w24ith

[w24ith]

It feels so strange 

Like I can still feel tiny claws digging under my skin 

Or feel a pulsing in the space where a warm body used to be held

Small, wriggling, soft

Stay away from my hands

And all they have done to you 

For you 

And now, The steering wheel 

Hot, streaked with tears and sweat

I hold to distract myself 

From your  cries 

Mine 

And keep my eyes on the road 

I’m sorry, I’m sorry. 

As they take you away 

We both shake, with fear, with life

And I curse my hands and heart 

I promise, I thought this was the right thing to do

I hope you never think of me again 

For what I’ve done 

For my misguided hopes of a better life 

For you, for me, 

And the pool of sweat your form left behind 

In the wake of my tears 

‘it’s gonna be alright’

Has been proven 

Nothing more than hot air 

(written around August 28th, sometime late.)

I brought a kitten to the animal shelter and I feel too much in my heart.

[w24ith]

I have no recollection of writing this.

I really don’t like beagles very much because their eyes strike me as so human. Like there is a human man trapped behind the body of this beäugle and he is mad because his legs are so short.!

[w24ith]

I really don’t like beagles very much because their eyes strike me as so human. Like there is a human man trapped behind the body of this beäugle and he is mad because his legs are so short.!

[w24ith]

Today is July 21st, and starting tomorrow my life is going to get a whole lot more complicated.

Tomorrow, ideally at 5:00 sharp, I will board a plane with my mother and fly to Germany. I will spend several weeks in art courses and awkward conversations with distant relatives (all the while artfully dodging fun topics like my top surgery and whether or not I’m going to hell), and then, when it’s all over and we’ve had enough of all the excitement, we will fly back home.

Normally that’s where the adventure would end, but not this time. No, this time things get a whole lot more complicated because only two days after touching back down on home soil I’ll be back in a car again, this time driving south to my new home for the next four or so years. I’ll run a few loads of laundry, shove everything I think I need (as well as all the things I think I think I’ll need) into several duffel bags, and somehow get it to fit inside the car.

Once it’s all done and shoved into place I’ll be able to look at my room from the doorframe and try really hard not to cry. And since I’m already having a hard time now, four weeks prior to that fateful day, I’m certain I’ll at least cry a little when the opportunity presents itself.

My room is clean for the first time in months now. My desk is empty of everything nonessential, my floor is swept and free of cat litter, and the clothes in my closet are folded for the first time in a year. My posters are still up and so are my guitars, soccer balls, stuffed animals, and all the small trinkets that make this room feel like my own. But soon they’ll either be crammed in a box or collecting dust. Soon I’ll have to decide what items I’ll allow to become relics and which ones I’ll take with me into my cramped dorm room. I’ll have to know that half of my hoodies are still at home, that half of me is still at home, and that the room I have lived in for the last 18 years is now more a museum dedicated to a prior life than proof of the real thing.

I’ve been sorting my clothes into bins since eleven today. Admittedly, that’s not all I’ve done, but sorting has been the word of the day, I fear. I sorted my clothes, my shoes, my school supplies, my art supplies, and even my art itself. All of it is now packed and categorized into three piles: going to Germany, going to college, or staying home.

And I hate it so much - these boxes, the scattered piles of stuff with me in its center, questions of ‘do I want this?’ and ‘do I really want this?’ until it’s all been picked apart like a whale carcass. Perhaps I’m being overly sensitive, (and a touch dramatic to deal with that,) but sorting things like this makes me want to rip out my teeth.

I think this is affecting me so strongly because it’s kind of like proof that all of this is real and happening. I can’t put off the hard parts anymore. I’m a big boy now and have to not only get my shit together, but also figure out which one of the many boxes that shit belongs in.

The last few days have shown me just how much I can despise change. I finished a major art project, and didn’t know what to do with myself once it was done. I cleaned off my school desk of two years and mourned for a spot that was never really mine to begin with. I said goodbye to three friends who will all be going to college far from me, without me, and had no idea how to deal with it on the whole hour long drive back home. Now, packing up the pieces of my room that give it character or make it ‘mine,’ I feel all these crushing emotions and more. As I peel back layer after layer of my possessions, sweep a decade of dust out from under my bed and sort my old schoolwork into piles, my room feels more sterile. I feel like a landlord painting over personality as one would door hinges with white paint, removing the things I love to make way for change. Change that will come, yet I have yet to accept.

God, what a feeling. To know that this thing that I’ve built in my heart and with my hands could be so easily removed. Perhaps when I stand in the doorway, ready to leave on move-in day, I’ll see it as nothing more than a shell of itself. Something that used to be alive that I have bled dry. Maybe I can convince myself that it was never really my room to begin with, and that these four white walls have always been as empty as they are now.

Maybe it will hurt less that way.

July 21st, 2024, 11:11 pm

Edited August 16th, 2024, 1:17 am

[w24ith]

Best friend

I am a dog some days. Loyal to a fault, optimistic and excitable, and always up to do whatever is asked of me. Give me a task! Please! I’ll sit! Stay! Roll over! Let me prove myself to you. I’ll protect you with my shouts and growls, keep you company at night, or whine when you leave each morning. The ground beneath my paws is hard, but the grass is soft and alive with the movement of little things. I roll and run and live, fully. Tail wagging, out of breath I will run back to you with the ball you threw with a loping smile on my face, both of us full of pride.

I will sit with you all night long waiting for you to throw it again, to make me feel useful, to make the love and care you show me feel earned. And when I am old, with broken and inflamed joints, you will feel me leaning against you to show you that I am still here, still yours.

(Written ~5/24, edited 7/27/24)

[w24ith]

Wake up king it’s me from the future and you don’t have tits anymore. It’s gonna get better, you angsty fuck.

wakey wakey you still have tiddies

[w24ith]

12/29/22

I feel like there’s probably better ways to keep a diary than this, but I hate writing things down physically in a notebook. It’s inconvenient in terms of needing to have the notebook on hand, and it’s also a bit of a liability when others get curious. Writing things down here removes the first problem, but may have little effect on the second. Who cares, I’ll find out soon enough right?

Anyways, today has been weird. I woke up at 1:00 after having fallen asleep at 14:00, fell asleep again and then slept until 9:00. Then coughed out my lungs and had oatmeal and toast for the 5th meal in a row. Took my meds, watched documentaries, stayed in bed, worked on the map, almost fell asleep again. It’s all very cyclical. The last few days have been nothing but repetitive, and it’s getting exhausting. I think my condition is improving, but honestly I can’t be sure. Either way, today broke the monotony because I went outside for lunch. I ate some soup then felt absolutely sick. At least the weather is nice enough k be outside though. I’ll miss the ice on the lake, but it’s not like I can go outside and skate on it anyways. Mom published her book today. Everyone is incredibly excited for her, and I wish I could celebrate better. We had to drive to several different locations to try to upload it because the wifi at my grandma’s is so bad. I just ate again and feel sick again. Lying down and typing this out is helping because I’m able to distract myself, if only temporarily. Hopefully I’ll be able to sleep some. I need to work on schoolwork tomorrow, so it’ll be important to be well rested.

[w24ith]

My mother just said I wasn’t mentally Ill

[w24ith]

WHY I WAS BETTER WASNT I

[w24ith]

I love my friends

[w24ith]

Nothings quite right. I feel so much. It almost hurts. I wish they’d notice me. I wish I wasn’t such an idiot. I wish I were more

[w24ith]

I miss the blackbox

[w24ith]

Constant anxiety, constant nausea, constant aches, day in day out

[w24ith]

I CANT FOCUS!!

[w24ith]

Wish me luck. It’s all ready to go but me

[w24ith]

Today’s the day

[w24ith]

I’m so far behind my teammates