masochism 101

what i am i doing?

i looked at some stupid shit on indecline, closed all the windows on my computer, pushed in the keyboard tray, put my elbows on my hot pink tights and cried...

i never shed tears for him and now i never want to stop. i am not sure i will ever be able to.

i thought it was over. i thought this new and real crush was something to be happy about, a sign of something positive...shit, i even dressed nicely for rehearsal tonight...(he wasn't there)

i was standing in the backstage hallway of our rehearsal space and i felt him there, and the nostalgia over took my body and i wanted nothing more than to run to the airport get on a plane to the ocean and confess my sins to him...

...god, i feel like a small pathetic child sad because her favourite movie star just got married and now she'll have to find someone else...

i don't know what i am doing and i don't know how to feel this sad and survive. i know it doesn't compare to grief or to even to the loss of someone who loved you back but my heart is breaking and to me that's real...

i am an insane person and i need to go to bed.

xo alice

when from across the room...

last night began like any other night. i had coffee at my fav little coffee shop with a dear friend whom i have missed...we chatted and it was great. sitting immediately behind my friend was a boy whom i have met a few times, his name escapes me as it usually does and we look at eachother every few seconds or so. my friend and i continue to chat; the boy and i continue to flirt...

as my friend and i are leaving the coffee shop he noticed that the boy has forgotten his car keys when he left a few moments prior. so we left, i drove my friend home but couldn't get the boy and his flirting eyes out of my mind so i went back the the little coffee shop just to see if he had come back for his keys.

he had. he was inside. i didn't want to seem presumptuous so i waited outside casually smoking and trying to look as if i had a purpose for being there. he left the coffee shop and as he walked past me he made eye contact with me and held it for one moment too long. he kept walking but turned around after a few steps:

'do i know you?'

'i think we have some mutual friends...theatre people'

'oh yeah. and i saw you at new city last week with charlene right'

'yeah i think so...'

so we chat and it's a bit akward but we decide to go back inside and have a beer (or beers). we're there for a couple of hours just chatting and sharing stories...i was surprised to find we had so much in common. finally the waitress, tired from bringing us beer after beer tells us that they are closing and we had to go. so we go outside and share a cigarette:

'did you drive here?' he asks

'yep...shit!' (we're both pretty drunk at this point...)

'well, i live near by if you wanna come over. i'll sleep on the couch...you can just grab your car in the morning'

'but i have to work'

'i'll make sure you're up in time'

so i go...what the harm? as we begin walking to his house he takes my hand and i don't resist. his skin feels so warm against mine and i shiver a little.

we get to his door step and just as he's about to put his keys in the door he drops them. as he stands up, keys in hand, our eyes meet and he kisses me softly on the lips.

i read the other night that the best part of a kiss is the moment just before you kiss because you can hear their heart beating and their breath steamy and nervous in time with yours... i love that moment too...

that moment doesn't last long. before i know it we are inside, up against the wall in the main entrance way groping each other and gasping for breath. we pratically fall down the stairs into his tiny basement apartment.

we finally grope our way to the couch, a trail of shoes and jackets and mitten and toques and sweaters behind us. i had never done anything like before in my life and i was loving every second of it.

we were up all night clinging to each other the way 16 year olds cling to each other in the back of their parents car...we couldn't let go no matter how much our bodies wanted us to...he finally collapsed with exhaustion in the early hours of the morning...

we slept for a couple of hours and at 6am he woke up and made me breakfast. we showered together, still unable to let go and i left for work...

i have been thinking of him all day: remembering the way his skin felt, the way his little beads of sweat dripped onto my back, the way the floor leaves marks on your knees and hips.

god i wish that were all true...looking at that guy across the coffee shop last night, that guy who i have met a few times whose name i do remember...i wanted that.

i was going to keep up with the story, make you all believe (or at least want to believe) that i lead that kind of life, but i don't. instead: i got an email from john just now and i am just crying missing him so much that my teeth hurt. i feel like i have dug myself into a hole far too deep to ever climb out of...

i don't even know where i am...

xo alice.

unexpected and curious

so i had this brilliant idea for a post yesterday...i was feeling inspired by song and ready to start a counterpoperosion revolution (www.thefaint.com) in my own home... (while providing you all with ways to do the same...)

today, this idea is dead. the revolutionary spirit in me is quelled for the moment, only for a moment i am sure, but tonight i am feeling warm and happy inside...one could dare say, excited...

now i am sure the question that is passing through your mind is, 'why?'...that would of course be my question as well...the answer ladies and gentlemen is simple and 'simple' at the same time: i have a crush on a boy...

shit, i have a real, giddy, stupid, wanna hang out with him crush...

my crushes usually involve people who are either completely unavailable due either to relationship status (already known by me before preceding with crush and of no consequence) or sexual preference (meaning: i have a thing for gay men...) or they are on boys who i may never actually meet and are appealing because if i never meet them they can never reject me...

but this is something new, something i haven't felt for a while: something that makes me want to brush my hair and teeth and put on makeup before going out; something that makes me want to say witty things and have more clever conversations about experimental noise pop vs. mediocre edmonton punk rock in the hallways of obscure treatment centres for youth with mental and emotional problems...

it makes me want all of that and it makes me excited on a sunday evening...

now, is there hope for me and my crush? well, there are a two things i do not know about him: 1) is he single? (usually, i already know and don't care...this time i don't) and 2) is he interested in me...

i hope he is. i want him to be. i want him to play guitar for me at 4am and write me songs and sing them in a quiet voice as the sun starts to rise... i want all that cheesy pop music romance shit...

i never feel like this. i haven't been this excited about a person in ages...

'so who is this guy?' i guess that's the last question on your mind... see the 'big fat stinky liar' post from a few weeks back...

this is so exciting!! (or at least i hope it might be...)

xo alice.

'drop kick the punks'

now as some of you out there in internet may or may not know there is a little website/message board for all the bored punk kids with too much time on their hands (www.indecline.net) and i embarrassed myself a little on there today...well, i didn't feel embarrassed but the dude who clued me in on my little punk rawk faux-pas sure thought i should be...

here's a little back story... this dude was talking about the 'true meaning' of punk (ugh) and got onto this huge rant about anarchy and that the anarchist spirit is what 'true' punks embody... so basically every single kid on this site slammed this dude's opinion and called him an asshole etc... whatever- some of the shit he said i agreed with so i responded with the following:

i think you guys are all being a bit shit about [ ]'s opinion. i agree that by choosing to live on the street the problem of poverty is being romantised but choosing to live without the confines of the capitalist machine is one of the principles of anarchy but i think it fails on a fundamental level because (true) anarchy is utopian and within a capitalist society (however disgusting) where real poverty is a real problem it may not be the best choice...that being said and all the slams against him for being bourgeois or whatever...fuck you guys...we have no control over the families we were born into...[ ] could not, at birth, control that his father was an attorney the same way someone cannot, at birth, prevent their mother from being a crackwhore...it's what you do with your situation and how you deal with it in a larger social context that matters. the fact that people like [ ] step away from the world they were born into is wicked...it's a step away, maybe not the best step but at least he's making one instead of dicking around and complaining about shit...that's fuckin' punk rock...

(named removed to protect the strangers who post here...)

so then this dude who posts like 5,000,000 things a day responds with the following:

You do realize [ ] is a joke user right? It is a fake account created to start up hilarious shit. The person who wrote it knew what they were saying was totally retarded and that is why they said it. In conclusion [ ] isn't real. Just a user created to start shit. -{ }

first off...am i suppose to embarrassed by this...so some fucking kids who think they're pretty hardcore because they play bingo at new city on tuesdays think it's funny that i am not so in on the indecline nonsense that i didn't know this...whatever, fuck!

but then it got me thinking, actually thinking, about this whole 'scene' thing...and how much it erks me...

ok. another brief history...just to make sure we're all on the same page...

i have been a music fan-a hardcore music fan-since around 1993-ish. i have been into punk since around 1994-ish...that's what 10-11 years? my punk experience was a little different then the gangs of kids with mohawks and bondage pants playing in bands and really living the subculture...i didn't know any punks. people like that, people like me, did not exist where i went to school. that, and my parents were incredibly strict, so basements shows and all those experiences were not part of my reality...the scene was never a scene for me. i thought punk existed in london, la and new york and so i listened alone in my basement having what i felt to be my own authentic punk rock experience-i was the loner...after junior high i wanted to have friends and i didn't want people to think i was the 'freak' so i changed...i did a total 180 and became the preppiest kid ever. obviously i wasn't happy, i hid the whole 'punk' thing away in headphone late at night and smoked way too much pot so i just didn't have to be an active part of my own deception...deep, i know but you think i knew that at the time? fuck no, i thought it was cool that i was stoned all the time and listening to rancid alone in my room...so i finished high school, and was finally able to accept myself and do what i love...so we cool... i like that i had that time, that experience and it's made me different then a lot of the punks my age who i see at shows...the number one difference: i hardly know a soul...

which brings me to my point...i don't know anyone at shows, except the person that i am there with...and so all these strangers are there, claiming to be part of a welcoming refuge for freaks and artists and miscreants (parts of which i am composed of...) and i find it to be the most exclusionary place...and here's why: being punk in edmonton in 2005 has fuck all to do with punk...or even music for that matter! the scene is about being seen in the coolest band t-shirt; it's about knowing the people in the band but not really giving a shit about their music. i really believe that most people don't like 'punk rock', they like indie rock, but love the punk seen...punk is nasty music and i can't believe cindy 'i-am-so-fucking-punk-in-my-diesel-bondage-pants' really likes listening to it...

now this of course doesn't refer to EVERYONE at the show except me. i don't claim to be anything i'm not and not everyone at the show is there for sly fashionista purposes (...but jesus i have never seen so many 'vintage' $400 blazers in my life) ... i just find it really fucking amusing when i go to a show and no one is there to hear the bands (which i am because i don't know anyone) and no one will talk to me at an event, defined through history, that is meant to be completely inclusive of all people otherwise excluded...

all of it-indecline, blazers, snobby bitches, punk, etc...-all of it makes me want to jump up onstage at new city one night, rip the microphone out of the singers hands and scream...'fuck you posers!!'

now that would be punk...i am just worried they'd all be mean to me, burn my blazer and kick me off indecline...

xo alice

synergy and cross-promotion

hey hey...alice here, again, i just really can't get enough of this...all my thoughts out there for the world to read...i am sure the world doesn't read them but they're out there if the world was interested...

that being said i went to a movie tonight. before i tell you what it was i will also tell you that it didn't cost me anything...i had a free pass. when you read what i have to say you'll understand why i felt compelled to say that

so read on...

(p.s. this is not a review per say and i will ruin the film for you...)

this evening my sister and i partook in a little (BIG) movie called 'in good company'. plot wise i think the movie was about the following:

boy feels no love as a child, boy goes to college and gets business degree, boy advances quickly up the corporate ladder and makes tonnes o' cash, boy's wife leaves him and he flounders, has a quickie rebound relationship (what the ads make the movie look like it's about), finally boy learns that life isn't about money or corporate sloganeering (ie: synergy and cross-promotion...). he learns that you should only involve yourself in the high-stress corporate world if you really like it...the man who teaches him all of this...a man who truly loves it (after a very rousing speech about humans and team work etc...) happens to be older and surprisingly (?) wise...so boy finds his passion, old man has a baby and rebound girl enjoys her time at nyu...

basically.

on the surface i didn't hate this movie...it was cute. it made my heart a little happy and the male actors were able to express a healthy amount of physical affection for each other without the writers throwing in more than one gay joke (and the one that was in there came from the stereotypical "vp asshole" character...) it's funny but it seems that with big movies when men express physical affection for each other it is often accompanied by an excessive amount of macho bravado...not this time... so that was one good thing.

on the flip side i hated this movie and here's why: the whole point behind this movie, at least as i saw it, was 'don't buy into all that bullshit corporate propaganda...live your passion even if you'll never own a porsche...and even if you already own a porsche it's not too late...'; a message i'm all for, believe me. i am uncompromising in my 'live your passion' attitude and i will NEVER own a porsche... :)

now in order to make a movie such as this, all slick and glossy, you need money. and how do you get money? product placement! so this seemingly anti-corporate film in filled to the fucking brim with pepsi and porsche adds. our young hero at the peak of his game goes out and buys a porsche, followed immediately by a close-up sweeping shot of the candy blue porsche. later, at the low point of our hero's movie day, he has been punched in the face and hold an ice cold diet pepsi up to his throbbing eye...followed of course by a close up of the can sweaty with refreshing condensation...so denis quaid gets his 20mil. or whatever and i get thristy so i go out and buy an ice cold pepsi and perhaps tomorrow a porsche to satisfy my desire to appear heroic in the eyes of strangers...

and here's what i hated even more...

anyone who knows me will tell you that i am huge music junkie...it's heroin for me...so i get really excited when i hear good music in a movie. this little (BIG) movie was full of GREAT music (iron and wine, the shins, damien rice, etc...), all the shit that the indie kids like me are all over; but the music was 100% inappropriate. they played one of the most beautiful pro-love songs in history as our heroic boy wonder's marriage was breaking up...all this music said to me was 'ah...another fine example of cross-promotion'...not, 'wow! that really enhanced that scene for me...'

allow me to explain:

according to howstuffworks.com (http://stuffo.howstuffworks.com/music-licensing.htm) music licensing is big time business and record companies are doing it all the time. see the record companies own the actual recording of the song and the artist retains the copyright on the lyrics and the music and the 'intellectual property' after a song is recorded and copywrited it can be sold to films or television or radio. here are some of the actual numbers as far as $$ goes:

-Low-end TV usage (e.g. -- music is playing from a jukebox in a scene, but no one in the scene is paying any attention to the music) -- free (for exposure) to $2,000 for a 5-year license. In a film, the fee would be $10,000 in perpetuity. [and that's low end...it can get up towards towards 1mil. +]
-A more popular song is worth more, perhaps $3,000 for TV and $25,000 for film.
-A song used as the theme song for a film might get $50,000 to $75,000.
Commercials fetch even more money: "a song can command anywhere from $25,000 to $500,000 plus per year. The typical range for a well-known song is $75,000 to $200,000 for a one year national usage in the United States, on television and radio."

so, 'good for the artist' and the little indie-lable right? yes but also better for the film and the record company releasing the soundtrack. sure sam beam of 'iron and wine' and his lable, subpop, will benefit (interestingly the shins are also on subpop...) but hipster kids like me will see this movie, go buy the soundtrack, tell all their friends about it who will then go buy the soundtrack and perhaps see the movie to see what kind of film would be cool enough to put 3 'iron and wine' songs on the soundtrack...therefore big money... think about it, how many people knew about the cool hipster soundtrack to 'garden state' before they actually knew anything about the movie?

it's all really fucked up to me...but i understand why an artist like sam beam or a lable like subpop would do it: they cannot compete with the 4 (yep, only 4-ish) major labels and it costs money to make art and perhaps better it come from 'art' then from say, a cigarette company...i dunno but... i just bugs the shit out of me when i go and watch a movie full of cool music and a pretty decent (albeit cheesy) message sold to me by pepsi and a cool indie lable...

fortunately i already have the albums that the 4 or 5 coolest songs came from...and (without meaning to sound like a HUGE snob...) i found them all on my own...(ugh, that was pretty snobby eh?)

guten nacht internetland!
xo alice

science fiction comes to life

hey hey. alice here with a little something important for all y'all out there in internet land.

the us and canadian governments are in negotions to create a missle defense system which would ultimately end with the weaponization of space which, aside from how ridiculous it actually sounds, is tantamount to a new (and far more devastating) arms race.

if you are a canadian, regardless of your party politics, please sign the petition at the following

http://douglas.ndp.ca/starwars/epetition.php

or do some research on your own. this scares the shit out of me and it should scare you too...it's amazing where people's minds can take them given even an iota of power.

and if you aren't a canadian do some research into your country's stance on this issue and take whatever steps you can to prevent this from happening...and it's close.

take care,
xo alice

true patriotic love...?

alice welcomes you once again and she is also offering up a little something new. we are worried that alice is perhaps getting slightly superficial in all her chats about pseudo-blind dates, best of lists and sappy, sad, cliche love letters and she's beginning to feel a little stupid. so here is something else.

(* louise, you've seen this before but i'm hoping there are other lovers out there in internet land who may stumble upon me one evening...)

"The fundamental question, though, is why people use Canadian patriotism as a protective cloak from American patriotism. Do they not see that while the colours may be different, the fabric remains essentially the same?....I rebut the argument that simply 'being better' than the United States of America (or 'American citizens') is...a cause for celebration - indeed, this is not a difficult achievement. In fact, if we measure how peaceful and just a given society is by using the United States as a yardstick, our moral compass is in need of significant returning. [...]"

Before i begin i would like to say that i love living in canada. i really love universal health care. in fact, if universal health care had sex organs i'd fuck it and if it was legal to marry an act of legislation i'd marry it.

i have recently began wondering, like the above, article, if being 'canadian' is all it's cracked up to be.
a couple of weeks ago i went to a show at the local dinner theatre for a staff christmas party. unbeknownst to me the show was a tribute to canadian pop stars and consequently also beer and shitty television. is that being canadian means? is that what being a citizen of any country means: paying homage to your national heritage by celebrating mediocre pop stars and bad beer? somehow i don't think so and when the show failed to acknowledge non-white performers i got a little uncomfortable. who the hell do we think we are? we forget so much of our own genocidal history and focus soley on peace-keeping and pop stars.

i recently had the pleasure of spending some time in the united states and meeting a lot of really cool people and when i got home and people asked me what the best part of my trip was and i say the time i spent in the states i get this, "but isn't it so fucked up there?" kind of look. and yeah, it's fucked up, no one is going to argue with me on that one...but it's still a place full of PEOPLE who are people regardless of their nationality.

in the grand scheme of things nationality is irrelevant. in the end, the fact that i am canadian is totally irrelevant. we've gotten cocky and it's turned us into ignorant/arrogant people. today it's not the kind of ignorance or arrogance that starts wars or commits genocide (as it was at the time of our colonial forefathers); but it's the kind of ignorance that makes us believe that we are somehow better and therefore entitled to something. all people are entitled to the same things as we are-we forget that-all the things that we take for granted are the simple rights that should be afforded to all people. instead of looking in the mirror at our own countries problem, we stand up and say "we're the best! we're better than americans! we're peace keepers! jim carrey is a canadian!!" fuck jim carrey!! People are being held in canadian jails for indefinite periods of time without trial; the premier of alberta is a bigot, homophobic, fascist money grubbing asshole...he is the george dubya of canada. when this exists how can we be the best. how can we even be considered better?

one need look only to the natural disaster in south east asia this past week to see that we are so much more than people under a flag, or a beer brand. we are citizens of a world connected by nature. nature destroys indiscriminately. when a tsunami kills over 100,000 people what does it matter where you are from. your brothers and sisters and their children are dying and will continue to die. how is living in "the best country in the world" going to prevent you from being affected by that. it's not.

being proud of where you live is not a bad thing. that is what patriotism should be. pride in where you're from demonstrated in such a way that you care for that place. it's patriotism at the expense of other people that becomes ridiculous. american's are not destroying the world. a certain administration's view of america and their resulting foreign policy is. that idea has nothing to do with joe average guy in omaha nebraska. shit, joe's the same as you, he just has a different passport-he eats and shits and cries when his dog gets hit by a bus the same as you would.

we've got to start looking beyond our national borders and look at the people. we are citizens of a big fucking planet, not a tiny little country...

what more can i say...thank god for health care and i will be the first person on the steps of the legislature the day ralph attempts to take it away from me...(or the next time he tries would be a more accurate statement.)

please see full article: 'canadians have no reason to feel proud' at http://resist.ca/story/2004/12/22/2009/3774 by samir hussain writing in Znet on december 14, 2004

xo alice.

also: i am listening to this amazing band i just discovered that i know nothing about: american analog set...check 'em out!!

big fat stinky liar

the internet is a big fat stinky liar...
actually, what i meant to say was that the internet allows people to only approximate their personalities without being forced to reveal basic truths...

'oh alice,' you're probably thinking, 'what brings on this sudden revelation?'

well, dear reader, i will tell you. last night i met up with someone whom i had met over the internet. it was not a date, let's just clear that up, but it did have a slightly blind-datey feel to it, as does any meeting with someone you don't know and you had to do the whole 'what do you look like' thing...anyhow, i met up with this guy who is doing some work for me (see post about rejection if you wonder what i do...) and to meet him, based on the first impression i had of his emails, left me a little bewildered.

when i say that the internet is a 'big fat stinky liar' i don't mean that in a negative way...i just mean it can skew your opinion. this guy was amazing: smart, excited about the project...three steps ahead of me...but he wasn't his emails and that is why the internet lies...

so keeping that in mind how much of what you know about me is true? very little i suppose. sure some of you actually know me so you know what is untrue but others stumble upon me and believe what i tell them because the internet doesn't lie. And the internet doesn't lie but it approximates, it gives the best picture of a person it can...it allows you to approximate yourself.

You know what i love, i love being shocked when the approximation doesn't live up to how amazing the person actually is...

enjoy my continued approximations.

xo alice

prepare to be judged

currently it is my job to judge people. i had to do it for two hours tonight. i don't like it. it's the one part of doing the thing that i love that i don't love.
sure, i am like most people and spend my days in silent judgement of others; but these silent judgements never result in a telephone call going something like this:

alice: hey is jane there?
jane: this is jane.
alice: heya jane! alice here. how are you?
jane: great you.
alice: (aside) aw sweet fuck, great? now i have to ruin that? (back to jane) so whatcha up to tonight?
jane: oh, i am going to see wednesday night heroes at new city tonight. you?
alice: (aside) fuck! and now i have to see her. (back) cool. me too.
jane: so...
alice: so...
jane: well, you called...
alice: right. listen jane i wanted to thank you so much for coming in this afternoon but you have been judged to suck ass.
jane: ok. well i will see you later.
alice: yeah. bye. hey and come see the show when we open ok?
jane: fuck you.
alice: what?
jane: yeah ok. bye.
click...
alice: hello?

you get the idea, and while i would never say, 'you've been judged to suck ass' saying, ' i just don't have a part for you' feels like i am saying, 'you suck ass' because no matter how unsucky you actually are you always feel sucky when rejected. such is the nature of life.

i have felt this sucky feeling many times-too many to count anymore- but i have learned something over the years and years of rejection at the hands of tyrants who feel their cannot be realised with my puny little talents; i have learned that it's not your fault. don't take it personally. talent is innate. you suck. move on.

just kidding.

xo alice

evil evil evil evil

i have spent some time with my television recently. we hadn't seen eachother for a while. for a while we weren't really getting along to well. tonight i buried the hatchet, turned the stereo off, put my maximum rock'n'roll down and absorbed into my couch for a day (or almost a day) of much music. here's what i learned:
jessica and ashlee (ashlee? why not ashley) simpson are evil, evil, evil. evil, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid girls. i know everyone knows this. duh, how could you not? you'd have to be evil and stupid. but here's the thing...
i can't look away. i am afraid that if i blink i might miss a moment of stupidity and feel totally out of place with my pop-culture loving peer group. it's like a car crash. you don't want to look because you know there are intestines all over the highway but you can't help yourself...they aren't your intestines.
on tonight's episode of jessica: she ate some tuna.
on tonight's episode of ashlee: she signed some cd's and complained about how hard her life is. poor baby was tired.
and i watched this shit for an hour...more than an hour if you count pimp my ride and all the other shit. me and my cosmo magazine can now fit in at parties. we know about the "chicken of the sea" and why it's the funniest thing ever. and i was busy reading about cool bands, i am so glad i got over that one.
i was worried there for a second.

xo alice

dear john

a little purge is a good thing now and again. you can't wrap yourself in sadness everyday so it's best to get it out...

i have wanted to send this letter for as long as i can remember. i don't have the guts.

thank god for the protection of anonymity.

dear john,
i was struck this evening, as i often am, by a wave a ceaseless deja vu.
it was snowing as i stepped outside from the neon warmth of the movie theatre. do you remember that night? the only difference about tonight is that i am not crying.
i was so embarrassed. i cried so much that night. so much that i don't remember you saying anything or hugging me goodbye. i think you didn't comfort me that night because you knew. it changed things between us. my tears changed things between us.
i remember every other touch.
the worst part of this kind of honesty is the loneliness. i love you and you love her. a shitty cliche and i am living it. another cliche? i have loved you since the first moment we spoke.
i imagine you missing her, touching her shoulder, kissing her eyelids. i never imagine myself in her place. instead i wait (uselessly) for the moment when you realise you wish it were my eyelids you were kissing, my shoulder you were touching, me you were missing. a masochistic fantasy at best.
if i am being realistic and honest, which i struggling to be here john, i realise that i probably never cross your mind. amid the joy of creating, longing for her, and living the life you always wanted and deserved to live i must get lost by the wayside. i took your mind off the shittiness of being here over a latte for two hours every fourth thursday. i validate your feeling shitty about everything and kept silent about the ache in my heart and my overwhelming desire to jump off a bridge. i wanted to drown myself in a puddle every time you mentioned how wonderful she is/was. another time when you weren't thinking of me.
i thought of you. i think of you. each breath is a thought of you. every time i exhale i pull the next breath in as quickly as i can to hold onto you a little longer.
i hate that i love you. in doing so i betray my own borders. it's treasonous. it's cheesy and i hate myself for turning into a movie-of-the-week. but i do it. i love you more and more and the more it hurts the more i want to love you. i want to love you. i want to have the scars that wanting you have given me. with scars i can prove that i have loved. ah, the fucking cliche!
i thought i'd be crying by now. there have been few tears. i thought they'd come now and they hint at it, like a dry heave, but they never come. instead they come on snowy nights outside a movie theatre, outside a house with arms inside i longed to be in. in those arms i'd never cry.
i keep coming back to that night last year. Maybe because tonight looked like that night but also because it was that night that i realised i loved you. not only that i loved you but something far sadder, far more distressing, far more horribly cliche. sitting in that theatre listening to that actress say that she's become the witch of her own fairy tale ...HOLY FUCKIN' SHIT!! I died because i knew that i would love you forever. that i would be (at least partly) stuck forever in the fantasy, the fairy tale , that someday we'll meet again and you'll love me the way i loved you since that first night we spoke.
what are you thinking reading this? are you alone and thinking 'how pathetic. she should know better' (and i do); or is she there reading over your shoulder, her hands on your back, sharing a moment, a kiss and a laugh at my expense? falling even deeper in love with each passing word?
i don't know what to do.
i was thinking about the highway the other day. about that night. about you driving my car. about you driving my car in nothing.
do you remember that night? i was so scared. i was seeing things on the road and in the future that weren't there. we went long stretches of prairie highway without speaking and the silence never felt awkward. it felt full. full of...love (?) I saw that same full silence years later. i saw us along the prairie highway and i saw animals in the road and the car heading towards us and i wanted to jump out. i'm not sure i have ever been so afraid.
i know i have never been that sad.
i know i have never been this sad.
i don't know what to do, john. i have so much to say but i don't have the words. i'm too scared.
there are songs, of course there are songs but it's a cop out and i cannot hijack someone else's words to make up for what i lack.
my side aches and i cannot believe i'm not crying; tears would feel good right now. but they aren't coming and i don't feel well. so i'll go. i'll write more. i am plagued by the memory of you walking away from the car before i got on the road to the airport. i had to get away from you. i can't forget and all i can do it write. i hope i'll get to be loved like this sometime.
wishing i could say goodbye,
yours, alice


wow, that was a bit long.
xo alice