1557 Noe St., San Francisco

Not a single person I know speaks the same language that I do. Words come out of my mouth and people hear them, but they don't understand the words the way I mean them. When more than one person hears the words that come out of my mouth, they hear them in different ways, all with different meanings. None of them quite the same as I understand the words.

It has been years since anyone has understood my words in the same way as I understand and meant them. Madoka is probably the last person who did, and she doesn't anymore. We've grown apart and I don't consider her one of my closest friends anymore. Shiho is the last person I was in a relationship with who did, and that was five years ago. And it wasn't much of a relationship.

Am I still looking for someone who speaks the same language as me? I feel like I wish I could find someone who does, so in that way yes, but if I'm trying to maintain this period of my life as the twilight of it and hope to die within the next few years, in that way no.

1557 Noe St., San Francisco

Josephine is OK, I guess. I found her online, but she wouldn’t talk to me. All she wrote was “busy”, and that was it.

Everything is gone between us, I don’t even want anything to do with her anymore. The love between us was human love, base human love. There was nothing between us beyond human love and our recent communications and this earthquake is very indicative of that. If the earthquake happened here, the first thing I would have done was contact the people I love to let them know I was alright. All she could manage to address my concern was “busy” several days after the fact.

I have my job interview with Ritu’s firm tomorrow. I might have a job. The philosophical ramifications of having a job stagger me. Everything will change. Not having a job, life was one thing. Having a job, life will be a completely different thing. I haven’t quite figured it all out yet, but it feels like the end of my life, nothing more to strive for, overcoming the last obstacle to prove I wasn’t running away from failure.

Having a job means integrating into society and becoming nobody. You are now living to make money and money serves all the activities you want to do, and in that way you become a servant of money. It’s not life anymore. It’s making money. I’ll only know for sure what it is once I’m in it, and then I can decide whether I live or die, or die sooner or later.

Bangkok, Thailand

Josephine and I are still experiencing ups and downs. Today was a major down, but we ignored and avoided each other to prevent a fight. So, we're still holding to our promise not to fight, but I think she's straining. Three cars went up to Ayuthaya where Josephine and I went last week.

Apparently Josephine encountered some sort of epiphany last night and she's forging out a newfound independence and freewill. So we were trying to decide whether we were going to go on this little excursion today. It was an unnecessary trip by any account since we just went last week. So we decided not to go. But then I thought that this is going to be the last group excursion since the program is pretty much over and people are going their respective directions next week. So I decided to go. Then she decided to go because I decided to go. Halfway through the day, when we were deciding where to go next in Ayuthaya, Josephine suggested going home and said that she was bored.

My confidence in this relationship is very low at this point. We avoided a fight by avoiding each other. I decided adamantly that I wasn't going to see her or talk to her tonight, and I hold to that. That's OK, really. Avoiding a problem is better than fighting as far as I'm concerned, that's how sick of fighting I am. I'm willing to sacrifice a lot to avoid fights. So what we did was definitely the preferable course of action. What the tension between us says about the relationship is another thing.

My dislike for Sui has reached new lows as it appears Josephine's friendship with her has reached a new height. They spoke in Chinese for most of the ride back, and I realized how comfortable she sounded speaking in Chinese, even though the communication wasn't smooth since Sui's Mandarin isn't perfect. I'm realizing the huge communication barrier between us. It's fine for me using English because I'm not the one struggling with a foreign language. But for Josephine, there is so much that she can't express, and she is constrained by our limitation to English. That's another reason to believe we're wrong for each other.

Well, if avoiding and ignoring problems is how we deal with problems, I can deal with it at this point. In those times of tension, I just need to be by myself, let things cool down and when we get back together, pretend nothing happened. Story of my life.

Suicide is also not a settled issue come Josephine. It's still certainly here, albeit dormant for the past few weeks. The past few weeks haven't been reality. Bangkok, the YMCA hotel, rooms across the hall from each other. I haven't thought about reality in a while and I have the opportunity to avoid it even more, having applied for another year in school.

The possibility does cross my mind, though, of not returning to the States at all. Doing it here would certainly feel much better than in San Francisco. Do it after Madoka and I return to Bangkok. When I'm supposed to go to the airport, not to.

The current plans are that I'm supposed to go to Taiwan for a few days to see Josephine there. Those plans have two days to get scrapped if a fight gets out of hand. If they do get scrapped, then I think I’ll take it as a sign and start planning on not going back to the States. These euphemisms are getting out of hand. “Waking up tomorrow”, “not go back to the States”? Come on.

247 19th Ave., #2 San Francisco

Nobuko has been gone for a week and a half. We'd been spending a lot of time together. We communicate well, and that has been a comfort even though we don't always get along and less often agree. Nevertheless, if I say something to her, I can be fairly confident that she understands what I said the way I meant it. And her arguments against what I say are always logical and well-founded. After spending so much time together, I miss her presence when she's gone. She'll be back in a few days.

Cat and I have spent some concentrated time together in the past few days. A completely different energy exists between Cat and me. It's very charged, bordering on unfriendly, but sometimes very open and intimate. Sometimes open and unfriendly. But she's real to me and we connect. Again, she understands what I say the way I meant it.

I genuinely like Cat, and I can't say that about other acquaintances in my life. There's an affection there that doesn't exist with, say, Nobuko. But it is still tentative with Cat. She is still disposable. If we don't become closer friends, or maintain our current dynamic, or begin to trust each other, then the liking will probably disappear. The friendship has as much potential to fade as it does to grow.

247 19th Ave., #2 San Francisco

I've come to fear Joy's reactions, so I don't communicate with her anymore. If there's something I get really excited about and want to tell her about, I'm afraid of her predictable reaction: deadpan. If something moves me, if my afternoon was simply beautiful and I want to share it with her, I'm afraid of her reaction: big smile and "that's great". No empathy; perceived feigned enthusiasm. I told her that I failed my Civ Pro midterm. I should have feared her reaction: absolute silence. Nothing. Void.

But I didn't fear that reaction, I expected it. I wanted her to feel that silence, I wanted her to notice the dynamic. I FAILED. She had no response. She didn't know what to do. I kind of enjoyed it. I think it's true - a relationship with no ripples has deeper troubles than is shown.

I stopped cutting because I didn't like the idea of her knowing what had happened since the last time she saw me. What do I care? What is she going to do about it? She's not going to react in any appreciable way. I'm going back to cutting. If she wants to discuss it, she has the right, if she doesn't, no loss to me. I stopped cutting, but there was nothing to replace it, nothing to take its place, and that made stopping really difficult.

We're going to break up. The only questions are when and how. Not soon. I don't think I can handle going through a break up at this point. So if she doesn't instigate it, I'll just wait. When the time comes, no games, I'm going to come right forward with it and tell her that this relationship has broken down.

This relationship is dysfunctional, that's not hard to admit. I go back and read what I wrote about Joy last Summer and I'm at a loss to explain those things. Our relationship is a sham, it's silly. But what I need to do is not torment her. I have to go against my common sense which tells me to distance, to let her know there are problems so that she can see a break up coming. That has never worked in the past. I'm not going to make the relationship miserable to build up to breaking up.

Today was a good day. I haven't had a good day since Amina. I'm having trouble counting those days when I met Joy and was getting close to her. Those don't seem real, those seem more like a reaction to Amina, a rebound.

When I got home from school, I decided to go for a run. I planned to take a bus down to Ocean Beach and then run back along the Sea Cliff. I went to Ocean Beach yesterday since it was sunny, but it was still chilly and windy. The winds were calmer today and it was reasonably warm, and when I got to the beach, it was just gorgeous. It was so pleasant that I walked along the beach for a while before doing the run. Today was a good day, and I wanted to share it with somebody. I didn't.

I'm back in phone contact with Shiho. She moved out of her parents' house and now has her own phone number. We've spoken several times. Any romance with Shiho would have been unrealistic. Through letters, it was possible to conjure a fantasy, but talking to her reminded me of the dynamic that kept me from falling in love completely when we were in high school. And when we fell in love in Osaka, that was probably years of history guiding our feelings, not present reality.

She has no idea who I am or what I'm about or the experiences that have shaped me. We can communicate, but I don't know how fulfilling it would be. I need someone with whom I can really connect. The big thing going for Shiho is that I would feel really, really comfortable around her, and it would be real.

247 19th Ave, #2, San Francisco

Today was the last day of classes for this Fall 1994 semester. How am I doing? Angry and frustrated as ever. More angry. A low-key, subtle, seething anger. That's what I felt as I walked away from school to catch the first 1AX bus of the commute hours.

I called to check in for a catering job I have on Saturday, I paid my rent, finished off one bottle of whisky and bought another, received a utility bill twice what I usually pay because I've been using the heater a lot. I bought a plane ticket to go to New Jersey at the end of December.

For the first time in a while I felt genuinely close to Joy. Like there was something connecting, something worth placing worth in. Not that it's a worthless relationship, per se, it's just that it's a very low-key relationship with not a lot of risk, not a lot of challenge, not a lot of change.

It wasn't overwhelming. She told me of a problem she's having, how she's not satisfied with her life, that it's out of control in a downward spiral. I don't know why, but it was a relief to hear that she was in that position. To hear that she isn't so impenetrable and sequestered in her superiority. To hear her vulnerable and that she isn't complacent about her life. She is striving for something and so maybe her happiness in our relationship isn't some complacent abandon and satisfaction in what I consider the severely mediocre.

On the other hand, she went through the peak of the crisis yesterday. She didn't mention it at all when we spoke yesterday. She said that she wasn't ready to deal with it then, she was still in shock of it and couldn't talk about it then. OK. She brought it up today and told me about it, but only after she talked to her parents about it.

There is a lack of passion in this relationship. It's very cold and calculated. It is complacent. It doesn't bother me. I'm kind of numb to it. It probably doesn't bother her that she couldn't come to me about the problem. That says a lot about the relationship.

I realize I can’t get sucked into her problems because my position in my life is still so fragile. I don’t know if I could have effectively dealt with her problems even if she had brought them to me. So it’s best that I keep a distance. If that’s a problem for her, then it’s her problem, not mine. Eventually this relationship won’t be able to go on if this philosophy is maintained. She will need more from someone than I can give, and she will realize how unsatisfying it is being with someone so different and who makes such completely different assumptions about life and living. So will I.

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.

324 S. Main St., Oberlin

Things have been going miserably with Amina so far. We’re living in an off-campus house, kinda far from campus actually, and it’s a grungy place and we live with a bunch of hippie white people.

Me, I’m not holding up very well. I’m still recovering from the past half year and I feel now that I’m in a transition period before heading to California and that is making me anxious. It may be my old problem with adjusting to new situations. Either way, things have been tense with Amina and we’ve been struggling to level things out.

I told Amina everything that went on this past semester, something I regret doing and shouldn’t have done, but even having told her, she doesn’t really understand the effect of what happened.

I also held it against Amina that we’re living with a bunch of hippie white people and not alone. I took that as an indication that she didn’t want this summer to be an intimate time to build our relationship because now we have to deal with all these other people. I held it against her that she gets along with white people and that being with her might mean having to deal with them more.

I know Amina hasn’t done anything wrong, I know none of this is right, I know none of this is her, I know this is my problem, but knowing what the problem is isn’t helping me find solutions to overcome the effects of the problems. We have so much fun and we enjoy being with each other, but when things get tense, the things that come out of my mouth are unbelievable.

She has done so much for me and she means so much to me, I just have so much trouble expressing my gratitude, appreciation and affection openly in this house. It comes to mind and heart, I just can’t get it out. I don’t know why I can’t break out of my undesirable impulses to take offense and to distance. I don’t know why I can’t be stronger for Amina. I feel that she doesn’t need me and she has a life of her own. I see her stressed because of me and she’d probably be having a good time here if it wasn’t for me being sour and tense.

Lately I’ve been feeling like there is an inner shell developing inside of me. I have my outer shell which everyone sees. Under that is another shell that contains my feelings and expression and it’s under lock and key. A definite separation between the shells has become more and more pronounced. Not only is the inner shell closed off and inaccessible, but it is shrinking, increasing the distance between the two shells, making me feel more distanced and isolated.

Communication has failed between us. I resort to letters I won’t send and we’ve stopped telling each other how we feel. We’ve stopped asking and requesting of each other and instead we just expect from each other. We need to talk more and be true to ourselves. I need to stop being so wrapped up in my problems. New Jersey is behind me, I’m going to California, I need to look up.

Englewood Cliffs, NJ

Amina and I have had two consecutive conversations that have been tense and non-communicative. I can’t help but fear the worst for our relationship. I love her so dearly with all my heart, mind and spirit. The thought of losing her after loving her for this long is unbearable.

We’re both under a lot of stress, though, and there is no way the way we treat each other can’t be affected. I pray that it is temporary and doesn’t damage what we have. But we need to learn how to deal with each other under stress. Perhaps we’ll grow into it.

I made those two phone calls and I regret it now. She’s in crunch time and doesn’t need me distracting her. Even when we can be positive and have fun, it still takes energy and distracts. I have been telling her everything that I’ve been going through and that can’t have been easy, since I’m sure she has problems of her own. Problems that she doesn’t tell me about, I’m sure.

I didn’t even want to talk to her the last time I called her. I’ve been getting confused lately; a cloudy sort of numbing I-don’t-care type of confused. I know exactly where I stand and I’m resolute in who I am and what I’m doing, but things have started getting cloudy in general; on the fringes. I’ve been craving the company of people who are on similar emotional ground as me. And that’s not Amina.

Amina has declared that she has no sympathy for people begging for sympathy. I’m not sure what that means, but I think she was directing that at me. Perhaps my constant complaining about my circumstances spurred that remark. So I’ve respected her stance and have ranted and raved about my situation with no expectation of sympathy or concern on her part. She knows how to keep her distance.

But now I feel that I’ve temporarily taken a step away from the front and the actual fight and find myself in need of people who are able to step into a closer circle around me. Not even to talk about it specifically, but at least someone within the circle and to know they are there. And that’s not Amina. But god how I love Amina, why shouldn’t it be her? Why is she still keeping her distance?

A lot of it is my fault. Whether or not she can maintain her distance, I tell her every little thing that I’m going through and she has to defend herself against whatever feelings my experience may evoke. She has to keep her guard up against any negativity I’m feeling in my life because she has nothing to do with it and wants nothing to do with it. She certainly hasn’t told me otherwise. It’s my fault that I’ve told her everything. I shouldn’t have.

But Amina also doesn’t delineate what boundaries are OK to cross and which I have to be conscious of. I’m still defining what boundaries I think exist because she isn’t doing it. I’m still defining her role in the mess of my life because she hasn’t given me any indication of what she wants her role to be. I’m still telling her my effect on her and her life because she isn’t telling me. Distances and boundaries define our relationship, how they got that way I don’t know. How to fix things, I also don’t know.

Englewood Cliffs, NJ

Well, I got into law school. I haven't told the 'rents yet, I'm going to let them stew a little longer and make sure I've prepared the situation to my advantage. I've already gotten them to (enthusiastically) promise to buy me a $2000 electronic drumset if I got into law school. I didn't have to argue a case for it. I didn't even have to tell them what it was. I actually wasn't going to even press for it, $2000 is a lot of money! If they said "$2000!!!", I would have dropped it right then and there.

Bob was down here and I didn’t tell him either. I can’t trust him. He’s pretty much caved into the ‘rent’s perspective. I never would have thought that he'd become the way he is now. I think he's really fucked up. He covers up, justifies, and apologizes for a lot more than he would admit. He's deluding himself. He now sees just as much of the 'rents' perspective as he sees mine. That would be reasonable if he were a middleman, a mediator, but he isn't. He has been just as much subjected to this upbringing as I have, he is just as much a victim. So for him to take neutral ground is indicative of something. I don't know what. A lot, though.

Contrary to my previous belief, I think he was very directly affected by our upbringing. He wasn't just a passive player that tried to keep the peace or stand aloof. I no longer believe that any psychological burden he carries is due to the indirect fallout of the conflicts between the rents, Tom, and/or me. He was always right there in the thick of it and it has made him what he is now.

I even wonder how much he really wants to be a doctor. It always seemed so perfect and easy for him. The 'rents wanted him to be a doctor and he wanted to be a doctor, and he had the academic record and intelligence to do it. Now I question whether he would have become a doctor if the 'rents hadn't pushed that from the get-go. Maybe he had it the worst. He didn't even have a chance to resist. Maybe the impulse was suppressed from the start.

It seemed like he would be the one to turn out successful and happy since he was good at anything he tried. Everything he touched he did well. But now this change in personality is so drastic that it begs for some explanation. Tracing the path back with hindsight, his background also allows for alternative paths that he may have preferred to have pursued and didn't.

He has acknowledged and accepted how the 'rents express affection through money. I'm sorry, that is just such a twisted treatment of human communication, expression, and family interaction. For Bob to endorse it just blows my mind. Instead of establishing trust, loyalty, and love, they make money, and then use that money in place of trust, loyalty, and love. Making money is so much easier, and making money is a one-sided undertaking. Forming a relationship necessitates complex compromise, understanding, and acceptance between multiple parties and their respective personalities, perspectives, and values. The 'rents just make money and they give money.

Love as money also means that there is a limit to their love. Once their bank account is theoretically exhausted, there is nothing attaching me to them. The love ran out. And besides, who gave them the right to redefine love, its meaning and its expression? If they can define that in their own terms, I can re-define what I give back. What do they want? Gratitude, filial piety, respect? Why can't I define for myself how those things are expressed?

224 College St., Oberlin

Dear Luyen,
You have been disappearing from my life for a long time on many different levels. I know I have been active in allowing you to not only distance, but really disappear. Nevertheless, I now feel the shocks of our imminent separation which saddens and frustrates me on various levels. These are shocks that are afraid of the change, afraid of the separation from you even though things between us have soured. Afraid because things hadn’t been resolved. Afraid because there will be no more chances or opportunities to work things out. We struggled with each other all semester and now it feels like we’ve failed to be what we wanted to be to each other.

Things changed. At one point we were perfect together and then we weren’t. Something happened, and something changed. I could have sworn that it was you who changed because at one point you were the best thing that ever happened to me, and then suddenly I had no idea who you were or what I was doing with you. But what happened between us so perfectly matches the patterns of my other relationships that I’ve begun to doubt myself and wonder if it was me.

It’s an identifiable pattern. Things would get uncomfortable, communication would break down, I would become extremely critical and deny that things could get better. Distance would fester and grow, relations would deteriorate, tension would build to a final separation and separating would be a big relief. I finally realized that it was me, that there was nothing wrong with the other person, and I promised that it would never happen again because I felt the pain it caused was a crime. Yet here I am again.

It’s too late for us to go back and be happy. Too much has happened. And with my future so boldly in front of me, I have no desire to have anything short of happiness attaching me to the States. I want to leave for good, and I wonder about what I take with me and what I leave behind. There was you who was always right there, fun, made me smile, made me happy. And there was you who rarely gave a decent greeting, somber and brooding, socially impossible, beyond recognition or familiarity.

How I want you to get well and work through all the issues that cloud your thoughts and feelings. How I wish you would at least acknowledge that I will only take the good memories, remember only that part of you. Is that really only half of the story? I want the Luyen from last semester back, even if we can’t get back together. I want the Luyen I loved back then. Not you, I don’t want you. That’s how much you’ve changed, but I know who you were back then is still somewhere there.

I know that the person you’ve become is who you are, and no doubt you like elements of who you are now. But the anger and resentment that has been accumulating this past semester is baggage that is too heavy, and I’m not going to carry it around with me, I’m not going to leave with it.

The time we had was too short. Part of me regrets not being able to be here longer and stick it out and see what develops with you and between us. But most of me will feel a heavy weight lifted. And I’m sorry about that, just as I’m sorry about the so many things that happened this semester. I’m sorry for what we became to each other last semester. I’m sorry we didn’t have a breakthrough, I’m sorry that I couldn’t be more supportive or insightful.

I know where you are because I’ve been there before and it took me a long time to get myself out. I doubt anyone else could have helped, it was something I had to do myself. Maybe that’s the case with you, and if anyone did try to help me, they would have gotten similarly burned. Maybe someone did, I don’t remember very well. The only reason why I know what I know now is because of what I went through. To think I could spare you the experience was probably naive.

I thought that you were my opportunity for penance for what I subjected people to when I was going through my problems. I thought that the way to make up for what I did was to help someone who is in a similar situation as I was in. I tried, I didn’t run away, I confronted you and tried to stay with you, but I still failed. And now I leave and can only hope that you will go home and be strong and confident. Listen to yourself, know yourself and who you really want to be.

224 College St., Oberlin

Luyen’s gone too far. We had been getting along fairly well, doing things together, talking relatively openly, having an OK time in general. But once the bottom falls out, it feels like I’ve been taking a beating from her. My personal time and space feels sacrificed and abused and I was left feeling very vulnerable.

In retrospect, I can deal with feeling taken for granted and used, these things can be resolved, but I couldn’t take the game playing and mind tests. When she expects me to figure out that something is wrong, figure out what is wrong, and then approach her about it, that’s more than I can deal with. When she gives no clues, doesn’t reach out at all, remains cold and aloof, and takes it out on me when I don’t do what she wants me to do, forget it.

I used to be like that years ago, but no one was stupid enough to get close enough to me to be the target of blame when things didn’t go my way. I couldn’t blame anyone but myself, and maybe that isolation helped me get out of it with my self-esteem intact and whatever humility I was fortunate enough to get. I had to deal with it all inside my head.

Blame is a difficult sentiment to control, it comes up naturally when people feel hurt. Luyen can say that she won’t blame me, but it’s hard to put much faith in that statement. I didn’t have enough patience. I didn’t ease her pain. I didn’t understand her problems enough. I didn’t try. I wasn’t there when she needed me. I didn’t care when she called for help.

The world doesn’t revolve around her. I don’t have the time or space to commune with her like birds. I can’t become her or be her to the point that I’m in tune with all her feelings and problems.

224 College St., Oberlin

Luyen came by this evening after several days of us ignoring each other. She’s having trouble dealing and I have trouble dealing with her. She’s become so confrontational and I’m not even sure she’s aware of it. In any case, communication is almost impossible. We can’t have conversations. Her responses always just run the topic into the ground. She doesn’t give anything to work with. She just doesn’t give.

She was here when I came back tonight; I never lock the back door. I took that as a positive sign that she wanted to get something across. I kept myself safe and tried to draw her out and say what she wanted to say. And she did. And I still have no idea about the nature of what’s going on with her now. Well, I haven’t stressed at her negativity or hostility, I won’t stress at her ambiguity. This good relation between us is temporary, but I hope she knows she can count on me - but she has to approach me.

224 College St., Oberlin

Yesterday, the moment I opened my front door, the phone rang and it was Amina. Then just after we hung up, there was a knock on the door and it was Luyen. We’ve been having problems, but we’re starting to be willing to work on them and we communicated silently via the computer. We took turns writing things to each other that were too hard to say out loud. It was good, but there’s still more healing to be done.

Today we broke some ground. It didn’t start off well and we yelled at each other for a while but at least she was communicating and finally she let me know exactly what about her father’s death was still bothering her and only then was I able to focus on her pain and find words to say to her. We needed that breakthrough and I hope she’ll have the confidence to tell me things without me having to wring it out of her.

Fort Lee, NJ

I did something I shouldn’t have. I went through everything that Shiho ever sent to me. It took over three hours and it was very painful. I had nightmares afterwards, the guilt was so overwhelming. What I’ve put her through was an injustice. She did try, she wanted so much from me that I know I was able to give. She took in so much of what I wanted her to. She deserved so much more than I gave and in the end she was an innocent victim of all my personal difficulties. There’s a good reason why she’s so far away now and how I do deserve it.

Back in high school years, Shiho and I decided to go out with each other a few weeks right before she left for Japan. It wasn’t enough time to make much of an impression and when my mental stability declined after she left, she got more and more overshadowed. By the time I got sent to the hospitals after my first semester in college, I was totally numb. The letters she sent from six months preceding my admission into the hospitals are filled with subtle pain that I totally missed.

The hospitals started in February 1988 - the same month Shiho managed to return to the States for a visit, a year and half after she left. She actually visited me with Liz when I was in the second hospital and I think she was quite shocked at what was going on. Immediately after that, I don’t think she knew how to approach me. I don’t think she was even able to ask if I was alright because she might have been scared of my reaction. We considered ourselves broken-up soon after that. Nothing said, it just happened.

For another year I was numb and minimally functional. A year after that, March-April 1989, corresponding to my move into Third World House, I started getting better, developing a positive outlook with death as its ironic base. Shiho and I had kept in touch writing occasionally, but I guess by then we had pushed each other into the margins of each other’s lives that we were already on a pen pal type letter basis. We’d gone our different directions.

She got hurt, she was a victim of my self-destruction. It’s a self-destruction that isn’t designed to succeed and this time, the cost has been Shiho’s trust; a very high cost. I guess I shouldn’t see the tragedy of Shiho in tragic proportions, though. It’s all abstract, theoretical and emotional.

I imagine one day we’ll be sitting in a coffeeshop in Japan, sipping at $7 coffees and talking about the too many years we’ve missed. I’d look her straight in the eye and recollect this weekend to her and tell her how sorry I was. She wouldn’t give any indication that it meant anything to her and she’d tell me to forget it, there’s no need, perhaps because that’s exactly what I’d tell her if the roles were switched. The coffee would be my treat.

84 S. Park St., Oberlin

Each consecutive occurring moment is “reality”. What happens to it when it passes and becomes “memory”? What happens to the “reality” character of it? What is the difference in the character between the moment in which it was happening and the moment once it passed? Each moment is so vivid in the exact moment it happens, then it becomes abstract, a memory, a thought, a reflection.

This being, that’s what is on my mind. I consider my current situation. The stress of this semester, the ‘rents, the money, my future, and on the bottom of all of it is my being.

I hate being with people. I don’t hate the people. I hate how I behave around them. I hate myself afterwards for behaving the way I did. I hate interacting socially and being totally unaware of how little of myself I’m really communicating. I hate feeling like I’d been trying to communicate something. So why am I writing this? What do I hope to communicate? I’m writing this just for myself, no one else, and anyone who might read this isn’t doing it for me, they’re reading it only for themselves.

Oberlin, OH

I hate explaining myself. God forbid it ever comes to that.

What makes me think that I can possibly say something about myself and have someone else understand it? There are too many degrees of separation between what I am and how I come across to someone else.

It all starts in the primordial muck that is my being. I don’t even know what’s there. I’m trying to peer under the surface for something to express. The too many layers of trying to get something out of me. Once I grasp something, there is something about me reflected in my understanding of words I choose and language that I use. What I’m trying to show or express is already limited, tainted, and distorted by subjective language. Then whoever is hearing what I say is informed by their own understanding of words and language, and interpreted by their own experience. What are the chances that what they hear coming out of my mouth has anything to do with what I am or understanding who I am?

Of course, why this obsession over being understood? What the hell do I care? I know what I know and I know what I feel, and if I can’t articulate it effectively, it’s not my problem.

So why should I even try to explain why at the age of twenty I can decide that what I want to do with the rest of my life is not to live it. There’s too much emphasis on living life, life is just as fun as a spectator sport. Me, I like TV, watching life on TV. Not as much as some, but I accept it as a fact of life.

It’s not about giving up and it’s not about not going on. It’s not even about killing myself, even though that always seems to be there somewhere in the mix. It’s...nothing works and nothing gets any better. The world sucks and people in general suck.

It’s about value of life and how living it doesn’t necessarily do credit to the wonders that it involves and entails. Living shouldn’t be a matter of surviving and not living it shouldn’t be considered giving up. Everything is out of touch and out of synch and nothing makes sense and that’s exactly how it should be. I imagine being inside the shell that’s me and whacking away at the inner lining with a plank of wood. Surviving is different than living, and all I’m doing is surviving. I’d rather watch TV.

So what does it mean for me to be a functional member of society? And why would I want to be one? What value is there in being a functional member of society? Is music enough? Well, I know that I’ve wanted to do it since I was like eight or nine, but . . . it’s not going to happen. And the more it doesn’t happen, the more I don’t care and the more I don’t even want to do it. Now I just don’t even want to do it, I can’t imagine getting any peace or satisfaction from it.

Living under a bridge or becoming a monk is always an option. Nice fallback. I just wish I could disappear from people’s realities without them getting hurt, that would be ideal. If I could I would in a second. But sometimes I think people shouldn’t be a factor. People disappear from other people’s realities all the time and of course someone gets hurt. They die or leave or move on and the people who happen to be there at the time get hurt. Can’t be helped. It’s pretty arbitrary who’s around.

I’m mildly content, I’m not unhappy. I’m not full of bubbles and beans, but that doesn’t mean I’m unhappy, not even venturing to figure out what that means. And I’m certainly not depressed and I wouldn’t do anything rash as a result of being depressed. That would go against whatever principles I have. I don’t know what I intend to do, I haven’t thought anything through concretely.

I do realize that I have to think about the things I’m asking for because I know I’m not accepting a lot as it is. Or maybe I’m asking for something and getting it but my eyes are too closed to realize it. Or I’m asking and expecting much more and disappointing myself. I don’t know what I think. So I wouldn’t worry about it. No, I won’t.