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8:41 p.m. - October 18, 2001 Of course, then there'd be no argument. Everyone would KNOW who you were and what you felt, and you couldn't tell them that those pants didn't make their ass look fat if they actually did, or that you accidentally forgot to meet him for lunch, but actually you were sleeping with another man, and anger would abound, not that it doesn't already. So maybe not. Maybe just a little private transcript, one that you could pull quietly out of your ear while sitting at home self-reflecting. Mmm. And then transcribe it here. Because, for fuck's sake, I've forgotten my point, and the transcript would remember it. Something like this. I was having freedom fantasies today, very high-school child-ish freedom fantasies about what my dorm room will be like, and what kind of friends I'll have, and how late I'll stay out once I won't have a curfew, and whether my roommate and I will get along, and thoughts along those lines, but I know, and you probably know, that I don't think linearly like that. It was more like, started in focused in on the books on my dorm bookshelf. No more Judy Blume and (God help me) Sweet Valley University and such of the books I used to read when I was younger and have saved, but books I'd be willing to let the world see, like.. well, I couldn't picture any of them, but then my mind scrolled up and there were these beautiful walls, collages I started making junior year but got bored, these collages were finished, and they were beautiful, they just epitomized me perfectly, and as my mind was admiring the collages, the huge CD collection was tipping in the corner of my eyes, all this beautiful music, not any of the things I bought because I thought were good but then turned out to be awful, like Sugar and the earlier Mr Bungle and Glassjaw and such.. but rather, as with the collage, everything just epitomized me, and it did it better than anything I've ever written. The room was ME. Because it had no remnants, like here, of my stuffed animal phase, or my everything-must-be-gray phase, or my Hanson phase (yes, my Hanson phase), or my old magazines phase, etc., so it was all current, and very representative, how I've always wanted my room to look at any given time. Because, you see, I love my past, I embrace it and analyze it and write about it and talk about it, but I don't want it around, looking at me all the time, pretending it's current. It isn't. I want it packed away, where it belongs, so I can look at it when it pleases me. I don't want it around so people look at it and think, 'Oh, that's how Hannah must be', if it was how Hannah was three years ago. I only want to see it when it pleases me to see it. It may sound selfish, but fuck, I want to look ahead, not behind. I don't want to look at that sticker I used to have on my dresser and remember the time I was deep in depression and panicking and ready to slit my wrists and my mom came in and said, 'It's that picture on your dresser, it's giving out very bad vibes. Bad luck. Take it off,' and so I took it off and stuck it in my journal, and FUCK that thing scared me. Eventually I had to rip it up. But you know, if I'd kept that thing up, who knows what would have happened? I'm not the kind of person who thinks about stickers and bad luck anymore. The wrist-slitting pocketknife has been replaced by a cutting-my-fingernails pocketknife, and that's all I need to know. Nothing about the sticker. In my dorm, I didn't see any stickers. I saw a lot of quotes and abstract art, a messy thick fluffy bed, my music station, because of course I'm bringing my music stuff with me. CD's. Sophisticated books, well, not sophisticated, but at least not Sweet Valley. Something special I couldn't catch. Something my future squeeze might have given me. Future squeeze, my God, I laugh. I don't need you to tell me I'm being idealistic; I already know. I don't care, I don't care, I deserve my hope, I deserve to look forward to this. You see my tongue? I've put it out at you. Because you want to know who I am? Of course you don't. Nobody ever takes anywhere near as much interest in other people as they do in themselves. My own site is the most clicked-on site in my favorites list. 'Look at your words as if they weren't by you,' says my self-satisfied mind at times. 'Look at how well that is done.' And my inner smile is also self-satisfied, and I waddle off carrying my ego along with me, bumping it along the floor. I come back later that day, maybe tomorrow. "NO NOTES?" I screech. "NO GUESTBOOK??" And I stomp off, stomp back, click on my site, look at it, and think, "IF I WERE ME I'D RESPOND TO THAT!" and them stomp of, for good. Still other times I'll do the click and stare for awhile, chewing on the inside of my cheek and muttering like a deranged psychopath. 'That is absolute shit,' murmurs my self-deprecating mind, at me. 'Look at that. A three year old could have done better. Look at your insights. Those aren't insights! Ten million people have already gone through that stage. Cretin.' And I'll be unable to look anymore. Stomp. Slam. You know the drill. The next day, I'll come back. And.. there will be notes galore! Guestbook signies galore! And I will be absolutely livid! "WHY WOULD THEY RESPOND TO THIS CRAP!" I screech, albeit inside my head. "WHY DO THEY WRITE ABOUT THIS ENTRY, OF ALL ENTRIES, AND NOT ABOUT THAT ONE? OR THAT ONE? THIS ONE IS SHIT!" And I wonder, who do these people think I am ? The answer is: not much. I know this, because I spend very little time worrying about how people see other people, because (and you saw this coming, I know) I already know how people view them. At least I know how one person views them. I'll go, and I'll read, and I'll think, and I'll say, 'ooh, that was pretty amazing', and maybe I'll leave a nice little note in their guestbook or their notes, and I'll think about it a little more, maybe go through their archives, and then I'll move on. No, other people don't enter my worrying radius, though, when my mother says I'm a selfish brat, I doubt she's referring to this. Because egocentric, self-centered, and selfish are not synonymous. Just because I don't spend much time obsessing about other people's souls and their reps and their images, doesn't mean I don't CARE about them. It may take a lot for me to really care about someone, and as of yet I've only had one I've really violently cared for, but I'm.. you know.. I'm not a monster, I'm not, Mom, I'm not. If someone tells you I'm kind, you'll snort at them. But I daresay maybe I AM kind. I think of small things like given away lollipops and admissions ahead of me in line and money for lunch, but please, there's more. I think this is going nowhere, so it's better to end abruptly than to just ramble on and on and fade into the darkness over some period of time where nobody really knows, well, maybe somebody does but YOU don't know them, realizes you stopped feeling anything hours ago.
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