Both feet fell asleep so I stumbled as I made my way across the house.
The concentration it took meant I didn't immediately notice the bruises on my hips
from my jeans digging in.

This is a list of things I like

Harmonicas, maps, people who recognize the legitimacy of a saw as a musical instrument, coffee mixed with hot chocolate, clean sheets

I haven't had much to say lately.

You take one step and miss the whole first rung.

I want to be optimistic so badly.
I want to believe that things will all work out.
I want to worry less and embrace things more.
I want to be hopeful for somebody else. For everybody else.

When will I learn to drag myself out of bed when I think of something worth remembering?
I haven't have a worthwhile thought in a long time.

This is a year and a half old actually.

On Saturday night I dreamt about my church days.
Procession, crosses, white robes and lighting candles.

Sara Durland

I wonder if I ever learned anything.

Let's say you were twelve years old again, what would be a typical day for you?

Wake up early, walk to the bus, get on the bus, go to school, go to my first class (science, with Mr. Mig) and fuck around with Clyde and Martin, go through the rest of my day with Clyde because we had every class but social studies together. Get in trouble for talking too much and making fun of Mr. Pond. Try to ditch PJ, while being unnecessarily mean. Get on the bus to go home. Go to Katie's, watch TV, go home, eat, go to rehearsal everysinglenight (hang out with Clyde and Josh after Fortissimos Tuesday nights, hang out with Sam and the boys during Once On This Island rehearsals), come home, pretend to do homework. Sleep.

I turned twelve in seventh grade. That was the year that Clyde dated Kayla Gordon for a while. Katie, Angela, Gabby and Clyde were in my music class. We would draw faces on pictures of composers. Clyde drew a giant afro on Beethoven once. A car and the moon were in it.
Clyde and I were also in a secondary math class with about nine kids because we scored poorly on the state math exam the year before; but we were in the accelerated math class ninth period.

My English teacher's name was Heidi Wagner. She set up a giant "Shakespeare festival" at the end of the year for the seventh and eighth grade. Our class split into groups and performed our own rewritten renditions of scenes from Hamlet. PJ and I did the scene where Hamlet doesn't kill his uncle. I was Hamlet. I had a lightsaber.
This week marks the first time I stepped foot into Sunshine Studios.

We went to the Bronx Zoo that year. Josh and Chalen started singing the Spongebob theme song while we were in the ghetto and the entire bus started singing with them.
The last day of that year was really amazing. Because our math class was inter-academy, Josh Chalen PJ Clyde and I wound up spending the period sitting in an empty classroom because the other two academies were at an assembly. We talked about blanking out on tests and our parents and Josh told me I should start wearing contacts. I think he was trying to imply that he thought I was pretty. I never pressed the subject.
The five of us also took French together. I was never very good. Josh and Chalen always sat together, Clyde and Martin paired off and I sat with my friend Amanda and Ashley most of the time.
PJ was in love with me for all of middle school. We were best friends in first grade. I had no interest. It put a strain on our friendship and I handled it poorly, due to being a twelve-year-old girl. I still feel bad. Amanda and PJ started dating years later. Looking back, I was more surprised than I should have been. Clyde and Olivia were on and off that year. I was in love with Clyde but everyone knew that, didn't they?

It's funny how much I remember now, seven years later.


The next year went to shit. Amanda moved a few months through the year. They split classes up by gender. I wasn't friends with any of the girls in my academy. I actually hated a large portion of them and I was miserable most of the time.
I had social studies and health with Angela, Katie Alicia and Gabby. Jon was in that class for some reason. We also had health together with Clyde and Josh and some of the other Jefferson boys. For some reason health and gym weren't seperated by sex. That makes no sense to me.

Angela tried to commit suicide that spring. I don't remember the exact number, but it was around thirty stitches. Nobody saw her after that.

I lived with my dad. My mom moved out and Ian and Melissa moved with her.

I was terrible at French. We had it first period.

We got a new English teacher. Her name was Lisa Puckey. I always had a feeling that she was a lesbian. I thought she was fantastic. She had us keep weekly journals. We could write whatever we wanted. I wrote constantly. She always gave me an A. She said "I don't know how to grade a person on their thoughts. I feel like a shrink."
She called me out once. I was generally unmotivated. She saw my standardized test scores from the year before.

"You have no excuse now. You are so smart. You are in the 98th percentile of all New York students on your ELA test. You are a genius. I'm not accepting your slacking anymore. Hey ladies?! LADIES! I need your attention! THIS GIRL IS A GENIUS. SHE IS A GENIUS SLACKER."

I thought the boys' class must have been able to hear every word of it. I was mortified.
She gave us an assignment to write a short story. I poured my heart into it. I worked on it every day. I rewrote it three times. It was two weeks late. I got an A+.
I think most of the stories averaged three pages. I wrote 14 and a half. I handed in a fucking novel. It was about a band. I think writing and music were really the only things that mattered to me at that point.

I quit band. I stayed in choir.
Etienne and I got close again.
I didn't eat much. Sometimes I didn't eat anything.
My lunch was usually exclusively vanilla milk and ice cream from the vending machines.
Katie and I both moved at the end of the year. They got evicted from their house. They had 48 hours to move everything out.
Her mom died when we were in ninth grade.

Thought from last night:
While I hate the prospect of poverty and not being insured, maybe this recession could be cool.
I mean, culture's high points are always during economic depression, right?

2:30 AM Conversations with my brother

Me: thx 4 keepin me in da loop
Ian: well you gotta loop the loop
Me: and pull
Ian: not that thats even close to being relavent
Me: now your shoes are looking cool
Ian: okay spongebob go home
Me: whatever
Me: you're just as bad for knowing it was a spongebob reference
Me: i'mma go chill out in bikini bottom
Me: AKA the shower
Ian: get me a crabby patty?
Ian: AKA
Ian: drown yourself
Me: Sure thing.
Ian: alright
Ian: ahahah


---
Addendum

Ian: WOOOOAH
Ian: is it like
Ian: a genetic thing to take showers later than most people are awake?

Sometimes (a lot of times) I just cannot bear to change the song that's playing, so I will listen to it for hours on end.

Broken Heroes on a Last Chance Power Drive

In the day we sweat it out in the streets of a runaway american dream
At night we ride through mansions of glory in suicide machines
Sprung from cages out on highway 9,
Chrome wheeled, fuel injected and steppin out over the line
Baby this town rips the bones from your back
Its a death trap, its a suicide rap
We gotta get out while were young
`cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run.

Mmmmm, am I patriotic enough if I listen to Springsteen and The Gaslight Anthem?

Does anyone completely understand you?
Probably not. I'm not saying that I'm so out there that I'm incomprehensible, but you really need to know my family to know where I come from.

I am an amalgamation of my father, his five brothers, his parents and his aunt and her husband.
Yes, I am slightly elitist. Yes, I am sarcastic about everything. Yes, I do think everyone else is dumb. Yes, I will show affection by picking on you relentlessly.

The way I tell stories, the stories I tell and my sense of humour all come from my dad's side of the family. I get exaggerated accents when I tell stories. Long Island and Queens.

I am the first Werkmeister girl born in a generation. There are ten of us: four girls, six boys.
Boy, girl, girl, boy, boy, boy, boy, boy, girl, girl.
My personality is not a coincidence.

If I Could Wake Up Anywhere.

This accompanies thinking a little bit too much.

I don't know you well, I know just enough to tell you that.

I dream about playing harmonicas and trying to escape. Unsuccessful at both attempts.

I Found Paint

It matches the colour of my titles links exactly.
Room matches blog.
I might be really cool. I'm probably really lame.
This wasn't even planned.

I hate watching other people do things.

This is getting uncomfortable again.
This stagnant feeling. I need a change again. I'm getting bored again.
I'm too close to not being uninspired. If you don't know what I'm talking about then you've either never done anything or you've never been in a creative rut.
I'm sick of waiting around and I'm sick of not doing anything.

Bank of Boston Beauty Queen

ive tried dolls that were guaranteed sixteen or under none were very exciting
sorta like a laugh track or whacking off they’ll get you off but it’s just not the real thing
its been decades since my pit days
but i havent shaken it - i sit there like an idiot
still caught up in the old punk protocol
and dreaming that the teenagers will think that i’m a radical

and i still wait for the bus to come where high school got torn down
still expecting to find true love among the skateboarders hanging out
in back of the bank in my hometown

all this talk and no action’s got me stiff from the tit to the bone
so im living in lala land - but at least im not living at home
same old catcall same old chemicals
same old thrills stealing stockings from the shopping mall
its simple enough to grow the fuck up happy with the rough cut
nobodys in the market for a diamond in the rough but

i still wait for my mom to come and pick me up at holly’s house
10 years after they cashed it in to make a multi-level parking lot for a seven-eleven and burger king

i’ve got cryptographs i’ve got all the phones tapped
i’ve got proof enough it is indisputable
love’s not good enough i want pies and graphs
something that will teach me my arithmetic at last..

better rope the folks in - i’m on the loose again
and getting more ridiculous the more i think i ought to get my mind out of the gutter
(it’s getting dangerous, amanda, god - you’re old enough to be his fucking...)
my own private highway from the cradle to the grave
i save a bundle skipping middle age and saturdays

and i still wait for the cops to come where the station since bunred down
still convinced that they’ll pick me up for all the sins i committed in the back of the banged-up pickup truck

i’ve got autographs, backstage passes and leather jacket back patches up the...
ask me anything i’ve got evidence
single serving saccharine packets dripping black with lipstick kisses

i still wait for the bus to come back where the high school got torn down
still expecting to find true love among the sakteboarders hanging out
in back of the bank in my home-

i’m no pederast it was nice to ask
thank you, but i’m capable of getting up and getting dressed
love’s not good enough i want photographs
something that will stand the test of...
time and time again
i think ill head downtown again
oh god
i’m thirty
no, i’m ten
i’m seventeen
and a bank of boston beauty queen....

Dresden Dolls
by twiggirl

I don't need much.

I am really thankful for my sister being there to be my best friend when I need her to be.

I fully endorse taking showers with the music as loud as it can be in the other room.

Have I mentioned this?

I want to know everything about everybody.

I Still Feel Like This

More things that I wrote a year ago.
Sorry about this.

---

I wish I could get into somebody else's head. I wonder if everyone wonders what other people wonder about. It's probably a natural thought process. Exploring the unknown, right? That's what it's all about in the first place. I want to keep a journal of other peoples' thoughts. I want to piece together everyone else's lives. I want stories and thoughts and sights and sounds and feelings and smells.

I live vicariously through other people. I want my own experiences.

The lives of humans are intensely fascinating, whether they be terrible or Kodak's perfect family snapshot. I love stories. I love to read everything that everybody writes, from a full-page confessional to art history notes. I love conversations where people let me subtly interrogate. Somebody said coffee in conjunction with three am and conversation, which just so happens to be my favourite combination of both words AND pastimes.
I love handwriting.

I just want to collect the world in a jar and keep thoughts written down in the big book of world thoughts.

I want to associate words with and between every person I meet.

-

I want my chest pressed to your chest.

I'm 16 Years Old Again, Awkward and Shy and Unsure of Myself.

"I'm going to give you a new word, write about it." Perfect.

I come from Sullivan County, New York. Yup, where Woodstock was held in '69. Yup, a tourist trap near the Catskill mountains. I was a pretty happy kid growing up and turned into a pretty cynical, introverted person, but I can't give up on studying people. Of all of the interesting things in the world, right? I think people generally suck. I'm a pessimistic defeatist who tries to be optimistic.
Everyone is poor where I'm from. The schooling is awful and I'd bet good money you won't find someone without a vice. So where does that put me?
In this room in Rochester in a class that I'm not even enrolled in because I don't have the money to stay. Needless to say, back story is important.

So who am I? What do I want to do? Do I believe in altruism?

I want to believe that people are good. I don't know if I want to be a photographer. I want to experience life. Photographs are a way to make memories.
If I can share memories, I think I'll be in a good place.

I don't hate everybody, but I really don't like a lot of people. And there are gems out there. I want to meet with them and work with them and learn.
I don't know that I'm answering a question at all, much less answering it correctly.
But my life is at a crossroads. Educationally, intellectually and artistically. I thought I knew who I was and sometimes I find myself second-guessing.

My name is Rebecca Werkmeister and I hate tourists.
I love noticing peoples' habits but I can't interact very well.


I've been told that when I learn to perceive myself correctly that everything else will follow.

Some things truly do run in the family.

"I'm tireddddddddddd."
"So go to bed?"
"I don't want toooooooooo."
"Make coffee?"
"Ohhhh. That's a good idea! ... my knees hurt."
"Because you're so tall."
"Yeah... coffee... coffee fixes everything!"

Like the stutter I get when my anxiety is bad.
Like the sense of humour I have.
Like my sleeping patterns.
Like the fondness for photographs and for art, in general.
Like coffee at late hours of the night.

I don't remember much. I just remember thinking that maybe this is who I want to be.

Fuckkkk

clearly this is a product of cross breeding. it's like computer aids
desktops (< / 3) laptops
we need to put a ban on this

[- B M Latimer]

My computer had a shitty week.

A very interesting question was posed to me tonight.
Something has to come from it.

How do you account for missing an 8am class due to anxiety attacks ahead of time?

I Hope To See My Sister Married Off to A Smart Man.

xxelmo0265xx: heyy were r u ??
MissyAnn95x: Rooomage.
xxelmo0265xx: oh doi wat lookin at da magizine???
MissyAnn95x: ....way to not speak English
xxelmo0265xx: oh **doin **dat
MissyAnn95x: You're still not peaking English.
And no i'm not looking at the magazine I already did.
I'm on the computer (obviously)
xxelmo0265xx: oh shut up
xxelmo0265xx: peaking isnt english either
MissyAnn95x: Yeah but that was just a typo.
MissyAnn95x:Dat, Wat, and Da were not typos.
xxelmo0265xx: da was
MissyAnn95x: No, it wasn't.
You meant "the" but instead you wrote "da"

"Research" Paper

Would you stay in the room if a large spider was in it?:
yeah sooooooonn
id have a mad nice intellectual conversation with it share stories and drink some tea with that niggah

For my Intro to Psych class, I'm writing a term paper about the relationships between my siblings and me, and how our parents have affected us, or not affected us, in a couple of good cases.
It's supposed to be about 10 pages long and I have about two to three weeks to finish it by. I think I'm going to start jotting down notes in my spare time.


My brother is close to four years younger than me and my sister was born when I was five and a half years old. As far as I can tell, that's a pretty big gap for most families in terms of sibling closeness. If my brother means the world to me, then my sister is more important to my well-being than oxygen.

Tips For Dating Girls

1. Shut. Up. Shut up shut up shut up. You are not nearly as charming or as clever as you think you are.

I Didn't Really Like The Great Gatsby

But I think Daisy is a fantastic name.

PSA

Psychology homework is exorbitantly frustrating when slightly inebriated.