2001-05-03 :: 3:33 a.m.

the honesty project

Soundtrack: Afghan Whigs, Gentlemen; Matthew Sweet, 100% Fun

I've been avoiding posting here for some time, haven't I. I was going to post the story of Lucky the Stray Dog That I Took Care of For a Night and Who Got Back to Her Owner, but I'll save that for another day. Because this is reaching for something else. This is reaching for purity, for honesty, something more than interesting Australian anecdotes. The kind of brutal beauty that Heather produces with nearly every entry lately, God bless her.

The whole of this diary has been honest, but honest to a point. What I want is the opposite of solipsism, I want to know what you think when you see this. What self for me are you constructing. The problem is that not very many people care about this sort of thing. So the self I've been given from one reader is that of a thin-lipped individual watching the fish of humanity swim in a bowl, my face pressed to the glass, watching. What I want is for you to watch me and press your face to the glass, then report your findings back in 1,500 words or less. But I never tell you this, because that's breaking the rules.

But fuck the rules. The Rules. Come on. What am I doing, really? I'm holding back. I could look at just about any entry here, print it out, circle some section, and write "Needlessly cryptic!" around it. I may not want every detail of my life on here, but if I'm going to get anything out of this, I've got to hold back a touch less.

Well here's a little more than a touch.

I can't tell where I am, in the fishbowl, or pale and glued to the glass, watching the little guppies go at it. I'll say this though, I'm in the bowl more than this thing might let on. And it's no real shame to admit that. I was maybe the drunkest I've ever been tonight. (Probably 6 shots of Midori before going to Chasers, then 2 double Bacardi and Cokes, a double Vodka Lemon Lime and Bitters, and maybe 4 glasses of wine.) Closing my eyes, I was suddenly spinning out into nowhere, hurtling on some Pink Floydian rollercoaster, multicolored lights flashing, my body going everywhere, flying up and away from the cesspool. I could literally feel myself going up, looking down at my bent head and sunken shoulders, slouching in a thrift store brown suit and pink shirt (retro cool, but not quite cool enough). I kept running to use the horrifically close-to-overflowing urinal, a moat filled to the edge.

The problem is alcohol pollutes any moment of honesty you have. I am trying so fucking hard here to get to the point of just saying what I feel to people, to not sit around and watch Dawson's Creek while feeling the intense burn of the cheesy dialog acting as double-speak for me, to bear all and not worry about What It All Will Mean Tomorrow, all of those TV drama ideals. But the problem is that alcohol taints whatever you say, no matter how comfortable you are in the moment, alcohol sits around as an excuse, a blame drain for you in the morning (especially if the person you were talking to was sober).

I had a big talk with Gina tonight: she likes attention and yet doesn't want to hurt guys, which is why she never brings up the boyfriend, of course -- she didn't want to admit to the attention part, but it came out; as soon as you get good and honest with people, suddenly they start coming clean like you wouldn't believe. (I will admit that it was really nice to hear her tell me what Robyn said about my writing, however shallow or bad that may paint me, I don't care.) But Gina was pretty much as I expected, except for her little detail about her staying with her boyfriend back in the States partially because he's "good in bed." That was priceless.

Shortly after that chat with Gina I talked to Serena, discussing the distance and coolness I always seemed to feel from her, the boyfriend she left behind but feels is her soulmate but it's too early (so obviously he isn't because Rule #1 is you can't fuck with time), how I had the same goddamn experience and missed out and only time cured me, blahblah. I poured a good lot of high value discussion in, the accumulated gifts of my parents and hard-won knowledge. She had warmed up, she wanted to know about this "distance" I perceived. She even confessed that she and Garny had something of a romantic competition as roommates. And then, maybe half an hour later, she was gone; only to show up on the dance floor snogging with some senior official from Trinity. What does that mean? Did I serve as nutcracker? I knew, as I was talking to her I knew that all these excellent phrases and ideas I was generating were lost to me as soon as I said them; they were beautiful little fetal alcohol syndrome babies. All I would be able to say was: it was good, I have no regrets. Which is indeed all I can say. I wonder if she'll feel the same way when we cross paths again. I can comfortably say that that is curiosity and not worry: the talk with Serena was good, and another stepping stone to somewhere better.

And then there was the talk with Les. Which had to happen with Tim next to her, no less. Les was the beginning of all of this, the coming clean point. (Well, to be technical, the talk I had with Garny was, but that was so consequence free that I wouldn't count it as more than a practice clean-coming.) The person who I stated my feelings outright to, content to live with the consequences, whatever they were. And it bothers me to no end that the followup had to happen with alcohol involved, that we had to be so goddamn drunk to say things that meant something. And when she says "I love you as a friend," I say "Part of me takes that as a high complement, and part of me gets killed by that." Even that isn't quite right, but that's the gist of it. But Heather said something very true: "you're young, you need experiences, they're going to make you feel good even if theyre making you feel bad." In a way that sounds like it could be an excuse for outright hedonism, but whatever holds me back from that is what sends my mental camera soaring the moment I close my drunken lids. So I just kissed her cheek and said "This is just too awkward with Tim there. Thanks for everything, Les," and got out of the booth. I meant that thanks, I really did. I told Les she has no idea what she's done for me, even if she wants to pretend nothing ever happened.

Maybe the worst was talking to Michelle, who was part of the group I went up the east coast with here. She wasn't drunk, and I was pretty seperatist for the majority of the trip, and being sloshed here, I chatted her up while saying the inane shit that a drunk who knows what drunks sound like says. There is no way to make it better, to make it sound any better than what it is: faulty honesty. She was not forthcoming as to whether or not she hooked up on the trip, which was strange. Then I saw her dancing with Paul, and so that began another "How'd that happen?" moment.

I hate it, though. I used to make fun of people for relying on alcohol to socially lubricate themselves. Why can't people come clean unless it's dark and fueled with drink? Even this isn't right. I'm trying here, I'm putting effort into this to actually make it "sound good" and so I probably will fail, will fail prey to that alcoholic honesty scourge. I don't know what else to do. You get burned a few times and you fear putting yourself out on the line, saying the silver bullet. So you play games, you dance around. But I'm no good at that. I don't pick up in bars; I was in the seeming minority at the ball here, coming home alone. I'm certainly quite alone in this computer lab. Maybe it's the fishbowl watcher part of me that holds me back, even in my most intoxicated hour. I don't know.

Slowly but surely I am clawing my way back to not worrying about what I say, and just saying it. If I can really put myself in that place and not just figuratively stay there while I am here (Australia being a place I'm not likely to be in again for years, making it far easier to adjust to that brutally honest frame of mind), I'll live with the consequences; they can't really be so bad. Whatever you think of this entry can't matter that much. Whatever face I've lost with you is more than compensated by having this to look upon later, to demarcate the second point (the Les talk being the first) at which I try to build something new (or rebuild something old, one might say).

PS: I'll record one more bit of honesty I'm glad I had tonight. The bouncer was telling me to get in or get out when I poked my head out to look for some missing friends towards the end of the night. Of course, there was no re-entry, so I wasn't getting quite out, but I needed to have a look around. When I left for good I told him there was no need to be like that, and he went on about not wanting to hear my problems. As if I was trying to tell him my problems! Like he knows where they even begin! I told him I didn't want to tell him any of my problems, but I wanted to see where my friends were and he didn't need to be such a bastard. At this point I didn't much care; I was too far for him to hit me and I was out of the club, so he couldn't really kick me out. He just went on about how he was a bastard (as if this acceptance of my accusation succeeded in nullifying it, the moron) and didn't want to hear about my problems, so go on and get going. At that point I just said "Get fucked," and turned around to rejoin my friends. It was deeply satisfying. That was some great goddamn honesty, and I don't care how much alcohol it took to achieve it, because he had nothing to say back to me, and it was delicious.