lauren

sitting in that room with laurens friends. awkwardly silent. pissed i was around drugs. lauren seemed cattish on the bed. perhaps playfully rebellious as a lesbian. that seems to be the columbus thing. i can't believe that was lauren's thing. she lives with damien. i'm not sure how that works. they always seemed strange. she always seemed strange. there was a time she was nice. she took me to a beck concert. plus she shared her pills. those were darker times. ive learned to call those self destructive now. but she amped up my music side. as well as my drug side. which i guess was part of my self destruction. its hard to move past the past. she hard to get ahold of. its almost fooling me to get her phone number. i always feel stupid for calling. nothing changes. she never answers. its just the same old stuff.

current questions

- what is a conservative
- why dont i want anita to go to the club without me
- be willing to allow your typical treatment of others be what you yourself go through as well for the sake of equality. is this a good philosophy?
- why do i seem to give unequal treatment to the topic of race with regards to indians, and is this an earmark of conservative thinking?
- why do people put up walls?
- why do people become self destructive?
- do whatever the fuck you want - is that a good countercall to conservatism?

tough topics i want to tackle in the future

tough topics anita's bringing up

- lauren
- the haircut
- your dad's reaction to the haircut
- your mom's reaction to the haircut
- your sisters reaction to the haircut
- going to college for the first time
- the hospital situation with kirby
- life in america

death

so anita just posted a nice post on death. i figured i'd try and rival hers. well... what do i think about death? well... i don't know. i had a friend die, and then a few years later, i literally saw him sitting next to me. he wasn't a skeleton, but a whole human, i didn't see his face, but i saw his suit, and black shiny shoes. he had his leg crossed over the other, and he and i were just sitting there together listening to the band at the open mic. i glanced away then glanced back and he was gone. but i knew what i had seen, and i felt greatly comforted by this. i think the vision of someone you know is dead gives you a feeling that perhaps you are being watched over. if not watched over, then at least that people do go somewhere when they die. i remember vivek used to talk about how he had a cousin who he felt watched over him, and then to have vivek die and then for me to get the feeling that he was watching over me... well it was interesting. i mean to think that there's people watching over you and stuff, it's kinda weird. to think that people once dead can still float around watch people and stuff, it makes you wonder what exactly these dead people are capable of. im pretty sure nobody else in the bar saw vivek except for me, and of course part of me says my mind was playing tricks on me, only i saw the guy so vivedly it was hard for me to just discount it as an optical illusion. at the end of the day, what i saw next to me was a spitting image of my deceased friend, in the flesh, wearing a suit, and he seemed in good health, just chilling out and giving a serious listen to the music being played at the place. i mean to me it was just really comforting to see the guy again because of course the last time i'd seen him was in his casket. and then of course the picture they ran in the MVS notification of his death. but yeah. see anita tells me vivek was my real best friend, like of that time. im not sure, but i sure did learn alot from him. like when he was alive, he gave me cakewalk, yeah he got me into some drugs, like weed and stuff, but it was always a positive thing when we used drugs, with kirby it was always a chance to just get all spazzy, but vivek actually had a lust for life and was upbeat and all that. maybe he just had the bad fortune of doing the wrong junk. i dont know. i dont really know why vivek died. i dont know if he wanted to die and intentionally shot himself up with too much. i dont know if... well... instead of that he like... i dont know... perhaps was just using a small amount, but the junk was somehow tainted? i dont know. see one of the things about vivek was he refused to ever use in my presence. so like, i dont know exactly what he did. if he shot in his arm, or what. but like, the thing was, i knew he was doing it. he told me is the thing. i wouldnt know otherwise. i didn't have that kindof insight into it. and i think he knew it. which is why it was so good of him to even tell me. i think i might have been the only person he did tell. the guy who dealt in his apartment, i think he might have just dealt in pills. i dont know for sure. but i dont remember him actually buying heroin from the guy. just pills i think. but yeah. i dont know if that guy actually sold him heroin too. i dont know if i asked him. but i think it could have been that i did and he said the guy did sell it to him. but its been so long i dont even remember anymore. i do remember sitting in his final apartment and listening to his stuff, and just marveling at how amazing it sounded. i mean he really did get alot better over time i thought, he was really onto something, and it was pretty brilliant. but the thing was, it never really did get its own like place to be played. but yeah. it was a sad thing how things went. i didnt expect him to die. of course i had just wrapped up some studio sessions with him. so to me it was a big surprise. it was a surprise to jason as well. apparently he had just thrown vivek a party. and i guess vivek asked me for some help at chipotle. he asked me if i could talk with him but i told him i was busy. i should have recognized the sign. i feel like maybe he was reaching out to me because perhaps he might have been feeling suicidal. but i didnt know enough about it and all i felt was like i wanted to be away from vivek because i didnt know how to understand him or how to handle him. and then i guess he went to his birthday party maybe that day maybe not and yeah he went to it and i guess he left saying he was going to take his meds and thats when perhaps he decided to end it. but then people soemtimes say if you commit suicide you wont make it to heaven. but of course i saw him at the open mic maybe a year or two later. so i dont know about that. i dont know if vivek was visiting me from heaven. i dont know if his spirit was wandering around and found me at that open mic. i dont know if he was watching down, keeping an eye on me from time to time, and decided to stop in that one time because he thought the music was neat. but it was a profound experience for me. i mean i had never seen someone i knew had died before againsince then. there have been a few people ive known that have died. uncle bob is probably the first. and then avid's dad who was a guy i actually liked alot. and then vivek would be the other. vivek was definately a good kid. but it was the drug use that i think did him in. i guess they found him with a needle in his arm. and i mean you can only assume that the drugs are what killed him. the drugs that might have been in the needle before he injected himself. i dont know if maybe he had a cardiac arrest. thats when like your heart stops. reading about heroin it sounds like pure heroin rarely kills, that its tainted heroin or a mix of drugs that can doa person in. drugs such as valium and i know that vivek was taking antidepressants occasionally and also painkillers from time to time. i think perhaps he took a mix and that overwhelmed his system. i dont understand exactly what it does to the body but it cant be good.

how your parents prevent you from going to boston

well this really pissed me off. perhaps in february or so i was ready to rush off to boston to see what all was there, and immediately my dad steps in and says dont go its raining / snowing. to me it was like, dude, i fucking know the road conditions, i have a sense of when its too rough to drive, and you're not the fucking boss of me any fucking more this's the key thing in this whole situation, im 23, and im geting told bullshit like this from my 60 something year old dad. fucking rediculous. shouldnt be happening. i mean like, this was my dream, my goal. and he just steps in and more or less hardcore presses me to agree with him. and the bottom line is he has not encouraged me since to go. not once has he said it was a good idea. ive already had about three or four different chapters of my life play out in ohio. im not really keen on having any further developments occur whilst in this geographic location. its racist, hostile, and destructive, much like drugs. druggies try to sell drugs upon other people, if they bring them in they do them, but if you compare the pictures, it really tells a tale. drugs destroy the body. i recently lined up two pictures of lauren, and itjust showed alot about the destructive nature of substance. and then think there were people who wanted this to happen to ME. and then i realize my parents are in a way peddling drugs too. they're peddling the addictive-thought that everything is fine and i should stay here until im physically destroyed. this is a fucking terrible thing and to me its heartbreaking that my parents would wish such a terrible fate upon me. in my life, ive got many barriers and difficulties. most all of them come from the result of my parents management of my life. i feel like its high time i managed it myself. so really, thats my intention. i'm fucking going to boston.

the situation between you lauren and damien

so i met damien when rob emailed me a date and time to meet up. it was at robs house that i met damien. i also met lauren in the same house. i was rehearsing with damien and rob and lauren appeared one night in my periphery. i was surprised, i didn't know the girl. but she was listening to my playing, and i was flattered. i later learned the girls name was lauren. to this day i still don't know her last name. i began to crush on the girl, i thought she was attractive and i like what she had to say. i had heard that damien was crushing on her. long story short, i kiss her, sleep with her, once each, but i don't manage to keep her around for a long term relationship, damien manages that, and he becomes fiercely protective of her, to the point where he became hostile towards me, and i became very bitter because of his foolishness.

the reaction of your dead friends mom

when anita and i came to the door it was crazy the reaction we saw from the mother of my dead friend. i was surprised and i recognized her, she recognized me and opened the conversation with some welcoming words for me. i mentioned i had brought a book of vivek's, that he had given me it years ago and i thoguht i'd give it to her because perhaps she'd get some use out of it. and then she began to panic when i mentioned the songs that she'd told the studio not to give me. i was surprised when i heard her flippant attitude to my own hard work. i was angered and it was all i could do to keep her at the door. but she slammed the door in my face but not before i managed to call her rude.