--I'm everyone and I'm no one. I'm the face of the world but I'm also just one face lost in a crowd.

I want the world to know I was.


Just to know.