These · are · my · Confessions

I have been keeping this journal for a long time, and time is essential to what makes something worth anything to me. I believe the time I have invested into this digital notebook, chicken scratch is what makes it valuable to not let it rot away.

Every few months I hit a mental block where I feel a bit hmm, nostalgic? I crave sweet-smelling things around me. My female side blooms I want to dress up in pretty skirts and wear a bit of dark make-up and call a friend to come over to bake brownies with, escape to light sounds of passionate melodies and trade thick, bound books with, show my balcony to, and show off the new candles. But there is no one I can call to fulfill those desires. Some people want to stay in, some decide to go to sleep instead, and some are simply too fucking far away.

I often get upset at people, mostly those who I wish I spent more time with on a regular basis but don't have a hate for anyone. Recently I decided I dislike small talk, I dislike lies or trying to be anyone you are not, I dislike rudeness and snobbery in people, I dislike extreme petty behaviorisms, I dislike people don't get off their ass or look around at the really unfortunate who still smile. Usually I love the world perhaps a bit too much. I see too much beauty reflected in people, especially in the poverty-stricken and the humble families I work alongside. The strength that people in the bay area have to survive and care for their family is beyond what I have seen before.

I do like and enjoy people who smile through their eyes, and have good souls who mean well and take care of their animals, their children and their loves. Who understand with patience and tree-like wisdom, who read, know a little about everything, who laugh and don't take life too seriously. Who can stare out in the distance with me. People with a terribly geeky or morbid sense of humor, a passionate nature, a creative energy, a hunger to help, to live, to breathe and get through life without wanting more than what they have that very second. People who can make you feel good without being falsely charming. At this point in life there is no need for false covers, facades and hard stubborn demeanor, no need for power survival techniques. I want to surround myself with people who say what they mean, understand beauty without jealousy; who are calm, composed and loyal and mostly those that always want to get together and can't hang out with you enough.

There is something raping my soul. This itch inside my map of veins that I cannot seem to get enough convincing, prodding and dire, intellectual advice about.

I relate everything back to childhood friends. Stephanie and Kaye would laugh and make photo scrapbooks of our days. Jessica put together binders of our daily notes and summer journals (which we shared only with each other). The boys...well we were on the lawn of our school, looking over the church and I would bring up my philosophy and they would bring it back to which girl in class they'd like to fuck most.

After high school- months of I said, you said, he said, they said, were over and the concrete reality smashed down from the second story window, this was all a facade. I disappeared and walked the New York Cirty streets alone for the first time in a city too big for my breaking heart. I never came back to my high school...I was too close to death when i was there.

I moved on fast and a few years later I was greeted by an old high school friend that referenced someone I didn't talk to in over a year by saying, "Oh you're her best friend!" My brows struck up because it occurred she was still living back there. Were there others living in the past? Was i living in the past? I still call on Bari's birthday and I still think about Natalie when I talk about Santa Barbara. I check in on Sarah when i drive home to the valley.

What do I make of the seeds planted in primary school of braiding each other's hair, sneaking candy, innocent laughter, lies, the first false promises and meaningless rings? What do I make of remembering back backs in rows under the recess bench had to be piled by the group of friends you associated yourself with, what happened to all the people that hung out on the stage or the lawn or the tables beside the lunch lines? Not to mention drama classes and twin brothers in junior high. After school we listened to portable radios and drank, made jokes about the possibilities of life. I'll never forget in 3rd grade no one wanted to walk first or last in our single file line as though a snake wouldn't bite the boy in the middle. Eventually waves parted and people moved on. When I saw the fat kid in the casino nightclub years later in Vegas he wasn't the fat kid any more, but a muscled up good looking brick layer. I think back on the first time I smoked pot and all the things I once thought I'd lost, misuse of tampons and sega master systems, super nintentos, and "what would you do if..."

How quickly we move on and how quickly we forget what we have left behind.

My wedding list is a carefully constructed list of who is in my life presently and who I am still comfortable enough to be vulnerable around; and who i am obligated to include.

As I read through the list inevitability hits me and it's sad I won't have Kelly there or Steph there. It is sad Erin after so many years will not be invited or that Matt will not be there.Daryl. Charlie. Chris. Dave. Daniel. David. Eric. Deven. Jenn. Evan. Jason. Jeff. Josh. Nessa. Amanda. Molly. Pam. Robert. Sam. Scott. Steve. Fuck

For me, time continues to be the scariest part of life. Friendship continues to be the most sacred yet unpredictable thing of all...

I wonder if all we are is really empty, a void, if that is what we truly consist of. I wonder if we make up everything. Make up love, make up sadness. make-belief. These kids, oh my heart is too big for these kids.

I've been very depressed and upset for the last couple of days. Having an overactive imagination doesn't help in understanding life.
Last night I spent four hours in the ER at West Hills hospital with my mother, as we earnestly watched over my great grandmother at 104 (105 this November) recover from a fall she took out of bed in the middle of the night. To everyone's surprise, her cardiv. scans were perfect, her blood work amazing, all CAT scans clear, all Xrays negative, and as they ran test after test on this woman- this remarkable and strong woman- she quenched with pain and bewilderment and then turned to me. She starred and I asked my mother in English (a foreign tongue my great grams doesn't know) if she thought my ggrams knew who I was. At that moment, she said my name "Marina" and followed it with "are you here getting practice on me for your degree?" the humor. The ability to take a moment of complete sadness and fear and even though confused and hurting, she knew who I was, what I'm studying, and constructed a perfectly timed, well articulated joke with such poise. She amazes me on a daily basis and as I laid in bed at 5am after taking her home, for the first time I was able to smile with tears in my eyes and thank G-d for this gift that is my great grams. May we all be as fortunate in our lives. I feel like I'm learning so much more about what life should be about. My fear of the unknown is dwindling, sputtering, and basically laying on the ground choking. Understanding takes the state of this confused place. Life continues. It's going to get more exciting. The mischievous twinkle in the eye of the universe tells me so.

how stupid i feel after expressing these human emotions.
how willing i am to feel stupid.
how stupid it is to feel stupid
about something i feel.

There should be a law about how many accidents one person can be a part of in a single lifetime. Well if there was, it is likely that I would find a way to exceed that anyhow.

life is insane, really really. i think it must be me and my spirit which is restless and i am forever wandering and scared but i have yet transitioned into something complete, will i ever? i don't know.

instinct is what has been driving me lately. actually utter complete insanity and impulsive decisions that have thus far made me a better person.

i've been here before...but memory tends to be pushed back into some dark closet in my mind of how scummy and frenzied it gets. I'm scared. I have a lack of sleep and i'm dizzy.
Nothing compares to the feeling I felt when I crashed my Tahoe. NOTHING. I thought I was gona die. I thought Eric had died. no joke. I laid in the hospital bed and there was no one there. NO ONE. (My parents and sister undoubtedly arrived in due time). My best friend was in South Dakota, the guy I was dating was looking for a way to break things off with me, and well none of my friends deemed it important enough to drive 30mins to be there. I'll never forget that feeling. That empty, sick to my stomach, lonely fucking feeling.

I never felt it before that night and I never felt it again...until tonight. I talked to people yea, but I came home... no one was here and no one arrived until my parents and sister came home late. Not that this was even comparable, by any measure, to the accident a few years ago- I felt that feeling again and it truly saddens me.

I'm glad everyone is okay. And it's awakening that family will forever be the only constant in my life.