summer in the suburbs means work, work, work.

my first year at nyu.

this entry will be edited multiple times. i will re-read it constantly and i will remember more and more details that i want to include. i do not know what to make of this, typing this all out, though i am allowing myself the privilege of being incoherent.

last night was my last night on the town. i went to a smalltime asian bar in the west village with a bunch of people i don't know and someone i know very well. i received a frightening phone call telling me that my father was in the hospital. immediately i started tearing and it made me realize, this is why i go to school in new york. So that on the given day where I would receive such a phone call I would know I was not too far away. A good friend calmed me down, and convinced me out of making a bigger mess of myself. This is the first time I felt like I could do something without the help of people from home. I didn't need to call the same people I called all the time. I wanted to, but was told I didn't need to. I was proved wrong. I didn't really need to I just wanted to think I needed to.

Today I am sitting in my room and it is completely barren. My art and posters, Ali's men and photos, everything has been taken down. She has been gone since Saturday. I have never missed her so much. My bed is bare to the mattress and it hurts me to look at and think of all the times I spent in that bed. You always forget just how much time you spend sleeping, which is what I've realized I did a good amount of time here doing. I spent the night out of that bed, my first time doing so at college. I hated every second of it. I have an enormous attachment to the place I sleep. Which is why I should probably avoid having sex in a bed unless I plan on buying a new bed every time I start a new relationship. To think of it, that's not a terrible idea. My desk is bare and looking at it, I just think of all the hard work I did here at this same spot, in this chair. I have never felt so accomplished, so incredibly proud of myself for all of my work here. I still cry over the grades I got, in awe of how impressed my professors have been with me, and in even greater awe of the fact that, with the help of a few good proofreaders and my own skill with language, I was able to acquire A's on every single major paper I had written. In the English language of course.

I look out my window and I remember the winter months when it was much easier to see Bobst and see inside the windows of the library I have used twice this year. I remember being able to see the pedestrians walking through Washington Square Park and thinking to myself how fortunate I am to live on the park. It has been beautiful. Falling asleep to jazz musicians or students chatting while walking down the sidewalk. I now have a hard time falling asleep to silence.

I didn't think I'd cry every day when someone else left. I think I could cry more today if I could say goodbye to the few who are left. I couldn't cry over others for fear I'd give myself away, or for the simple fact that I know they would not cry equally. Since Tuesday I have been a mess of tears and stress. My friends, my friends separate from those at home, have left and I am always the last to leave. I suppose that's going to mean something some day. I am the last to leave for every vacation, for every break, with everyone in my life. It sounds ridiculous. I have a feeling I'm supposed to take something from it and embrace it. Or make something of myself so that my leaving last does not hurt nearly as much as it always does when you or someone else leaves.

I will not be able to miss the city the way other kids will. I will never have to. I will be here every week, working at the same internship, for the same two women, for one who I am quite certain appreciates me and for another who seems to be entirely too self-involved. I will take the same subway line and possibly see the same similar faces to enjoy a meal or two with on those days. Life will not necessarily change for me. It will be as it always is. You will all miss the city, you all miss the city always, but I will never have that. I don't know if that's what I want.

The talk of transferring comes up always. I discuss it often and consider it daily. But when I consider it I look around and I wonder if I could truly leave. They say you should experience something you're not familiar with. I'm not all that familiar with living in New York. Sure, I'm not living in Arkansas and watching people drive tractors, or watching people go cow tipping in the midwest, but I think that's because I know there is nothing for me in an experience like that. I need to be somewhere greater, more moving, passionate, loud, boisterous, fabulous, excessive and incredible all at the same time. The city is excessive. But excessive is not always such a terrible thing.

I am nervous to go home to the friendships I didn't care to maintain and to those I know are dangerous to become involved in. Coming home winter break I realized that I had lost a few more friendships than I had counted on, though I maintained a few, and only one that really has true strength. My best friend of longevity will be gone all summer, something I'm used to but am not necessarily pleased with. I feel this weight in my heart and as I sit here waiting for my mother to pick me up, I feel an equal sense of excitement and dread. I don't want to come home for anything or anyone. I don't really want to come home. I want to go back to my life a year ago, when I didn't have these new people to miss or care for.

Goodbye Washington Square.
I'll be seeing you shortly.

two lips tulips

there's something about the way the tulips bend toward you
when you walk past them
they call you and pull you
swaying and leaning with each step you take
their two lips kiss me and i embrace them.

i have decided that now i can honestly say, i think you disgust me.