11/1/01 11:10pm

is this really want i want to be doing with my time, or at least this percentage of my time, or am i really just trying to fill some void with whatever i can find? because when i think of the idea of personal fulfillment, its definitely not going out and partying like a rock star every chance i get. in a way, im happier than i've ever been before. but sometimes i feel like its kind of a superficial happiness - like one day im just going to do one too many hits of acid and realize exactly how much bullshit this all is and then im not going to know what im doing with myself.

sometimes i feel this emotional stagnancy creeping in again, and i find myself wandering through the streets of dc at 3am for no reason, freezing in late october pre-dawn chill and searching for something that i cant even recognize in my head, let alone in the real. i curl up in the corners of coffeehouses and all night diners and stone walls around campus with some paper in hand and these questions in my head that i cant even put words to. i look at people out of the corner of my eye, looking for some certain look in their eyes that i probably wouldn't recognize if i saw, some tone of voice out of the multitude of random guys who strike up conversations with me at parties, some structure of words that would tell me there's something there, something more than the stupid post-adolescent i-want-to-fuck-you leer, watching the way a girl smokes her cigarettes sitting alone on a bench.

but i never talk to them.

i never ask the girl with the cigarette what it is she's reading, i never ask the boy who i catch glancing my way his name, and far more often than not i shrug off the advances of others with a raised eyebrow and a wry smile.

i never did know how to meet people. i find myself assuming that people talk to me just to fuck me, which is a pretty goddamn arrogant thing to think to begin with, but in most of the random social settings i find myself in, its the most obvious conclusion and is most often more than likely the case - and of course this is not exclusive to me, by a long shot, clubs are meat markets in general.

maybe thats why i used to talk to people online all the time. not that i still dont, but nowadays i very rarely talk to someone that i dont know, and if i do its usually via dcraves or some shit, and they know people i know and etc. i used to sit on irc, or even njc way back in the day, and watch the inane commentary proceed, waiting for some comment to catch my eye, and try to strike a conversation with whoever. it was kind of like a game, me being 14 15 16 yrs old and forming these some sort of friendships with the few people worthwhile without using my body and eyes and mouth, even if i knew we'd never meet in real life it was a conquest. and doubly back when i used to meet people from njc, the few cute and interesting boys that i met, mike and matt and even chip and joey and so on. i think in a way i enjoyed knowing that i was too young for them and knowing they knew it and knowing they wanted me anyway; i could use my brain and my words online because i knew i didn't talk like a 15 year old then, whereas if i'd met these people randomly in real life i would undoubtedly have sat there silent and stupid and giggly, which i usually did anyway when i did meet them but id talk to them online, and say more than 2 words, and keep them interested.

i wonder if id have become friends with the same people were if not for njc. i think many of the first conversations i had with abby and kristin and thad and matt hoover and jen and even jessica g and leanne and god knows who else in high school were via njc or email or some junk. heh.. that's so weird. "what could have been: my life without njc." kind of sad, but considering that at 15 i had *far* less confidence and social skills than the not-impressive level im at now.. well, whatever worked at the time.

nowadays, at least all my friends are people i actually *met* and *then* became friends, even if half the time most of the communication i do is online rather than over the phone - its far more convenient since several live in fucking richmond (not just richmond - FUCKING richmond,) and besides, i just hate the phone, and i dont think there's anythign wrong with that.

and once in a while i find that connection in the most random places. like meeting justin and layla in dennys back in may. i was sitting alone at a table writing something, killing time at around 9ish cuz i didnt feel like going to help set up quool (the syndicate party), and they were sitting at a table nearby. layla sat down next to me and asked me what i was writing, and we started talking, as justin was sitting there half curious and half embarassed. so i joined them at their table, and we talked for hours, about everything from school to 8 bit nintendo gaming to our respective fucked up emotions, until it was 1:30 in the morning and i realized i had to go to quool before it shut down because i was in fredericksburg and i didn't want to drive all the way back to dc and i needed to make sure i could crash at chris' house. (also, probably because i wanted to get laid.) and ive actually kept in touch with justin, although not layla; it was such a good feeling to go out and completely unexpectedly find a proverbial "kindred spirit," at dennys of all places.

on that note, im still fucking exhausted from last night, im SO GLAD i can sleep in tomorrow. not that im usually really good about the whole "getting up and going to class" thing, but, at least i dont have to feel guilty when i wake up and 3pm. heh.