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May 1, 1968 I have a lot of homework. People are giving me problems. "The Other America" has to be read for History by the 15th. It's not a big book, but it doesn't look like much. I'm tired of print on paper; it just doesn't breathe, it doesn't cry. You know, god is really the only "person" that can do anything about me. He'll tell me what to do and I hope I can hear him. He's been talking in very low whispers lately; I'm beginning to think He's given up too. But that can't be because He's God. I'm tired. goodnight. May 2, 1968 Things are beginning to pile up. I'm just beginning to see that this world is for real. I mean it. Up until this semester, I've been in a weird dream world with colors and people and crazy sounds, but nothing added up. I was very naive and immature; I still am to some extent but I'm beginning to crack the shell. Lots of tests are coming up. My semester Math test is going to be 50% of my grade. If I bomb it I'm going to have problems. I found a good book yesterday called "50 Works of English Literature We Could Do Without" by Brigid Brophy and co. It kicks a few institutions in the shins. It's thumbs down for Beowulf, Moby Dick, Hamlet, Huckleberry Finn, the Faerie Queen, and Peter Pan. It's the kind of book that makes me happy to see there are some down to earth intellectuals who refuse to let the great power of literature become blocked and stagnant by a few "classics". It's pretty late and I don't feel very good for some odd reason. goodnight. May 3, 1968 Another Friday. And more wasted words. I've been reading over the past. It's pretty boring. I pity you. What can I say, or how can I say it? I'm just a poor, ignorant fool and don't have words on my fingertips, just uneven nails. I've developed a psycho-somatic symptom. I cough. I don't really have a cough, it just happens when I feel like a fool. My day is one cough after another. A portrait of immaturity. I miss a basket in gym, I cough. Totally absurd. Isn't that wonderful. I don't know what I want to say. I've just got to break lose and go to hell. gudnight. May 4, 1968 I have had tests all day, from 8:30 until 4:00 with an hour for lunch. They were all pretty hard and I hope they don't have much influence on anything because it can only be for worse. I didn't work today, I just sat there filling in little rectangles with my no. 2 soft lead pencil. The tests were at West, a nice school, but then I've never been there on a regular school day. You know the truth? This stinking diary isn't what I'm really like. I can't begin to say. I'd like to start all over, but I know that if I didn't have to I wouldn't. I just couldn't take the time. I have a hard enough time just trying to fill up space for every day. My life is boring, I don't have adventures, just a lot of problems and doubts. Things never work out. I'm surprised that I have finally committed myself to something. My record is one of talk alone. I have to be rigidly enforced. People have to keep me on it or I'll fall of as easily as I jumped on. They say God has given everyone a purpose, I think I might have found mine, but I've got to be tied to it very securely or nothing will come of it. I need help every second of my life. Things are very shaky all around and just about anything can blow it for me. But I swear I'm going to do it this time for the rest of my life. May 5, 1968 Sunday is a nice day. The sun has been shining of course and birds have got to be singing. (I'm locked in.) It's too nice to sit in here. I'm going out. See you later. If I'm lucky I'll never come in again. good day. May 6, 1968 Answer me this. Who wrote:
I don't really go along with the stated philosophy, but there is a little something to it. that's all I've got to say for today. THIS IS WASTED SPACE. May 7, 1968 I had yesterday off and worked all day. I've given up most of my creative efforts that's why everything is so boring. My mind is slumpy fodder and I can't do a thing about it (I'm not sure that I want to.) It's that time of year and I can't say a thing because my brain doesn't want me to, and who am I to argue? May 8, 1968 Wednesday. I want to say something profound and deep, but I can't think of a thing. On the level of occurances, everything is neutral. Mary Kay is causing a slight disturbance and my brother thinks he's smarter and more mature than I am, that's all. I hate my sister and loathe my brother; have total contempt for another brother and love another sister or two. GOD IS ON MY SIDE. ARE YOU? May 9, 1968 Thursday. School is almost finis and I couldn't be happier. IGNORE ME. IT'S GOOD FOR MY ALTER EGO. Worked tonight. The library is there. Our elevator should be working soon, thank Mammon. My back is killing me. There isn't anything to say. This is a pain. I'm sick. Happy? My style hasn't even quivered under the massive assult of the past year. I don't think this diary has done me any good. Because it's spring and diaries aren't fun anymore. There's better things to do. goodnight. May 10, 1968 Friday. Thank God for Friday. It is almost all over for this stage of my life. Curtain up, down, and here it comes again. Twelve days. It doesn't really mean much to me. I'm trying to force myself into a state of awe, but it isn't working. "A million miles from here to June." Remember? (Thomas Murphy Sept.'67) A few slow yards to go? Not really. goodnight. May 11, 1968 Saturday. I worked. No school Monday, just Mass. Mother's Day. The sermonizer will get up and tell all the things we should be and the day will go. But today was nothing. (To tell the truth, this is Monday) Fr. Welch will give a searing sermon and everything will be very touching and true. (No sarcasm intended. I love my mother.) May 12, 1968 Sunday was very pleasant, a sunny day but as empty as it was bright. This is one hell of an existance. I'm going out of my tree. Mass was nice. For the first time the priest (Fr. Kaffer) used props for his sermon (an egg, a pan, a gun). It was o.k. nothing special. That's it. May 13, 1968 Monday. Mother's day Mass (see May 11). I saw M.K. at library she was as vague, obscure as ever. Should have gone to History session tonight, but don't have the strength. I'll go to the one tommorrow. I'm full of pretension tonight. fin. May 21, 1968 It's all mine from here on. Maybe there will be no more pretense. But no promises are ever to be made. This will be quite sporadic. Maybe I'll try it once a week; It'll stretch to a month and soon fade into the environment. I'm beginning again. I was born in '50, in an undoubtedly sterile hospital. It's now a few bricks scattered about. The new one is even more antiseptic; I've been there once. For a few months I lived in Braidwood (a town which at the turn of the century had 99 saloons) but that has long been consigned to my subconscious being. There are only a few pale images remaining. One of them is a view from beneath the darkwood dinner table. The forest of wooden legs remain in focus, standing perpendicularly over a well travelled carpet, but beyond that are only hazy forms, perhaps a bay window, a sofa, or a piano (which is now dusty in the basement below me). that is all of Braidwood I know. Of course I can pick out the image of fire trucks and parades and days at the beach, but only in a very fluid memory that works only for itself. In Joliet I can remember a stuffed green naugehyde chair and a coarse fuzzy beet red davenport. And I would not talk, only act and move about. There is no sound in my past. Other than fire sirens, that is, only movement. Limbs would tumble wooden blocks and I'd stand above my fallen empire by the window. School had finished, John and Mary came home past the white bush in the corner of the yard, to play with me. I would build another civilization. I remember only Stratford Court. This is enough. Next I'll forget all this and gamble with what I have. May 22, 1968 Already the second day. I took my last exam today. School is past. What am I going to do this summer? a not so rhetorical question, because I'm open to suggestions. Stop. May 23, 1968 Dear Mary Kay, You are understandably bothered. It's my fault all the way (well almost all the way). You want to know precisely where you stand in my mind. And that, my friend, is dangerously close to an impossibility. I change faces frequently, if you know what I mean. Sometimes I'm like this and sometimes I'm like that; it's not a mood, it's simply me. That must be one accepted fact. Now, how do you fit into my picture? when we first began our "affair" we wrote back and forth every day. As you well know things are said in writing that aren't said out loud. You told me your problems in letters and I hinted at mine; I really didn't have any (believe it if you want to, but its the truth). Right now my problem is that I'm growing up and there's nothing anyone can do about it. You've got to take me for what I am. Our whole relationship was founded on pen and ink. When I skipped writing for a while something happened. When I ceased writing, as I have, it mattered to you. I saw that we talked to each other using paper as a middleman. If you lived on the other side of the world all of this would be fine, but you don't. We see each other, however infrequently; we still must say something. You've admitted yourself that you're hooked on me, but we are in no sense of the word going steady. I have no deep emotional commitment. In fact I have no commitment. It may sound cruel, but its the truth. I'm afraid you've wound yourself up about me too much. You've got to go out with other people. You should have said yes when you were asked to that prom. Don't get tangled up with me; first of all I don't want you to and secondly there's no percentage in it for you. I consider yourself my good friend, but lets not lose our heads over the whole thing. You go out with other boys and live. Forget about me when you're doing something you really like. Life is a gas don't waste your time over something you can't help anyway. I'm not so conceited to actually think you're whole life revolves around me; I hope you don't even come close to that state of mind. They say girls mature up to 4 times faster than boys. It's true in our case. You expect too much from me. You're trying to pin me down and I just can't accept that. (to be continued) May 2?, 1968 After a spontaneous explosion my mind settles into its foundation at the rear of my skull. The weather's turned humid. In the air hang suspended globes; they sludge through nostrils; they stickily spread across arms and the nape of the neck. I breathe them and they do their own thing within me and across my breast. It drags down upon me. June ?, 1968 It's been a warm day. The passing crowd ignores everything by right of malice. Things affecting me:
Graduation is yet to come. God is playing it cool. |