Cataclysm
3-10-99 W 8:02 AM
Class.  Bitter again or still.  Shirelle called this morning.  I'm lost.  A lost soul.  What's true and right and good is a mystery to me. Jim Bolger was a guy I knew in college.  He married a pretty girl named Michelle, and they bought a house and had a little boy.  When his wife was about a month away from delivering their second child, he ran off with another woman with whom he'd been having an affair. 
I was so depressed last night, I ordered twenty-five bucks worth of pizza and beer.  I ate two slices and went to bed.  Slept a dreamless sleep. 
I'm hungry.  I'll have to go to the donut shop for a croissant.
I wish something cataclysmic would happen.
I have to call around for a new apartment today.  Scarier, I have to decide if I want Shirelle for a roommate.  I want to call Idaho today, too.  Ugh.  I've got to finish Vivid Dreams today.  What else?  I need to make this room look nicer before parent conferences next week.  I'll have to get going on report cards this week.  It's another dreary day.  Winter seems determined to live out her last days.  Dawn's here.  She says she's going to try to read books to the kids that have "minorities" in them. "What's 'minorities?'" the kids want to know...2:30 PM  Time to go home.  I'd rather finish this first.  A whole nother page to go.  There's nothing to say.  I could go for a drink.  I have beer and pizza at the house.  What else?  I told Coleco to go home and ask her mom to give her a beating. 
I'm doomed.  My shoulder still hurts.  That list of doctors should be at the house today.  Tomorrow is my brother Mac's birthday.  I haven't talked to my sister Bernie for a while.  Marlin just came in on roller skates with a Blo-Pop in his mouth.  6:40  I'm at night school now.  The inspector was to see the house.  The realtor, Katie Neill, was waiting there when I got home.  She started asking me who lived across the street.  I said, "Why?  You want to get them kicked out of their home, too?"
I called my grandparents and then my father and step mother.  Shot the shit.  I read a Ring Lardner story about a vapid nurse.  Finished Vivid Dreams.

What Happens When You Lose Your Balls

3-9-99 12:50 PM Tu
Only Tuesday.  I went to the Chinese place.  Lauren was there.  I got sweet and sour pork.  We talked about our weekends.  She makes me wonder...We worked on the crossword together.  The bell rang early.  It was a rainy-day schedule, even though it wasn't raining anymore.  I ignored the bell to stay working on the crossword puzzle with Lauren another few minutes.  Yikes.  I'm back in class now. The kids are watching a video about the Mayflower.  I could use a nap or a cup of coffee.  I can leave here in about an hour.  Do my third-person page when I get home.  Read Vivid Dreams.  Ride my bike to night school.  Pray for some help with Jim.  Wonder if Shirelle will come tonight?  She's tripping and whining and nagging about her birthday and planning a party.  I suppose I should call back Glorious and see what she wanted.  Maybe she'll pay me the three hundred bucks she owes me.  What else?  I have to take a leak.  Life is such a burn.  The sun is out now.  Same cool breeze as yesterday.  Senoritavilla is over on the basketball court with her savage fourth-graders.  My class has lost all their balls, so their just running amok.  There's a faculty meeting today.  Ugh.  My scar itches.  I need to get that poster out of the trunk of the LeBaron before I go to work tonight.  What else?  I can hear the kids out the door cursing for the joy of it, the adult power of using inexplicably forbidden words.  3:55  5:40 PM  The lawyer bitch who wants to buy our pad came by to let us know she would evict us.  I'm so bummed and pissed.  People with money can throw people with less money out on the street for profit.  (323) 935-8604  Fuck this world. Whatever.  So now I've got to find a new apartment.  I hate myself for not having the wherewithal to buy the place myself.  It wouldn't be so bad if it was just that I'm stupid; the really fucked up thing is that I'm too smart to be in this situation, but am because of my poor judgment.  Fuck, who knows?  What is my major malfunction?  What's my character flaw?  Is it alcohol?  Am I too idealistic?  I don't get it.  I work hard.  I help people.  But that's not the path to success.  Or would it be if I wasn't a drunk shit-head? Now I'm going to be forced into a decision with Shirelle.  Godanm.  I deserve all the bad that happens to me.  I'm just a see-through, psychotic neurotic. Whatever.  I know nothing.

Until He Does

3-8-99 2:00 PM M
Man, am I lagging with this.  My life is too uneventful to write about, my thoughts too cowardly to leave the room.  The kids are working on a lesson about 1700s Pennsylvania settlers.  I read the newspaper and did most of the crossword.  I ate a donut and a ham and cheese croissant.  I've been eating a lot lately.  I guess I can wait 'til I get home and east those chicken wings.  I've got to call Blue Cross and Ricardo Flowers.  I hid from Ricardo after he drove all the way out from Saugus, just stayed in the house and didn't open the door.  He called beforehand and left a message on the machine that I heard; I had only to pick up the phone and tell him not to come, but I'm an asshole.  Ugh.  I have to check my Email.  Definitely have to write a third-person page.  Work on Jim.  Jim in the car with a bunch of high school girls.  It seems criminal, sick, and taboo, but it is not unusual, just my fear and paranoia.  How the hell will I fill this page?  I want to smoke when I get home.  It's cool today.  Late winter breeze.  "Mr. Zurn, Javier won't share the ball with us!"  "Well, why don't you tackle him to the ground and beat on him until he does?"  They go running off.  I have homework to turn in by March 22.  Report cards and parent conferences are next week.  What else?  When will my thumb stop aching?  Stanley Kubrick died yesterday.  I heard a rumor that Joe DiMaggio is dead now, too.  Kubrick was only 70.  Forty years from now.  I wonder why I haven't lost my night job.  God grant me the strength, wisdom, and judgment.  Forgive me my sins, stupidities, and mistakes, please. 

3-6-99 Sa 1:17 PM
I'm at an incredibly boring workshop at Wilshire Hill right now.  It's a cloudy day.  It seemed like a dream riding across the playground on my bike under the gray and white sky so early on a Saturday, not a soul in sight, save my own.  I sat next to Anna Senoravilla at the first workshop, "Hands-On Math."  Math wasn't quite what I wanted my hands on.  Urgh. Fuck.  Whatever.  I read the newspaper during the second workshop.  Sergio and I went to Taco Bell for lunch.  There's another workshop after this.  My back hurts.  I should be drunk and golfing right now.  I haven't seen Shirelle in days.  I don't know what's up for tonight.  Chillers with Tim?  Bandera?  Something else?  I should get home and type.  My writing has hit a near standstill.  Partly because the weight Shirelle's putting on me, partly because of Sam Manson's lame novel.  It makes me not want to write out of fear of writing like that.  What else?  This Discussion Leader gives about the same size shit I do.  Nothing to see in here.  No pretty girls.  No interesting faces.  I'm in an upstairs classroom.  The leafless winter trees are striking like black lightning against a photo-negative night sky.  They look sad, but not hopeless, like tough old men.  Other than that there are just boring billboards out there.  Anna is in the workshop below.  If I had x-ray vision, I could give myself butterflies looking at her through the floor.  Stupid.  I'm stupid.  She is so not friendly.  I didn't have any money at Taco Bell.  I had to borrow money from Sergio.  Beer.  Beer.  Beer.  Beer.  A woman's arse spreads four feet across the one-foot wide chair she sits on.  What else?  What should I do?  Shirelle said she has other offers.  That's funny.  I don't know what to do.  Whatever.  Fuck.  What else?  This is incredibly lame and boring.  I guess I can try to stomach a few more pages of Sam's novel.  Ack ick urg shit fuck.  What else?  This woman has no idea what she's talking about.  Whatever.  What a waste.  What else can I do with my life?  I want to travel travel travel.  Slim Phantom