I don’t need life to be fair. I don’t want easy relationships, marked and tightly wrapped in brown paper like cuts of meat. I want my days strung like a long, beaded necklace that swings when I dance, and I want to have the courage to let the necklace dangle where it may, the beads refracting light into rainbows, despite the danger of having it snag and snap. I want to whirl, knowing that the string may break and send the beads skittering across the ballroom, escaping my frantically clawing fingers before they disappear into the slats in the floor. I want days like disco balls, each spinning at a different speed, some holding perfectly still to reflect the natural changes in light.

I have never wished for fame. To have a cult following would be all right, I guess. I could handle being recognized as cool amongst elitists and eccentrics, as long as their winks and passwords didn’t encroach too much on my time alone. I hope to always be able to make the luxurious distinction between loneliness and solitude.

I feel my youth, and lordy, I’m terrified that I’ll outgrow it.

I want a car with a decent stereo, and a partner in crime. We would abandon this linear life and poke erratically around the continent, working odd jobs to pay for gas and necessities, begging off other payments for a time, choosing romantic adventure over responsibility, even while the interest rates of our stalled loans mounted.

There are many people I love, but only two, maybe three, whose energies compliment mine in such a way that (I’d bet) if we got together to give the world a cheeky flip-off, things would happen. We could score free pie at a Mormon diner by virtue of looking so damned broke, friendly, and out of place. We’d get kicked off of church steps for not looking homeless enough, and have to sleep in the car again. We'd be involved in brawls and reunions, witness loves and departures. We’d stop for gas or a breather, and hear the confessions of aged transients and uptight car dealers, who would tell us their stories because we would look just tired, patient, and curious enough to listen. And they would be correct. We would listen.

My partners in crime and I may seem as dissimilar as turtles and a butterflies, or we may know each other on such a kindred level that verbal exchange is seldom necessary. The partners I have in mind are people I seldom see, if ever. But I share with these friends a compassionate perspective, the ability, despite however life has embittered either one of us, to scoop out or peer between the seeds of humanity, eventually getting to its ripe flesh. Perhaps despite ourselves, we see the good in others. We collect stories, and allow strangers to become gilded in their own pasts as we take bites out of their memories and shower them with the juices.

I realize I don’t have the freedom for a wantonly spontaneous road trip, what with job, and bills, and other things that don’t matter in the long run, yet sometimes come so close to fucking up my life.

But, partner? You come get me, or I’ll go pick you up. Greet me at the door with a pillow, a camera, a folio of CDs, and a pair of comfortable shoes, and nod in the direction of the car. I’ll try to muster the courage to refrain from saying, “I can’t, baby.” If I argue, you can run a gossamer scythe gently underneath my feet, and cut me loose from the transparent filaments that fetter me to the earth. Take all of my becauses and stuff them in garbage bags. You’ll allow me to bring as many with me as will fit in the trunk, but the rest have to be tossed in the alley. We’ll work it out, you’ll promise, and I’ll jump in the car, because I'll believe you.

And we’ll scream down the road toward the proverbial sunset- a stained-glass window of sadness called hope. Under our tires we’ll crush our weary exhilleration even as it spreads endlessly before us. We’ll make our malleable sense of home sit “bitch,” wedged between us in the front seat. We’ll get a bottle of cheap wine from the drugstore, and drink it in Arizona, marveling over the feminine fecundity of the gash that is the Grand Canyon. Sometimes the whole world will be sexy.

As with all great love affairs, ours with the voyage will include emotions as varied as the elevation through the Rockies. Some days, the wind that whips into the windows and knocks the cherry from my cigarette will be “I love you I love you I love you.” Others, the sun will blister our shoulders and the backs of our necks, sneering, “Fuck you I told you so” as we hike to the closest gas station to use the last of our cash for petrol.

Maybe you’ll get pissed at me for talking too much about the way things could be and should be, or for waffling in favor of something that is obviously stupid, just so I can avoid conflict. Maybe I’ll get annoyed at you for your snobbish tastes or your way of alienating people by being overly aware of yourself, or whatever it is that might make you “too much” of who you are. We’ll argue, and stop talking for a spell. Instead, we’ll sit in silence and allow our moods to be dictated by the music on the stereo, which we’ll have chosen in accordance with the current landscape. Or we’ll stop, and step away from each other for days or hours, gathering separate stories to share with each other when we’ve both cooled off.

The only boundary we’ll mark will be that between sunset and sunrise, and we’ll note any change in climate by the frizzy circumference of my moisture-sensitive hair. We’ll stop wherever we want, for as long as can afford to do so. Sometimes we’ll drive until we’re exhausted, only stopping when the car threatens to take on a life of its own and make a Kevorkian swerve off the next bridge. But we won’t be sorry for any of it. It will last until it’s over, recorded in our photographs and memories, and in the postcards we’ve scattered around the globe, to friends we may or may not have in common.

I know, this sounds like silly dreaming, a glamourized fantasy inspired by too much Kerouac. I just think it’s irresponsible not to have adventures and experiences that are somewhat within your power to have, and I feel bewildered and guilty when I think about how much I want to do, and haven’t done. There's so much music I haven't heard. I fear that no matter where I go, regardless of how wonderful the city/my friends/my life/my self-image is, I will never extinguish the feeling of, “I have to get out of here.” Maybe that's not such a bad thing.

I need to talk to my friend, Pablo. He’s a manic pirate of sorts, living according to what feels right at any given time, never apologizing for his choice to do so. He has a way of pronouncing “happy” like it’s something you win at an arcade.

I know that by thinking that happiness is always around the corner, I run the risk of racing from one corner to the next, like Spiderman scaling a geodesic dome. But I think that’s kind of beautiful. I’m not unhappy. I have always had a sense of Joy. I cradle it to support its fragile head, as if it is a newborn baby. I hold it in my mouth, its glow only escaping when I smile or laugh. It nests between my shoulderblades and fits in my belly-button, as malleable as my sense of home, but far easier to identify. I am sometimes most aware of it when I am deeply in hate with my life. I take it with me everywhere. It's quite light.

I want a car, and maybe a million bucks. Twenty grand would do.

~ Last Five Entries ~

Moths, and Relative Nonsense - 08.18.05

I Finally Have Internet Access in my Bedroom. But, No Ashtray. - 08.09.05

Here I Am - 08.02.05

One-Armed Paper Hanger Earns her Wings - 07.29.05

Sugar & Lemon - 07.28.05

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BUY JEN'S BOOK! BUY IT! DO IT!

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BUY DEAN'S BOOK, TOO! YOU KNOW YOU WANNA! SERIOUSLY.

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