not a catalogue of
romantic possibilities, just a generic
sketch book, sold on the shelves of every
bookstore and
stationer in america, the
little black book came home with me from
washington dc in sixth grade, the only
memoir of that trip that means anything to me. when i bought it, at the
university of maryland, i bought two pens - salmon and lilac. and i drew
little girls with them, and a
terrapin because that was the school's mascot. and i threw the book in a box with all the
cheap postcards sold on the streets near the
monuments and it wasted away until
high school.
in high school, i learned to see whatever it is that some of us see in
blank pages. the challenge, the possibility. there aren't many
creative exploits that can't be accomplished with only the
ready white surface of paper and a good ink pen, even a pencil. it's
mystical, the effect blank pages have on me. they're
sexier than maybe anything, especially good paper, like the
supple sheets of the bed in an expensive hotel turned back, waiting.
throughout high school, the beginning of
college, even last fall, it was my
diary and the old entries comprised a
bible. i forget who i was as a child. if i met her, i probably wouldn't understand her. but i'm no longer in danger of
losing touch with myself as a teenager, even as a
scared young woman
venturing off to fight the demons of lonliness and self pity.
and though it may seem ill-advised, i'm going to node the things in that book. not all of them (i'll make a note where i skip places), but the important things. the
bad teenage poetry, in all it's
pimply faced,
akward glory.
table of contents
- torn out pages - used to have photos pasted on them. 11-12 years old
- hey, cat boy 15 yrs
- generalized teenage punk rock angst
- scary art from the anorexic days
- ranting at jesse
- drawings, notes on college application process 16-18 yrs
- a beautiful girl
- drawings, calendars, poetry too bad to post, stories..
- after a week at smith 18yrs
- after a week at smith part 2
- notes from dambuilders/third eye blind, 'i use my psychic powers. i teach the children, i grow the flowers.'
- someday, in cincinnati
- sad little rhymes, drawings from the new york transit terminal and the greyhound, 'no dark thought should intrude lest it take us out of time but staying upright in the middle is more difficult.'
- a slew of information about the apda hybrids debate tournament
- river, in all his innocent beauty and home in hers 19 yrs
- walking again
- our sister
- poorly rhymed lyrics part 1
- poorly rhymed lyrics part 2
- notes on running start 20 yrs
- i put away childish things, like myself
- more notes
- streamofconsciousness
- streamofconsciousness with separate sentences
- drawings from oly 21 yrs
- i'm afraid of hipsters
- the last few pages, which i don't think i'll ever fill because it's time to see this little book for what it is and put it away someplace safe, not confuse the record by adding pieces of my more recent self.
again, i admit readily that this is bad teenage poetry, so please don't hold back with
derisive commentary - that's what's fun about this particular '
art form.'