13 August, 2001, 11:36 p.m.

where did you put the first one?

back & forth

One of those not-accomplishing-much days, thank gods. I say "thank gods", because practically anything I got done today would have been poisoned by the vaporous air. Nameless and unapproachable evils float abroad in Boston, graves yawn out of wet late-summer boredom, and even walking sprites are taking it easy or getting out of town.

JB's in town, but I don't think he wants to see me, and it's sticking in my craw. Granted, the last time I saw him things were ... uh, awkward, and I don't think a few of the things SB said to him about me really helped. Really, my reputation as a creepy guy might be partially deserved, but it seems to be the sort of thing that even the best of my friends have no interest in diminishing.

But that's not the worst skeleton in (or out of) my closet at the moment. CG tells me that the infamous SP may be / is moving to town this fall.

I was literally shaking. "O, get over it, AT," you say, since, and you're right, it was two years ago, there's been a LOT of water under the bridge, and things have simply got to be different. But the point to SP was that he wasn't different, that he was inexplicable.

To set the record straight:

1. Nothing "really" "happened" between me and SP.

2. We broke off correspondence because I let drop an incredibly bitchy comment, which might have been just a little unfair.

3. In another milieu, what I did vis-�-vis SP would have got my kneecaps broken with a lenghth of lead pipe. Then again, in still other milieux, his actions might have inspired similar consequences.

To queer the record considerably:

1. I still ... L*VE ... him. In that icky, problematic, unrequited, physical, overidealizing, unreasonable, scary way that everyone hates in others...

2. but secretly loves in him or herself. Damn it, attaining unreasonable love is the antidote to the Tragic morass. If Tragedy is all about the way good intentions all go terribly wrong via a series of carefully thought out philosophical steps, then the unreasonable romance (I'm talking about the happy-ending variety) is about the indomitability of Love and Magic.

3. He's prolly bi, and was, at times, prolly into me in that special way, but this space is so contested you can pretend I didn't say it.

3. I can't deal with this. He has this really big cloud of opiate smoke hanging off him, and I get terribly fucked up on it. It doesn't seem to be as wicked to other people's systems. Anyway, I get bad SP flashbacks. Sometimes, when I wake up in the morning, I believe I'm married to him.

Luckily, CG and I were in a [bad] Japanese restaurant and I could concentrate on getting the [dreadful] yakisoba into my mouth and chewing and swallowing and thinking and picking up a glass of water a little unsteadily and putting it back down again and swallowing and picking it back up again and taking a sip of water and putting it back down, before I squeaked out, "Oh, really?"

Concentrate, AT. SF in one week. You can do it. You can get your car out of hock, you can pack a duffel bag. You can go visit people you love deeply. You can get a sense of perspective, and, for gods' sake, get some sleep.

I rock. I found a used copy of John Eliot Gardiner's 1996 period-instruments revival of the 1806 version of Leonore, a/k/a Fidelio. That overture! Those Revolutionary sentiments! Bad for my idealism, I think. Therefore I'm listening to worldly and warm Handel as a brief palate cleanser.

love and cactus,

a