There seems to have been some misconception. So, after numerous instant messages and emails later I have this to post:
My birthday is in two weeks time. A fortnight. There are a few entries that confuse the issue. Rest assured that machinations are in place for some sort of birth soiree.
I’ll keep you posted.
JungFroid, excitedly: You’ll never guess who in the entire metropolitan area has your exact same sonyericsson phone.
PraxisLoki: I don’t know. Who?
JungFoid, again, excitedly: C’mon, guess.
PraxisLoki, kinda bored: Tabitha DelVadre*pause*
JungFroid, angrily: Fuck you, man.
kuyaney: Nice.
One of the best places to eat and have a good time has to be Penang, in Bethesda. Do not confuse it with its lesser, based in DC cousin. Had a good time there with a group of folks. Some people couldn’t make it, despite their best efforts.
To those people, (you know who you are) I say this: You owe me dinner.
It’s a large space, plenty of large tables. Aesthetically pleasing. Don’t miss the water wall. Although you can probably get away with eating there by yourself, I don’t recommend it. The servings are really made for two people. Bring at least one other person and eat family style. Or, if you’re by yourself, order up a $2.75 Kirin and Roti Canai (roh-tee cha-nigh) for a bit of something to keep your stomach occupied until you can whip up more people to eat with. Order Roti Canai anyway, it’s a pan based bread served with Chicken Curry as a dipping sauce and it’s delicious.
The only issue is parking and finding the place.
Anytime you feel like going, just let me know, I’d definitely be up for it.
She looked so shocked when I caught her. She’d just brought her index fingers to her eyes, and I had just walked in the door.
Her laughter, and the laughter of her friends died down to shock as she caught my eye.
You can’t make up timing like this.
She looked up, just as shocked as I was amused.
She was making “Chinese” eyes, lifting up the corners of her eyelids and squinting. She didn’t squint all the way, because otherwise, she would have missed me.
She didn’t. She just sort of froze as I walked in the door. There was nothing she could do. She was already physically committed to whatever joke she was making.
Me, I was just trying to get on the train.
I caught her eye.
I smiled and winked.
Her hands and her glance dropped to her lap, and I continued to look for a seat on the train.
I think that was the show that started it for me. It was nineteen ninety. September. I booted up my Apple IIe one evening, started up PFS: write, and started typing three lines of text. Here, for your amusement (or pain, whichever) are those three lines:
(9/10/90) Well, here I am again, trying to start a journal. Hopefully, I'll be able to actually keep it. A__ just transferred to Kearny, leaving me with no one to talk to. I had an interesting weekend. Watched a movie, played Moonwalker (Michael Jackson's), chewed someone else's gum (P___'s), and saw the group again. Not necessarily in that order. Well, the group got smaller. Just the diehards. Me, A__, K___, and P___. I have no idea why I'm attracted to her. I just am. It's either stupidity or luck--bad luck. Which is about the only luck I ever get.
Obviously, that went on for longer than three lines. Also, I managed to keep a journal fairly religiously since then. I’m missing a month or two, but nothing larger than that. The journal spans two inches of printed dot-matrix computer paper, two spiral bound college ruled notebooks, two spiral bound art journals, a black leather “walking” journal, a small yellow shorthand pad, one dream journal, one work journal, one Multi User Creation Kit site (my geekiness knows no bounds–my SO and I at the time even coded removable clothing), and one web based publishing tool.
When you write down everything, it’s hard to lose anything. When you have the date of your first kiss–May 9, 1992, the day you lost your virginity–October 30, 1992, and the day that Joe Lopez and Terry had to kiss for play practice and we all giggled like little schoolgirls, because that’s what we were (I participated in several productions at the all girls’s high school near mine–mainly for the fact that there were girls there. In catholic uniforms. I thought they were sexy before everyone thought they were sexy.)–September 18, 1991–it’s hard not to think about how much you’ve changed. (And how much you haven’t–I still think those outfits are sexy.)
Recording everything, whether it’s pen to paper or little magnetic dots on a tape–it’s important. Looking over the old journals, I find that there’s a lot of things that I’ve learned about friendship, love, sex, work, girls, women, parents, college and writing.
The funny thing is that now, I can finally read them and learn something about me.
I like who I am. I can look back at my history and see all of my mistakes (the ones I chose to record), all of my ridiculous worries, fears, and doubts and know undeniably that I have had a singular experience.
Now, thousands upon thousands keep blogs. Some people, I know. The majority, I don’t.
These bloggers are incredibly diverse. All have different stories. All have different lives.
But they all sit at a keyboard at some point in the day and record their life. Doogie Howser found one thing each day that’s important.
Our lives aren’t scripted–but there are lessons to be learned each day. Something special happens each day. Recording it all just helps us to remember it.