I've not been taking care of myself. I know this, but change is scary. Change seems like a nuisannce. Sometimes I'd rather fall asleep for a million hours just to hide from it. Or numb myself with alcohol. Or abuse my body with cigarettes and alot of coffee--I find ways to rationalize it, like-this is how I always "dealt" with it. It's okay to indulge, I tell myself. Maybe once in a while, but this is just plain self-destructive. There always seems to be something more "important" that gets in the way, things that aren't really important. It's gotta stop somewhere, especially since I've been getting extremely winded on my bike from all the lung junk and poor maintenance of my roaddog (bike, ha) and bad diet, etc...

And it's weird, because this self-destructiveness is a part of my identity. It's a part of, it seems, a large portion of my subculture's identity. It's hard to get away from, but the signs now are as clear as a hidden spring from a huge mountain I've been struggling to climb. I just fucking ranted on someone else's blog about it-the romanticizaton of it. I just read an amazing book about it (that I found out about from this site, which is going to be the next feminist book club read: Live Through This, on Creativity and Self-Destruction). The message I've always recieved was, if you're creative, ya got be this big mess, and it's sort of sexy. Being a mess is sexy up untill the point I stop brushing my teeth and eating real food. Until I get dog piss on my messenger bag and spilled beer on old, priceless journals.

I need to make a commitment to myself, and it's scary. I'm already feeling so isolated in an area which is, as a friend put it, "emotionally displaced". I'm burnt out, and feeling alone, even with the closest of friends. I fell in love recently with the aforementioned best friend who I saw for a couple minutes today. She stopped by to give me fresh lavender and cigarettes before she went on an epic new england train trip. She's a gal, and I'm a gal, and this is new territory for me. I've been attracted to girls since as long as I can remember but only really explored with curious girls. This was less scary, because I felt there were no expectations. In combination with my severe christian upbringing, hostile treatment during middle school and first years of highschool for my orientation, and all the social conditioning pounded into my head with the message if you are a lady you have less value than a man and can only increase your value with a good catch (or group of guy friends), I've suppressed many desires. I felt shitty and "bad" for fantasies of any of my girl friends/aquaintances/strangers. On top of that, my fantasies of women as a little girl were a retreat from the reality of incest and nightmares, etc..The times I have been with women, I was (but didn't know what to call it at the time) very triggered. But I really love this gal, and it made me realize homophobia can be self-directed. Okay, that was a big tangent but there it is. Any insight would be fantastic. I realized after I saw her last, when she left I kind of fell apart. I'm not sure if I was just superbummed because this amazing ally to share all my deepest secrets with/work on projects with/make music with/and who can relate to the sexual abuse stuff left, or I am starting to form a codependent attatchment. Maybe it's both, but now that I write it out, okay--it's probably more of the former.

Well anyways, what the hell happened? I used to love myself. I re-read Cristy C. Road's Indestructable today and she said something about how long it takes us when we are teenagers to learn how to do this, and sometimes it's thwarted from us, and we have to learn it all over again. That's where I'm at. I used to love myself, believe in myself, and sure I wanted friends and needed them--but not the constant approval and reassurance and helping hand like I do now. And I'm living in an area that I feel lin my heart I need to be in, but damn interpendence is such an alien idea admist all these sarcastic, apathetic, but albeit lovable kids. I want to ressurect that "fuck 'em" attitude. Not one where I didn't give a shit about anyone's feelings...but one where I took pride in every aspect of myself and did things regardless of what anybody thought. I'm glad I re-read that book, because she said another powerful, cathartic thing about how she was looked at as too "p.c." or a "feminazi". She said something along the lines of--well maybe it's obnoxious to them (the people calling her those things) because they don't have to deal with being called a spic or a slut everyday. A friend that just visited me before he embarked on a midatlantic bike tour was telling me something I can relate to on this note, about he always had his roomate/best bud to back him up when he was up against a whole bunch of intolerance, fucked-upness, in the behavior of his peers. I don't really have one of those, so alot of times, I'm the bitchy uptight p.c. feminazi getting down on everybody for these things-supposedly ironic jokes, blatant generalizations, macho posturing, competitiveness... and it's a little much sometimes. It's a little exhausting. Not like I flip my lid over alot of little stuff--these are big, offensive, soul-crushing things. And it wears on me. I start to feel like I'm the "crazy" one.

I seriously need a healing spell. I need a rite of passage ritual. My twenty-first is coming up and sure I'm going to bring it in with an acoustic benefit show in my backyard followed by crit mass and a zombie/caberet dance party, but I don't want it to be a continuation of self-destructivess and debauchary even if I'm legally allowed to. I know only I can decide that, but it's alot when I feel I'm on my own. And I'm still carrying this secret of incest. Another reason why I wish I had that amazing self-loving/fuck you! attitude I did as a 15 year old runaway. I'm working on a zine called I Shot Tommy Horn. Tommy Horn is the name I gave to the social workers who came to my preschool to talk about "good touch" and "bad touch". That was the name I gave them to tell them what was going on, because I believe at the time it was too scary to say who was really responsible. Ironically, my family has made that into a joke present day. "Oh she gave us such a scare--how imaginitive, how confused!" is the general moral of the story. I wish I could shoot down tommy horn for real, especially since writing about it has drudged up so many horrible feelings. I wish I could stick the barrell down his throat and say--I'm not a liar. I'm not crazy. I made it through and I'm tough as shit for it. And nothing you have ever done can take my self-love away. I own who I am. Fuck you!!! (BLAM)