August 3rd, 1996
We rushed through our goodbye. By chance, C and I pulled into the parking lot just as the 5:04 to Penn Station sounded its signal. The next train wouldn’t get me to New York until 9:45, which meant 10:30 to Brooklyn at the earliest. So I took it.
Vacation with C: Done. Back to work. Totally uninspired.
On the drive to the train, a jeep full of college guys blew through a red light and came within a few feet of plowing down a mother and any one of her five kids. I gasped in shock, realizing how close I had come to witnessing someone else’s tragedy.
I worry that bad things will happen. Whenever I leave him or my family, the potential for bad things worries me.
We just passed a junkyard. Heaps of newish-looking cars without tires, trunks and hoods open, each one an accident.
When I’m at this stop–Belmar–on the way home, that is, to Bayville, to C and my family, I’m eager. I’m almost there. Now I’m looking foward to nothing really. Will I regret those 2 1/2 that I could have spent on a walk with C instead of back at my apartment in Brooklyn avoiding my roommates?
Yesterday we went to the Cape May Zoo and I saw a Capybara for the first time. It’s a vile looking rodent, the world’s largest. It’s got yellow teeth and a twitchy nose and grows to be over 100 pounds.
We also watched a Bengal tiger lift it’s tail and piss on three unsuspecting preteen boys. We laughed harder than we should have.
We passed a sign:
100 percent HUMAN HAIR
VALUE EXPRESS
T-SHIRTS
NOVELTIES
It makes little sense to me.
Things I fear:
skin cancer
lost elasticity
cellulite
a flabby ass
death
boredom
complacency
We do so many stupid things when we’re young. We don’t use sunblock. We fall wildly, passionately in love.
I don’t know what I mean right now.
Kids don’t know how good they have it. Three months off. No work. Then I remembered how bored and sad I used to get. I cannot remember how I occupied my time during my sixth and seventh grade summer. I was achingly alone.
C told me about this Stone Harbor holiday two months ago. I remember this: He came to Brooklyn on a Thursday. He was waiting for me when I came home. We were in bed by 9pm. I played hooky on Friday by telling everyone I was going to the allergist to get my sinuses examined and C and drove down to Bayville in the rain.
Soon he’ll be back at school and summer hours will be over. No more three day weekends. I feel they’ve barely begun.
Sad and restless. That’s how I feel. I need to change something.
C says he knows what it is: I need to start writing again, something, anything unrelated to FITNESS magazine.
He’s right.
