you put your handprint in the brand new sidewalk.

Sometimes I have these crazy urges. Like just now, I had the urge to chop off all my hair. I didn't, but that's a moot point. Sometimes you just get so fed up with everyone being prettier, that goddammit, who needs good hair.

And all I'm saying surely allegorizes some bigger meaning, but I don't know what that meaning is yet. Or maybe I do, but it's all in my head and it makes sense to me but to hell with everyone else.

You wouldn't believe how hard it is to find someone to talk to you when you have such a mouthful of words and thoughts and deeper meanings to spit out. I swear I haven't connected with another human being in months. I crave conversation. People don't call me anymore because they know that if they do, I won't want to let them hang up. I feel so devoid of human contact and conversation. I don't think I've physically touched another person since Metalfest.

I cling to these people who I really don't mean shit to because they're so much cooler than real people, right? I feel lightyears older than everyone at school, but being around my "friends" makes me feel so damn young and belittled and humble. I never feel quite right. Either I'm listening to the juvenile, immature conversation around me and thinking, "Fuck, I gotta get out of here", or I'm just "that young chick with the tits." It's always one extreme or the other. Maybe I'm an elitist. Who knows. But for Chrissake, you haven't seen what I've seen, you haven't done what I've done; who are you to tell me that maybe, just maybe, I might have made the wrong choice? What's a wrong choice anyway? In the end, the wrong choice might end up being the right choice because you can't always tell right away how things are going to work out.

Nothing ever changes, really. Times are not a-changing. And yet...they are.

I was thinking about how I haven't seen Kyle since I threw a beer bottle at his head on New Year's. And I was thinking about how totally different my life has been since he and I last spoke, which was December 29th, 2004. Our one year anniversary. Since then, I've started drinking out of control, moved in with my dad after not hearing from him for six years and then moved back home again, smoked weed for the first time, been with way too many guys, started hanging out with all new people, met some people who are now my closest friends and I couldn't imagine life without (such as Liz T), bought a car, moved my horse to a different stable, changed all my goals for life, and yet...here I am. Despite all this, despite that my life is seemingly totally different than it was four months ago, here I am, sitting in the same chair as always. Sometimes I still think of him when I hear "Your Deepest Scar" by Elgin James or see a Toyota Corolla on the highway. But most of the time, that chapter of my life doesn't seem real; like that whole year never really happened. It's amazing how someone who knew you better than you knew yourself can become a total stranger in the blink of an eye. But I don't know why I'm talking about that; that's not what this is about.

But then again, what is this about? I guess it's about me having no one to talk to or something. About wishing I could just say what I'm thinking. About wishing I didn't have to laugh at jokes that I don't think are funny. About having some weird obsession with New Jersey. I think all people need acceptance; that's the underlying problem in society. Where's my group? Where's my group of friends who all have goofy nicknames and inside jokes and a weekly hangout spot in some goofy kid's basement?

Sean Patrick always says he's jealous of me and my life, because I just "do what I want." But do I really? I don't know what I want, and I don't know what would make me happy. I don't know what happiness is. I don't have any doubts about the future; I've always known where I'm going and what happens, happens. But right now, I'm running on a treadmill. When I go to a movie, I look at my watch to see how much longer until it ends. When I ride my horse, before I'm even warmed up, I'm looking for an excuse to get off. When I'm with my friends, I just want to go home. I'm never content with where I am or what I'm doing. There's always something else I'd rather be doing, but when I do the other thing, I'm not happy there either. I'm realizing all this now that, for the first time, I have two spare minutes to myself since AP US is over. I was thinking about how no one ever thinks they're a bad person. And how I used to be a "good kid" once, and now I'm different from how I was then, but I still don't think I'm a bad kid. But I know what people say. I know what my reputation is. But my lifestyle is okay for me. I'm living life, and I guess that's all that matters.

My horse looked at me today and I almost cried. Being alive is such a weird thing. Did you ever think about that? I laughed out loud the other day while I was driving because I was looking at the other cars and it hit me how crazy everything is, just everything. How is it that the first one-celled organism evolved into more complex species and all the sudden, here we are, a billion years later, driving cars around? Being alive is such an improbability. It's just so mindblowing to me. I can't even explain it.

All I want right now is to stand with my back to the wind and crumble apart into ashes and blow away.