I have no room in my life for relationships and no desire to be in one. I don't want to be caged and trapped or attached to someone. I don't want anyone to know me or find out about me or learn about me. What I want is to die. And I can't very well hold to that if I'm going out with someone. I'm living to give music a run for the money. If that doesn't work, what's the point of living. I’m done, I'm through. I’m not going to live a meaningless life just to live it, and I can't find any meaningful reason to continue living my life. A relationship, attaching myself to another person, is not meaning. It does not make a life meaningful.
Oh God, the last time there was color in my life was with Amina. Am I still slogging through that? It's so old, but it's true, my life hasn't been the same without Amina. This has nothing to do with Amina anymore, I think it's pretty safe to say that she's pretty much completely gone from my life and my heart, but nothing has come to my life that compares to what she was to me. It's not about her, but what she symbolized, what she meant, and nothing has come close to that. I still want to die and I will die and I will keep reminding me of that fact until I achieve it and hope it keeps me out of relationships at the same time!
Sunday, October 29, 2000
Wednesday, October 25, 2000
1557 Noe Street, San Francisco
This Friday, friends of Ritu in New York are having a gathering to remember her and celebrate Diwali, the Indian festival of lights. I've been collecting candles from people who wanted to send candles and have them lit at the gathering.
Wednesday, October 18, 2000
1557 Noe Street, San Francisco
There is a certain dynamic in the interaction between Josefa and me, and it's a dynamic that is suitable for co-workers, maybe a superficial friendship, but nothing more. In practice, it's actually more of a harmless, low-level lust. Hey, I'm a guy, she's hot. End of story.
Josefa and I were just crutches for each other to get through Ritu's death, but Ritu is gone and we have to go on with our lives. Our own lives, and we weren't in each other's lives before Ritu died, there's no reason that we should be in each other's lives now.
Josefa and I were just crutches for each other to get through Ritu's death, but Ritu is gone and we have to go on with our lives. Our own lives, and we weren't in each other's lives before Ritu died, there's no reason that we should be in each other's lives now.
Saturday, October 14, 2000
1557 Noe Street, San Francisco
"Hi friends,
You might decide to not read this or save it until after hours or an appropriate time.
Saturday was the one month mark of Ritu’s passing. When Ritu died, I was jealous of her, and the next day I got a horoscope telling me not to be jealous of other people's accomplishments and to write thank you notes instead. So this is the note I wrote to her. I took it to Land's End on Saturday with the candle container of the candle I'd been burning for her for the last month and burned the letter in the candle container and set it off into the ocean.
Dear Ritu,
This is a thank you note, the intentions of which I hope will reach you in some form wherever you are.
I want to thank you for being who you were, as you were, and for entering my life. That is all. That is all that is needed for me to thank you and to be thankful to you.
I didn't know you that long or that well or that deeply, nevertheless your presence through your absence is deeply felt. And that, perhaps, is the value of having been alive, having lived.
Having touched my life by having been in it, I miss you. I miss your presence, I miss knowing that you are somewhere out there in a form I would recognise, a form in which I could say, "Ritu?" and you could say, "what?"
I will remember your face, your love of orchids, your love of orange, of Eddie Vedder's voice, your passion for the music that touched you, your tactile appreciation; you loved life more than I ever will and you touched it more deeply than I ever will.
I will also remember your pain and your struggle for compassion. I had very little good to say about you in the last month, but now that you're gone, it has all been placed into perspective. We all have our pain, we all have our struggle, and we all deal with and express them in our own individual ways that may be perceived differently by other people. I didn't understand your struggle, but now I recognise it for what it was, and that it was just yours, not for me to understand or solve or resolve or cure.
So thank you and godspeed. Go on your journey and always come as you are. In whatever time or place I meet you again, if I recognise you on some level, know that I will welcome you.
On behalf of Josefa, Barb, Cass, Wayne, Angela, Lorena, Zenaida, Jeptha, and anyone else who shares the sentiment but I don't know about, thank you. Take this burned candle, this incense, and this song for you and go. If we are to meet again, insha'allah, in this I believe."
Today was the month anniversary of Ritu's death. The day after we got the news, I drove Josefa home to Vallejo and there was a candle in a glass cylinder in the kitchen. I mentioned that I wanted to get one of those and burn it constantly for Ritu. On Monday, Josefa brought the candle in and said her mother gave it to me. I haven't been burning it constantly for obvious fire hazard reasons, but I've been burning it all day at work for the past month, which is in itself still a fire code violation, I shouldn't wonder. It finally burned out this past Thursday just before I left work.
So tonight, I wrote a thank you note to Ritu, took the glass cylinder and incense and went to Sea Cliff to burn the letter and the incense and throw the cylinder and the ashes into the ocean.
It took a long time to burn the letter because it wasn't catching and the long-tip lighter I was using was just about exhausted. I didn't burn the letter completely, there was a piece of it that I finally gave up on, and I shoved the lighter into the cylinder and chucked it all into the ocean. If Ritu wants to read it, she can burn the rest of it herself. Of course, it doesn't work that way and she probably won't get the part that didn't burn. I played a tune on shakuhachi until the incense burned out and left.
You might decide to not read this or save it until after hours or an appropriate time.
Saturday was the one month mark of Ritu’s passing. When Ritu died, I was jealous of her, and the next day I got a horoscope telling me not to be jealous of other people's accomplishments and to write thank you notes instead. So this is the note I wrote to her. I took it to Land's End on Saturday with the candle container of the candle I'd been burning for her for the last month and burned the letter in the candle container and set it off into the ocean.
Dear Ritu,
This is a thank you note, the intentions of which I hope will reach you in some form wherever you are.
I want to thank you for being who you were, as you were, and for entering my life. That is all. That is all that is needed for me to thank you and to be thankful to you.
I didn't know you that long or that well or that deeply, nevertheless your presence through your absence is deeply felt. And that, perhaps, is the value of having been alive, having lived.
Having touched my life by having been in it, I miss you. I miss your presence, I miss knowing that you are somewhere out there in a form I would recognise, a form in which I could say, "Ritu?" and you could say, "what?"
I will remember your face, your love of orchids, your love of orange, of Eddie Vedder's voice, your passion for the music that touched you, your tactile appreciation; you loved life more than I ever will and you touched it more deeply than I ever will.
I will also remember your pain and your struggle for compassion. I had very little good to say about you in the last month, but now that you're gone, it has all been placed into perspective. We all have our pain, we all have our struggle, and we all deal with and express them in our own individual ways that may be perceived differently by other people. I didn't understand your struggle, but now I recognise it for what it was, and that it was just yours, not for me to understand or solve or resolve or cure.
So thank you and godspeed. Go on your journey and always come as you are. In whatever time or place I meet you again, if I recognise you on some level, know that I will welcome you.
On behalf of Josefa, Barb, Cass, Wayne, Angela, Lorena, Zenaida, Jeptha, and anyone else who shares the sentiment but I don't know about, thank you. Take this burned candle, this incense, and this song for you and go. If we are to meet again, insha'allah, in this I believe."
Today was the month anniversary of Ritu's death. The day after we got the news, I drove Josefa home to Vallejo and there was a candle in a glass cylinder in the kitchen. I mentioned that I wanted to get one of those and burn it constantly for Ritu. On Monday, Josefa brought the candle in and said her mother gave it to me. I haven't been burning it constantly for obvious fire hazard reasons, but I've been burning it all day at work for the past month, which is in itself still a fire code violation, I shouldn't wonder. It finally burned out this past Thursday just before I left work.
So tonight, I wrote a thank you note to Ritu, took the glass cylinder and incense and went to Sea Cliff to burn the letter and the incense and throw the cylinder and the ashes into the ocean.
It took a long time to burn the letter because it wasn't catching and the long-tip lighter I was using was just about exhausted. I didn't burn the letter completely, there was a piece of it that I finally gave up on, and I shoved the lighter into the cylinder and chucked it all into the ocean. If Ritu wants to read it, she can burn the rest of it herself. Of course, it doesn't work that way and she probably won't get the part that didn't burn. I played a tune on shakuhachi until the incense burned out and left.
Friday, October 06, 2000
1557 Noe St., San Francisco
I slept for 10 hours last night and went to work feeling rejuvenated. I felt for the first time that I'm really getting back to how I was like before Ritu died. I don't know how accurate that is, but I felt I was more cheery, for lack of a better word, than I've been in weeks.
Tuesday, October 03, 2000
1557 Noe St., San Francisco
I’ve been occasionally having trouble sleeping these past few weeks. I woke up several times last night, but managed to get back to sleep. But then I woke up at six and didn't want to bother trying anymore, so I got up and got ready for work and got there 45 minutes early. After work I decided to continue and stay and put in overtime and it was Josefa and I working late, just like we did on the 13th floor, and then I walked out with her after 8:00 and walked her to the ferry.
Sunday, October 01, 2000
1557 Noe St., San Francisco
It's been just over two weeks since we got the news of Ritu's death, and my whole life feels different now. Work is completely different with Theresa and Josefa and having moved to the 18th floor. No more 13th floor.
In these past two weeks, Fiction hired a new guitarist and got a gig booked. Anita and I have cut communications. Our friendship was at its end, Ritu's death finalized it.
These past two weeks have been trying times; Ritu's death was just an undercurrent. The impact was considerable, but with everything else going on, her death now feels like it is far in the past.
In these past two weeks, Fiction hired a new guitarist and got a gig booked. Anita and I have cut communications. Our friendship was at its end, Ritu's death finalized it.
These past two weeks have been trying times; Ritu's death was just an undercurrent. The impact was considerable, but with everything else going on, her death now feels like it is far in the past.
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