Thirty of the past thirty five hours have been spent in bed. Painful headaches, the type where with every step, every slight movement it feels as though the insides of your neck are crashing around into each other. Back pain also. And wretched coughing so violent it hurt my abdomen.

Terrifying dreams probably due to the insane amount of cold medicine I have taking. Terrifying moments of being awake where my head pulses faster and louder and it seems as if things are moving really fast, making me really paranoid in nervous.

I am going to work in two hours. Will I be able to make it rhough my whole shift? Stay tuned.

i need a tv so i can the paris hilton farm show and queer eye, so i can be part of america

I just got finished watching The O.C., and man, is it good! After I caught myself saying "Whoa" to some bit of outrageouness, I had a brief fit of nostalgia, thinking back to Cypress Circle viewings of American Idol, Joe Millionaire, and various Michael Jackson specials. I sometimes really wish that I had a tv in New York so that I could engage in trashy tv watching. I miss watching stuff that you know is bad, but enjoying it anyways, and having fun doing so.

This show, like 90210, is about a bunch of rich, white kids in California, doing wicked things and having fun doing so. The success of this format should probably give me pause, but I am going to cite Aristotle's Poetics to justify my liking of these shows about rich kids. His theory was something along the lines of: Drama should be about gods and nobility so that that way their falls are much bigger, are much more tragic. They have more to lose. It is a bullshit theory that privleges wealth, and assigns more meanings to the actions exercised by those in possession of it, and really I don't know why I just cited it to justify my love of shows like this, other than I want there to be a reason for their appeal. A reason other than an unacknowledged idolization of these people, of wealth and whiteness.

Okay, fuck it, the reason is sex. It always is. The show is about teenagers, and although they are richer and prettier than most of the teenagers I knew, there are still bitchy high school people, people that want to be cool, and people negotiating ways in which they can be concieved of as sexy. And this is (was) such a large part of the high school experience, and to see this acted out in such a magnified (histrionic, dramatic) fashion is to make these moments all the easier to say "Whoa!" about, to recognize what's going on, and to be distanced enough from the situation (thank god) to be able to say, "Whoa!", to say "I cannot believe she just did that." Watching humans interact in ways so believable that you are forced to say, "What is he thinking?"

The O.C. is not complete trash, there are admirable aspects about the show's production and writing, but it was still shocking tonight - shocking - to hear my current favorite Belle and Sebastin song, "If She Wants Me," played during the background. Belle and Sebastin on The O.C.?!

I also have a little crush on the Seth Coen character. His hair and his cheekbones(!) remind me of a former obsession, Marky Mark Fessenden. And I love having crushes, just seeing this O.C. character who reminded me slightly of an old crush, made me full of desire, a desire to be touched, a desire to touch someone's brown, moppy hair. Yours, Seth Coen. Anyone's really at this point.

fortunate son

Sometimes I think I am being fucked with, that as soon as I think I have put something behind me, stepped into a normal routine, started living a joyful life, something (in this case, some one) has to emerge from the place I escaped, grab my ankles as I try to escape the horror house, and say "No, no, you didn't think you were going to get out that easy, did you?" It is my friend, now a zombie, a bloody fucking zombie, begging of me not to leave them there, to take them with me. And really, they just want me dead also. They don't want to be alone. No one does. I don't want to be alone, but I'd rather be alone than in the company of zombies, of bloody fucking zombies.

I just got off the phone with my dad's sister, my aunt, Herta. She called me about a week ago for the first time in a year or so, holding back tears, just saying she needed someone to talk to, and that she knew she could always call me, told me that my father was not doing well, and blah blah blah, more shit trying to make me numb. When she called last week, a chill went down my spine right before I answered the phone, there was a pause where I considered how I should react to the news of my father's death. However, that wasn't going to be the call. I have known the call was going to come one of these days out of the blue, telling me that my father had died. He has had lung cancer for the past two years, and when he was first diagnosed, he was only supposed to have six more months to live.

That wasn't the call I recieved today either. Herta started off this call by saying that she would understand if I couldn't answer her question, that I didn't have to. And I wondered what question could warrant this warning, nervous about what she was to ask, and then she asked me if she could have my address so she could mail me letters. And that was the question I did not want the most. I did not want my father to have my address, I did not want him to ever show up helpless on my doorstep. And so, I was forced to be an asshole and refuse my address to my dying father. Herta seemed a little suprised by my No, and asked if she could ask why. I merely said that I did not want many people having my address. Then she went into a near crying monologue with these themes, all tied together, and repeated numerous times: I don't know everything that occured with your father, I know he has had problems, He has found peace now and this makes me so happy to know that my brother has found God, I don't know if you are religious or not, Your father is very sick, I need to know who is going to take care of him when the time comes, If your mother is, Or if not, if you are, Because I need to know if I need to take care of him, I really don't understand what I have done or what your father has done for you, and your mother, and your sister to act this way, I know that you and your sister are the most important things to him in the world, He loves you, Have a good life.

And she ended our conversation by saying, "Have a good life." Throughout the entire conversation, I was laconic, my heart is cautious when it comes to my father, cautious from experience, not letting other people know the pain he has inflicted, guarded so as not to allow him to inflict any more pain. My only real inputs into the conversation were, "No, I just don't feel comfortable giving out my address. I am sorry," and, "I don't know what my mom's plans regarding my father's arrangements are, but I know there is no way that I can do anything. I have no money, whatsoever. So yeah, that's something that my mom's going to have to decide." And it was shortly after this last statement that Herta told me to have a good life, but not before telling me to ask my mom to contact her.

My mom is doing her best to avoid the zombie's lunges for her ankles, is trying to keep her heart away from the swamp creatures, and so I am the only person right now in contact with my aunt, and man, it is rough. I am going home for Thanksgiving today, am boarding a bus in three short hours, and I don't know whether to tell my mom about this or not. I don't want to be the zombie lunging for my mom's ankles, the Herta in her life. I am glad my mom is doing well. I am sorry that it took to many shocks to her Catholic sense of charity to finally say No to my father. And we'll see, we'll see. I will have time on the bus to think about this, and to not think about this, to read the magazines I purchased yesterday for my bus ride, to listen to music on my headphones, and to watch the earth roll on by me at sixty, maybe seventy miles an hour.

Throughout 21 Grams tonight, I found myself feeling the pimples forming on my upper lip, fingering them to try to determine how large they were, feeling them form since they were not there when I left for work this morning and wondered with an annoyance why it is that at twenty two years old, I still have troubles with acne.

I want my adolescence to be over. When I got home from the movie, I looked in the mirror to actually see what I had been touching, what I knew I should not have been touching with my oily fingers throughout the movie, but yet could not help it. And I replaced my tactile memorey of my face with a visual one, and then went about replacing that visual one with an altered visual one. I tried to assert my adulthood tonight by popping my zits, tried to assert the fact that I am not fifteen anymore, tried to assert the fact that I rolled my eyes tonight during the film when the kids next to me made "Whoo!" hoots at the sight of cocaine on screen, that I am past that point in my life where I might have made cheers like that, or even had solidarity with those that do. Tonight, I rolled my eyes at the immaturity exhibited by these kids, and said in my head like a grumpy old man, "Shut up," wishing that these punks did not have to interrupt my more earnest interaction with the movie. At home, I tried assert this fact that I am not fifteen some more, tried to show my face that I am mature. I popped the little pimples one by one by one. They are these little white pimples that form on my upper lip, and I am sure that they have some thing to do with my shaving cream, my razor, my lotion, or some combination of any of the three. But man, being little pimples, they also pop so easily. And so with ease, I asserted my adulthood, washed my face, and then looked into the mirror at what I had tried to do, and saw the acne scars, the red, irritated skin, and the just popped pimples oozing that stuff that they ooze when they have just been popped, and knew that I was not there yet, that I am still a teen saying: I am mature, I am an adult now, I can do this. But I am not sure who I am saying this to now. Who, or even why.

Christy is on my living room floor right now, probably not sleeping, because she is sleeping on this tiny, narrow 4 foot long couch cushion set upon the floor since our couch is tiny and she didn't want to scrunch up. I felt really bad saying good-night since I was going off to my bed, my full-length twin sized bed. I felt really guilty, like I was eating in front of a starving person.

But I am glad Christy is here, even though I don't really have adequate sleeping conditions for guests. Tonight we went to the Sidewalk Cafe to see Jaymay perform, and she was really good. Some of the songs she performed had some lines that were a little too saccharine for my tastes, but those occasional problems were cancelled out by her singing. She has such an amazing voice these days. She has always had a good one, but lately, she has a lot better control over it and it sounds fucking awesome. Man, the melodic humming that she does conjures up idealized depictions of lullabies being sung, and you feel all right, because that's the purpose of lullabies to make you feel so, that everything is all right.

It is an amazing thing to see someone improve so much. I have seen Jaymay play numerous times here in my past six months here in New York, saw her play when it was still just two songs at the Monday open mics, and then she was really good, but now, she is a lot more comfortable performing and delivers the lines in the songs just right. She practiced. And that is how things are made great, by a devotion to your craft. And watching her, I thought about my own artisic production, my lack of it, and I chided myself for not being disciplined enough to ever write anything meaningful, to not create in general, to instead, just be a consumer, and at most times not even a critical one. I see lots of art. I go to galleries just about every week, but I don't even formulate criticism of this art that could pass as anything near what using my critical thinking capacities should be able to produce. I say, "That's hot!" to art that I like, because that is easy, and conveys my love without me having to explain my love. Consume. Consume.

Things will change, and this is how they will work: I will write meaningful stuff. I will revise it and rewrite. I will practice and practice, and then I will show it to you, and you will produce meaningful criticism. And then you'll show me your stuff, and I'll produce meaningful criticism. It will be so great.

Man, there is really no reason to be trying to write this diary entry right now, and plenty of reasons why I should not be trying to write this diary entry, but yet I persist anyways.

The reasons why I shouldn't be writing this now: I am drunk. Incredibly so. I was rejected by two of my crushes in really cruel ways tonight. And I encountered a third crush with his boyfriennd.

I have been listening to Morrisey's Viva Hate for the past three days non-stop. I love my fucking discman more than any possesion I own right now. It is amazing to sit outside on gray, chilly, cloudy days bitterly downing your lunch to Morrisey. And fuck you, all of you, fuck fucking all of you who are saying cliche, how cliche, like my manager tonight. My manager who last night asked me about my diary, who somehow, god knows how, found out I had one, may even be reading this entry right here, but asked me what song I was singing tonight, and then when he found out, said, how cliched. And fuck all of you.

Because tonight, crush #1, Christopher (see last entry), was with his boyfriend, but way more friendly with me than either crush #2 and crush #3.

Crush #2 came up and talked to me at the Phoenix tonight talking about how awkward that was the last time we rode on the subway going home with different people. Except I was just riding with a friend, but yeah that was awkward riding on the same car with two of my crushes that were going home together. He, Josh, said as if this was common knowledge that I should have a crush on him, "Oh, you had a crush on that other boy too?" When Josh was leaving the bar, to me, he said, "Well, it looks like another lonely night, I am going home, and I it looks like you're going to go home by yourself too." Ouch. Fucking ouch.

Crush #3, Jared. His quote of the night is: "If you fucking touch me again, I am going to hit you." Jared is about a foot shorter than me, and for this reason, I perhaps thought I would have good chances with him. But he has really good hair, and like every other boy I like and don't like, rejected me, took pleasure in it.

And man, I like to think that I am cute, I like to think that I am more intelligent than most people, but these little ego-gratifying assertions start to waver, start to become doubtful, very doubtful when you are not only rejected, but rejected blantantly and harshly by boys you think that you are better than, and you wonder if you are anything at all other than an ugly stupid boy who works a shitty retail job. And Josh rubbed my arm tonight hard after he asked if I was still working at the Strand, and I said, Sure, rub salt in the wound, asshole. And that was the most I was touched my any boy, by anyone tonight. And really, I think all I want is to be touched, to be touched out of desire perhaps. It would make me so happy.

today's word

Last night, Joe called me tragic. This was in reference to my tendency to become outrageously infatuated with people that are not interested in me (that, or they are not gay), and even after I know that they are not interested in me to still carry this torch and obsessively long over them, having my ego smashed over and over again with each slight. Maybe I like that pang in my chest when I am slighted. Maybe that is the whole purpose of the routine, to feel emotions physically, to get high.

Man, why is this how my relationships with boys have always been, developing huge crushes on boys that don't like me? When will I have a crush on a boy that likes me? Or better yet, when will a boy have a crush on me? I can't contantly be giving all my energy to lifting up the masses, to inflating everyone's sense of self, but my own. The key word is teamwork. We all need to help out if we are to make it, to get off this island alive.

better living through capitalism

Right now, as I am contemplating this day, the past couple of them, I am sipping a cup of hot chocolate that came in a value pack of 16 or so packets that I bought for three and something dollars. As I was sipping down the warm hot chocolate, I could not but smugly think to myself: This was a very wise purchase, this hot chocolate.

Even though my Catholic upbringing and education at New College have tried to instill in me an awareness that getting excited about consumer purchases should be a bad thing, I cannot but help rejoicing when I make wise purchases. It gives me a special thrill to make unnecessary purchases with money earned from my low wage job.

Two days ago, I bought a discman and this was also a wise purchase. I have been hesitant about purchasing a portable music player because I thought that instead of distracting myself, of tuning out my surroundings, I should try my best to engage with them, to notice the sounds, to be open to the conversation of strangers. But the sounds are noise, are not usually more than screeching subway cars or traffic, or indistinguisable voices, and the conversations with strangers just were not happening, and now I have a discman, and I think that it actually makes me more attuned to my surroudings. I am more comfortable. I walk slower and take in the visuals, thinking of what a good film shot a particualr street scene would be, how perfectly it would correspond to the piece of music that I am listening to. My mood is made more steady because of the steady music, rather than as erratic as all the usually curt interactions I had with fellow pedestrians tended to make it. This evening after I got off the subway and was walking home to Nico's Chelsea Girl, people were walking right behind me at the same pace and normally such a thing would have made me feel awkward, made me feel like I should either speed up or slow down, but tonight, the uncomfortable feeling of closeness was not experienced because I couldn't hear their footsteps or their breathing, all I heard was Nico, and I walked at the exact same pace, so comfortable in my own little bubble. They soon overtook me and it was a young father with a boy of around six or so. The father was walking fast, or at least faster than the boy could keep up with, and the boy would skip or run to catch up with his father, only to fall behind again and have to skip to catch up again. And I watched these boy with such fascination, and I attribute this to my wise purchase of the discman, of how to the soundtrack of Nico, this sight took on an even more privleged beauty.

And if a purchase can make my life more beautiful, than more power to hot chocolate and discmans. Life is nice. I am thinking more and more so that beauty is the goal, to live a life of beauty and to notice the beauty in things. That it is a pretty simple task, one that gives such a pure happiness when realized, its just that there are some many hindrances and obstacles to this task. The amount of ugliness in the world is sometimes mind-boggling, that there are many attitudes out there that are doing their best to stomp on beauty. This boy at my work, Will, really has the ugliest attitude of anyone in recent memorey that I have encountered. He is so bitter and cyncial about every topic that we discuss. The prayer of St. Francis of Assisi: "Lord, let me be an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred let me sow love. . . Where there is darkness, light ... Where there is depair, hope." This prayer was on a bookmark and I was talking about what a positive message it was. He said that it was not. This prayer about spreading love and hope not a positive message because of its Christian associations. We jumped to various other topics throughout the night, all of us Strand employees, hanging out in the back corner instead of working. Rock and roll, MTV's trying to encourage political awareness, the Gossip, Gary Null - and to everything, Will would exclaim how horrible this or that was, tacking on to just about everything the adjective "banal." Now if "banal" is the adjective that you most use to describe things than something is wrong with your way of looking at the world. He is a force of negativity that I am constantly battling in the struggle for beauty, to realize the beauty in things, in MTV or whatever. So ugly people can stomp all that they want now, stomp, stomp, stomp and try to get me to notice, but I'll have my headphones on and will be noticing the beautiful, the magic things that sometimes get obscured by all the ugly people screaming, "Look at me! Look at me!"

Probably #1 on "Things That I Miss List" has to be my Fever to Tell cd that I left at the place I subletted at the beginning of the summer. I have been listening to the same Yeah Yeah Yeah's song, "Bang," over and over for the past hour or so that I downloaded from their site. Man, it is no lie, I love Karen O and listening to this song makes me want that album. Peter said he would burn me a copy. In which case, it would lose its position on "Things That I Miss List," would in fact not be on the list at all.

Other things that would be on this list in no particular order are: my glasses, various items of clothing, having clear skin, my childhood dogs, my pair of nail clippers, two notebooks, the leg painting.

Things I want in a very particular order that all should be attainable: A new job at a school where I can take classes for free, to learn to play the guitar, a cute boy to make out with, a new bike seat.

Of probably unrelated interest, if even of interst at all, I love giving myself haircuts and more often than not they look totally awful. But it's fucking hair, it grows back, it is there to play with, to chop at will. Sort a faux-hawk, but more so just a bad haircut, but it's okay because I live in Williamsburg and I can make it pass for "hip". Hopefully.

I had coffee today for the first time in three weeks, and as a result I was hyped up, full of energy and went out to a bar for the first time in three weeks. Coffee will equal beer evenutally is today's lesson. I talked to two people with Sarasota connections at the Phoenix tonight, and I also talked to my long time crush, Christopher, only to be rejected again with a polite, "I have to go home." And I love seeing a boy that I want but can't have every time I go out. The desire, the intense desire that occurs every time I see this boy, is so worth the rejections that only instensify the pleasure, the buzz of desiring someone unattainable. And one day, a cute boy will like me back. Bjork knows. One day, it'll happen, it'll all come true.

An Apology

I am sorry my last couple entries have been bitchy complaints. Right now, I am in the best of moods. I saw Le Tigre perform tonight, and they were totally awesome. Sometimes you just need to yell and shout until you are drenched with your sweat and the sweat of your fellow concert-goers, and then everything is all right, you can walk out of the venue, drenched and hot, and step into the cool moist air and breath out. This part of the evening, the post-concert exhale is the equivalent of the cinematic post-coital smoke. You catch your breath out there on the street, and think: Man, that was good.

So good. I was right against the stage because at Irving Plaza there is always an open spot on the far left side of the stage because there is a huge speaker stack there that will make your limbs vibrate with each beat, that will make you want to cover your ears, and worry about the long term effects to your hearing for getting to stand so close. But I didn't care, or not that much, it made the experience that much more intense, the fact that I could feel the music vibrating through me. It made me want to dance and scream more.

And because I love opportunities to scream along, Johanna Fateman is my new favorite member of Le Tigre. Lately, I am in love with female singers who just shriek and wail, and man, oh man, can Johanna fucking yell those lyrics like she's pissed. In between one of the songs, in a normal speaking voice that makes you wonder if all these polite talking people also have an inner punk rock scream just waiting to come out, she read an announcement about some feminist lending library, Jane Doe, starting up in Bushwick, how they are queer and trans friendly, and how we should support them, when some audience member started shouting "Gentrification! Gentrification!" And Johanna was trying to listen to this audience member and it took a couple more repeated shouts before Johanna heard her. This person then shouted: "They are not trans friendly."

This is at Irving Plaze, a fairly large venue, large enough so that it is weird when an audience member is shouting at a performer. Johanna, unfazed, and tough as nails said something along the lines of: "Dialogue is great, but I am just reading their information from this card. I think what they are trying to do though is really great, something that needs to be done, and if you have a problem with them, you should talk to them, get involved and try to change things."

So diplomatic, but yet still so firm in what she believes, and in her belief that we can affect positive change if we participate instead of griping. It really is such an empowering message that they are trying to promote in their music, it's so admirable, and so dancey, and inspiring. Because of the danciness, of the sing-a-longability of their songs, we particpate with the songs, we sing and dance with them, and they move us to action, making us see that mobilization is not impossible, that it totally fucking is, that it is happening right now with everyone singing this anthem.

Their encore song was my favorite, "Keep on Living," the slightly schmaltzy song that always gets me so excited about life and about living it. So I shouted along extra hard because I knew it was the last song, that soon it would be over and I would be in that post-concert state of catharsis, and I wanted to make that cathrasis as intense as possible, and so did everyone else there, so we all shouted like fucking maniacs and danced harder than we had all night because we knew this was our last chance to get off, to achieve orgasm.

And man that cool air felt so good outside. I rode the subway home with positive thoughts and high hopes in my head, and saw this insanely hip boy that I met at the Bruce La Bruce show over a month ago. I didn't say hi to him because I did not remember his name and I was worried that he did not remember me at all and he was reading the New Yorker and my voice was hoarse and I have no self-confidence. But when he was getting off the subway, he noticed me and said, "Hi Charlie." And I know it shouldn't be, but whenever someone remembers my name I think it is such a big deal, such an honor, and this is probably because I have such trouble with names and it takes about two weeks of knowing someone before I remember their name. But yeah, he remembered my name and I saw Le Tigre rock and roll, and so I went home totally stoked, totally happy and excited about life, reinvigorated, and so again, I am sorry for my sour mood these past couple days, sorry for being the the fat kid from the Goonies who didn't think anything was a good idea, sorry for being the heckler from the audience who just wants to point out faults. It was stupid. It was petty. Let's affect positive change.

I have been holding myself back from punching my computer screen all day today. So maybe I did look at porn on my computer this morning, but need I suffer from it all day long?Some horrible software has downloaded to my computer and keeps popping up ads each time I go to a new page. I have spent three or so hours trying to find this obnoxious program. As I have typed these few sentances, it was already interrupted by a pop-up ad for an online casino. The shame, the constant shame and remembering of the cause of all these pop-up ads. I have deleted so many things, but yet the ads still appear.

In other sad news, I am an idiot and threw away my Le Tigre ticket when I decided to chuck out all the reciepts in my wallet a couple days ago. I bought another ticket today, one that I was very careful to secure. I called in sick to work today, and now I am going to go see some Le Tigre.

And does anyone have an extra LJ code that they would not mind letting me have, so my friend Joe can join LJ. You can e-mail me at seniorcitizendiscount@hotmail.com. If so, thanks.

I got home from work a short time ago, and have since eaten some pasta and drank a beer. I am tired and exhausted, not so much from working today at work, but from encounters with people today at work, and from thinking of things I need to do shortly, like pay bills, like sewing up my one pair of jeans that ripped today, like getting new contacts, like voting tomorrow, and like waking up in eight or so hours to work tomorrow morning so that I can see Le Tigre perform tomorrow night and just breath out and dance my troubles away.

I miss conversing with people who share the same value-systems that I possess. Dare I say it, but I miss New College on days like today, where at work, after telling someone what type of deodorant I use (Tom’s), I got into the most stupid argument about why anti-perspirant is bad for you.

Here is one of the highlights of this conversation:

Me: [Not really feeling like having this discussion because it is totally asanine, and so not being as eloquent as probably is possible under different circumstances, namely an argument worth participating in] What do you mean how’s it bad for you? It’s a natural function of your body to produce sweat, it is not healthy, it is unnatural to stop the production of sweat.

Will, the silly co-worker: I don’t understand how someone like yourself who is constantly bashing essentialism, can then in an argument make claims that there is such thing as nature and things are natural.

Me: [Annoyed beyond the ability to form a decent argument against such stupidity] They are totally different things.

Will: See, but they are not.
[And blah, blah, blah ... more unintelligent gibber gabber that does not grasp either what essentialism is, or what nature, in the earthly sense is]

And it is conversations like these where I want to bash my head against a wall over and over that stress me out, that make me wonder why it is that I can not have cool friends in New York. And cool not meaning anything elitist, but meaning people that share my worldview, that are cool because of that, because they know what is what.

But it is okay, it is all okay. Tomorrow, I am going to wake up and affect democratic change. I am going to be a good American citizen and vote no on #3. I am going to go to work with a heart full of love like I do every single day, and am going to try to keep it full of love all day long, to laugh off stupidity, and then I am going to go shout feminist anthems till my lungs are hoarse and dance till I am covered, fucking drenched in sweat.

halloween

For some reason, it is more fun to be in a big group of people that you do not know than with a big group people that you do know, and have known for years. There is still something to be learned from the unknown. Those conversations are not all some variation of: "So, what have you been up to since the last time I saw you?" They are more broad, more playful: What do you do, What's your story, What are you doing here, Wait, where are you from? And in those questions, as shallow as they may be, there is still a genuine curiousity exercised in the asking of them, however pruient the cause of this curiousity. Things are new, people are, and there are still things to be learned. You still want to.

And so, last night, after attending the parade in the village that was marred by cold as ice weather and mobs of people preventing good visibility, I went with Dara and Mariah to Chris Mitchell's party, which was the big party full of people that I already knew, that I had known for years. A New College reunion of sorts: Maggie Ray, Shellly, Anna Montanna, Jason Grimste, Brian, Sarah, Melissa, and on and on, more people arriving each couple of mintues, and so after about fifteen minutes or so, I said good-bye to Dara and Mariah and slipped quietly away into the night, back onto the street, where my slight depression about the party that had caused so much social anxiety in me disappeared at the first drunken call of "Peter Pan!" that I recieved on Bedford Avenue. I remembered that I was running around in green tights, was called back into the Halloween spirit with the repeated callings of my name by passer-by.

And I made my way back into Manhattan where I went to Josh's Halloween party (the boy whose window I vomited out of after going home with him). There were a couple people from my work there but it didn't matter, because they were dots, small little dots in a whole crowd of people that I did not know, dancing to really fun music. And I danced and sang along to songs I knew the words to, but even more importantly, to songs that I liked. And I talked to people that I did not know, asked them questions that I wanted to know the answers to, and I even made attempts at flirting with some people.

Perhaps all that talk about knowing a crowd and not knowing a crowd all comes down to whether or not you are so familiar with everyone there and already know that you should not flirt with any of them, that nothing would come of it, or that you would never in your life want anything to ever come of it that determines how exciting, or unexciting the party will be. And this second party was exciting because of this, because familiarity is the death of desire and here I was not familiar with anyone, because there were people there that I desired, and there were people there that I tried to flirt with, and really that's all I can ask for, all I really want from a party. Besides the booze and the dancing that are requisite of any party and as such, not even worth mentioning as neccesary, the neccesary thing for me to enjoy myself at a pary is conversation initiated and further propelled by desire. Conversations brimming with excitement because latent in them is a wift of potential sex, of naked bodies togehter doing things, and so I talk and talk.