247 19th Ave., #2, San Francisco

Joy sat across her table from me. Cozy situation, her face already familiar and endeared to me. We asked each other vague, abstract, huge, difficult questions. Questions that begged more questions. Questions to find more about each other.

A yellow flag waved behind my eyes. Who was this person I met less than a month ago? Suddenly the realization hit me that we really didn't know each other. We were getting to know each other. I was struggling.

For a flash, the image of Amina sitting across from me flashed across my eyes. What if she were there sitting across from me? The somebody who already knows how and what I think. That comfort and familiarity that I have not yet reached with Joy. The familiarity which allows the energy from two people to comfortably fill the room and mingle with each other. When it's friends, it mingles. When it's love, it mixes. When people are getting to know each other, they are distinct and separate energies, and she had no idea what image flashed before my eyes.

247 19th Ave., #2, San Francisco

Telling myself that I don't want to get involved with Joy is purely a defense mechanism. I really wouldn't mind. I can't deny the effect that she's having on my life. Might I start caring?

Why did things fail with Amina? How could I have been so wrong? Why was I convinced that she was right? How do I avoid missing again? What was happening when, and whose fault was it?

I should have seen it coming. I think of the situations we were in, and how could I have not seen it coming? Things were already falling apart soon after we got together. Soon after the honeymoon part of the relationship ended. That should have meant something.

Our situations were all wrong, she was in academia and I was dealing with the 'rents. I needed more than she was able to give and she wasn't pressed to accept what I was giving. I was more stress for her than not, and likewise. But the stress she caused me was much less than the stress the 'rents were causing. So I intentionally burned my hand so that I wouldn't notice that the rest of me was on fire.

I have to look farther and deeper, though. I did go out to Oberlin several times during her Spring semester and those times were quite successful, productive, happy times. What was I ignoring that could have indicated to me not to let all my defenses down?

There were no indications when we were together, but how about when we were apart? When we were apart, our communications were woefully inadequate. She didn't communicate often and when she did, she didn't do it very well. She was too preoccupied. We were always postponing a happy, continuous relationship for some ambiguous time in the future. It was OK if things were crap now, things would be better “in the future”.

Dependence was a huge problem. I should have been gauging my feelings at all times. I used the problem of the 'rents to ignore Amina as a problem as well. I depended on Amina to help me through my problems. That was all wrong. I did have bad feelings towards Amina, and regardless of what excuse I could come up with to explain, disregard, or justify them, I should have taken them seriously as a warning. No excuses. My fingers should have been on my pulse. But is that love?

There was no reason why I shouldn't have trusted Amina. There was no indicator or warning that I shouldn't have been trusting Amina. I can't explain why I failed myself so miserably. I was just totally deluded, forcing myself to believe that we had a relationship we didn't. Placing faith in the future when the present was crap.

I don't know how to avoid it again. It's so easy to think that I can trust Joy, Joy is completely different from Amina, it's not in her nature or character to do what Amina did. Ah yes. Amina was just like Joy, wasn't she? How to avoid the delusion?

I don't know how Amina views what she did. She may not think of it as this evil, malicious, heartless breach of trust that I remember. People have needs, people break up with their partners. I've broken up with people and have hurt them in the process. Why is it such a major production when it happens to me, just because of the way I had treated it, just because of my perceptions and assumptions?

Avoiding relationships is not the answer, that's not me to cut off and deny myself the communication I need. That's not life. There are already differences in me now from what I was around Amina. Why Amina at all? She sure didn't leave anything. What about Amina aside from her presence, which lost its grace easily enough. There is still a lot to worry about in getting involved with Joy or anyone. When it comes into a consideration of involvement, both my trust and confidence plunge. Quickly.

247 19th Ave., #2, San Francisco

These past few days have been a struggle. Falling back down into my previous, pre-Joy state. Being alone isn't that hot after all. Being alone is only good if it's an option.

247 19th Ave., #2, San Francisco

I can't let this thing with Joy go any farther than it has gone. If she maintains interest and wants to pursue something further with me, I'll sustain my end, but I won't pursue her any further.

I think I trust her. More than most, but I still haven't fully recovered from Amina. I concern myself about the commitments I've made, the responsibilities I've taken. You have to take care of yourself before you think about taking care of other things. I do not take care of myself.

But wouldn't getting closer to Joy be taking care of myself, committing to something, exhibiting a willingness to share my life and myself with someone else? But then I think of the emotional toll on Joy from the baggage I'm carrying. Would it really be taking care of myself when I speculate how things might end up?

I'd rather self-destruct than put Joy through that, I'd rather be sad, I'd rather be alone. Besides, I'm still uncomfortable with myself, I still haven't committed to my own life. I don't drink because I have problems and alcohol helps me through, I drink because I'm trying to ruin my liver. I drink because I don't want to live past a certain age. Being sober wastes precious time.

Joy has dealt with many physical ailments: hypoglycemia, scoliosis, bronchitis, knee surgery, carpal tunnel, allergies, and whatever I haven't found out yet. She has to think about everything she consumes, her diet is extremely limited. It's easier for her to tell me what she can eat, rather than what she can't. Here I am having been given perfect health and I'm trying to destroy it. The wonder of it all.

Joy has already added to my life. Time to let her go. I want to be alone and enjoy the sadness that I wrap myself in before going to sleep.

247 19th Ave., #2, San Francisco

A few months ago, Tria said she felt comfortable with me and asked if I felt comfortable with her. It would have been so easy to say, "Of course I feel comfortable with you. Very comfortable." Instead I said, "Actually, I don't even feel comfortable with myself," implying that I couldn't feel comfortable with anyone else. That was about as serious as we ever got in a conversation.

"Dear Tria,
How thoroughly I've changed in the past half year. If we had met six or seven months ago, you would have met a completely different person. I feel so different now that I might as well be in a different skin compared to back then.

I might not have noticed how I've changed if I hadn't met you. From the first time we spoke, you made me feel . . . strange. It's clearer in retrospect, but I definitely recognized a strange feeling, even if I wasn't able to pinpoint and define what it was.

Being with you was different than being with anyone else I knew. It made me wonder why and what was going on with me. It struck me that I felt very comfortable with you, which meant that I must be feeling comfortable with myself to some degree, and I had stopped entertaining the possibility of that ever happening again.

I'm not sure I can explain it. Since meeting you my life has taken on a different feel. I've been kinda happy and uncharacteristically relaxed and calm. Almost to the point of amazement. I think I'm even different from a month ago, but looking at the past half year, I can trace a transformation that is almost complete.

Things aren't perfect and rosy, I still have my hard days, but I'm looking forward and I see challenges that I hadn't realized were there before. I told you about feeling comfortable about being alone. That's a facet of being comfortable with myself. I can deal with myself and I don't need to rely on someone else to locate myself within the framework of my own life."

I suggested to Tria that I wasn't comfortable with her. The irony is that without Tria, I would have completely lost my sense of humor by now. If it weren't for Tria, I would have been consumed. Being with Tria forced me to play a certain part that I wouldn't have otherwise; carefree, goofy, not serious. She skewed the bitterness that was growing and made it light. And the further irony is that without that, I wouldn't be able to be the person I am with Joy. I can let myself be happy and smile and not brood on the past.

Driving home from rehearsal last night with John. I think I am happy. I am happy. It means I can die any time. I can commit suicide and that's alright. That's it. That's all. I've told myself before that I would only commit suicide if I was happy. Despair and misery are bad states of mind in which to kill oneself. Committing suicide because you're miserable means being too attached to this world and this physical reality. Suicide while happy recognizes impermanence and that the state of being human is just a transient thing.

What if Amina and I stayed together? My life would be closed, complacent, boring. I would think I was happy just because I was with her. I wouldn't question it. I would have gone to Oberlin for her commencement. We would have had a good time, reunited, sense of togetherness and being a part of each other. We would have packed up her stuff and headed to California. We would build upon what we had built thus far, same jokes, same understanding of each other. We would stick with each other, do things together, be identified as a single unit. But Amina saw what was wrong with that picture first - I was willing to ignore it and cover it over just to be with her.

Now with Tria and Joy. Now with the way I feel about myself now. I wouldn't give any of it up to have stayed with Amina seven months ago. I didn't like who I was when I was with her. I don't like her anymore or what I remember of her. Bad taste in my mouth.

247 19th Ave., #2, San Francisco

We talked for hours and hours. I've had immediate attractions to people, as well as crushes, but I don't think I've fallen in love with someone as fast as I did with Joy. Of course, it's very possible that I'm taking this all wrong. I would be fine with that. I have apprehensions about getting involved with someone at this point, wouldn't anyone be just a rebound from Amina?

I could easily say to myself that I don't want to get involved with anyone, I'm not ready for that kind of involvement. I just want to fall in love with someone.

But I wouldn't run away from her if she wanted to get involved. And I have fallen in love so fast before. Hiromi. Amina.

I waited on the corner of Fulton and Durant in Berkeley. I felt like I was waiting for someone already familiar. I felt calm. She waved from across the street when I looked up and saw her. I noticed her walk and how she sort of bobbed. She seemed confident and relaxed. She was smiling. I felt a playful push on my shoulder and walked up to her. It was a little scary how familiar she felt; shouldn't I be a little more formal; a little more social?

We started from a cafe that didn't have coffee, and subsequently moved to a spot of green on the Berkeley campus, to a spot of shade, to a spot of sun. Moment flowed into each other moment, all of it comfortable. Why I feel comfortable with her I don't know. I had told Tria that I don't feel comfortable with myself, implying that I wasn't comfortable with anyone else either. I don't know what it is.

It's been hard after Amina to have the confidence in myself to feel comfortable and to feel that someone might find me attractive. I still can't come to terms with someone caring about me. I don't care anything about Amina anymore, but her effect on me lingers on. Those two years of being friends were so stupid, so fake. We should have gone out earlier and gotten it over with. Instead we had those two years in which I irrevocably fell in love with her. There was nothing in the year that we went out that was good that lasted. I don't have any good memories of myself with her. But I also know that my memory of Amina is no longer right anymore.

I can't quite pin down my exact feelings about me and Joy. It's more than just liking her. I'm reluctant, but I'm not scared. I'm insecure but I don't care. I trust Joy, but I don't trust myself or my reality.

Looking at myself with Joy in the picture is so different from the way I've been seeing myself in the past half year. All of a sudden I want to try? All of a sudden I care? All of a sudden I'm alive? How could that be?

I've been so confused and ungrounded. I haven't been concerned about my future, all of a sudden it's important?

247 19th Ave., #2, San Francisco

It's hard to listen to my own music. I still mean almost everything I wrote in the songs from the “One After Another” collection. “Indigo and Grey” is particularly hard to listen to because of its continuing relevance, all packed into five and half minutes. I push the play button and five and a half minutes later, the song is done, the point is made; supposed to have been made.

Five and a half minutes for years of poorly developed feelings. The song is not done, it isn't justice to myself, but it was the best I could do to express myself. Why am I even trying to put feelings into songs, cramming my feelings into these little bits of time and tape? It's frustrating because I know other people can do it. Other people cram and condense feelings into three minutes and the music touches people. My music barely touches me.

indigo and grey

I read the book Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto. It made me feel comfortable about being alone. Not feeling lonely, the sentiment, but alone, the condition of being. Here I am, voyeur that I am, reading about the character in the book making observations and reflecting upon them the way I might if I were the character in the book. I live my life like someone is observing me, reading about my story. How would my daily life be described?

I finally screwed up the courage to call Joy tonight. I know so little about her. I have no idea what she thinks about me. She is the total opposite of Tria; the total opposite of what in Tria has been so important to me. I don't know why Joy attracts me. She seems serious, whereas Tria has saved my sense of humor. She's saved my life with her sense of humor, a sense of humor that feels like it would be wasted on Joy. But something about Joy touches me. Something about her can intuit and empathize with my feelings more than Tria ever could. But that's not necessarily a good thing, and not necessarily what I need in my life at this point.

I like talking to Joy and there is a lot that I want to tell her. Maybe that is what I need at this point that Tria can't offer. But telling Joy about me still feels like teaching her. I'm so buried in my self. It's so complicated. Still, something in her being, the way she exists. Something in her personality, the way she listens and hears. In her eyes and in the way she looks. Boy, I'm leaving myself wide open. We just met.

I feel tugs, and we talked for a decent amount of time tonight. She agreed easily enough to get together tomorrow. It was easy enough for her to decline if she didn't want to, but she agreed, and we'll get together tomorrow and I can see if what I saw in her was at all real. As if I have any idea what is real.

247 19th Ave., #2, San Francisco

I can't concern myself with too many things. Nothing can be that important to me.

Amina is gone. Tria is going to start going out with someone any day now. Out of the Bay Area, Vikki and Lisa are the only people that mean anything anymore. I don't see much of anyone anymore. Joy was the first thing to tug at my heart since a long while, and I know nothing about her.

I'm recording another set of songs. I'm trying to just get 30 minutes worth of songs, and things are coming along. Nothing good, nothing that accurately conveys my feelings or meanings, but at least there is something in some musical form that I've been able to put down on tape. I have three songs recorded, awaiting lyrics; two songs complete, awaiting recording; three ideas awaiting development.

I've had it with trying to find Asian American musicians. Once I'm done with this tape, I'm just going to circulate it as widely as possible to find anyone who might want to form a band.

The R&B band is going to break up after we perform once in August. The question actually has been hiding in the wings whether we'd continue, but I think the general feeling is that we'll play once and we've basically had enough of each other.

I don't have any catering work scheduled. I'm not going to find anything else before school starts again. Tria got me involved in a Youth Leadership Seminar that is being held in Japantown. It starts this weekend. I really haven't contributed much even though I'm supposed to be participating in the planning. I feel like I'm just hanging out with Tria. I wasn't recognized as being part of the planning committee, even though I've been to all the planning meetings. Story of my life.

Nothing worth much these days. My life, my prospects, my future, my feelings.

247 19th Ave., #2, San Francisco

My past is marked by a trail of fuck ups. Fuck ups upon fuck ups upon fuck ups. Sparks of good and nice things that flash like lightning, but overall, what a mess I've made of my life; of this lifetime.

Lisa has been here for a week. She's been staying with Nobuko. She's great, I love hanging out with her. It would be cool if she moved here. If she's not around, though, she's no different than anyone else.

People are lame. I've been trying to spend as much time with her as possible and making time for her. She was complaining a few days ago how lame everyone else is. Most of the Oberlin crowd is hardly concerned that she's around, no big deal, they want to get together with her, but only when it's convenient for them.