1557 Noe St., San Francisco

Chris quit Fiction tonight. I think he came into rehearsal with his mind not made up, but once we started discussing it, it sounded more and more that Fiction wasn't his thing anymore, and as friends have to support friends no matter how painful, Lisa and I supported him to leave and pursue the music he really wants to play. With Lisa on bass and me on drums, our sound has become much more "indie", and Chris is a hard rock/metal guitarist and he's finding himself more and more at a loss in coming up with satisfying parts.

1557 Noe St., San Francisco

I wonder if someone is trying to tell me something. Yesterday, when I got home between Critical Mass and meeting Fiction, I found the phone was dead. Today, I was going to go out to buy CD shelves before going to the studio, so I was going to take my car. But when I tried to start my care, it was dead. Then after I got home, not to put too fine a point on it, the battery in the smoke detector was dying. Come to think of it, just a few days ago, a light bulb in the hallway died, too.

And why all this when both Mina and Rosalie are gone?

1557 Noe St., San Francisco

I rode Critical Mass this evening. Fiction met at 8:00 for drinks and dinner to celebrate the completion of our CD. Lisa and Denise spent last weekend burning, printing and assembling the package and I was so impressed that I suggested we celebrate.

I also wanted to find out where everyone was at, and it turned into a pretty involved discussion and airing laundry. I told them how I was ready to quit in March; Chris expressed frustration and non-involvement with the band's sound now; and Lisa broke it off because she was feeling sick. A real downer for what was supposed to be a celebration, but it brought out our true faces.

Denise and Rosalie both got laid off from their .com jobs. Rosalie left for L.A. for the weekend. She's taking the month off.

1557 Noe St., San Francisco

No one I know knows about my past. I mention to people how my goal is to not live past 34 and no one knows anything about that or where that comes from.

I have no connection to my past. I don't have a past to connect to. I don't know where this thought is coming from. The only remnant I have from high school is Liz. Very odd. She's an old friend and acquaintance now. It's like we never went out. I don't think of her as an ex-girlfriend at all. The only emotional remnant I have of high school is Shiho and I lost that connection a long time ago.

I think back to the years in high school with Shiho. I think of her house in Fort Lee. I try to see what I remember. I remember the basement where we mostly hung out. The color of the room, watching MTV. The stairs that led upstairs. At the top of the stairs, turn left and it's the kitchen. Turn right and there's a hall, her room was just to the right, the living room was left from there. We were teenagers. There was one time that her mom came home and was furious that we were hanging out in her room. She shouldn't have been bringing boys into her private place. But that's where she wanted me. I didn't appreciate her until almost ten years later when it was too late.

1557 Noe St., San Francisco

I don't even know how to start digging into the source of my feelings on anything happening in my life. What are my feelings about Fiction? Deep frustration comes to mind. But what do I mean when I say I'm deeply frustrated? I don't know. Dead end. I can identify the words deep frustration to vaguely describe my feelings, but I don't really know what the feeling is.

How do I feel about Ritu and my job? Working with Ritu can be tense and stressful, she's a difficult person to deal with and her moods are unpredictable. But she's also really good to work for because she doesn't power trip and she doesn't micro-manage my work. So how do I feel about working with her? No idea. Dead end.

How do I feel about anything? I don’t think I feel anything anymore.

1557 Noe St., San Francisco

What am I doing still alive? The question gets pondered every day. Life goes by as if in a dream, it's not reality, it's not real, all I see, perceive, and feel around me has a silken quality. Not solid.

1557 Noe St., San Francisco

I had another dream with Josephine, and this time it was clearly my idealized Josephine. The dream was a re-enactment of one of our typical mornings when I used to be up before her and then wake her up later. Those were always endearing times as they happened, but my feeling now about our entire relationship is that there was always tension and I was always self-conscious of my actions and trying not to set her off, basically walking on eggshells all the time. In the dream, there was none of that, it was just that pure feeling of endearment.

God, how I loved that woman. Why do I not think of her as one of the loves of my life? No, I don't, because she wasn't. The love of my life was Amina. Shiho also may have been a love of my life. But not Josephine. I'm not sure why, I'm sure it has nothing to do with anything that any of them were or are. Amina was a total creation, when I really dig down and look at the facts, Amina was nothing special. I have no idea why she holds such a special place in my heart. My only conclusion is that it has nothing to do with the person Amina, but my conception of her. Same with Shiho. But putting it that way, why not Josephine? I have retained more delightful, endearing memories of Josephine than Shiho and Amina combined.