September 12, 2003

• *edit*
  i realized something important during my time in L.A.–i don’t like L.A.. it’s just that simple. the only things i miss about home are my friends and family (they’re more people than things, really). i don’t miss driving. i don’t miss the shitty air quality. and i most definitely won’t be shedding any solitary tears for the culture of wanton excess. it’s everywhere and in everything from attitudes to serving portions, fashion trends to fashioned “ends”. i had my doubts, even in this past year when i was, for the first time, really experiencing “L.A.”. i thought to myself, “you’re copping out. you can’t do it, so you’re copping out.” but then i’d look at myself, my thoughts, my actions, and the fact of the matter is i WAS playing the game, wearing the costumes, and faking the funk.
  
  frankly, it wasn’t all that hard to do. so, i’m progressively closing in on the conclusion that it’s simply a matter of personal choice and values. and by values, i don’t mean to necessarily associate a hierarchy of virtues to what, to me, are merely individual preferences. i’ve never been one to pass judgment on others. it’s just something i won’t do. i know too well what that can and does do to a person.
  
  that being said, i just don’t want to live like that. i don’t want to live IN that. what’s that cheap and cliched “hollywood-ism” again? los angeles–city of lost angels is it? well, how long does a person wander around in aimless desperation before he’s lost himself completely? that’s actually a question i hope i never find myself answering with certainty.
  
  i’m not exaggerating when i say i hardly ate during those 10 days. that new profile photo to the left isn’t intended to be anything more than documented proof of how the body reacts to a mind assaulted. i think i dropped close to 6 lbs..
  
  those are my new boxers, though. the boxers i’m showing off.
  
  nearly all my friends, i quickly found out, either have jobs or girlfriends. which, in alot of ways, sounds redundant. those who already had significant others before i left for amsterdam, have now essentially relinquished all member access and priveleges to the brotherhood known as man. and by man, i mean single, non-whipped man.
  
  which segues nicely into the following: i finally met up with jacinda today. she’s good friends with susan. susan is brandon’s [i.e. "access denied"] boo. we met once at the beginning of the summer, near the end of my stint in L.A., at the pig & whistle when she came out with “susanbrandon”.
  
  i think we exchanged maybe a handful of words with each other, just enough for me to find out that she’d be doing a semester abroad studying in amsterdam in the fall. we finally met up today and i realized that i had gotten a wrong impression of her, that random night months back. it wasn’t that my intial take on her was negative. it wasn’t. it was just different.
  
  we met up at rembrandtplein, after i finished at the post office. and we sat on a bench for awhile, talking. on a side note, i didn’t sleep at all last night and even 15 minutes before i met jacinda, i was struggling to stand upright at the post office and i’m certain i was looking at people, all cockeyed from fatigue. then this junkie sat down next to us as we were talking about travelling in europe and asks, “how would you like to be taken straight to colombia? 50 euro for the best [coke] and purest stuff on the continent.” i complimented the guy on his sales pitch and we got up and left.
  
  long story short(er), when jacinda talks, she’s got this voice that resonates like lying in a hammock on the beaches of montego bay, feels. “refreshing” is the word i’m looking for here. what’s more, we have practically nothing in common which i think is great. different is fun. learning is good.
  
  ————————————–
  
  i got back to amsterdam yesterday morning, and since running a 45 minute relay race (2 flight cases and a suitcase; only two hands; figure it out) from the street to my flat, i have yet to fully gain consciousness or unpack. i’m running on empty.
  
  first, before i drone on and on about the last 10 days spent in L.A., let me get some minor things out of the way. first, i’m wearing fresh boxers–they’re brand spanking new. i haven’t actually purchased any form of undergarment in something like 3 years. what a difference a day makes…another thing i haven’t done in years, is try a new, what the french call a certain “toilet water”–that’s cologne for all you spaniards. ain’t nobody dope as me, i’m just so fresh, so semi-clean.

  • 6:49 am
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