Now he's guilt-stricken sobbing with his head on the floor...

It's been a long time since I last posted. My apologies. Life has been crazy.

But it's also been a long time since I read a book in one sitting. And that's exactly what I just did. I snagged a copy of Tangled by Carolyn Mackler from the ARC shelf at work, and I needed a new book, so I started reading. Now, let it just be said that I didn't get home from work until around nine-thirty. While working at a bookstore isn't one of the most draining jobs you could have, it's definitely not what most people think it is. But I digress. So I sat down at the kitchen counter with half of a leftover potato that my sister had made with dinner, vetoing the stir-fry she'd made as there was no meat in it. (My mother has recently decided that what she needs to do is be a vegetarian after reading some book, so now we're all being punished.) It took me a coupe of tries to get through the first couple of pages, mostly because I was exhausted and trying to eat and all of that good stuff. But as soon as I got into it, oh, boy was I into it. It's a minute past eleven right now, and I've just brushed my teeth and come up to bed. I'm still in my clothes from the day, because I couldn't put the book down until I'd finished it.

I realize that I haven't actually told you what the book was about, but honestly, anything I try and say right now will come out as incoherent gobbldygook. So I suggest looking it up. Basically it's about four people who meet, however fleetingly, on a vacation in the Carribean. There are four months in the book, April, May, June, and July, and each month is told in a different POV. (On a side note, I remember when I had no idea what POV meant and I thought it was some kind of car.) (See what I mean about the gobbldygook?)

Anyway. The book was good. And I really like Carolyn Mackler's other books, too, although I definitely favor Vegan Virgin Valentine. It's one of my all-time favorite books. In other news, I wore a dress that I got with my friend Jess on... Friday? Yeah it was Friday. It's super cute, and I actually felt like I looked good in it, which is one of my favorite things.

Goddamn, I'm hungry now. Maybe I'll go try and find a midnight snack...

I am my own affliction, I am my own disease.

One of my biggest flaws is my ability to always believe the best in the people I choose to. Not everyone, no. I have no problem pointing out the personality flaws in the people I want, but for the people I have some warped sense of loyalty to, they can do no wrong.

And it only ends up hurting me. Because I count on them to do things for me, to keep the promises they make, even when every one else around me is telling me that I'm too good for them, that I could do better, and I'm only going to get hurt. And I always do. I don't trust many people. I put on a good show of it, sure, but I don't. Why is it that the people I do trust are the wrong ones? That they're the ones that always end up letting me down?

I'm tired, and I'm needy. I'm a person who likes to have plans, set times for things, and not be spontaneous about when she's going to see people. I get too aggressive with my teasing most of the time. My stomach inflates after I eat, and sometimes I can't see my toes. I don't deal with my emotions well, and I hardly ever cry. I don't trust people. My face is oddly shaped, and I have too many scars to ever be considered unblemished. My family is so dysfunctional, we'd put Jerry Springer out of business. I get attached too quickly, and hate talking about my problems, because I feel like I'm burdening people.

These are just a few of the flaws I think of about myself every day. And I know that there are good things about me, too. I can write like nobodies business. My legs are nice looking, and my hair is actually pretty hot. My eyes, while they may be a bit murky, are green, and I enjoy that. I have never, ever, ever, turned down a friend in need. I keep the promises I make. I try to make everyone happy.

But when I'm thinking, the bad usually outweighs the good. So why is it, when it comes to my friends, the good outweighs the bad, even when there is only one redeeming quality to be found in them? Why is it that I continue to let these same people hurt me over and over, and continue expecting a different result?

This is a whole mess of rambling. And I'm sorry. But I'm tired, and I'm needy, and most of all, I feel lonelier than I ever have before.

It's not very often that I find myself wishing for a boyfriend.

But that sentence basically sums up my night. All I've done today is fight with my dad, and of course, he wouldn't let me stay home tonight.

So we're at the beach that I  went to [while we were supposedly at the Providence Place Mall] with Haley and Kevin two weekends ago, and all around us there are kids my age hanging out and acting like idiots together and all I want is for someone to act like an idiot with and hug me and just yeah.

Okay, so. Story of my life at the moment: My dad is a douchebag. My little sister is in a mental hospital and basically told me that she hates me. I'm losing the people I'm closest to, and I have no idea why. All I want to do is sit down and cry but we all know I don't do that. Basically, I'm all alone and have no idea what to do about it.


Hence the boyfriend-wanting.

So. It's officially my first day of vacation, and I'm still up before noon. In fact, I was woken at eight fifteen, if you can believe it. We're having our septic pumped or replaced or something that deals with big machines, so I woke up to the beeping of something large backing up. I thought it might be an alarm, but no. It was just sweaty men working with poop.

Anyhoo. I worked yesterday. I was down in the adult section, where I feel quite out of place. I should probably get to work on reading some adult novels. I worked with a girl named Clea, who I think is absolutely positutely amazing. I like her. I'm working again tomorrow, but I'll be upstairs with Lindsay. Who is another one of my favorite people.

Okay. I think I'm going to go for a bike ride to work off the ice cream and bagel that I had for breakfast.

Summertime, and the livin' is easy...

After tomorrow, I am officially On Vacation. At least from school. I'll still have to go to work, but it's nice to pretend. It's nice to pretend sometimes that I'm one of those girls who is thin and beautiful with long legs and gorgeous hair with even greener eyes who tans, and fills out a bikini in all the right ways. One of those girls who has the ability to let the days all run together during the summer, because the most stressful thing in her life is picking out which pair of earrings go best with her new dress. 

Instead, I'm me. A bit too pudgy to be thing, but too thin to be constituted as fat. My legs are a bit longer than average, but not noticeably long. I'm too plain to be beautiful, the most I'll ever be is pretty. The only time I was satisfied with how I looked in a bikini was when I still had a feeding tube. [Albeit, I wasn't completely happy as I had the feeding tube and that illicited quite a few stares.] My eyes are, and always will be, a murky pond-like green, and no greener. If I'm out in the sun for too long, I turn into a speckled lobster. My hair is soft, but it just lays there, dyed into submission. And to top it all off, I couldn't even tell you what the least stressful thing in my life is, even if it is summer. 

So. Here's to fantasies.

Something I'm working on.

It's three pieces, but I only have two of them semi-done. I'll probably add more to them later.

I.
I am that girl. That girl you either don't look at, or look at for a moment too long, because there's something about her that you can't quite identify. I'm that girl who you'll love and hate, because she won't make you talk about your feelings, but she'll probably make you uncomfortable with her blunt assessment of her life and inability to care if someone hears her or not. I'm that girl who either says too much or not enough, and is constantly looking for things she can solve for anyone but herself. I'm that girl who never leaves her house, content to keep her adventures in her mind, at least for now. I'm that girl who will mop the blood off your face and tell you that you're still a hero in her eyes, even though you lost the fight. I'm that girl who will keep going even when she can't, when the tears are pouring down her face and her body is tattered and worn. I'm that girl who you either don't look at, or look at for a moment too long.

II.
Hannah is the rain that kisses your limbs on that hot summer day. Hannah is that cup of tea you curl your hands around and smile because the steam hits your face. She is that feeling of craving something you don't know the name of, and the feeling of when you finally find it. Hannah is the arms that embrace you when you return from a long trip. Hannah is the blanket you hide under during a thunderstorm, sure that the simple cover of cloth will keep you safe. She is the color your lover's eyes turn when they see you, and the spark you feel every time your hands touch. Hannah is the smell that hits you as soon as you hit a bookstore, when you can't help but smile. She's the adrenaline that floats through your veins each time you do something that you're not quite sure is allowed, and the whirring of your computer each time it starts up. 

I am a writer.

That's how people know me now. No longer am I the cancer girl, the victim, the one everyone tiptoes around.

But I find that with being known as "the writer," there are more and more things expected of me. "Hannah, can you read this over and tell me if you think it's any good?"

"Can you proofread this for me?"

"Can you help me with an idea I have?"

"Can you tell me what you think of this speech? And if you don't like it, can you help me rewrite it?"

Etcetera. Most of the time I don't really mind, but then there are the times when I just want to scream. I wonder if these people even have any idea what being a writer means. On the second day of being in New York last summer, the teachers sat us down to tell us what our classes will be like. One of the most powerful statements I heard during those two weeks was from Lisa Reardon: "Writer's are the keepers of humanity." While that sounds heady and self-promoting, I agree.

Think about it: we watch people, we see what they do. Then we write, preserving feelings and situations and people for all of time. [Or at least, until all the copies of our books are gone. (:] And as a result of this, we feel more. We become the people that others go to to vent, to tell about their problems, and instead of pretending that we know what it's like, and that we're feeling it with them, we do. Because by writing characters, we feel each of these emotions as strongly and as painfully as if they were our own.

And while being a writer means feeling all of those things to the nth degree, being a writer also means that we have to write. You can't be a writer without writing, and then rewriting, and then rewriting a bit more. And these things take time. So excuse me if I don't want to read what you wrote because I'm too busy writing my own shit so that maybe I can actually make it. Excuse me if there's no way in hell I want to sit down and proofread a million and one mistakes because I'm doing that to my own.


I'm a writer. So just leave me alone and let me write.