Getting Back to IT
Well, I kind of feel bad not doing a winter special for 1996. So what the heck, I'll up and do one. What do you say?
I want to wait, really. I feel that for the last couple of months, well, ever since I had to sell my mind to get Pamela back, I haven't had a complete hold over my life's direction, my surroundings, and who I was exactly at the time. But yesterday I was at Shiela's house, and I was reading the letters I wrote her while she was in France. They took me right back to the days of swing, and I'm happy to say that I wasn't writing old swing last summer, but enough good stuff to mean that I still had the ability and flavor for it. That was exciting. But I told Shiela and Colleen all about it yesterday. I miss my youth. That's about all I really knew. I should question why.
In the past, I knew what had gone before me. I knew what it meant. I knew the year I was in, I knew where I'd be ten years from them, and I knew the present because I had all the time in class and church to think about it. In fact, I think that's about all I did with my weeks. I assume it would be easy to conclude a lot about life with it being that small. And it went on for so long. Easy as pie. Still in high-school. Hiding behind the wall of being less than eighteen. Not having to face anyone or anything as far as writing went. Whenever I write, it is always truth. But I don't always see what I'm writing and pay the attention to it that it requires to milk some better action from it. Take what I thought I knew about relationships my entire teenhood.
Anyway, I'm out of high school, the dream has faded, and since I got home I've been nothing but really lazy. I did get a job, but it was a miracle I got what I have. The job at the coffee shop. (Do you love how nasty and rough this copy is? I always have been such a man of aesthetics in writing. It's incredible how great it feels to have no correction tape!) So I'm working with the lame-os at the coffee shop. But they're the best lame-os I'm ever going to find. I know that. I had the job at Papa Leo's for a couple of days, and it was all but too much. I take that back--it was too much. I quit, and felt bad as always, and as it was with Best Western, I felt terrible about leaving them high and dry, so I wanted to forget about them paying me anything. But there's mom on my back as always about work demanding pay. And always I owe her dollars not to be believed. I did my taxes with Andy today, and so I'm getting enough to pay her off, but then I'll have to keep Switzerland in mind. And that raises so many other questions. I just want to get this all down, even if it's in the worst possible order. I want to write everything I know about what happened after my relationship with Marya faded. Everything since Mid-October 1995. Because up until that point, I have an exact picture of what life was like. '88-'95. And I figure if I can get this nailed and make some sense about how it relates to everything else I've done, I'll be back on the road to being an author. I know it's crazy. But I think I need to remember everything again. Something like make a big chart of the beginning to now. My life. I don't really care about the tech regression in doing it. I just need a hard copy of the events. This is my winter documentary, and it has to lead me in the way I should go. I have to answer to myself about the past year, and if I had the journal, I could really get started.
Of course, Ed still has them, and after a big overdrive of read, he's probably become apathetic to the idea of getting through the last two. I can almost smell it.
I'm working at the coffee shop now. Confused.
What's important is that I've realized how much time I've had. Actually, how much time there is in any elongated period. Just do a little, a lot. Get it? That's how I was able to pump out all the stories. One here, another there. Ten while in Kutney's (ha!).
So that's the one thing I know: I want to write. I was designed to write. And I haven't had the material or the drive to do it in a long time. And that's funny, because I was already a big veteran at 16 of the whole authorship game. Ed's writing class would have taken my stuff seriously at 16. Not 15. Oh no.
Dennis is the only thing stopping me after I figure out what I want. But that's only as far as the writing goes. What about my life?
Has it gotten smaller or just out of control? Well, I really don't think it's gotten smaller. Maybe less interesting, but I don't think it's that either. I guess last summer I really had it figured out. The answer to life was to quit society and live alone with farmers. That will always be the answer. Always. Let me say one more thing about writing--while I was in high school, writing was perfect. I had school and small adventures, and nothing else, and in the meantime while I had nothing to do in my room, I was supplied with the greatest typewriter of all time. He just sat there on the writing desk, and he ate up paper at incredible speed. No wonder I wrote so much, but also no wonder I couldn't get beyond the boundaries of that small Fantasia--my room. That's why I later write that I was bigger than my room. I got past the mindset. Now maybe that shattered some security, and maybe I've broken too much of myself by stepping out as much as I have, but I don't know any other way it could've happened. Now there's no school. Life is not school. Life is just waking up and doing whatever with your day. And thought increases. It has increased over the summer. But while the thoughts went up, the writing went down. The journal took off and I was writing a lot there. But the fiction kind of took a nosedive, and I don't know if it really was the death of Dennis that stops the flow of the writing. But I'm going to see how much it costs to fix him. And I do believe that's the first solid step in a good direction. My brother is going to give me his word processor, but if I take that, might I as well take the job at the bank and the house in the burbs. Well, I never believed about the house in the burbs. Real pretension. No thought as far as my complaining goes.
Now I talk about the road life has fallen off of. That's the right way to live. Well, maybe the writing is inseparable from that, in the assumption that my life is writing. Making sense of it all. Suppose the journal has fallen off because I don't want to talk about my life at the date which has superseded the old standby of highschool. And suppose I didn't know I might write about the progress of The Foot or the bands at church, or what I was really thinking as far as my convictions about God and church went. Because that's the truth. I couldn't put those things in the journal. Remember about the purpose.
I felt like I didn't write those things in the journal because it seemed I would lose the little grasp on my mastery of life that I have left. But maybe the whole losing the grip on life came from my not putting down what I really was feeling or happening. Just an idea there.
What's life? It's living in this small house, working at the cafe, dealing with Pamela and the fact that I don't feel the way she feels about me. Trying to deal with Ed and the Foot, although his drive to work is little. Having to deal with the church band and the band that Mike Sochay is proposing. Making promises to everyone. I can't say no.
In spite of that, what do I want? Why couldn't I just take a look at myself? Why couldn't I just listen to my oldest dreams?
In spite of that, what do I want? Why couldn't I just take a look at myself? Why couldn't I just listen to my oldest dreams? I want to write, for crying out loud. I want to be a self-supported freelance writer. And it's all I used to dream about. Did I know what it was like to sell out back then? No, I didn't. It's a lot slipperier than I could have cooked up. I had no reason ever to believe that I would stop writing. Sidetracked. But I have been. Maybe the music just took over for a while. I make promises to be a rock star still. And I wrote so many songs while in Switzerland. I've written 24 as the Foot. I've written 30 songs in all since Thanksgiving. Can I later call this period the Pursuit of Music? Or how about this documentary. I don't know. How about Getting Back to It? Ah, maybe not. Maybe I'll know when I give it a few more days. I need to give this a couple more days. There's no Seibly or Sara Ludwick. There's only Julie now.
It's been a year since I saw her. Since I've seen her. And I want to see her, and I want to see Ajna. I've been thinking about those two over the past week and a half. Ajna and Julie. I sent Ajna a letter. I just told her that I turned down a job at the bank and that she was the only reason. I really hope she writes back. That could restore some of my lost childhood maybe. Every once in a while, now, I just seem to come to the rock wall of a conclusion that I don't have the feel for some of my own memories like I used to. And that the feelings will only get more hazy. I know it. It's coming. I've got Ajna's phone number, too. I didn't know I had that. Maybe I just might. As for Julie, well, if I ever have enough cash. Maybe.
I should spend a lot of time in my room, rereading the old stuff. Getting reacquainted with it. Or maybe not. Maybe the writing can only move forward if I put the past behind me. I know the old writing could never be changed. One read and I may be back to it. But what if I started reading other authors and copied their style? Not to replace my own, but to learn and grow. I can never lose my identity as Dustin Gould, I know I can't. I'll write later, we'll see how it goes. I'll get a feel for the now.
Hey there folks, I'm back. It's been about three days since I last wrote. And since then I've given the journals a read and also the installment of this document that comes before now. They're both saying one thing to me: Something's missing. But you know what? The only thing that's changed is the writing. In essence, I think I made myself believe that something has really become different. Now you have to throw in the 20 barrier. Turning twenty sounds worse than it is. And I was building that up before it happened by talking about it all the time. Oh, twenty was going to be the end of me. Oh, I wasn't going to talk to anyone under twenty once I turned because it's just a completely different world. Oh, I was going to die before I hit 20. And then it came and all of a sudden in the journals, I didn't know myself and my feeling of self was gone tight out the door.
Well, I say bug all that. If Ajna was here she'd say bug all that. So that's what I'm saying. I'm twenty but I'm a bad-ass mother. And I'm laughing at that. Johnny and the mothers. I've been asking myself time after time where my apathy for life came from, and asking myself how I could have lost my drive for moving forward.
Now listen. Switzerland did change me. I've been in a place where I did nothing but adventure. And it's strange, but only after two months, I've kind of forgotten all about my life there. Even though it was the greatest time of my life. Somehow I let the feeling slip away in Feb. But if you want to pinpoint it, I'd guess the laziness (the real laziness I'm talking) came from Switzerland. That's just a guess, but it sounds right.
I find myself trapped in the cafe, trapped in the bands, seemingly trapped into waking up late every day and getting a late start on everything I want to do. I feel terrible, but because of the laziness, like the song I just made, "Let the Month Slip By." I did. I have. But what they can't take away really is the writing. Laziness = no writing much as far as the journal is concerned. Especially when the handwriting is on hiatus as well. Double or triple that when I feel burnt out as far as age goes. Just a big mess. So what do I do? I start throwing the pitch left or right or both: "I'm back." I don't know squat about squat, but I'm back. And that's all that matters. Only every time I say it, I've forgotten it by the next day, and I feel the same. Nothing's changed. What to do.
I finally know. And it’s writing.
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It seems like there's a sense of frustration and regret about not pursuing a writing career that the author had dreamed of in the past. They feel trapped in their current situation, working at a cafe and playing in bands, and struggling with laziness and burnout. The author acknowledges that writing is the one thing that can't be taken away from them and wants to start writing beyond their journal to pursue their dream. The author mentions a cat named Phil who has been encouraging them to write, and they seem to find comfort in his company.
____________________
I also said Dennis is coming back about ten times. Never happened. But whether or not Dennis is coming back immediately, I have to get something started as far as writing beyond the journal goes. And that's the secret. If I do that, well, I'll have what the nineteen-year-old me didn't have, and that's the writing career I lost. Just one story. If I feel like life's been different in the past year, well, take a look around there. Being out of high school's not the only thing that changed. I stopped the fiction, for the most part. River. Phil knew it. He's been on my back, and that's the only reason I figured any of this out. Yeah, my Rod Stewart groupie cat. He's out like a light right now. But he came in earlier saying something about a lost love and how being cool was so unimportant--then he just deadpanned into the sheets.
There are new institutions if I would just look for them. I won't ever forget the most important things.
This is my winter document. And it's turning out well. I'm working in the coffee shop. Surviving. Let me help myself along a little more. And provide happenings from the present.
As I said before, I've tried contacting Ajna again. I wrote her a letter and sent it last Saturday, I think. It's now Thursday of the next week and I've received nothing. Maybe she's still with Travis. Maybe her life's still as big as it was to shove me out of the picture. Maybe she'll write back.
Ajna's always been important to me, a symbol, I guess. She comes to mind at important times. And maybe she represents a part of my mind that simply doesn't want to yield to the takeover of adult years passing by. It seems that way. In the same way, perhaps Julie is nothing more than my feeling nostalgia about days long gone. I wouldn't argue with someone if they brought such points up, but in my secret heart I know that there is more to those two stories than meets the page, otherwise I never would have symbolized them at all. Notice how Jackie became nothing more than a page marker. Byington. Something.
I'm getting paid tomorrow. It's Friday tomorrow. And there's snow on the ground. The prereqs. Eut I haven't felt very romantic or excited this winter. Maybe in Switzerland, but that was a different life. I haven't brought much of what happened there home with me. I later came to see that. 99% erased. But I can recall it if I want. I have, by the way, in the past few days, tried digging up some of my basement folly in the house of the Flückigers. Hey, there's always Cyberdogs with Claudio, even if Pamela ditches out on me in Deutschland.
So I'm thinking about going down to see Julie. Julie Diane Vaughn. I've recently had two dreams about her, and that's enough. But on top of it, I heard. Masterpiece yesterday. And that's always been the signal. Like the spotlight with the bat emblem. Boom, I'm there. Lost Relationship Boy, he'll never let you down (or forget).
Besides that I could talk about Pamela. She's coming in 24 days. When I arrived home from the Schweiz, I thought everything was going to be fine. I liked her a lot, and I had myself ready to like her for life. Well, I could talk a long time, but basically, in layman's terms, the spell wore off after a while and. I was able to view my relationship with her objectively for the first time. It's real thin. Let me be clear with myself--I know there are better girls for me. I was caught by a dream. When Pamela first started writing to me, and when she got going with the talk of romance after I got maybe some swing, going--I knew to play the game with her was deadly. I'd done it my whole life and in fact just gotten out of it at that point. So I was a smart mother. The whole time, however, in the journals, I was admitting that a physical encounter might break my will to hold out just because she wanted everything so much and she's so pleasing. Question: Should I embrace what's going on between us. It's the last time such a thing will happen with me. After this Is over, I may forget over time why I don't have so much fun anymore with swing, and feeling as far as girls are concerned. Let's say another girl starts writing me out of the blue, professing love. I'll feel so far away from it--I'll feel like an old man. Already broken once after finding out the truth. I could never fall twice. And so it is over. All my younger escapades. But this thing with Pamela, I'm saying, is still going on. Should I utilize it? Let me just say, at least, I should recognize it, no matter what happens. Later I can study it, to remember why things like this don't happen anymore.
Who and where will I be then? I wanted to learn from my journals but really I did not. I didn’t know what it would be like to outgrow some of the things that ruined me.
So she'll be here in 24 days, and my greatest hope is to start her on her journey of finding and developing a suitable self-esteem. I know I can't give it to her, but I can help her as far as her self-image is concerned. I remember when Ajna used to write me about it. Standing in front of her mirror telling herself things. Well, she was right--no one can block the ball like her. I won't forget the most important things.
Can I help her with the bulimia? Well, I got Missy to write Pamela a letter, since Missy used to be bulimic. Something I found out after coming home. Pamela got it this week, and I hope the two of them will get along very well. I know Pamela will have a lot to ask. Mr. Brotmann and I were the only ones who knew until Holmes here opened his mouth, but I'm attempting to save her life. If I can help her get an image and faith in life, I can finally get to the business of our relationship. It's not all that bad. After it's over, no matter in what way, or if we never end, I'll be glad to know I helped her. That's the most important thing to me about her. Not our relationship.
So that's where life's at. I have to work tomorrow. Maybe I can finally take Dennis in to get an estimate on fixing him (yeah). I hope you're all enjoying my winter documentary so far. I don't know how long it's going to be or where I'm supposed to stop. It's usually the onset of school, but there is none this time. Well, I'll know. Maybe when I finish a story, if that's the remedy to my situation. Maybe. Anyway, I hope to see you all when I open the Sweatshops. That's all. Have a good journey.
Men, this is a day, well, it's a day of remembrance for one. A year ago I packed it up and headed for Albion, heart first. I did the same thing today, but with a new turn out. This time the whole college was a ghost town because it was Spring Break. Hey, that's Wonder Boy on the stairs.
I worked today, and while I was there I wrote four poems, I found my thoughts turning to the poetry I did in Kutney. I didn't know it then, I really thought it was bad, but the poems I turned out then kind of defined the times. Senior year. And the stuff I wrote today didn't seem to have the same effect. It seemed not as good. But maybe someday far off it will.
But the big news, I suppose, is that I feel the writing walls going up, like the beginning of a cabin that might someday turn into a palace. I've got this winter project on wheels, I've written a few poems, started a story, and my journal is feeling a bit better. I put some things in today about specific happiness at work, and I actually felt like putting it in. I was right, though. The answer was writing. The walls of writing going up, the opening of the old sweatshops by Tommy, bring back a hazy sense of well-being as well.
I read some of the really old stuff out of the orange notebook when I got home from Albion and I've gotten my cd player back in action. So I have the Clifford Brown on and life is good. All I need is a coke. And I could have one if I wanted. I also got a book back from Sheila tonight that I'd left there about a month ago.
She and I watched a video tonight, as we sometimes do together. We watched it on that bed we used to have escapades on. Incredible. I have to say, I do like being with her very much. More than a lot of people. We had pork chops with Crazy and her dad.
I guess I’m not going to write a lot tonight. It’s about two in the morning, and I don’t have the fire. Anyway, the big news is, I actually feel something beginning. Remind me to tell about the Ed situation with my story tomorrow or whenever.
Looks like it's turned out to be whatever rather than tomorrow, I wrote nothing yesterday. But I did buy a photo album and buy two rolls of film that I had developed. I put a montage of photos in the album and it came out great. A great start to doing something I always wanted to do. Today, however, I plan on doing a great deal of writing. I woke up this morning at Missy's with Ed, and I took him to work. I haven't yet mentioned Heather Borden who works at the cafe with me and Jones. She's a fellow Weezer fan and a great friend. Hipper than cats. I talked with her this morning, and she's always early morning fun.
The book I got back from Sheila is what I'm planning on doing for once I'm done with the entry for today. It's called Emperor of the Air and I think the guy who wrote it sounds like Ed and I, so I picked it up. I've only read one story, but it was undeniably Ed, with a lot of practice, making something of all the short pieces he does. The story I've started has potential. It had a lot of potential on page two, but now it's down to a little potential on page three.
I sent a letter to Ajna, good old Ajna, last week. And no response. Did I expect one? No, not really. I sent one to Amy, too. No response there either, but I didn't ask her for one. I want to get a letter to Pamela soon. She did get the package. I'd like to send the video, but money is talking.
I would love to write. I have nothing. I don't know if I've learned how to get beyond not having anything to say. I don't know. I have to go right now. My mother has taken away all inspiration. As always.
Well, I hope this entry turns out well. I worked 1-6 at the cafe today, and I feel I should mention something about the way Marya seems to have completely changed. She used to be so outgoing and fun, but it seems to all be about work now. She's always on my back about being a slacker when I'm not. It drives me up the wall. I've never seen someone seemingly forget who she used to be so quickly. It kind of happened in high school with Kathi, but that wasn't so quick.
I really should get back on my stories–well, story. That’s just about what his whole essay is hinged on.
Pamela is coming in 19 days. So it’s finally broke the 20 barrier. I'm ready for her. I'm ready to try and help her while thoroughly enjoying her time with me. The Schatz and I, we have such fun together, but I don't know if the magic is going to be outrun by the fact that we'll be smack in the middle of my world. The world that takes the fun out of the word Life. If Pamela told me that, I'd tell her to try and improve her own situation, but this is just boring, not terrible.
This morning I was reading from the Green Journal, and I must say that that is some truly amazing writing. I can't believe I was ever so witty and on about my own life. Isn't that crazy? It's me, and I can't believe it. I was also stunned by the frequency of adventure - even at nineteen, just a year ago. I'm jealous of that life. Even being at Discovery Zone, things were going on. They sure were. And I guess they're not now. I'm working at a coffee shop and playing in bands, but I did get a lot better in music over the past year. I can play from music on paper now if it's chorded, relatively quickly. I think I've gotten better at different keys and at not looking at my hands. But this morning I was reading about Andreja the Brat and of the Jamies at DZ. I had a big adventure asking out Seibly. Asking out Jessica yesterday (in the journal if you want it) was no biggie. I did it with one heart behind my back.
After all this, writing is what I want to do, and Maine is where I want to do it, with my wife? Hey, that's the legend. So I hope I start to sell, because yesterday I had to realize just how I've let some good time slip away since last year, not writing. I only did that story about Paul and Audra and the thing Eddie turned in. Oh yeah, I was supposed to tell about that.
Well, while I was staying with Matt's family last year, I used the computer to create what I thought was a story. I took it to K college one night and ended up reading it to a bunch of people in a literary read, and the crowd went nuts over it. I had the house going.
I left this story over at Ed's some time, and he pulled a scam move and turned it in as a piece of writing that he was supposed to have done in his writing class at school. His teacher gave him the piece back with "See Me" on it. The meeting with the teacher revealed that the teacher wanted to get together with Ed to discuss where he was going to publish this piece. The teacher was confident about it selling. But of course, she was under the misperception that Ed had written it. Now it's funny because if I want to sell it that way, Ed's name would have to go on it. And that would be my first sale. My fluke story with Ed Murray as the author. If I turned famous in years down the road, that would turn into a wonderful piece of trivia.
So I've got to be to band practice with the boys in an hour. My mother just gave me three dollars for a value meal. I always spend the money she gives me on what it's for, even when I need it. Right now, I need to go. I have nothing to report.
Well, I haven't written in a few days. It's Sunday now, and I think the last entry was Tuesday. The weather has been great the last week, and I think we're approaching sixty soon, or fifty. I can't remember which.
I've got some news which I think is great to report during one of my side journal projects. I'm glad that it happened now. Amy's written me in response to the small letter I sent her a week or two ago. I got it yesterday. It speaks about several things. She and Nick are no more. Now you have to remember that it was the relationship between them that ended communication between Amy and me last summer. I couldn't accept what she was telling me about them and what it meant for us, so I called the whole package quits, which was amazingly like Ajna. Only Ajna did the quits calling in our instance.
I happened to see Nick during one of my recent trips out to the cheap theaters to see Braveheart, I think I was with Sheila. I pretended not to see him, but I think he saw me. I wouldn't have known what to say to him. I wondered what he was doing in Lansing. Amy's letter revealed that he had taken over as Youth Pastor up in Mount Hope Grand Blanc. I can't believe that either. He's such a weird character. Amy apologized for the way she handled things during the whole ordeal, and I never thought I'd hear that from her. She was always so responsible and I thought the responsible ones were always right, but that's what got me about her actions last summer. They didn't seem right. I'll never forget the walks she and I took down her street past the horse farms. I'm thinking about writing her back. It's looking like I will. But I don't know what our relationship could be with her so far away at school. I don't know the next time I'd see her, if ever. Her college is in Oklahoma. What if for the rest of our lives we were simply reporting our affairs to each other? I have discovered, and I don't know exactly where, that that's no good. It's not worth it. You have to see the people you talk to, unless you've never seen them or do not have the drive to.
So that’s the big news.
To be honest, I have no idea about what this essay is or when it's supposed to end. I don't know why my journal is not enough and what I can put here I couldn't write in my journal. I have almost no drive to do this work here, but feel that I should. If for no other reason, just to put some bulk in my portfolio. I don't know what changed since the previous years to make this feel like it does. I don't know if it's having moved, not doing it on campus, drugs, my parents having divorced, just being older, all of that, or what. I don't know. But it's the same plague that makes me feel different. Not having control over my feelings. But that's been going on for so long now that I've gotten used to it and it's as if I always have been this way. I think I have to quit for today because I don't know what I'm doing here.
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This is the warm up on March 18th, 1996. The day I went down to see Julie and she actually talked with me. We walked around and shared experiences in just the way I wanted to. I couldn't believe it, I actually laid the past to rest. It actually turned out, and she believed me, everything I was there for. I know because she looked in my eyes and searched for the apology where I made it, and in the end she asked me for the letter. Not the letter, even, but she asked, "Can I have my letter?" Her letter. She knew and believed. What a day it was this afternoon for old times. What a fine Monday.
I've started a story about me on the run, painting apartments, and for now, it looks as if it could run and be right. I ask myself if the sweatshops can ever really be open on this typewriter, and I don't know if they can be as open as they were on Dennis, but I am sure that I can turn out a story or two. I know that touching a piece of Julie and finding Amy again has done things to me. It has let me know that the past is not dead, completely. In that sense, I just may be able to put out some prose and poetry to work like Dustin Gould always has. The weather is nice today, and it will be better in a few weeks, and maybe it's time that I made myself some new institutions. This is actually not a warm-up at all but a part of my essay for the winter. It has outlived the winter, and I am beginning to feel prolific, as prolific as I ever was and more. I'm reading now. And how could this change me if I let it? No one can say. Sure I need some stability. That's what my life is missing and has gone. All the things I have previously named simply combine to form instability. I can't believe I didn't notice that before.
How would I answer if they said they knew a way back to feeling on top of everything. I guess I would say yes, and later, when I'd made it there, I'd feel as if this was another part of my life. The time when the carpet was yanked out from under me. Well, that carpet can be bought with moments like today. Finding the greatest girl in my life, and two days ago, finding the second. By this count I should be comfortable in no time. Work or no work. They are all so far away, but there are others that are much closer. If I was okay with money, I could hang out a lot more with them. I admit it, I am close with no one, and I long to fly a kite in the park with a good friend or a girlfriend. And can that be Pamela? I don't know. I guess I'm secretly afraid she could leave me. Hmm...I think it's time I put on Rod and got back to the fiction. Read before you write. That's the secret. See you all at the turn out.
Well, I guess I'm going to keep the warm up as part of the document. I wrote it two days ago, after washing my car and heading down to Albion, never hoping for the success that I had there. The whole thing is in the journal, all except a few things and the very end. The farewell.
Just to say it, I went down and found her room, knocked, and she was home, and didn't shut the door on me. A few things left. One, how absolutely unbelievably in-stride I took the whole ordeal, walking around with the legend of my loves, years after we'd had our last conversation. That has struck me since we parted. But you know she is just Julie Vaughn when you get down to it. And there was a time when I was all she wanted. I recall the two of us walking down the stairs together, and I asked if she was going somewhere. I thought I misunderstood, that I would have had to have, what she said about the two of us going out for a walk because it was such a nice day. She walked ahead of me and seemed to have great purpose in her strides. I thought for a moment that it was a trick, and that we were going somewhere. A short walk. But it was me, in the end, that left. She gave me all the time I wanted, and I now believe that by the end, she was enjoying our time together. She even asked me what I was driving these days. I said a Subaru and asked her if she wanted to go see it. We did. That was about an hour after our walk began. And I had played piano for her and explained myself in full at that point. I was completely at ease with her and I think she was with me as well. She laughed at Sheila's license plate and that really caps it for me. And, of course, as I wrote already, she said, "Can I have my letter?", standing outside my car.
It seems that every time I begin one of these winter documents, something important happens, or important enough. Something that unfolds in almost story form. And just when I was so put off by there not being anything going on, one of the biggest adventures of all time comes about. I made it happen. And I went alone. It was for the past. It was for all the me's that missed her when Masterpiece came on since our falling out.
There was a point when we were talking about Ponderosa days, a point at which the suspicion had been paved over and we were starting to warm up. And she looked at me and said, "Good memories are nice to have." I passed over that statement at the time, but I've gotten to thinking about it. It's proof that I really had reconciled something. That her bitter air and deliberate harshness had disappeared because she believed in me--wanted to and did--and was glad herself that I had come for this final, memorable parting of the past and goodbye.
Another shocker was when we entered one of the very small practice rooms with the piano and she wanted to show me something. No longer the nemesis, I thought of myself, either that or she's letting me have this, the way I suspected Pamela might after her warning in the end. But Pamela was sincere. That's obvious enough. And I know now that Julie was too. "Good memories are nice to have," she said. And she said it of me.
She told me about the one she's marrying in four months. Brian is his name. I've known of him for over three years now. He walked in just as I was walking out. Back when Julie and I were writing letters, she spoke of him a little. I'm glad that it's him. I'm glad that she didn't spend the years since me in senseless relationships, assured that love could only let her down. I see it hasn't. It proves to me one thing, though. She was faithful. I was correct in every assumption about her. That it could have lasted. But you know, I'm still not sure which theory was right. The two I made in my journal just when she was leaving. Was it to drive us apart? Or keep us together…
I remember the way she looked -- not a day older, but different. She sure was beautiful, and when she untied her hair and it came down, well, I'd never seen her that way. I wonder how many times she's had it cut since we've been apart, and what I was doing. I endorsed her marriage by telling her that if she believed it was the right time, I knew it must be. It's funny telling her a thing like that after taking such a blow by learning that Andy Strane had up and married. But I do believe in Julie's judgment. It was always clear while mine was off-center. But I followed my heart, sometimes impulse, and I've come a long way from the ways I used to hurt her. Still not perfect. I blessed her wish to be a teacher, too. She's going to be so wonderful, I know she will. She already is and always was. She seemed happy to hear it each time I wished her the best or well in some area. I've taken everything she said to me as a sign of her mind, and the light in which she viewed me, and came to view me.
The granddaddy moment of our afternoon together would have to be our few moments outside her hall, Seaton, when I felt my time with her for exactly what it was, and that it would soon slip away. I asked myself what she would think of our last time together, once the years got a hold of it and she was able to look back on it and was able to see what it meant. And so I turned to her while we were both looking out over her campus. She looked me in the eyes and we were connected, one of the few times we let ourselves watch each other's eyes. And I gave her the most sincere and worthy apology I could muster for every transgression. How I meant every word. No, I didn't know the pains she claimed, and I said so. But never again. Never again, Julie. And we held our gaze through all my words. It was one of the hardest things I've ever made myself do, I wanted to look away. But I did what was right. And I know she believed it, and that it shaped the afternoon. Gave it the meaning and closure. Gave it definition, and myself some merit for coming back if for nothing else to really apologize, so far away from the fact.
A few minutes later, I held out my hand for her to shake it, an indication of the ultimate reconciliation between us. She hesitated long enough for me to notice and feel embarrassment, and then I knew she was not going to shake it. Just when I was at my worst, she clasped my hand and washed away our past--the first time we had touched in over three years. And surely the last. Her belief in me was true.
I was able to drive home and think about the entire afternoon and write at McDonald's. I guess the only thing that could have gone better was me having remembered all the words to the song when I tried playing it for her. She actually showed me her competition music. She turned the pages for me to see and explained things to me about it, though I was barely listening. I was too busy being overwhelmed and watching her as she moved. I was in heaven a couple of times. I let myself realize I was doing something inexplicably large and old and meaningful.
And so I know it's over, and finally she does, too. I will keep her in my heart, always. I know for sure now. The story between Julie Vaughn and I has a beginning and an end. And unbelievably those two dates are the same. Different years. March 18th, 1992 and March 18th, 1996. The day Lynne Gifford slipped me the letter which explained things to come, and the day I traveled down to Albion to again confront Julie, which finally panned out a heck of a lot better than any of my Frank Zappa plans.
How does it really feel? The crowd wants to know. Well, a bit sad. Sadder than I planned, I have to say. Maybe because I never thought it would all be over. But it is. I miss her now more than ever, because I know I will never see her again, and that used to be all I had. Like many things, the end of us became all too real. Now I have to look at it--never changing, mind you. It is what it is now. There was always room to change things in the past, even if she wouldn't speak to me. But now, well, now we've shaken hands and said okay about everything. Wished each other well. So yeah, that's a little hard to take, but it's the best thing. I know it in my head, but as happens, my heart still sings a different song. A sad song could still do it to me. I don't know exactly what she thinks of everything, but I know she's happy about what happened. And that makes me feel good.
I can see a picture of her in my mind, and I can recall our first days. It’s wonderful. I’m able. I love her someplace. I don’t know where. And it’s goodnight at last, I see. She said it herself, I guess. Good memories are nice to have. …
It's later in the evening, now. Much later, actually. And I'm so glad I had the opportunity to write of my encounter with Julie. I hope it's something I can always look back on with at least a smile. I wanted to get all the details on paper before I forgot them. It was listening to old Rod deliver Waltzing Matilda as I finished the entry, and I wanted to cry because of the combination. Two beautiful things coming together.
Tomorrow I will talk of Pamela and of the finishing of this document. But for now, it’s goodnight Matilda. :-)
Well, I got out of work early, and any excuse to write is a good and productive one. One that could only lead to a longer and better document. My winter document. And a funny thing happened yesterday. It became the first day of Spring, which means this couldn't be a winter document. But...it snowed yesterday after a severe spell of spring weather. There is snow on the ground--I have been given an extension. As you all know, snow outside is the prereqs for this stuff.
May I speak of Pamela, ladies and gentlemen? Or of my writing, my journal, or work? I think I will cover them all. I will tell of my life and...proliferate! I don't know what the word means, I look it up and find that it is: to multiply or to create rapidly. I am working at the cafe, and writing poetry on my breaks.
Pamela will be here, in this house where I am writing, in ten days. I realized yesterday that it's time I got busy planning our adventures. And oh, folks, there are adventures to be had. And I guess that's the big truth--if there's one person who I can lose myself with, it's her. Because she knows me as the heartful and passionate boy I was while I stayed with her, in a place where I had no past, and the future meant nothing. I suppose it's worth saying that I like her quite a bit. She was on the phone with me today and I realized I'd miss those calls in a way I can't describe. Maybe she's the last part of me able to be so foolish and youthful. Yeah, they all laugh. I'm so old. 20. But it's the truth of me. I've left the mentality and boyishness I'd have wanted to retain for life. Even if the things I know now will yield me better crops and percentages as far as situations. I'd rather have the youth. And maybe later I'll come to recant on these opinions--but that's always the option. I feel my world beginning to have walls again by my writing.
Pamela. Hmm…Kurt Kaiser is on and doesn’t know what to say about her either. But he’s got advice: Write pages. Phil gives it the nod and we’re off.
I guess I can't help being worried about our future together. I don't know if I will be able to have the kind of money I need to flee the country back to her by the end of June. That's the first time I have admitted that to paper. But my mother is going to give me her paper route. And I think that's $400 a month. I'll keep the cafe, which is another $250. Bills are about $300. I don't want to sit here and figure it out because I've never stuck to figures. I've made things happen in other ways when I needed them to. I suppose that's the part of me I won't discard in the coming years. I would never want to trade that in. There's always camping. There's always Switzerland. Yes, I've come very far, but too far to make sense now. I remember the essentials, and a thorough journal read could get me some specifics. I'd be right back. But guess who hasn't finished reading the last two journals? These two books have become legends in my mind. A part of me that is being held captive and that I must set free. I feel bound by Ed's apathy and inaction to read.
Another thing I'm worried about is the sex. I know Pamela expects it, and wants lots of it for that matter. She's very specific on the telephone, and she gets me pretty worked up. I don't know if I could resist, or that I want to. But our future together is shaky, and that could spell broken hearts. How often it has, sex aside. But that act is a power bonding, and I've never thrown it in the mix of a relationship before. I don't know the effects. I could get the scoop from Matt now that Tricia wants nothing to do with him, but I think his sense of it is warped anyway. It might be worth a big fat zero.
My writing is good. I think I feel good about it, and that its quality is increasing. I am reading Ethan Canin right now, and I'm almost done. I'm not going to write on his work because I have to save that for portfolio work. That's a lot of work. Literally. But I'm reading old Ethan for now and plan on diving into This Is My Best once I'm finished. Also, the story I'm working on is coming along just fine. It's essentially about me, on the run, the best time of my life but confused about it. I've changed a few things (who doesn't). It's on the eighth page right now, and the chapter I scratched out last night, after being assured at the time of its creation of its poor quality, turned out to be a decent section. I followed my gut writing it, and I see that if I do so, the words will come out okay. The points will make their way to the page. I just have to be honest. Later, the corrections will smooth it off like a final coat of the flat. Kilz on the socket plates, remember. Actually, I should be telling all this to my portfolio.
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It seems like you have a lot going on, and your writing is reflecting that. Your winter document is progressing, and you're working on poetry during your breaks at the cafe. You're also worried about the future with Pamela, both financially and sexually. However, you feel good about your writing and the quality is improving. You're reading Ethan Canin and plan on diving into "This Is My Best" once you're finished. You've also been specific and prolific in your journal work, and you've captured the Julie affair beautifully. Overall, it seems like you're busy but productive.
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So you want to know about my journal work? Well, folks, it's well. Like the last burger I had - it's well done. Ha ha. I've been specific and prolific - the two marks of quality. Quality in writing. I got the Julie affair down beautifully between this document and the journal entry. I don't believe I'll be able to forget about it now. In fact, what I meant to say was that I believe I'll be able to remember it in its entirety and meaning. I'm lucky that I was back on the ball with my linguistics when the event took place. Or maybe it's all interwoven. Causality. I could dig on that. Pick up a milkshake and dance with that for a song or two. But really, the journal's always hard to define while I put something going on the sly. Something on the side. Multiply that by ten when it's a second journal. This. The documents. The line has been forever hazy between my Winter Specials and my journal, and the books usually take a nose dive in one way on the table. Excuse me, my mother just said, "...on the table," and there it appeared in print. In lieu of this, please imagine the phrase OR ANOTHER. And there you have my report on the journal. Just the way you like it. Hamburgers.
It’s nearing four thirty, and I’m proliferating with my home prolific kit.
It's time I wrote what I can of work. Of Gibson's Books and Beans, the cafe at which I am employed. It's decent work because it's not much work at all. It's a hip enough job, and I wrote of that a long time ago, that I might have to just up and be cool about the whole thing. It hasn't happened yet, but I'm not ruling it out. Larry's okay, and we've been getting along better than we were a few weeks ago. It's a tough spot, working for your ex-girlfriend. When Pamela comes over and I take her into the cafe, I'm waiting for a reaction. From everyone.
One guy who I work with, named Stephen, is a real pal. He and I talk it up every day we work together, which is most of them because he's the only cook we have right now. Or chef. Or preparer of foods. I don't know what they label the guys in back. Me, I make coffee, work on the register, and more than not am answering to my true calling of Dish Holmes--a title that has found its place at the cafe after my bringing it there. (Just a note, Holmes seems to have slipped back into the arena of use after a long hiatus. I don't say Sloan much at all. Is it the end of cigarettes? I haven't smoked since turning twenty, four weeks and four days ago. I have a lot of support from all the cafe workers, most of them smokers. They've quit vicariously through me.) I also like conversations with Julia as well, but I have the small feeling that she puts up with a lot of the things I say. I try to make her happy. Beth is a worthy Slamwich opponent, but that's about it. I'll play a hot game of Slamwich any time with her. I don't know what to make of Heather. I don't know if she cares about me or not. I've had the notion that I had a grasp on this subject a few times, but she continues to prove enigmatic to my labeling. But we get along, and she likes Weezer, which is one of the biggest pluses with me. I would love to work morning shifts with her, as Ed does. He's getting twenty hours next week and I've been given ten. That equation produces a simple hamburger of truth: He's doing a better job than I am. That intrigues me a great deal. I pass some of it off on personality.
Well, to tell the truth, I'm beginning to feel on top of this essay. And that really signals the beginning of the end for me, in an essay which had no definite time limit. So I've given the signal of finality to the symbol of the prereqs: the fallen snow. I have resolved that the end of this will come on the day that the snow has all melted and gone. That could be tomorrow or in a few days, but I'm pretty sure it will happen before Pamela arrives. If not, then that will be it--her arrival, because at that point I'd like to be back in the books. I think I'm going to talk mostly about what this essay has been named, "Getting Back To It," an apt name. Because that's what I wanted when I began, I remember. I felt far away from the old ways and the old days, and I wanted a way back. In between there and here there have been a few events and some big effort on my part to get back to feeling like myself, and I'd like to reveal, folks, I am back. I feel fine, and like I've got direction now. It's the writing--I was right about it. But there have been other things. And I'll write it all in a big wrap up, whenever it is coming. I just thought I'd give you a sneak preview. I know that my task now will be to read this all from the beginning and to tie up the loose ends or elaborate on things. And then give it the nice closure I used to find at the end of my journals and of all my Winter pieces. I think the big read is coming soon, and that the snow will soon be gone. I've been given an extension by someone. So thanks. This time I needed it. Ask me about fiction when I'm wrapping up. Okay, gotta go. Intervarsity keys beckon me, and food. I'll write later.
Well, folks, I don’t think I have much time. The snow out on the lawn is scarce, and the sun is out today. I’m going to have to move. There’s no snow at all on yards across the street.
But what news I have! How much I have to write, only proving that the writing has not just brought direction but action as well. I got up this morning at 9:30, ready to attack the planet and do something, and it was Friday to boot, so I knew I had a paycheck waiting at work. I also know the cafe as a place that I have gotten some good things accomplished writing-wise in the near past. Mostly poetry, as I have written, but, well, a few other things as well. So I up and went to the cafe at 10 and set up a small writing camp at the bar counter. Soon, Julia was over next to me, making the sign for the day, and I decided I'd like to read her something on such a fine Friday, so I started to. At first, she was a little condescending--I was reading an old story just out of the blue, right in the middle. I didn't really care though, I wanted to read, and I was. Heather, Theresa, Jeff, and Jessica were all working as well, and they came by now and then to hear what I was doing, and it was great. Even Jeff, it surprised me. It took me back to the old days of showing off my work in classrooms during the day in high school. Proud of my current pieces and writing the cliff-hanger of The Washington Room for the guys in German. What a time.
Finally, because Julia was really not listening and criticizing the story, I decided to deliver some installments of this document, which I knew was good, any which way you slice it. And as I started to do so, Heather and Theresa became a permanent part of the audience, and I gave them everything I had with my oration, and then got into the part about Julie on Monday. I had to break and give them the basic run-down of the past and our relationship before I began, but once I did, it all fell into place, and I noticed that Jessica had gotten in on it as well at that point, which put me on pins and needles because I think she's so cute. I don't know what she thinks of me now. Everything that she's heard of mine has been about girls--minus the hippopotamus essay.
When I finished the reading I was rewarded with praise. Hey, it was the beginning of my morning at the cafe, which turned out to be such a great day. Last night I reread this whole baby and made notes to myself about the end of it and the things that have made this document what it is–the constants. The plot, I would say.
I also made an amazing discovery this morning. I found all the things I wrote at 19 years old. I guess I had put them all in my closet. What a wonderful surprise! I was able to bulk up my portfolio and see that I had done more than I thought I had before Dennis broke last summer. I found two warm ups among the wreckage and became very sad and surprised that they had gone on as long as last summer. That was the last time I will write warm ups without trying to sound so witty. Even if I get Dennis fixed, warm ups with the power will never be the same--for the same purpose. They've become too legendary for me. The same way that I can no longer invade the very old journals with notes and corrections.
Now you have to dig the fact that before Heather left for her other job, I gave her "Neon in Wellburg" -- the story of Paul and Audra -- to write something about for the section in my portfolio, Reader's Reaction. Theresa got off at eleven as well and she sat next to me and we talked and I read her some other things. She's really down to earth and I like her a lot. When Heather returned about an hour later she had typed over a page and a half, single-spaced, about the story. I was very excited. She left and I began to read it.
Folks, it was the kind of thing I used to do. Almost to the T. I see that Heather has the ability to be a great writer, she would just need a little work in the mechanics and shaping. Her response to my piece was a glimpse of her own life, in fact I'd say it was a full-fledged confessional, weaving what she had read into it. Using my story as a springboard into what she really had on her mind. I wrote a little about Heather last night, if you remember, on whether or not she cares about me, I guess she does, and I'm very excited about what will come next between us. She delivered me a large piece of her history and mind, and I want to get to know her. I think she could be one good friend. Plus, she likes Weezer. So…
My morning at the cafe continued to proceed as one big read--the employees came and went, and by two o' clock when I had eaten a veggie pita and exhausted my reading resources, I had read to around ten or so of my fellow workers. Even Ed. I also did a little writing. In particular a poem about Stephen, which you'll find in the Poetry Pocket. I'm working at the cafe. Getting back to writing and adventure.
It's time I wrote about what I discovered on the reread last night, in preparation for the closing of this long and ground-breaking essay. First of all, you'll notice the alternate titles on the cover page. Well, they are all small institutions of the writing--things that capture the meaning between the words, and things that just sound good. But I have decided to keep the title, "Getting Back To It," as you'll see why.
The question to answer is, what is this winter special? Well, it began on a whim, as is apparent from the first words. I just decided to up and do one. But once I got writing, I saw that what I wanted most of all was to overcome this feeling that had been growing for a while: I no longer felt like myself, and that life was somehow different and wrong now.
But during the course of this essay, one thing began to change in my life--I started writing again. A story, another story, poetry, the essay itself. And over time, I said it here twice I think, I began to feel the walls go up. I began to feel the guys downstairs walking in the old place, barely recognizing it, and starting to clear away the cobwebs. Tommy and the boys reopened the old sweatshops. And I can't begin to tell you how much that started making me feel like my old self. It is truly indescribable. But I was right--what if they asked you if you really wanted to come back? What if they really had a way to get there? Well then I guess I'd take it and later on label this lost life as another period. This is exactly what's taken place. It started with the writing in intangible ways, and then something incredible happened--I went down to see Julie Diane Vaughn and I spent the afternoon with her. It was only the day before that I was completely lost in this document, well going in the words, but still felt that this wasn't enough. I now believe that the writing made something like Julie happen--that my extensiveness and proliferation each time I do a winter piece allows for some of the best adventures of my life. The plot seems to carry me through the real world until it's over. Life can work like a story for a while.
So, what exactly has taken place since I began? I have begun to be an author again, including writing some poems that developed others that, yes, are beginning to become signs of the time, just like my Kutney work. I have spoken of Dennis and of his resurrection. My CD player is back, which allows me to listen to the same songs I always used to write to. I made my first photo album, which will tell me where I've been and tells me where I am. Definition. I have gotten past having nothing to say, something that I found plagued me in the beginning. Amy has come back to me, at least in letters, and she is waiting to reinstate a relationship of some kind. She came from one of my most important and defining past relationships.
And of course, maybe the most important thing that has happened in years--the reconciliation with Julie. If that's not enough happening for me, well, nothing can be. Now there's the excitement of turning out so much writing, and something like Heather happening--the finding of someone much like me, who wants to pour their heart out in every chance to write. I feel good about adventure. Money's going to happen. I've discussed my takeover of the paper route, and that means enough money to live well until I can make my break.
Pamela will be here in 9 days, and we'll all see what's what in the normal books when she gets here. I know that adventure and movement lies within her, too. It has always. And so basically, I know it's time to close this winter document of 1996 up, maybe the most important document I've ever done, but one that will be viewed as the others maybe. Without it, I don't know what would have happened to me or my writing, or if there ever would have been more stories or winter documents.
But there's one thing I wrote somewhere in the mix of all these pages that still rings true to me--I shouldn't close this document, with all the credit I've given to the return of writing as my source back to feeling stable, wonderful, legendary, on top of things, and myself, how could I possibly sign off without first having completed a story since coming back? I don't think it would be right. The title is apt, Getting Back To It. And the "it" isn't just writing. It's my own life. It's my old life. It's life that made sense and that related to me and the past, and that's just what happened. Make no mistake about it: I have returned in full. And it has a new twist of something I can't name, but maybe it's being older.
Where am I headed? What's in store for this new/old author? Well, as I may have said, the dreams are now becoming challenges. I have been forced to make plans that don't and can't begin with, "First I'll finish high school...", and they have to be more specific than I ever have been. Otherwise time slips away, as it did for so many months. But now I'm writing again. I'm married to writing, and it has produced everything I have been missing. I'm getting back to it, you see?
Thanks for listening, as always.
I will write again when the story is done, and when the snow has melted. And remember: there are hamburgers of truth all around us. Don’t give up on your dreams.
Yours,
Dustin Gould
March 22nd, 1996 Friday
