Sunday, August 13, 2000

Two things have been swimming around in my mind:

We may be through with the past, but the past ain't through with us

I hope the dogs don't bark tonight -- I always think its mine.

The former because I watched Magnolia, and, despite the fact that rather enormous amounts of people disliked it, I at least give it credit for being something different and for actually moving me to think. After the movie was off, it was about 3 A.M. and I collapsed into a big pile of weird, messy tears. Not about the movie at all, just because it had made me think of how crazy I can get or something silly and unimportant like that. I don't even remember, really, what it was about. Just that it made me think.

I have had the soundtrack for months and have been waiting forever to see the movie. And now I can't stop listening to it because I like it that much more. The song "Wise Up" was always my favorite, and I sat up in my bed when it came on in the movie.

And the latter because I've been spending hours on my summer reading write-ups. Every time I look through the stranger that one quotation stares at me and I'm not positive about that, either.

But, moving right along.
I am ashamed to admit that I have rented Drive Me Crazy not once, but twice. How embarassing. What can I say, I like Adrienne Grenier. I've seen The Adventures of Sebastian Cole, which I love, over 7 times. Something like that.

But anyways, I am reminded of a part in the movie where "Alicia DeGrasario" says, "A real man works without a net." Right on, I think.

Because you cannot seem to get the message. But not only that, you can't confront me. Why should I be direct with you when you cannot ask me a simple question? You are an idiot, I swear. I will not react to notes and I will not react to you asking someone to ask me to tell you... Real Life is not like 2nd grade, where you were to afraid to confront someone about trivial things. Its like rejection on paper is not even rejection at all and neither are questions on paper. Its just play, a paper-doll way of dealing with things, if you ask me. (which you most certainly won't, pussy.)

And to another you:

I understand you now, even if I still hate you. For months after you stopped calling, whenever the phone rang I would hope it was you. Every time it wasn't, I was dissappointed. I was waiting, and in a way, I've never stopped.

I told myself a number of things. I've told myself that you were scared or that you didn't like me like that anymore or that you didn't like girls or that, since you were leaving so soon, it wouldn't be practical. I've thought that I hated you so much because, if nothing else, we were friends. I've told myself everything except for that, maybe, you just didn't want to see me again. I tried to keep from thinking that, but now it seems more likely than anything else. What else am I supposed to think? I am just the same as you.
posted by Leslie Ruth 8/13/2000 6:29:59 PM

Sunday, August 6, 2000

So how do you tell someone that you think they're boring and that you no longer prefer to be in their company? In the past I always disliked people who complained about suffering relationships and I always would be really mad about it, because at least they had something at some point in time to cause them to complain about the change that occured.

I always thought that relationships with the opposite sex, or the same sex as the case may be for some, were just like friendships: unofficial, unstated, and, when it came to the time when things just didn't work out anymore, there was no elaborate break-up, but more of a fading out of terms. You didn't have to spell things out because, really, both people should just be concious enough of the surrounding circumstances and what should continue on and what shouldn't. People should just know these things. They should just get the message and why should everything have to be so verbal all the time?

I was in a horrendous mood the other day, because, for the entire second half of the day, I thought it was Sunday. But now that it is Sunday, I'm just a little confused.

Its not that I haven't done this sort of thing before, because I have. And even to the same person. And he didn't understand then like he won't understand now. I tell him the whole "I-just-don't-like-you-like-that" thing, and, of course, the "we-should-just-be-friends" thing, but even that is not enough.

Really, how do you tell someone this: the sound of your voice grates on my nerves. we have the same conversation every time we speak. you are tired and uncreative. you bore me. i hate you for telling me that the state of the economy could never be affected if everyone decided to by japanese cars and the way that you always say things that are wrong and think i'm too stupid to know they're wrong or to even grasp the basic concepts of economics, like someone i know is. i hate you for mispronouncing the word "fascist" and pretending that you know what you're talking about when you obviously don't. i get bored with people who harp about how stupid gun control is. i hate the way you never offer to pay for me, because you are so afraid that I might accept (i wouldn't). you bore me. i hate the way you asked me if i was going to pay for my dinner at prom and never told me i looked nice and never opened any doors for me or made any effort to be nice at least for one night. i hate the way you are so disgusted at gay people. i hate your favorite movies. i hate the way you asked another girl to give you a back rub and pushed me off a bed and didn't understand why i was upset. you bore me.

And that's just a short list.

Boys are highly overrated.

posted by Leslie Ruth 8/6/2000 12:21:56 PM

Friday, August 4, 2000

I think I am a horrible person. There's a man who comes in the video store a lot and he always rents a lot of videos but he never says a word no matter how much you say to him. I never understood that, but apparently he's deaf and that made me think that he must use closed captions to watch his movies and what would he think of the people who get mad when they find out that they've rented a movie with subtitles? I mean, for him, every movie is in subtitles. His world is made up of subtitles. How awkward.

Jessica let me borrow a couple of Blake Nelson books, and I've been reading Girl instead of The Heart is a Lonely Hunter like I am supposed to. A week and two days until school starts and I have two more books to read...

Yesterday my senior portraits came back, yet another glaring reminder of my dwindling (thankfully) high school career. I have been far too obsessed by the idea of college, the idea that college takes you and transplants you from point "A" to point "B," and, technically speaking, it kinda does. But I map out my future from college to college thinking "What would I major in?" and "What clubs would I join" and "Where am I going to end up?" You know, things like that. I get so ecstatic when I get college mail, especially the booklet things with all the pictures and what have you. Then I think to myself, "Leslie, you shouldn't be so preoccupied with these sorts of things. You should giggle and think about shopping and boys and sex. Your a teenager, after all," except for not really. What can I say, I just want to get out of Alabama. I just want to make something out of my life and not turn into one of those withered, unhappy people who get mocked by Salinger.
posted by Leslie Ruth 8/4/2000 9:18:35 PM

You know, I am starting to unravel and I am looking forward to it.

I find myself thinking about my situation, and its so unnatural being tied down to a person for almost a year, especially when its a snore, you know. Its not even that the situation is comfortable, because its not. In fact, its very uncomfortable. I feel like I've spend the past 7 months with a sweater on that has one of those tags on it that just won't stop scratching your lower neck and its very-very uncomfortable.

I am amazed at the childishness of this person and I find myself wondering what exactly it was that was going on inside my head those first couple of weeks when things first started and I didn't feel that tag scratching my neck. And for a while I just pretended it wasn't there, but whats the use in that? After all, it just becomes more and more persistant, and it certainly doesn't just go away. But I have to get the itch to go away. I need a swift kick in the ass.

He gave me a note today, and not even person-to-person. I find myself astonished that I have allowed this to drag on when I have wanted and wanted subconciously as well as consciously. I find myself angry at him for a number of things that maybe I shouldn't be mad about and I think to myself that I am somehow more wordly and more knowlegable about these sorts of things than he is, which, in fact, I am.

I am amazed at his cowardice and the things about him that grate on my nerves -- the way he chews on his fingernails and repeats the same conversation over and over again and the way that you can't tell that he's smart at all even though I know he is at least a little....
posted by Leslie Ruth 8/4/2000 1:44:05 PM

Wednesday, August 2, 2000

Two more weeks. Then my life will start flowing again, and I can't stop thinking about how this year will be. My years are characterized by certain people and certain events. 9th grade was my falling out with Lisa and practically every other friend, but before that it was movie gallery movies and chiclets and donuts from win dixie; sitting on her waterbed and talking about things that seemed deep and important then and seem somewhat deep and important now; her father calling me some strange name that I can't remember any more; Lisa being hostile towards her mother and her religion and me learning what "Eckincar" was; and how her mother thought her tori poster, with the gun and the dead cock in the background, was just so phallic. 10th grade I remember coming in the year with few friends of the female persuasion. I remember coming into chemistry class and sitting alone, with no lab partner until Jessica, who I hated at the time, showed up. 10th grade was characterized by fun -- A Life Less Ordinary, Oscar, The Breakfast Club, that poster that I had to make for Chemistry and accidentially wrote "Los Angeles" instead of "Los Alamos"... I didn't have a job and Jessica didn't have a job and we would hang out practically every weekend and stay up until 4 in the morning watching movies and talking about everything from boys to the existance of God. I would be awoken the next day, inevitably, by her barking dog. 11th grade was characterized by Jessica working and me being bored and missing friends who had left for school and me being with my boyfriend, which was exciting at one point, but not at all now. In fact quite the opposite. So I'm hoping that things will be different and I hope I could maybe be alone for a while, or have some sort of excitement, something to remember...
posted by Leslie Ruth 8/2/2000 11:35:02 AM