slumber parties

I wish I could say that slumber parties taught me about life, or friendship, or sex, or even ouija boards. When it comes right down to it, I never liked slumber parties. During the course of the evening, something would always happen that would mark me as a party-pooper or as an uglier-than-(insert cutest girl in fifth grade here). The era of slambooks, those hideous little notebooks with “anonymous” entries about who you most despised or who was the most annoying person in the school, brought about more humiliation than I could stand. It was apparent I would always be “Nicest Girl.” But I didn’t want to be nice. I wanted to be pretty, or funny, or scary, even. Anything but nice . Nice was the curse of boring people who always...

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Posted on 17 Jun 1998 | Comments Off

procrastination

Odd that I should procrastinate while writing about procrastination. I suspect this was tied up with feelings of inadequacy after the trend of lame entries I’ve been writing, but still … I waited until the last possible moment to write this one. For shame. I procrastinate to the point of utter, all-encompassing guilt, and then because I feel so guilty, I don’t want to think about it any more so I don’t just do the thing, I procrastinate further. Then it becomes this monumental task that can Never Be Completed because I’ve put it off so long. Why? With writing, it is different. I don’t intentionally, consciously procrastinate writing. When I have something to write, I do it. Except for this journal entry, of course. I...

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Posted on 9 Jun 1998 | Comments Off

maternal instinct

An acquaintance of mine, a med student, asks me, “Do you have any kids?” I laugh and say, no, no, not me, ha ha ha, very funny there, move along. Then he points to my wedding ring. “Well, that kind of goes to say you’ll be having them at some point, right?” I become self-righteous — or not self-righteous, but somebody-else-righteous — “No,” I explain carefully, “I didn’t get married to have children.” But I want them. This terrifies me on a regular basis. Probably about three years ago I started noticing babies in that MUST HAVE BABY sense I had always heard about, always feared of. The all-powerful Biological Clock had started ticking for me. Only mine doesn’t seem to tick down;...

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Posted on 8 Jun 1998 | Comments Off

competition

“Why do you and Chad need separate computers?” my friend asked me the other day. “We wouldn’t be together without them,” I glibly replied. “But why?” Why indeed. The first thing that came to mind was competition. We are very, very competitive sometimes. This is also my answer to other questions, such as: “Why don’t you two play cards against each other?” and the like. We get along quite well, but there has always been an element of competition in our relationship, and frankly, I like it. I compete with other people in my own mind, as well. I seem to be constantly striving towards “most interesting person so-and-so knows,” now that I don’t care to be the best dressed or the cutest....

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Posted on 7 Jun 1998 | Comments Off

imaginary friends

“I can imagine how alluring an on-line relationship can be because of the safe little shield. But a rl relationship has to be so much more satisfying, in every way. On-line you really are (though I hate to say it) talking with an imaginary friend; this person says all the right things and can basically be anything you want them to be. In real-time you get to deal with a real-live person, individual and independent of all the things you’ve imagined about them. That’s so much more rewarding.” - excerpt from an e-mail The safe little shield. I’m wondering what this means. Safe little shield on which side, the transmitter’s or the receiver’s? I have a shield nowadays, but I didn’t always. It was...

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Posted on 4 Jun 1998 | Comments Off