Teen Angst

Remember when I started that new series, Teen Angst, back in August? Then I didn't ever post again? Well, the baby sickness is calming down (thank the Lord!) and I'm back. So, here we go...

11-27-98 (18 years old)

I wanted to be alone. Actually my real feeling was that I desperately needed to be alone and I couldn't help that feeling. Stuarts* seemed like a good place to be alone. I'm sad. I don't know I guess it could be the holiday season upon us once again and I guess I can't help recalling how I was feeling last year at Christmastime. Right now I can feel that my self esteem is low and that I do not feel like my usual happy, giving self. It's like the best way to describe it is bummed but oh it seems much more profound** than just that. I've been having dreams about someone holding me in his arms. So, I've grown used to this gnawing loneliness that I've carried for so long but it seems that in the past couple of days it just can't stay down and it is gnawing at me. I want to cry so much I feel all bottled up inside and I'm not sure why. I feel awful about the whole situation with Garrett*** which perhaps in the future will seem trivial, but at this moment I only feel that what I did was wrong. Then there's Dad. I seriously am doubting that I'll be able to get time off to go back to Philly for Christmas. I don't' know how I feel about that. And no matter how much deep seeded anger I have in me for Dad, I still miss him and especially if I don't' go for Christmas that will be the longest time I've gone without seeing him. I can't help wising that he cared more.**** I guess that's all I ever wanted and it's just never happened. Is that so much to ask? I don't want to deal with anything and suddenly I feel I have to deal with everything all at once. I don't even see why all this matters, because what do our lives amount to if we are not happy? We just end up moping around taking up everybody else's space for no good reason. I don't really know what my motivation is right now. Don't get me wrong, this certainly isn't any kind of suicidal feeling. It's just some kind of profound unhappiness. I feel I'm just going through the motions and can't be sure where they're taking me next. Maybe I don't even care either. Okay, so let's be honest here. I know that the real reason I cam to Stuart's was because I was hoping I'd run into Garrett here. I mean, it is true I just wanted to be alone (or more accurately, left alone), but when he wasn't home when I called this morning all I could think about was seeing him. It's all I've been able to think about at least since yesterday morning. I don't even know if he's worth all of this thought or not. I almost wish I hadn't come on Monday night and hadn't seen K hanging all over him. I almost wish that I hadn't left that message on his answering machine. But wishing never got me anywhere, did it? If there was a god, if I knew what I believed, I would ask him to give me strength now, I'd rather not spend my time feeling this way or feeling that all I want more than anything is a sweet caress, is to be held and that my strong want (need) for this makes the joy of anything else acquired much dimmer in my heart. So where will I end up? Maybe I'll end up an unhappy overweight addicted to nicotine lonely single old woman. What do you think? I share my every thought with you, wish you were able to give me an answer, I am sure that you would know what would make me happy. And I am sure you would know how I could make myself a better person and to improve my life and the lives of those around me. I play the fool, falling too hard too soon, able to over analyze every situation I get into, every move that is made, every person I meet and every breath of air and word spoken by said person. Able to see life as a silhouette of happiness. Wishing for the shadows of my doubt to disappear. And when I look back at this journal entry will it just be one long cliche to me***** will I have been writing in clips and phrases of what I have already experienced? Or will I have been profound and poetic without even trying in this caffeine heightened state of awareness as my mind outruns my hand and I try to keep up my words turning into unintelligible scrawls? Remembering that writing is a rush for me, the adrenaline flowing through my veins tells me that I feel the words I put down and that there is nothing, nothing in this world that I would trade for a life of being able to write down my thoughts, my feelings and anything to evoke emotion and response in another person****** That there is no praise greater to me than to be praised for my writing as I say thank you with a cramp in my hand and a smile on my face. That there is no better feeling than to page through a book of my work and to know that these are my accomplishments and they belong to no one else but may be shared by all. And that I must let no negative thoughts, no negative feelings, no rejections and no reflections turn me away from this art that they call poetry or prose or some people call shit but I would never agree because these are my sentiments. And that this exercise of my mind has got my heart pounding, my blood flowing hot and my breath coming short as adrenaline pulls pulls pulls feelings and emotions from deep within me flowing down my tired arm into the ink that I guide onto the paper. Thinking of a famous authors thoughts on writing and wondering one day these will too be published on an anthology called authors of the 20th century discuss the art of writing******* or some such thing. And wondering if anyone in this friendly, awake coffee house has noticed my frantic scrawling and the change of my demeanor from sad to nothing but emotional flow a hard concentration and the movement of my lips to the words I am now writing. And if someone was to notice these things or the way I pause to take the knots out of my cramped hand would they wonder what I was writing about?

And that's how I feel.

* Stuart's was an amazingly awesome coffee shop that used to be in downtown Bellingham. It still exists in a different form in our Public Market, but it's not the same. It was my second home when I was 16-19, I hung out there constantly.

** Profound? Really? I like how many times I wrote profound in this entry.

*** Garrett was the guy who ran the weekly poetry night at Stuart's. I had a brief and strange sort of flingish relationship with him. It ended with us talking and me saying 'you play games', his reply 'i know', and my retort 'don't play games with me, or I won't be your friend'. I know he wouldn't mind me using his name here because he'd probably think this was pretty hysterical. I think I'm friends with him on My Space now.

**** I had a lot of issues with my relationship with my Dad, I rest assured now that he totally did care and I love him a lot.

***** Um, probably the cliche thing. Yeah.

****** I wanted to be a writer then, and I still do. If I could make a living off writing, it would be a dream for me.

******* Seriously? This drivel in some kind of anthology about thoughts on writing? No. Just. No.

I chose this one for several reasons. It's almost a perfect sample of something written at that time in my life. I wrote this 4 days after my 18th birthday. I love the embarrassing cliche of it (my favorites are in red), but I also love that even re-typing this I could feel that rush I used to get from writing. I write here because I still love the feeling I get when I am putting words down and something comes to me and makes me feel. I still share my writing because I want it to mean something, and I still want to write a book someday. I wrote this sitting in my favorite coffee shop, I used to go there several times a week and write in my journal, write poetry, and mingle with the other regulars. That was my culture then, it was me. I also see looking back many journal entries where I talk about being sad - I wish I'd known then about depression and that it didn't have to be that way. But I also love what I see here - this outlet I had where I started writing down and in true 'teen angst' and ended on a high, invigorated and ready to go on.