don't mind me, i just need to vent.

[trucker's atlas]

it just now finally hit me that elliott's gone. i see the thoughts that have to get through to me somehow, as mental billboards. and the one that just flashed in front of me only says:

ELLIOTT HAS LEFT THE BUILDING.

and i didn't get to see, none of us got to see, the part where he packed up his guitar and pulled on his trucker's cap and tugged it down with a little smile and a wave and he turned around and walked out with a little "see ya later" thrown in there somewhere. and we didn't get to see it, because it didn't fucking happen. it didn't fucking happen.

i found out totally by accident. i went in to the office that morning, and my mother wanted me to look up, of all things, the billboard rating for that fucking clay aiken album that she loves so damn much, so i punched up billboard.com and what hit me smack in the face? yeah, you guessed it. and my first selfish thought was that this was not how i wanted to start my workday. so i sent the link to my coworker/roommate, who'd gotten me the job there not long before, and she's someone i'd turned on to elliott... she asked me to come over to her part of our cubicle-farm, and i did, and she lost it. and i didn't. i couldn't. i can't lose it when someone needs me to be there for them. so i went about my workday and kept on filing like a trooper...

after work i went to pick up my friend who'd come to town for his weekly (or so) hospital visit, and he proceeded to get me totally. fucked. up. numb. i like being numb, i don't have to deal with reality. that's a whole different world, y'know? heh. whole different world. just swallow that little-big pill (so much easier than a needle, so much easier...)

SO MUCH EASIER

easier. easy. easy way out. too fucking easy. give me another one for tomorrow. and then come back the next day. and i sat there in my little fuzzy world, trying to be a part of it, trying to look in from the outside, or should that be vice-versa? i listened to elliott's records, and i was sad that he was gone, and the 30 or 60 or 90 mg of anti-reality gave me the will to make things, to do things, to write, to be creative, to make all those calls i'd been putting off for so long, but mostly it made me sit there and be numb. pretend like i'm not on a nod, pretend all is well, pretend that next time elliott came through town i wouldn't be a slacker about picking up a ticket... to pretend like his records were just albums i liked a lot instead of things, thoughts, emotions, actions or inactions that i identified with so fucking much it hurt to even think about... like nothing else, ever, in this world... nothing. nothing. i felt like

NOTHING

and nobody knew that i wasn't *really* with them, nobody knew, nobody...

NOBODY KNOWS

i went home to my mom's and started cleaning her house. i found a plastic bag with some heavy paper rolled inside it, and i unrolled it to find the poster that i got signed the last time i went to see low. something that's been on my list of things to get framed, when i get the money. i never seem to have the money. there's always something more important like records or rent or food or gasoline or a concert ticket... innocuous little things that seem to eat up all the cash flow. it reminded me of the time that i took some friends (some already into his music, some not) to see elliott do an in-store at tower records. i taped it... what a beautiful acoustic performance. this was right before XO came out. he did the i'm-signing-things-here-now line afterwards. i had him sign something and i don't even remember what it was. i know i have it somewhere. i think it was also a poster, because i remember that being on my list of things to frame, too. i still can't bring myself to look in the closet and see if it really exists. but on that day, i remember feeling guilty for having him sign something... there were hundreds (probably) of other people who did the same thing, but he just so much looked like he'd really rather be anywhere else on earth, doing anything else... and i felt good about my day, and also guilty, at the same time. i'd met elliott a few times, you know, the whole 6 (or how many ever) degrees of separation thing... never any meaningful conversation but i could tell, i could tell, we had a lot of things in common. there was one time, shy person that i am, that i tried to talk to him when there wasn't any of our mutual friends of friends around, and it was pretty obvious that he either didn't remember me or just didn't want to say hi, and i felt horrible... and that day at tower records just made me feel that much more guilty, who was i to think that i could have anything in common with this person who was so obviously uncomfortable being himself but was still so incredibly, fantastically beautiful? nobody. nobody at all. just another fan who thinks probably the same thing that every other real fan in that line had been thinking... i may have had no right, but i still felt it.

[trucker's atlas]

I STILL FEEL IT NOW

the days drug on, and so did i. i'd already known we were getting laid off from our jobs, but the last day came and went. no big deal. i turned 30. again, no big deal. i had my first wonderful birthday ever, while remaining totally, blissfully unaware of the reality of my life.

yesterday was my first day without the drugs since i heard the news. i could feel it leaving my body. somehow, it felt kinda good. first day totally clean and sober in a while. time to deal with reality for a while. i went back to my mom's house. i was tired, so tired... yet still so awake. i hate stop and go traffic... i rear-ended someone while trying to get onto the bridge. thankfully his pickup and his person remained unharmed, but the front of my car is a mess. i'm not even sure i should be driving it, so here i sit. at home. this is my first time alone in a long, long time. truly, really, honestly alone. i think i need more of this. it's a reality check. there are things i can't change, there are things i can't ignore.

like the billboards in my mind.

i'll never forget the first time i heard either/or. i was driving by myself, late at night, on this "loop" that i drive when i need to think or just reminisce or mull things over in my mind, whatever. and i had to pull over when i heard "between the bars" -- i'd been there, i'd felt like that, i'd just never had the words for it. but more than that, it was how i'd always wanted someone to feel about me. and nobody ever has. sometimes i don't think anyone will ever need me with that kind of love, that kind of desperation... though we all need (or at least want) to be needed.

NOBODY NEEDS ME

and so now i see that i just have to tell myself, to convince myself, that I need me. i need myself. sometimes i think that elliott might have thought, at different times throughout the years, that nobody needed him either. well, elliott, i can only speak for myself, but i honestly don't think that i'm alone when i say:

I NEEDED YOU

I NEED YOU STILL.

and again, how selfish of me to still have that need. elliott won't be able to fulfill that little/huge need for me anymore. i can only hope that he has fulfilled some needs of his own.

elliott hated his face, i hate my body. i hope he knew, i KNOW that he knew, that there is so much more. there is so, so, so much more. but when you're all alone and (unhappily?) sober, sometimes that's impossible to see. i just have to tell myself that though i might not be the prettiest ornament on the tree of life, i still have a lot to offer, and to believe in. i have some pretty good ideas, i know what the score is (though i'm not happy about it) and i make some pretty cool shit. now i just have to get it out there and find other people who think it's pretty cool, too.

today is day two. i don't feel it leaving anymore, all i feel is the bang of the door as the familiar ol' fuzziness slammed its way out. i don't have to be caught in the eye they were pulling me through. i'm not caught anymore. i'm not. i'm here. i'm not caught.

I'M NOT CAUGHT
I'M NOT CAUGHT
I'M NOT CAUGHT

i've lost one of my best friends, and it's hard. and most people don't understand. but now that i've made my way through this fog, this sweet fog, this fog that i've decided i don't need anymore... i understand what i need to do. there ARE people who need me. they might just not know it yet. or maybe they do, and they just don't show it. and now i know that i'm worth it, i'm worth being awake to feel the pain of being human, i'm worth sticking around to run what i've got up the flagpole and see who salutes it. but it hurts. the only way to keep it from hurting would kill me. and i'm not ready. i'm not ready.

I'M NOT READY

today i had my first good cry about this whole damn deal. every once in a while i reach up to feel the roughness of that new tattoo on my back, that image of sweet, sweet ferdinand, and that sweet flower with the initials "ES" in it. it feels like a whole new desperation to reach back there and feel it. but it's just a reminder that i DO have a whole new desperation now. before, i had elliott to lean on (whether he knew it or not) and help me shoulder the weight of being me. it's hard to be me. i know that it was hard to be elliott, too. now i have to do this on my own. the billboards are changing. the one that read "nobody knows" now reads

NOBODY KNEW

i reach for my back, to feel that new image impressed upon me forever (as if he wasn't already, y'know?) and i can feel the scab-over starting to flake away... it's starting to heal. and i think i am, too.

CROSS YOUR FINGERS

i love me, i love you.

xo
~renae

[singlefile]

beautifully written, honest post with feeling & passion. thank you

[candylion]

Originally posted by singlefile
beautifully written, honest post with feeling & passion. thank you

:yes: agreed

[trucker's atlas]

well, thanks for being there.

i have come back and read this a couple times tonight and every time it makes me cry... and every time it makes it just a little bit more "real" - and, perhaps, a bit easier to handle.

though nothing's gonna be easy for a while.

xo
~renae

[amity]

that was lovely and made me cry a little.

thanks for sharing xo

[Anjy]

//to pretend like his records were just albums i liked a lot instead of things, thoughts, emotions, actions or inactions that i identified with so fucking much it hurt to even think about//

//it's starting to heal. and i think i am, too.//

Thank you for that. It pulled down what was in my subconscious into something tangible and beautiful.

[SarahC]

thank you for speaking from your heart

[trucker's atlas]

no, you're making sense, perhaps the most sense of us all. thank you for putting that somewhere that i could read it...

grief, for me, is always such a delayed reaction. it feels like i just found out about this yesterday. that "nothing will bring him back" part not only hits the nail right on the head, but if i just keep repeating that (on a billboard in my mind, perhaps?:) it's gonna be easier to get on with doing the things i have to do...

take car in for estimate
assemble crafty products that are almost ready to go
build display easels
choose a name for my business already (!)

ok, enough note to self, i'm satisfied that i'm sane this morning... be sure to check in for the next episode of "renae needs to vent" --

well, at least my sense of humour is back... :)

xo
~nae

[IsThatLatin]

Rely23, I must say that I really appreciate that you took the time to post that, for all of us to read. Mainly for the intent and the content, but also for the writing itself. I relate, I appreciate.

Please stop by The Dancing Banana Club sometime. Humor is good. And I think Pointy is making Martini's. ;)

We'll help you lift your chin if you help us with ours. :)

[trucker's atlas]

and then we have the simple things to deal with. i went to, of all places, wal-mart with my mom.

we're in the card aisle and i'm checking out the balloons... they have one that says, in bright joyous fun-filled colourful letters, "Happy Healing!" and in between the "happy" and "healing" they have band-aid shapes... fucking shaped like

XO XO

and i just wanted to rip it down and stomp it to shreds...

but i tried to forget about it.

we wandered over to the watches/wallets/etc and i thought i'd look for one of those squeezy little coin purses for mom for christmas, since she loves them so much and they're hard to find. i don't mean the little plastic oval ones with the squeezy slit down the middle, i mean the ones that look like a regular little vinyl or leather coin purse that would normally have a zipper across the top, but these have bendy metal bars across the top of each side so when you squeeze the ends of the coin purse it pops open. she's been looking for another one of those for a long time now.

but the only thing i saw was the whole line of Amity brand wallets.

I had to leave and go have a cigarette.

We just can't win 'em all.

:heart:

xo (with no tasteless balloon pun intended),
~renae

[pointyjess]

Originally posted by IsThatLatin


Please stop by The Dancing Banana Club sometime. Humor is good. And I think Pointy is making Martini's. ;)

We'll help you lift your chin if you help us with ours. :)

Well, except for my chin. I have a debilitating condition where my chin weighs 400 pounds and drags on the floor.

Its cool.

[trucker's atlas]

i'll just have to stop by with that special trolley i built for it... your chin can have its own little red wagon!

[Cold Discovery]

Originally posted by rely23
and then we have the simple things to deal with. i went to, of all places, wal-mart with my mom.

we're in the card aisle and i'm checking out the balloons... they have one that says, in bright joyous fun-filled colourful letters, "Happy Healing!" and in between the "happy" and "healing" they have band-aid shapes... fucking shaped like

XO XO

and i just wanted to rip it down and stomp it to shreds...

but i tried to forget about it.

we wandered over to the watches/wallets/etc and i thought i'd look for one of those squeezy little coin purses for mom for christmas, since she loves them so much and they're hard to find. i don't mean the little plastic oval ones with the squeezy slit down the middle, i mean the ones that look like a regular little vinyl or leather coin purse that would normally have a zipper across the top, but these have bendy metal bars across the top of each side so when you squeeze the ends of the coin purse it pops open. she's been looking for another one of those for a long time now.

but the only thing i saw was the whole line of Amity brand wallets.

I had to leave and go have a cigarette.

We just can't win 'em all.

:heart:

xo (with no tasteless balloon pun intended),
~renae

I know what you mean. The number 34 keeps showing up everywhere, and every third author at work seems to have the name Elliott, or Eliot, or Elliot. Heh, I sound psychotic. I'm going away now.

[Anjy]

Renae, I'm the same way. "Everything Reminds me..." for sure.

[pointyjess]

Originally posted by rely23
i'll just have to stop by with that special trolley i built for it... your chin can have its own little red wagon!

That made me teary. Thanks for accepting my chin for what it is.

I have a couple weird "Elliott" things...right after it happened, I got sick and had to go to the store for medicine and I was just wandering around not really finding what I was looking for because it was a store I'd never been to. I was getting really unnecessarily frustrated and teary and paused by the bargain bin of books to look around for the drug section. I rested my hand on one of the books in the bin, looked down at it, and it was titled "Smith!"

Later that night, I was getting ready for our garage sale and was pricing a bunch of clothes my mom had brought over. I was listening to my Elliott's Greatest Hits CD and all emotional and I unfolded one of my stepdad's shirts to see the tag, it was of the brand "Elliott."

Of course, his last name IS Smith the most common last name ever so maybe I'm just too sensitive.

[tangerinesparks]

Originally posted by rely23
i'd met elliott a few times, you know, the whole 6 (or how many ever) degrees of separation thing... never any meaningful conversation but i could tell, i could tell, we had a lot of things in common. there was one time, shy person that i am, that i tried to talk to him when there wasn't any of our mutual friends of friends around, and it was pretty obvious that he either didn't remember me or just didn't want to say hi, and i felt horrible... and that day at tower records just made me feel that much more guilty, who was i to think that i could have anything in common with this person who was so obviously uncomfortable being himself but was still so incredibly, fantastically beautiful? nobody. nobody at all. just another fan who thinks probably the same thing that every other real fan in that line had been thinking... i may have had no right, but i still felt it.

i think it's clear that you did/do have a lot in common with elliott -- you both communicate so beautifully & honestly with such depth of feeling and insight. thank you for sharing. best wishes...XO

[demo gurl]

everything you wrote i can relate to. completely. nothing is wrong with what you wrote. everything is right and that is the only thing that went wrong. do you know what i mean?

along time ago somebody told me to listen to "between the bars". no. he said to me, he quoted some words from that song and the next day driving around at work i really listened to the song and i freaked the fuck out because i knew he knew me better than i knew myself at that point.

i think "between the bars" sort of knocked me to the ground that day. i had to pull over and i cried and cried.

i took the words in so many ways. about a boy who saw a girl and wanted to help about a boy who saw himself and wanted to help.

the love at first undetected and eventually unaccepted because i know i'm not who you think i am. i can't see me the way you do. just like i felt elliott struggled with his own thoughts too.

the people you've been before that you don't want around anymore, they push and shove and won't bend to your will, i'll keep them still.-es (maybe misquoted)

whew. thanks.


my thing is hearts. i see hearts everywhere. back up. my friend brett had elliott sign my xo poster after a show at spaceland because i was too embarrassed to ask. elliott wrote :heart: elliott. the same way i sign everything.

okay well, i see hearts everywhere. i'm serious. stains in the carpet in the hallway. etched into the walls. in food. on a piece of paper i even found a heart shaped rock at the ocean one day. hearts are everywhere and i see atleast one a day. of course i want to know, what does this mean? i told my roommate about it...he knows. i point them out to him often and he knows...

finally i decided that i was going to allow it to mean that i should learn to love myself. that this is some sort of sign to remind me that i'm not the disgusting person in my head which would love to see me dead. no. the child abuse. the mean kids at school. etc...on and on and then the inability to defend myself verbally and physically because i never told anybody.

elliott touched alot of people. some deeper than others. some in various ways.

you can't love someone unless you love yourself? is that bullshit or is that true? i wonder? i mean i can and i do have the ability to care for and about others more than i can for myself. it's easy to focus on somebody else.

i love what you wrote. keep writing. seriously. i felt jealous. that is awful to admit but i'm going to say it. you're the first person so far on this board that i have felt this feeling and thanks to lou barlow who can admit that when he first heard elliott he felt jealous because he knew that elliott or he felt that elliott was doing what he was trying to do and doing it better or so he thought cos we all know lou is lou is lou and i love lou too.

okay. i am beginning to lose the plot. sorry.

you rock! thanks. i pm'd you too.

[trucker's atlas]

yes. i know what you mean.

demo... sometimes i feel like i can't say anything after your posts. you kinda say it all... i can't do it any better.

and then some days, like today, i wake up with this vision in my mind... this vision of a bus that' i'm on, and i'm sitting on the left, towards the back. and everything is in black and white. and as we roll along, i'm looking forward sometimes, and sometimes out the side window, and i'm reading these billboards in my mind...

and then i look up and realize that somewhere in my mental ruminations, there's now someone else on the bus. it's elliott. he's further up the bus and on the right, and he's looking sometimes forward and sometimes out the side window and i don't KNOW that it's elliott... it's just some guy who looks like he'd have a good story to tell or maybe he's just another square peg in a round-peg world and i want to talk to him, i want to talk to him but i'm scared, i'm so so scared of new people, scared they'll ignore me, scared they won't like me, whatever. take yer pick. and he's in his own little world, and it's not like me to intrude.

i wonder if he notices my billboards and then i see a couple more:

HE CAN'T SEE THEM

HE'S READING HIS OWN

and it just became so, so alright to be alone on that bus with that interesting-looking guy, and i was okay with not talking to him, so i pick up my book and start reading and as i'm falling asleep i notice that he occasionally starts to shimmer...

and when i wake up, i'm still on the bus but he's gone.

i wake up like this quite frequently. i thought it had stopped, but it surprised me again today. i have this momentary freakout that i can't talk to him but then it hits me that just because *i* was asleep doesn't mean he didn't know where to get off the bus. and then i just know that he's okay.

HE'S OKAY.

picture it, sometime. am i the only person who's felt like they were the only one on the bus with elliott?

*shrug*

i could use some company on the bus. but i can't put anyone there unless they hop on of their own accord.

the last billboards i saw read:

KEEP ON

KEEPIN' ON

and i think i'm doing that alright. ; )

i have these pictures that i took in the little town where my dad was buried. i spent the day after his funeral (well, the day after that, actually... the organizer's gotta sleep sometime) doing some further exploring of this mystical modern-day mayberry just off the I-5 corridor with a good, good friend... he and i just roamed the town and tried to do things dad would've done when he was a kid (back in the '20s it's pretty easy to imagine what small town little kids were doing there) and there are 2 pictures that immediately said to me "there is nothing missing from this picture but Elliott."

one is of an overturned, burnt-out pickup shell in the middle of a field, i think you can see part of the dirt road curving in front of it. it just needs elliott and a guitar, looking down, at the bottom of this hill in the field of grass and dirt.

the other one is of a pathway leading to the river, just a tiny ways out of town. an ancient little path leading to the river where my ancestors that i wish i knew more about fished for their tribe and their living... this well-worn path through some brush and tall grasses, and the path is worn low, and there's a spot where an old log has been placed over the path (or maybe it fell there years ago, but it looks almost too neat to have been an accident) and the picture is kinda taken from far back, so you can see that it's high enough that you'd have to duck underneath it to pass through... but still kinda high. it just needs elliott either sitting on it playing guitar, or swinging or hanging from it, just taking advantage of an opportunity the day gave him to be momentarily silly on his way to somewhere more important.

but alas, i take empty photographs.

it's lonely here without him.

xo,
~renae

p.s. the pictures were taken in june of 2000, they've needed elliott for a long time now.

[canustillfeelit]

what you wrote, rely23 is fucking so beautiful. i love to know that there are others out there thinking and feeling as i am, real people going through real emotions. sometimes life can get so clouded in your mind so that you feel like you are the only one living life in a different way, that you are all alone in your feeling. thank you for allowing me to cry.

you, my dear, are a writer. truly.

[trucker's atlas]

thank you.

i don't try to write, i just try to find a way to let it out and cry so i can stop crying... i don't mean to cry. i don't mean to make anyone else cry, either.

what you said makes me feel better, it means so much to me to know, to have an actual validation from another living human being (even if it is just words on a screen) that i'm not the only person left alone in a sea of people who don't stop to wonder, who don't care...

today has been, well, i saw another billboard while i was in the shower.

IT'S ON THE TAPE

over the holiday, i went into that room and drug out a stool and climbed up to the top of the closet and i dug out that box just overflowing with old posters, and i dug. through it, over it, around it, i cleared the path through a whole big box of memories of a person i used to be... friends i used to have, places i used to go, people i used to see. people i've been before, that i don't want around anymore... (or maybe i do?) they were all in that box., just waiting to remind me of little things that i'd forgotten but would stand there in line, just waiting to be remembered...

i got to the bottom of the box, and the elliott poster i'd been looking for hadn't appeared. i got to the copy of the Stranger with the cover story that had run on him the week that he did the in-store we went to, and i remembered my quasi-boyfriend at the time being so excited that he got elliott to sign the cover of the Stranger... and it made me angry, for just a brief moment, with myself for ever having shared elliott with him because that guy had turned out to be a total loser... except, he loved elliott too. and when i realized i'd hit the bottom of the box, i thought "well maybe i didn't have him sign anything that day after all, that wouldn't be unlike me."

but then today it hit me, another billboard passing by...

IT'S ON THE TAPE

i bootlegged his in-store that day. i used to do that a lot, then either send a copy to the performer if it was someone i knew well enough, or i'd shyly hand it over (or have a friend do it) next time said performer came through town. i guess i just liked sharing with people what they sound like to people who weren't a part of the creative process. i used to make photo collages and title the pictures in each one with what song i was listening to when i stopped to take the picture. (my favorite was probably modest mouse/764-hero's 'whenever you see fit' while driving through the cascade mountains. fucking beautiful.) i guess sharing bootlegs was kinda like that, but something i could share with someone other than myself and they might, they might just get it.

i never did give elliott a copy of the tape. but when we went through the line, matt had him sign the cover of the stranger (or was it the rocket he was on back then? i'm pretty sure it was the stranger but i'm not gonna drive 60 miles in a downpour to make sure) and i had elliott sign the blank insert from the cassette tape i'd recorded his set on. i don't think he knew i'd taped him, i'm usually pretty good at being discreet. he looked at me like he didn't quite get it. he would've 'gotten it' when i gave him a copy... i just never got around to it.

sometimes i have this need to know that someone is real. when i find people that i feel a connection with, i feel this compelling need to find some way to reach out and touch them and make sure that they're not just my imagination playing tricks on me. i used to have lots of people in my life that i thought were so incredible i'd have to see them or touch them or talk on the phone, whatever, just to make sure they were real.

elliott was one of them. i dug through that box just trying to make sure he was real.

and now that i remember where said proof exists, i want to go to that scrap of paper, view it with my own eyes for reassurance. i want to waltz with it, dance until i fall down into a pile of dust and cobwebs.

but the victrola's still playing.

that little piece of paper is so precious to me now. i've never had many very truly precious things. i've never been a valentine, a spring bride or a prom date. but i've had moments, these wonderful moments where just for a minute i think that i'm pretty or successful or funny or just plain having fun... and i have this paper, this proof that all of these little things happened... it wasn't getting it signed that was special, it was all the little moments that i had with my friends and myself that were directly or indirectly caused by elliott and i know, i can't deny, i know that this beauty was mine, and it was real.

"i'm never gonna know you now, but i'm gonna love you anyhow." it's been quoted a million times now. but that doesn't make it any less heartfelt.

thank you for letting me vent.

i find some peace in it.

xo,
~renae

p.s. -- i'll look for you on the bus.

[Cacophony]

Originally posted by rely23
and now that i remember where said proof exists, i want to go to that scrap of paper, view it with my own eyes for reassurance. i want to waltz with it, dance until i fall down into a pile of dust and cobwebs.

but the victrola's still playing.


:heart: :heart: :heart:

[Cacophony]

a story for renae:

One door of his apartment led to a small, square courtyard with a concrete ground, a mildewed mop and rotting broom in one corner, and flower-pots half-full of sod and cigarette butts but no plants. Leaves gathered around a lone white, plastic lawn chair with the broken seat. No other units had access to the patio so the walls were bare brick with no other doors, no windows.

"What are we doing out here, exactly?" he asked.

"We're dancing," she said, holding her hands out toward him.

He stood in the middle of the courtyard and looked around. "Music?"

She took him into her arms and held him loosely. "Just listen."

He closed his eyes. The wind swirled down into the small walled-in area and the leaves rasped against the concrete. Faintly, at first, then growing stronger, he heard a waltz from somewhere floating on the breeze. He thought he may be imagining it. He felt Kelly sway slightly against him and take his arms more firmly. His feet knew the steps suddenly, and they were spinning in the waltz. He had never learned how to dance, but it came to him all at once, the way it did in his dreams. He hardly felt when they occasionally bumped into the walls. The patio became an open ballroom with Greek columns and flowers hanging all around, and the stale wind changed into a stream of perfume and pastry smells.

His hair grew longer, shining black, reflecting many colors; he grew taller, and he had the face of an angel. He never wanted to look into a mirror again, to be reminded that these changes were not real.

The air grew still, and the waltz vanished. The couple spun to a stop, standing close for a minute before they each took a step back. He was just Alex, the same blunt-faced man as before, nearly eye-level with his girlfriend. But the look in Kelly's eyes at that moment made him feel beautiful for the first time in his life.




(this is a scene from a story i have been trying to write for about a year. it's inspired by elliott. your writing made me remember this scene.)

[telulahbouffett]

Originally posted by rely23


i find some peace in it.



Your posts are very touching...they have brought me some peace at this moment.

[trucker's atlas]

that hit pretty close to home, it's beautiful.

for just a moment i am going to pretend that i'm kelly and that my little cassette insert is alex and when the music stops i'm going to imagine myself going down to the park in the rain tonight and carving 'alex + kelly 4ever' onto the bench.

thank you.

xo,
~r.

[trucker's atlas]

telulah, thank you.

sometimes i just need to know that the wonderful folks of sweetaddy-land are real, too.

:grouphug:

[Cacophony]

Originally posted by rely23
and when the music stops i'm going to imagine myself going down to the park in the rain tonight and carving 'alex + kelly 4ever' onto the bench.


that's exactly the sort of thing kelly would do...

[Cold Discovery]

I really love all these posts and stories. It feels good to come back here after work (petty day with 10,000 petty questions) and read all of these nice, insightful things. It's lovely to see that sense of wonder and true bittersweet enjoyment still alive in people. I come home nightly feeling like my eyes and ears are stuffed with images and sounds of people demanding, people begging, people averting their eyes and people just tossing out niceties like pennies. So much mental pollution. Keep writing, keep observing, it's beautiful.

[trucker's atlas]

i try very hard to find the beauty in things.

it's too often too difficult.

and, rest assured, you are definitely not alone here.

xo,
~renae

:heart:

[Anjy]

//sometimes i have this need to know that someone is real. when i find people that i feel a connection with, i feel this compelling need to find some way to reach out and touch them and make sure that they're not just my imagination playing tricks on me.//

I know exactly what you mean. I feel the same.

//i've never been a valentine, a spring bride or a prom date. but i've had moments, these wonderful moments where just for a minute i think that i'm pretty or successful//

Everything you write is just beautiful prose.

[Cacophony]

it's orpheus who needs to be rescued this time...

we just can't look back...

:(

[trucker's atlas]

i throw myself upon the mercy of words.

and as for orpheus...

who, or what, is going to lead us out?

:(

[Cacophony]

we have to be the leaders now

[trucker's atlas]

i suppose we do.

i'm inside, where it's warm, and i'm all bundled up from the cold. i have my slip of paper with me, my little insert of reality, my proof that we all exist in this particular realm of reality...

we are waltzing.

there is proof that we all share this moment, this moment in time and space that is so beautiful, it's frozen by the evidence, frozen so wonderfully and tiny and crystalline that jack frost can't even see it.

LOOK OUT THE WINDOW

we all can find our proof there.

xoxoxo,
~renae

[trucker's atlas]

so i had this dream. no buses, no billboards. just a house full of people having a new year's party. my house. there was a house down the street where i got into a competition with the guys who lived there, about who could get better music for their party. it was 80 degrees and we were barbecuing and i was scrambling to find stuff for the entertainment setup because *gasp* grandaddy were getting ready to rock my back yard!

you know how parties get. i was busy, here and there, did get to lift a few beers and enjoy the show and direct people to the bathrooms and break up the arguments and try to clean up messes as the night wore on... but as always when hosting a party, you always see people you want to talk to but never have a chance to. there were people i spotted all night that i never had a chance to catch up with... we stopped the music long enough to watch the fireworks shoot up from over the water (a bit away from the house but we could still see 'em) and then more music and happy revelry and people started to filter out, and the guys from down the street came up to the house because they had the shins playing their party but it turned out to be a different band calling themselves the shins! heh heh. i won! and they came over to catch some grandaddy (who wouldn't?) and all is pretty much said and done, and i'm cleaning up beer bottles and tossing them into a big black plastic bag and i just got so tired from being nonstop all day that i sunk down onto a picnic bench (at this table that'd been set up in the driveway, by the barbecue) and just put my head in my hands for a minute and sighed. stretched and sighed.

and this guy comes over and sits down at the table so i look up and say hey there, and it's elliott. and he smiles and thanks me for having everyone over, and we agree that grandaddy were fantastic, and we laugh... and he reaches over and takes my hand and just holds it, and his hands are so, so warm... and we look at each other. just for a second. and then his friend comes by and says "hey, you coming?" and he gets up to leave and i get up to stretch some more and he spies ferdinand on my back and says "nice" and he smiled, and got into the car his friend was driving.

we waved at each other as they pulled away.

then i woke up to 23 degrees and snow falling so bittercold it looked like this thick blanket of pristine snowbliss with white and silver glitter falling and falling and falling upon it, no end in sight.

peaceful. so peaceful.

and i feel better today, y'know? like something in me has passed some sort of threshold, like i've taken a deep breath to get ready for the next pitch life throws my way. like in my sleep i'd heard the sound of settling and was finally ready to accept what that can mean.

perhaps now i can listen again. now that i know i'm cleaning up after life's little parties and i can move on.

but there will always be this void, this hole, this place where elliott used to be. i'll always miss him. always. i don't want to fill that void with something or someone else. don't sit there, that's elliott's spot on the bench! or in the car, on the bus or just everywhere. everywhere.

and now i'm feeling ok with missing him everywhere. i'm looking out the window. i miss him and the snow is now melting in the rain and i'm going to wake up and see what it looks like tomorrow.

tomorrow is coming and i'll be here to meet it. i promise. i very promise to taste the morning in my mouth.

xo,
~renae

[trucker's atlas]

just imagine...

[trucker's atlas]

come sit for a while...

[trucker's atlas]

i'm glad i'm figuring out pictures...

:love:

[singlefile]

nice pics. Love the comments about your party dream and elliott being there.

[trucker's atlas]

y'all are so sweet...

i totally think of this as my little pet thread and i honestly never expect anyone to read it. how silly of me, considering this is a public forum and all... ;)

[trucker's atlas]

nine months later, nine months since i felt the updraft, nine months. nine what?

nine months.

nine months of watching the grey skies lighten, waiting, stressing, cashing checks, lending hands, looking up, digging holes, feeling the earth drifting through my fingers. driving and waiting and driving some more. cashing checks. getting a job and hating that job and beating against the lid of the soup can i sleep in to get out get out get OUT every day and do that job and try to find some solace in it. but there is none.

making things pretty and then setting them free. if only i'd set them on fire instead. they fought and kicked and screamed to get out, and i let them, and i learned from them too.

i set a lot of things free these past nine months.

perhaps the time has come to release some more.

every day that passes puts me closer to an end i know is coming, something to look forward to, something to dread. too many things to be done... it's hard to begin. it's harder to end.

words fail me, situations arise and pass and then are forgotten. another day, another breath, every minute takes hours to pass.

but i'm counting. little white and yellow and red near-flat discs, jars of hope, jars of absolutely nothing.

the tiger is sleepy. please don't poke sticks into the cage.

[softboygil]

thank you

it's a world full of people who don't share of themselves in one way or another - they don't share their money, they don't share their time, they don't share their hearts. it's all fear it's just all fear

but sometimes you come across someone who shares and somehow after elliott died it became my promise to myself that when i came across this sort of kindness, that i would say thank you, that i would tell the person what that the kindness meant something to me, that in a way it means everything to me, because without it, it would just be a world full of people led and pushed about by fear

:heart:

thank you renae

:heart:

[trucker's atlas]

well... thank YOU, m'dear, for not being one of "them" -- :yes:

i always feel a little odd when i have one of "those days" and i end up posting about it...

but, it helps. *shrug* like last night when i thought i might not be here today... i posted, let some of it out, and well... here i still am. :)

and now i've gone straight back to my usual not knowing what to say... :darn:

:heart:

[loveishell7]

Originally posted by Crysanne
a story for renae:

...He had never learned how to dance, but it came to him all at once, the way it did in his dreams.

...He never wanted to look into a mirror again, to be reminded that these changes were not real.

(this is a scene from a story i have been trying to write for about a year. it's inspired by elliott. your writing made me remember this scene.)

Crysanne, I like this!...there's so much good I've found on this board. And Renae, thanks for sharing everything.

....SOOOOO MUCH GOOD IN THIS PLACE!

[trucker's atlas]

Originally posted by loveishell7
And Renae, thanks for sharing everything.


so, does this mean you'll still talk to me, now that you've seen my darker side? :)

[hightowersmith]

Renae,

All I can think to say is thanks for what you wrote. I was so glad to just read it straight through. It was so nicely unabridged.

[loveishell7]

Originally posted by rely23
so, does this mean you'll still talk to me, now that you've seen my darker side? :)

I never know the right way to thank people for their words. I always live in fear that I'll end this life without ever being known. I'm so out of place with the people I know, sometimes I think I've forgotten who I am. Or...I suppose it's more, I know, but i've forgotten how to let that out.

But these things HAVE to get out, even if it's not from me. These thoughts and feelings have to become more real..more tangible, like someone was saying.

Elliott said these things for me. Elliott found these feelings. Elliott captured those moments in life that I knew life was capable of, but that it never reaches. And things you've said renae, and others here, have done that for me.

I've become so used to not being able to express certain things outloud, or on paper, not even to an audience of one person that would understand, that it feels like I need to learn again.

I can only waste so many words before it becomes too hard to wake up and speak them again. Or, pretend to speak them again. As they usually just stay inside, or trickle out in some simple form onto this board, or to someone I know here in a simplified way so I that I know they will be able to understand somewhat, simplified until it's not what I really feel at all, not what I wanted to say, at all. Too much is left unsaid inside. But this has become a place where some of these thoughts can be heard. Even if it's just a small softened portion of what I wanted to say.

I hope you always feel you can vent away here miss renae, and finish that book crysanne. and keep simplifying things for me demo, and jargon, and pointy, and anjy. Thanks. I'm following close behind all of you, and until I can catch up, your words make me feel like maybe I already have.

So much of what we're all trying to say is in the music, and I guess that's why we're here.

But damnnnnn... I'm not going to allow myself to post past 5 AM ever again :)

*missing elliott*

[trucker's atlas]

oh, please don't ever censor yourself just because of the time... i like what you have to say, and i really wish i knew you better...

:heart:

[trucker's atlas]

tonight. sitting, waiting, biding my time and my time and yours too, waiting for midnight to draw near, waiting to go end this year-plus of anticipation and dread, waiting for midnight when the doors to the basement would open.

sitting on a couch, in an apartment where i lived several years and several lives ago. stoned silly, watching my friends watch tv, thinking. always thinking. trends and tendencies, long forgotten, coming to mind.

revelations...

i saw exactly what happens when my life starts to take an upswing... the pieces fell into place, making a connection, switching on the lightbulb that illuminates my sabotage.

fear of the unknown turns comfort zones into cattle pens. make sure to undermine your escapes. nothing can hurt you when you're at home in your head.

now i know why i've always given in to temptation, taken the bait, made sure i've closed the door on myself. not because i wanted the bait. i just didn't want out of my bad spaces...

long ago i decided that i don't want to repeat the pattern. now i'm in an upswing. and again, there sits temptation, always a way to cut myself off, replace one fence with another.

but i'm where i want to be... i'm not taking the easy way out.

and i'm happy.

didn't make the phone call i thought i should. conversations mutate, bend, beckon. no tone remains the same.

enough. no more. let the sleeping dogs lie. and if they start to wake up... put them back to sleep.

a tire tick-tick-ticked all the way to the bank, around up down and through the parking lot, downtown, hurricane, new friends and old, coffee, laughter, dreaming of our so-called lives. migration, meandering, walking up to the basement. buying and staring and laughing and sighing. winding and veering and feeling the load of the car get lighter, then south and south and south some more, to the freeway, through the rain, a steady stare through the glare for the one hour it takes to get home.

new sounds through the speakers, spoke volumes when i'm pretty used to hushed tones. hush, baby, don't you cry... ssssshhh. it's alright. just another rainy night.

and i'm better for it.

thank you, elliott, for bringing me home.

:heart:

[Larkspur]

Originally posted by strungout_on_jargon
thank you

it's a world full of people who don't share of themselves in one way or another - they don't share their money, they don't share their time, they don't share their hearts. it's all fear it's just all fear

but sometimes you come across someone who shares and somehow after elliott died it became my promise to myself that when i came across this sort of kindness, that i would say thank you, that i would tell the person what that the kindness meant something to me, that in a way it means everything to me, because without it, it would just be a world full of people led and pushed about by fear

:heart:

thank you renae

:heart:


And thank you, too, for pinpointing exactly what's so poignant in Renae's writing. I found myself agreeing with her and feeling touched, but it wasn't until I got to what you wrote that it all hit me and I broke down. :heart:
I love you guys, even if I don't know you and you don't know me. Hope whispers in your words.

[Lala]

Thankyou.

[Kitty Fantastico]

Renae,
I love the style of your writing. Thank you so much for sharing this here. I've just gotten around to reading it tonight and so much of what you have said mirrors me/my thoughts and that's a marvelous comfort. Thank you.
Much love,
~S

[Cacophony]

Originally posted by loveishell7
Crysanne, I like this!...there's so much good I've found on this board. oh goodness... i forgot about that! :eek:

after several months of not working on that story (i just couldn't after elliott died, he was such a huge part of it), i'm trying to pick it up again, hoping to submit as part of my grad school application stuff... :(

hugs to everyone here. it's the most i can offer. i've forgotten how to share anything real. how to let myself feel anything other than anger and frustration.

[unsteel]

Originally posted by Crysanne
hugs to everyone here. it's the most i can offer. i've forgotten how to share anything real. how to let myself feel anything other than anger and frustration.

:(

i have been feeling this way all day today.
most days, really. :-o
i get little moments of sunshine that make me happy, and then too much of the time in between is full of feeling nothing.
or at least nothing good.

i wish i had more goodness to share here.

r.a., your writings are really wonderful. :heart:

i only got to listen to half of basement before i had to go to work today. :cry:
however, i did listen to it on good headphones, and will be listening to the remaining half (i unconsciously divided the cd into side a and b, like an lp) in about an hour and a half when i get home from work.

thank you, elliott, for all the goodness you brought into this world, and all the things you said that so many of the rest of us felt but never had the ability to put into words.

:(

:heart:

[trucker's atlas]

l.m. -

thank you. :heart:

and, you know that i can see much more than you can, that you have plenty of good to share. here, there and everywhere...

i wish you'd let me see more of the spaces between the sunrays... i know the unbearable weight of feeling nothing.

i'd like to try and help you shoulder the load...

today, more than any other day, i feel the need to tell you that i love you.

:heart:

xo,
-r.a.

[benderla]

I'm just wondering how Renae is doing these days? I am a recovering addict from Canada and your words resound with me. I hope you are well!

[trucker's atlas]

i am still here! and doing fine... much better than i've been in a long time, actually. i have things to look forward to, now... mostly thanks to the wonderful world of sweetaddy and the wonderful people i've met here.

:heart:

i can see that you're new... pull up a chair, stick around a while. the company's good, and miss Pointy makes a meeeeeeean martini (well, if you're into that kind of thing:))

are you really from calgary? if so, i have been to your fair city... drove all the way there just to catch a show. someone lied to me about how far away it was! it was a horrid road trip but calgary is beautiful and now, looking back, i wouldn't trade that little road trip for anything in the world.

well, there are a few things i'd trade it for... but the wealth of laughs it gives me now, certainly outweighs the travel-troubles i had back then... :lol:

it's certainly nice to meet you, and i hope you stick around. we're a good support group here, eh?

:D

*back to wondering what to post next, since i thought i'd felt like venting* ;)

[benderla]

Thanks for the welcome. This is the fourth post I have ever made and it seems like an interesting way to connect with people. Without reading back through the posts I remember that you had written a few things about using substances to avoid your feelings, I did that with disastrous results (over time). I'm doing much better myself - I've been clean for almost 6 months. And, yes, I live in Calgary. It is a great city, mostly warm and sunny (although it is snowing outside right now - big, fluffy flakes). You're in Puget Sound? And what show did you come to Calgary to see? Do you have a favourite off of the new Elliott Smith C.D? One last question - have you considered some form of career using your writing skills?
Warm Regards.

[unsteel]

Originally posted by benderla
One last question - have you considered some form of career using your writing skills?
Warm Regards.

aside from her lovely and unique writing style, her handwriting is really cool looking and she engraves a mean medal.

:D :heart:

however, perhaps we should all encourage her to write more...

[trucker's atlas]

benderla... please don't think i'm ignoring you! i just haven't had the mental fortitude to make a proper response... :darn:

i will say, though... career? writing skills? thank you, but i have none of those! :lol:

but i'll make sure to give this thread a little taste of the world inside my head, every now and again... :)

note to self: proper response tomorrow!

:heart:

[unsteel]

Originally posted by rely23
career? writing skills? thank you, but i have none of those! :lol:

:bullshit:

or perhaps...

:boolsheet:

:heart:

[trucker's atlas]

:ignore:

[trucker's atlas]

where's the smiley that's frazzled and pulling its hair out in chunks?

i was here at 1 am or so, and made this big long post... (benderla, it was for you!)

and then blamo froze up and ate it. :cry:

i'll try again soon... right now i have to go get ready for work. happy birthday, me! blamo eats your posts again! :lol:

[nikita]

Renae, I have not felt able to read through this thread of yours, although I know that it would be a good thing if I did...

You have been a really sturdy part of my life lately, even though I really don't know you, nor do I talk to you everyday... but the caring feelings that emanate through your posts are more than I've seen from any person that I've ever met (aside from my dear mother)... and it's really a lovely thing to know that there can be a person with her own problems and her own life, who can still be a supportive, thoughtful, sincere person (without being fake, as I have a knack for pointing out the falseness in people's posts... i think;)) to every person whom she sees any sort of 'niceness' in (for the lack of a better word)... Anyway, Renae, you are so special, and when I'm feeling up to *feeling*, then I will read through this thread, and I'm sure it will be a great day :) :heart:


I too should keep from posting late at night when I've been ill and lacking in vitamin C :\

[trucker's atlas]

benderla... are you still around?

i'm sorry it's taken me so long. sometimes once i come here and pour my heart out and blamo eats my words... it's hard to regroup and start all over again.

and that's not fair to you. and for that, i am truly sorry... :heart:

this is not the first time that's happened. just ask the "open letters" thread on the main ES board. it's eaten my words, too... :darn:

and i've not had a great couple weeks. seems like every little thing has fallen apart, or is on its way to doing just that. i'll spare you the long list, just let it be known that i'm finding it a minor miracle that i'm even *here* let alone posting much of anything worth reading.

*shrug*

shit happens.

calgary, for me, was a short visit in 1996. i'd gone to vancouver (my first time in canada) a couple days before, to see the posies. and i had a wonderful time! the posies were great, and all 3 bands on the bill with them that day were great too. i'd never heard mystery machine before, and they quickly became one of my favorites. and treble charger! oh, i fell in love with treble charger... they've changed a lot since 1996, that's for sure. but i still love them... we went home from vancouver that night and talked about what a wonderful time we'd had (me and the roomie and another friend, who had to go back to cal-uh-four-nee-yuh) and thought... double the distance, double the fun? the two of us got in the car and started driving. and we certainly surprised some folks who thought we'd gone too far in coming to vancouver to see them, let alone calgary... :lol:

i used to see the posies all the time, i lived in seattle, they lived in seattle... but everyone needs an adventure now and again, right?

right. :)

calgary was interesting. cold and beautiful (what little i got to see, my car's brakes were failing miserably and with no money for gas, food, smokes or lodging... we didn't drive around much) the show was at a club called Republik (which i hear has since closed down, which is a shame because i always intended to go back there for another shindig) and those wacky posies guys decided to introduce us to everyone (from stage) as their friends who drove all the way from seattle... so then everyone (such nice people, all around!!) talked to us and wished us well and said "oh, you have marleys!" and i was embarrassed because i had no idea what marleys are or were. and i was so lost when someone offered to trade me a looney for a marley. i thought i was perhaps just getting drunk and hearing a foreign language...

marlboros. they were talking about marlboros! so now i know... :)

and somewhere in there, before the show, we shared a burger at a little place called victoria's, and i bought my only souvenir of the trip at an antique shop down the street. i only had enough money for a couple old postcards... my souvenirs of calgary are vintage postcards from italy. that's typical, for me... i think i have our receipt stub from victoria's, too.

and nice people offered us strangers free drinks, places to stay and parties to attend... however, my roomie had to be at work the next day and so we decided to make the trek home.

which got us as far as back up into the rockies, in the middle of the night. snowfall and ice on the ground. couldn't see a damn thing. we ended up sleeping on the side of the road, hoping no big trucks would slide into us. i woke up in the middle of the night to nostrils breathing steam up through the antlers outside the car window. and i was so afraid...

afraid, but filled with love. :heart:

i would love to come back someday, but i'm half-afraid that my memories will be better than what i find when i come back.

[trucker's atlas]

and before i run out of room in this post (perhaps i already have) to answer your other questions...

yes, i live in the puget sound area. i used to divide more of my time between this house on the west side of the water and seattle on the east. but now i don't really have a home base in the city, so i'm mostly here in a small town out west. i'll be back in the city relatively soon, though. i will. i feel it in my bones.

as for the new elliott smith cd... i am still letting it grow on me. haven't given it a good listen-through several times in a row yet. i know it's the last one i'm getting... why rush it? i miss him incredibly. somehow it's like the very air that i breathe just isn't the same air as before... music is such a big part of the whole of me. now part of me is missing and i'm not quite over it yet. but i'm healing...

congratulations on staying clean. i'm having one of those periods where if there were substances around, i'd probably use them. but thankfully there's nothing here to steer me off track. now more than ever i have so many things i need to focus on, just to keep my head above water. i know that it's easier to sink. and i just can't afford to take the easy way out this time... my hat is off to you. you are truly a brave and strong soul for keeping it together.

what do you do in calgary? do you like it there? have you always lived there or did you migrate there by choice?

i can't think of any other questions right now... i don't even know if you're still here.

i hope that you are, and i hope that this post finds you safe and warm and well.

again, i'm sorry it took me so long. it's the easiest things in life that i can pull off quickly. :)

xo,
-renae

[trucker's atlas]

and niki... i love you. :heart:

i'm glad that we've gotten to know each other, although there is so much more that neither of us knows...

you say the nicest things to me. i just hope that somehow, on some level, i can be worthy of such praise.

keep on keepin' on, girl. this place just wouldn't be the same without you. :yes:

:heart::heart::heart:

[trucker's atlas]

oh, tasha, please vent...

i feel much the same way, most days.

there are so many things i think maybe i should post and then i just... don't.

i'm oh-so-guilty of the sin of omission.

and most times i do feel bad about it, but i just can't bring myself to do or say much of anything on these boards anymore.

do you know why that is? i mean, is it something you (or anyone, that is) can enlighten me on?

and i feel like i don't have many friends here anymore and it's probably because i just don't open my mouth and say what i'm feeling. i mean, am i right when i think that's why it is?

i have no idea. i guess i'm just venting a little bit too.

:heart:

[loveishell7]

help me sleep.
if i do i fail...but i NEEED it....
sooo bad.
so much pressure.
so much depends on me keeping my eyes open.
too many days...
tooooo t

too to
tooo

t
t

tooo
too
much.

[trucker's atlas]

twenty-seven degrees and i am standing outside, bare-legged, thinking.

twenty-seven degrees and my mind is fuzzy, pondering all the things i might turn out to be.

twenty-seven degrees and i am sleepy.

[amyjames]

XO.

Thank you - I feel a little bit more normal now, like all the weird overidentifying with someone that I never really met/knew stuff isn't just me and that there are other (far more articulate!) people out there feeling the same or at least feeling it in a similar way.

I don't want to give that Elliott shape gap up for anything else either.

I will try and write more when I'm feeling a tiny bit more up to using words in a way that other people would be able to make sense of at all . . .

I never wanted you to see my face
just to know that someone felt the way I did and do
wish I knew you knew
I see you in strange ways you know
and there's a lot of you dear to all the things I try to do
a thousand things I've been wanting to tell you
and there's a heart I've been hoping to sell you
and you can take it virtually for free
cause without you there's still me


take care people . . .

[trucker's atlas]

i'm sorry

that i didn't

get the chance to tell you

that this

is

the end

[loveishell7]

it's all so heavy.
without a reason...

[nikita]

Originally posted by loveishell7
it's all so heavy.
without a reason...





yep...



I feel like hell.

[trucker's atlas]

on days like today

i wish

elliott could be our valentine

again

:heart:

[trucker's atlas]

don't ask

me

why

i am

placing a mask

over something

i don't

truly

understand

[loveishell7]

OMG...

i haven't been able to find this thread..

[trucker's atlas]

it's always here...

i couldn't find it at first, either. but then i realized my page was only showing threads updated within the last 30 days...

duh! :-D

but right now, i don't have anything to vent about...

*poof, i'm gone*

[trucker's atlas]

where
do we
draw
the line
between
what we do
and
what we are?

[tasha]

Originally posted by rely23
where
do we
draw
the line
between
what we do
and
what we are?

hardest lesson
of
truth
is that
both are
illusions
:(

[sombre winds]

Originally posted by rely23
where
do we
draw
the line
between
what we do
and
what we are?

Is there a line?

[ParentheticalThought]

Originally posted by tangled up in blue
Is there a line?

I suppose it depends on what you do.

[Dead Pilot]

*sigh*

[Postcard]

What we are is always the same, who we are is constantly changing.


Still... if they don't like what i am AND who i am then i'm fucked arn't i.

[ParentheticalThought]

Originally posted by Mike Paco D
What we are is always the same, who we are is constantly changing.


Still... if they don't like what i am AND who i am then i'm fucked arn't i.


Well, it depends on what you do...

[fake concerns]

Thank you for these posts rely. That was beautiful. This thread definitely deserves a bump.

[Postcard]

Originally posted by ParentheticalThought
Well, it depends on what you do...

You make that sound so bad.

[ParentheticalThought]

Originally posted by Mike Paco D
You make that sound so bad.

How so?

[Postcard]

i probably ought to have winked then... it looks suggestive of some evil deed i have done.

no biggie.

[trucker's atlas]

*bump*

just to make this thread easier to find tonight.

[angel in the snow]

i never saw this thread.....
thank you for....omg! everyone who posted...
especially Renae, THANK YOU!!!!!!!!

i'm crying of course,
but you guys are making
me grin through the tears
just like Elliott does.....

:heart:

[candylion]

renae.. you are such a beautiful person... i remember coming here and wanting to say so much but feeling afraid to... you spoke what was in my heart. you were one of the first friends i made here. i'm sorry we never talk anymore. i hope we can remedy that!

:heart:

[Kitty Fantastico]

i hope you're doing okay, renae.
i miss you lots.
xoxoxo

[trucker's atlas]

i miss you guys too. i'd say more but i'm in a rush, i have to deliver some plaques and the mail that the mailman put in the wrong box... :darn:

i love you guys.

i bumped this thread because i wanted to vent the other night and then i just... couldn't.

but i still want to.

thank you for all the kind things you all have said to me. it's weird to think that people like it when i open up the floodgates and let out everything that i usually hold back. i can only keep it in for so long, y'know? :)

love, love, love...
-me

:heart:

[alicec123]

i don't know any of you. i've never been in a discussion board before. i'm not clever or talented with words in any way.
please forgive me. if i'm invading something i shouldn't, just say.
it sounds so evil to say it's comforting to know there are others that still miss him, mourn.
i started listening to elliott by mistake. i think i have to admit that i hated him before, passionately, before i had ever listened to him. i was busy trying to cover...up. i thought he was another self-indulgent, blear-eyed weeper, or, god forbid, kurt cobain. so, instead, i gutted myself for more practical fun. took my own insides out? i'm afraid and sorry that they're lost. there's no emotion then, but empty.
i was wrong.
tell me when i'm wrong.
i was thinking how important a mother must be, i mean, she's supposed to rock you to sleep when you're shaking, to pass her thumb back and forth over your forehead when you're full of choler, to hold you when you cry, to always know when you're high. that wasn't supposed to rhyme. she's supposed to have wide hips, cook big sunday breakfasts with country gravy, to wake you from naps, make you do your homework after school, make you come home. she has skirts big enough you can hide under and hair you can play with. she's supposed to cry for love and hate. she hangs your pictures on the wall, has a pillow for a belly, thinks she knows how beautiful you are, knows all your excuses, your birthday. she knows when to be quiet, when to hold your hand when you fail, when to push you forward, and when keep still. she is the blanket you take to school, and cry into when you get home. she is ready and willing to be vomited on. she understands when you wet her bed. she knows when to raise her voice, to insist, to counsel, to let go, even though it hurts her and you don't even notice. while carving you into her heart, she unwittingly forges her dwelling in yours. what is a person without a mother? i guess i'm not sure what a person is with one. am i exaggerating, am i dreaming? a father can't be the same. a father you take care of, but a mother cares for you. who knows how to love, but a mother? who loves you, if your mother doesn't? did i sign a contract, rent a womb for forty weeks? am i wrong? i am being over-indulgent. am i dreaming of anything real? i want to tell someone that i love her, and for her to smile generously, and, knowing full well that she loved first, to take me home and watch "it's a wonderful life" together.
just say if i've listened to waltz #2 too many times.
i'm sorry for being annoying, please ignore me if you will, i'm ridiculous. so i guess as long as i don't know what i'm trying to do, i don't have to be ashamed. i was just thinking, thought someone might placate me. see, no reason to be ashamed.

take care of people.
ell

[trucker's atlas]

ell, that's beautiful, you're beautiful, are we not all, in some way, mothers? of our own, to our own, we are. mothers.

mothers we are.

love.

:heart:

[alicec123]

no...no. no. it can't be.

[alicec123]

i'm sorry. i'm really sorry. i ruined it. just ignore me. you never saw me. i'm really sorry.

[trucker's atlas]

it's strange

strange

so strange

to be wrapping boxes
and being busy
getting ready
getting ready
getting ready
and this year i'm not quite sure
what any of it is for

a year ago, so far away
what happened here?
or better yet, what happened there?

don't answer

just let me tie another knot
and pull the (bitter?) ends over sharp blades
i hear that makes them pretty

[angel in the snow]

i feel like i'm not really here

like my presence
if that is what it is
makes no difference
to anyone

i feel like i'm not really here
and if i am i don't realy want to be

i'll never be good enough to
ever make a difference
to anyone

[trucker's atlas]

we,
the half-visible
sometimes think
we might only matter
to each other

:heart:

[angel in the snow]

:(

:heart:

[angel in the snow]

it's just that i don't know
what to say


so i think i have to repeat something:

people pass you by
passing up the chance to know you
their irregular
in the usual way

but they can't be people
not if I'm one
if i have to be like them
i'd rather be no one


so am i no one or
am i like them
'irregular in the usual way'
am i passing up the chance to know you?

[alicec123]

they don't want to know you, unless you want to know them.
let's all have our wishes, if i got mine.

[trucker's atlas]

for the short time
that we walked
together
down the long road of life
you taught me much
and i'd like to think
i taught you a little
and i miss you
more than you will ever know.

r.i.p. joaquin
you are in my thoughts
now and always

:heart:

[xangeleso]

Things are so funny in my head. I just can't seem to make peace with myself. There's always that need for something more that I won't allow myself to take. I feel like a ticking time bomb, set to self destruct. I'm afraid to live and I'm afraid to die. I'm so tired of the constant struggle in my life to do well, to be the person everyone wants me to be. I'm over ambitious and under ambitious at the same time. I want to cease to exist but don't want to die. I feel like I'm grasping for straws but can never find the right one. My song of the day is Alameda because I break my own heart and I can't stop myself from doing so. I just don't know what to do with myself anymore. :(

xo

[tasha]

Originally posted by rely23
for the short time
that we walked
together
down the long road of life
you taught me much
and i'd like to think
i taught you a little
and i miss you
more than you will ever know.

r.i.p. joaquin
you are in my thoughts
now and always

:heart:

:grouphug:

:heart:

i'm so sorry renae :( sounds like life has slammed you pretty hard lately :( :(

[trucker's atlas]

why thank you, miss tasha...

the holidays were... hard to get through, to say the least. then, since christmas, i've lost two people i was very close to. one, the woman who raised me. the other a close friend who met a violent end.

i'm dealing, but i sleep a lot. and i'm gaining weight again because i'm depressed and i snack because i'm bored and confused and wandering in little circles in my mind.

i should write. i never seem to find the time or the right place and headspace to do it.

but i need to.

feel free to come kick me in the pants and make me do it.

:grouphug: :heart: :thankyou:

[tasha]

Originally posted by rely23
why thank you, miss tasha...

the holidays were... hard to get through, to say the least. then, since christmas, i've lost two people i was very close to. one, the woman who raised me. the other a close friend who met a violent end.

i'm dealing, but i sleep a lot. and i'm gaining weight again because i'm depressed and i snack because i'm bored and confused and wandering in little circles in my mind.

i should write. i never seem to find the time or the right place and headspace to do it.

but i need to.

feel free to come kick me in the pants and make me do it.

:grouphug: :heart: :thankyou:

no, darlin - i think you've been kicked too much as it is :(

but i hope you get some time in/with some big trees...especially pine trees...they help so much with the painful stuffs...and they give good hugs too ;) i've been leaning on them alot lately too...

Blessings to you Renae :heart: you'll write when it doesn't hurt so much :( :heart: :(

:grouphug:

[SHOAF]

wow.

im teary-eyed right now.

those posts were beautiful, yet hard to read.

[pointyjess]

Rely23, I must say that I really appreciate that you took the time to post that, for all of us to read. Mainly for the intent and the content, but also for the writing itself. I relate, I appreciate.

Please stop by The Dancing Banana Club sometime. Humor is good. And I think Pointy is making Martini's. ;)

We'll help you lift your chin if you help us with ours. :)


come back!