5/1/94
I was thinking about Dante today. He doesn't really exist in my life anymore, but I think he was in some way connected to my future. No doubt about it. He was like a prophet. Only when he came along did I begin to see any truth in life. And how much it sucks to be here. Dante taught me two of the most important life lessons I'll ever be taught. He taught me about love, and he taught me about death.
Dante told me he loved me. Me! Someone so incapable of love. He’s the only person to ever have said that to me, and it scared me 'cause I know he meant it. Words can be pretty powerful.
5/2/94
I am not human. I am not human. I am not human. No human could ever argue with their soul, touch it, talk to it, and NO ONE could understand it. I can. I am not like those humans that live around me. I exist as a soul cowering inside the terror of knowing I am some strange creature living within the shell that is my body.
The easiest souls to see are those of little children, infants. Their eyes have not yet been tainted by the cloud of reality. Their eyes are clear right down to their souls. All you ever had to do was look. Look at them, stare at them, hypnotize them with your eyes. They will not look away. Their soul will reach out to bond with yours. If you blink, you will release the delicate bridge that binds you together, the invisible bridge, the silent bridge, the bridge that must be crossed. Break it, and their soul will fall to a tragic, untimely death, leaving the child to face reality alone. Their eyes will cloud over quickly.
5/20/94
It's very strange to me how I always seem to miss everything. I have such a great fear of everything ending that I don't allow myself to fully enjoy anything 'cause I'm just waiting for it to end.
This week in English class, we read The Great Gatsby. I read the last page really slowly, putting as much effort as possible into the impossible task of finishing the book without it ending. I just got lost in it and transported myself completely into its world of delusions, away from what my reality encompasses. After closing the book, you would think I would've returned to reality, but I didn't. It occurred to me for the first time that I am leading a life of delusions just like Gatsby. In fact, I am so much like him that it scared me when he died. I actually felt as though I had died with him. Nothing penetrates a delusion like the reality of death.
Reality was staring him right in the face, but he refused to look at it. He wasn't strong enough to face it, so he turned away just as blind as before, refocusing his sights on the woman who came to represent his ideal. He lived for her. Just like Lucas represents my ideal. Thinking of Lucas shields me from the world beneath an invisible veil of hope. When hope exists, nothing else matters. It is all. It is everything. Lucas is my all. Lucas is my everything. Lucas graduated last year, leaving me with nothing but a picture. Nothing but a picture. But I carry it with me everywhere I go, for while it is nothing compared to him, it is all I have. And I will never forget him. My ideal. No longer a person, but the embodiment of my hope.
I've had a dream of becoming a singer for as long as I can remember. And I hope I have that dream for as long as I live. If ever I were to fulfill my dream, I would be lost. Completely lost. Once the dream is achieved, all hope is gone. If I ever get everything I want, what would there be left to hope for? Nothing.
At times, I've dreamed of becoming a writer, completing a novel. Many times I've started, and every word was written in hopes of achieving my dream, but somehow I knew I didn't really want to finish it. That was Gatsby's problem. He came so close to accomplishing his life's ambition that he overcame hope. Without hope as a guide, life falls apart. Instead of picking up the pieces to put back together, he left them to mingle with failure and death, while hope drifted further and further away. I hope to God I never lose my hope.
6/8/94
Today is June eighth. One year since the last time I touched Lucas. One year since the last time I said something to him directly. I can’t believe it. A whole year. Of course, it wasn’t the last time I saw him. It was just the last time I interacted with him, the last time he was affiliated with this school in any way. I miss him so much. But you already know that. Everybody already knows that. The whole world knows that because I’m always saying it. I think I just have trouble getting it across effectively, and I subconsciously think if I say it often enough, eventually someone will believe me, and maybe--just maybe--understand.
The school is so empty. It has been since he left exactly a year ago today. I remember every last detail of that day. I remember the pattern of the clouds, the smell in the air, the perfect rain. Perfect. I bet it rains at Lucas’ funeral--not to bring up death, but I bet it does. It rained at the end of his high school career, and it rained at the end of the era in which he knew me, the last day I saw him. I was wearing the same thing I’m wearing today. I didn’t even realize that until right now.
I love the rain. I love the feel of it. It reminds me of Lucas. Rain. The weather today is exactly the same as it was last June eighth: rain--not heavy rain, but a gentle rain. The kind of rain that Lucas will have at his funeral. The kind I hope I do. You know why rain is good? Especially at a funeral? Because it is a continuation, a rebirth of sorts, a baptism, just like the water in The Adventures of Huck Finn. When you bury a body in the ground, it’s symbolic of a planted seed. All you need is rain to make it grow. Rain. Rain on our spirits. Rain on our souls. Death is nothing but a new life, not in heaven, but in the world of the dead. Death is forever. The rain is passing. It reminds the living of their mortality.
8/6/94
Alright. Where did it go? I used to have it. I used to have an overabundance of it, but it’s all gone. My passion for life, for fun, for my God-given talents that can put the world on hold, my spontaneity, my lust for perfection and fame...gone. And I want to know where it went. But you know what? I’m so sick of feeling sorry for myself that I’ve just stopped caring.
I’m bored. Terribly bored. And I hate it, not because I don’t like to be bored, but quite the opposite. I love to be bored. I just feel so bad about doing nothing when there’s so much to be done.
10/10/94
I was just thinking how people say a picture's worth a thousand words. I guess I understand that, 'cause you can't get the same things from words that you can from pictures. Pictures can help you remember a face, but words help you remember a feeling. I really think words are better than pictures. Words can make you see, or understand, or do almost anything pictures can. And, yeah, you do need a lot more words than pictures, but when's the last time you looked at a picture and remembered what you were thinking at the time?
10/19/94
I sometimes hear voices in my head. Ceaselessly bickering, arguing voices. I never hear what they're saying, but I know they're there. I'll know what they're saying perhaps as soon as I catch up to them, realize the true absurdity of my life, stop dealing with such trivial disturbances as the people with whom I associate, and take the time to listen--not to hear, but to listen, to understand, and to submissively heed their truths. Occasionally, they materialize when I'm tired or overcome by the pressures of mortal misgivings, but more often, they are the result of the brilliant immortal words of superior beings--in this case, James Joyce--the story: The Dead. Powerful stuff. I can only dream of writing something so innately purposeful, so wonderfully true, and so riddled with honest comprehension.
10/26/94
I know for sure now; I have to be either a singer or a writer. I have to be some kind of an artist because I have my own style, my own ideas, but mostly, I have that superiority that makes me feel like I'm constantly patronizing the rest of the world. I know, I understand, I appreciate, I feel, and I create. I feel total comprehension and satisfaction with my knowledge of the world around me--added to the proper amount of apprehension, of course.
10/31/94
Halloween--my favorite day of the year, and the one time I'm usually into this whole school thing, except today I'm excommunicated from the rest of the world. Funny how all the people that sit by me are absent today. Strangely coincidental and shockingly symbolic. This feeling of total alienation, too: strange, yet familiar.
11/1/94
Things are going remarkably well for me. But I am thoroughly depressed and extremely upset. And I think I know why. It bugs me that people around me are laughing and having a good time. I can't stand their total obliviousness to the world around them. And their attitudes! They don't care! They don't care to know anything. It's too much of a bother for them.
It bugs me how people swear so much. They do it for the same reason they do all their other little things: drinking, drugging, fucking.... Sure, I've said an occasional swear word, but not enough to be worth mentioning. When people swear, especially for no particular reason, they're not being cool. They're not doing themselves any good, they're showing a lack of intelligence and a lack of respect for those around them. And at the same time, they use words disrespectfully, without knowledge, with ignorance of their power. To them, words are meaningless. I wonder what they'd think if someone were to cut out their tongues. A little respect?
Clueless. They are so clueless. It's like in that Conrad book, I feel no particular desire to enlighten the people around me. And I detest their looks of stupid importance. They think they're so cool. I don't understand. I understand the meaning of life, and I understand fate, but I don't understand why nobody else does. Not even adults. So full of false significance. Stupid importance. It's like an unstoppable domino effect: started with one, now it's everybody. Stupid. Dumb. And wrong. Worrying themselves about petty mortal things.
My dealings with other people are mere fronts, humoring their insignificance, their innocence, and their naivete. I generally feel like I’m completely alien to everything that is human. I feel like I’m trapped inside some kind of shell and I’m peering out at everyone through the dark holes that are my eyes. I have friends, but I don't deal with them the way most teenagers do. I have friends so no one notices my obvious superiority. The amazing difference between creatures such as themselves, and me.
11/3/94
Today was just like every other day in school; I went through the motions halfheartedly and got myself all depressed. There's this thing with French class; I can't stand it. It's not that I just don't like it, like say, calc, it's that I cringe at the thought of it. I have a B in the class somehow, but that doesn't make up for all the time I spend miserably sitting at my seat biting my lip until it bleeds just so I won't say anything not so nice to the teacher.
For the last few days, I've had this nagging kind of thought in the back of my brain. I don't know what it is, though. It feels terribly important, but no matter how hard I try to listen, it can't fight its way out. I'm dying here! What is it? I'm so frustrated with things.
11/8/94
I just plastered faces all over my walls. Of course, I guess I've always done that, what with hanging all the movie posters I collect and all. Maybe I just feel less lonely with quiet eyes and soft smiles all around me. I don't even know who all the people are. Isn't it strange how I'm always drawn to things I can't have? Maybe it’s 'cause I like to think nothing can have me, control me. I feel closer to their level, those impossibilities. Question is, why? Why do I feel closer to those so far away?
We're reading A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man for English class. I'm sure it'd be a lot better if I knew what esthetics are. But even though I don't, it's a really awesome book.