10/05/2006 - Hamster in a Manster Cage

that title was a typo. But I thought it was hilarious so I kept it.

Time in Texas is creeping up on me... I know I'm only here for a few days, but there's a fascinating air of temporally multi-layered nostalgia that strikes me sideways every time I come home.

It's always been a reliable point of reference... never-changing, remnants of past lives strewn everywhere in strata like an archaelogical dig, stored in boxes on pieces of paper, in photographs and in things of sentimental value.

What does that mean, 'sentimental', anyway. My heart is heavy for the first time in half a year.

It's not really that simple, though. I am experiencing a little bit of anxiety- it's that human part of each of us that likes to revel in past and future like it's a playground. It's the part that says 'fuck it'... because maybe it likes to forget to be (present) and really, just likes to get lost in the confusing part of this life.

I'm okay with that.

I took this opportunity (with a littler more than coaxing on my mom's part) to clean out the closets during my time home... I'm sorting through everything I've left here on my past rebounds in between adventures (and there have been many). Digging through things I left here when I moved from my grandparents' house after graduating high school... things that had been thrown into the trunk of my stationwagon when I left L.A. in a hurry after graduating college, and things left when i quit my job and ran off to Maui.

The physical aspect of editing down your past isn't necessarily time-consuming... there's not a whole lot- probably the sum of a few boxes. But you know, I am a student of life. I'm moving slowly, taking it all in. Right now I'm learning the difference between nostalgia, sentimentality, and baggage. It's taking forever, and it's binding me to this house for the time-being like a hamster to a cage. It's kind of emotionally taxing.

This is why I often like to run off to somewhere new, where I don't know anyone, don't have any memories, and most importantly, don't have any reminders. Like Maui, or Boston. It's refreshing to start over. But first-

- I am cleaning everything out. And throwing a lot of it away. I am going to deal with all this first, instead of leaving it all behind and pretending it doesn't exist, like I've always done.

I'm going to learn from editing my past. And I'm only going to keep what I want to remember. Because that's what our personal mythology is, in the end. It's not all heartbreak and disappointment. It's the Good Story you make of it. (Haven't you ever seen Big Fish? Laaaaame, by the way)

I mean shit. I'm too young to have baggage.

Anyway, whatever this is... a little uncomfortable, but I like it. This whole year has been a lesson in not pussying out.