January 1, 1998

I really hate my mother. I am just livid. I called last night to wish her a happy new year and one of the first things that comes out of her mouth is "Poppa has prostrate cancer." Happy Fucking New Year. She does this kind of shit just to piss me off. It's not like she could have told me when she found out his test came back positive 2 days ago or to my fucking face, no, she has to really fuck my new year up, only the way my mother mother can.

She just doesn't get it, and she is too close to dying herself to think of life otherwise. I wish I could say I am not effected by what my father does or doesn't do, but because it still chaps my mom's ass and makes her mad, it effects me as well because I listen to her bitch. I suppose I could tell her I don't want to know but then she gets mad because she has no one to share her grief with.

I mean, I stayed at home last night. I wanted to be by myself but Andy was here and I was like, OK, whatever. He woke me up 20 minutes before midnight and I still missed that fucking ball coming down. I wanted to be alone last night. To some people, that sounds horrible, but I wanted to make promises to myself that I will keep in the coming year. Well, I will keep them anyway, but I just wanted to be by myself. So my New Year sucked. Happy fucking 98, I am sure this will be a noteworthy year, at least.

I didn't update my journal yesterday. so here is that stuff.

So I am sitting here enjoying watching my roommate move his ass out. Part of me feels sorry for him because it's snowy and yucky outside but the other part of me just doesn't give a fuck because he's the prick that decided it was a good idea to play darts when I was already mad at him. What kind of moron that KNOWS his roommate has it in for him and wants him and his stinky dog's ass out by the first of the year, I mean, how fucking stupid would you be to just tempt the gods into pissing her off? He brings out the psycho cunt in me because he is such a fucking moron.

Last night I waited for that cocksucker until 3 am to tell him he was going to have to leave today. He didn't come and he didn't come, so I worked on my application to Cal Arts. By the time 3 rolled around, I was too exhausted to deal with him even if he did come in from concentrating on my application.

I was walking around the house last night in the foulest of moods and Zac kept saying "Is everything OK?" I was like "I am just getting ready." I was going to yell at Dave for being such a fucking moron. I was going to change the locks on the door, which I think I will do anyways.

He's taking all the stuff he knows I can hock. How funny. Most valuable stuff first. That's fine because I will find a way to get what he owes me somehow. I am actually surprised he's not enough of a moron to realize that. (~ed 12/30/99 I never saw a dime of what he owed me so I just threw his shit out when I moved)

Anne called me this morning. She was in tears because she has been having all kinds of problems where she was living with her neighbors, so she moved to another location and had to have a couch moved out as well. Her boyfriend is still talking to his ex and that cunt has caused all kinds of problems between them and Anne just doesn't have the strength to go on with my mom dying alone. She has had a boyfriend ever since she was 13 and steadily since she was 16 so. she can't be alone with herself, which I think is one of the saddest aspects about her.

I suppose that I learned a long time ago there are worse things to be then being alone. I rather like myself, and enjoy spending time alone, observing life and thinking about things.

But I have also found that a lot of people can't stand to be alone because they are lonely when they are by themselves. I suppose it all revolves around what your personality is and how you can entertain yourself.

Well, so that was yesterday. Today I am pissed at my mom. I think I will go back to sleep.

I was dreaming of a spaceship just now. And I was in Vermont. Roxell says that he thinks it's boring when other people tell you their dreams, and I suppose it depends on the person and how well they tell it. I rarely find someone's dreams boring, because it tells you something about the person dreaming them.

So I was in film school, but for some reason it was in Vermont. I HATE VERMONT. I'm sure as a state, it is fine, but when I went and studied Russian there, it was not the Mecca of culture I had hoped for. I was under the assumption that since everybody in the states makes fun of Kentucky, then Vermont HAS to be a better place then here. WRONG WRONG WRONG. I have never been so wrong in my life.

This one annoying cunt tried to tell me about all the yuppies that live there and how cool it was. I should just stop now before I become politically incorrect.

So Vermont was pretty, and I did meet Jan there and a few other people, but that's about it. I wanted to leave everyday I was there and thanks to a bunk bed falling on my head, I got to leave a week early.

So I was studying film in Vermont, and the sky was all freaky and cloudy and we were all outside, and the "mother ship" came down. I suppose it was sucking and I was looking for escape. Now here is something I never wrote about, breaking up with Superman. It was a calm break up. It was me that broke up. I suppose he was a rebound thing and those never last.

He was telling me how the mother ship was going to come down and save us. Men that aren't grounded in reality frighten me, especially if they aren't creative enough to think of their own form of escape. (Perhaps if the giant octopus from the ocean were going to come save us, then I would have more compassion, otherwise, if Will Smith is your idol, don't even talk to me.) So it was over fast. Plus he thought it was a turn on if he didn't wear deodorant. How can I put this mildly. You ain't Tarzan and me ain't Jane so FUCKING BATHE. There are those blue moons when I don't like to bathe, but that is few and far between, but I am a girl, I smell good thanks to hormones and men just don't. It kills me to ride in the subway in Moscow on a hot day, and I have been tempted to walk home but found the bus has open windows if I can stand the fumes from Russian cars.

I have this sense of smell that knocks me over sometimes. Part of it is because of the migraines and the other part is because they went through my main nasal passage when they did brain surgery. But now I have an amazing sense of smell.

So, I woke up from my nap, no cocksucker to come move his shit. Figures. So I suppose I will go out and do something although I want to be pissed at my mom and mope around my empty, cat-infested (only 3) house. Marina saw this cute guy that she doesn't have the guts to ask out and she wants to go to where he works and flirt with him. She will bitch about getting into grad school and shit like that.

Priscilla will make me talk to her about what's going on. I think I should go out with her, but. maybe I will have them meet.

I fucking hate that, when your friends try to set you up with their friends so you can be buddies. Zac does that to me. Pris has done it too. I am to the point where I know none of my friends will like one another because they are jealous of each other for me spending time with one of them instead of the other. I know. Pris can drive, that way, when she has to go. I won't have to listen to Marina bitch. I hate it when my friends do this, but right now I am not emotionally on top of the world and couldn't possibly deal with either of them alone.

I think back to when I was young, and always lived in fear of my father. I know that had to be emotionally taxing and this whole thing with Dave has worn me raw. How did I go to school back then when today, throwing out a roommate sends me into hysterics? Plus having my mom be sick and other bullshit. I feel like I have no control, and I let other people take over and force their agendas on to me and I am just not strong enough to say, "wait a minute." right now.

I wish I could just run away and live my life under the sea. in an octopus's garden, in the shade. We would be warm. under the storm

I suppose next week will be better, it has to be since I won't be here. I will be in California where the weather is pretty and I won't have just started my period.

January 2, 1998

What's the difference between Me and Michael Kennedy?

When I ran into a tree, I didn't croak. And the massive brain injury was already present, at least in my case.

Yep, I now have these scratches from being a klutz and walking right into a tree last night, and I wasn't drunk or carrying a jug of water, I am just a klutz. Jean told me I was too old to be a klutz, but I am what I am, lummox, lubber or oaf anyway you put it, I can trip over my own foot. And I even have the battle wounds to prove it.

Now I am starting to freak out because Zac took off with the Neosporian and I have ointment to put on the wound, but. It's not Neosporian. And Cleocin hurts when you put it on. What am I going to do??? I am going to have my interview to be a Derby Princess on Monday and there are these gaping holes slashed across my forehead. I'll never get to be a Derby Princess in this condition.

Pull yourself together, dammit. I will be a Derby Princess, I will be a Derby Princess, I will I will I will!!! OK. so what obsession should I talk about today. Well. since I fucked up my forehead, I think I will talk about my skin.

When I was a teenager, I had PERFECT skin. all the girls had yucky skin, but I only rarely got a blemish. Then. I had brain surgery, and after that, my hormones were whacked so I went blubbering to a dermatologist.

She didn't understand why I was there to see her because my skin is so very nice, like a baby's. But, I started getting acne OK, so maybe one or two zits a month isn't a lot for you, but for me after surviving my teenage years with no blemishes, it was indeed a horrible experience. So she put me on Retin A and my skin has been almost flawless ever since.

I must admit, I am more neurotic about my skin then anything. I don't even have black heads that's how small my pores are. OK I mean visible black heads, like what most guys get on their nose. Nope, not me. Thank my genes.

I suppose it's a fair trade off, I think I would rather have had brain surgery and have great genes that make me look nice on the outside then have the best genes and just look mediocre. Although in either case, I am grateful to be a clever girl. I can't lie, being pretty and having big tits are both total advantages. Let me count the ways. Fuck that, you can use your own damn imagination.

It's not that I am particularly vain, it's just that these are certain obvious facts and so I recognize it and go on. Melissa and Priscilla are the same way. They are so very beautiful, and we are all beautiful in different ways, it just hasn't gone to our head.

I think Priscilla will move in with me, but I am not sure and a little apprehensive. We are both neurotic to a certain degree, and I am just hoping that we are neurotic about the same things, or at least we mesh well. She is half Korean and American and 5'11" and just so amazingly beautiful and her loser boyfriend treats her like shit and has stripped her of her dignity. She is finally starting to realize that, and she is getting stronger in order to leave him.

When she first told me she wanted to leave him, I was like "Yeah. DUMP THE FUCKER" because. she would get pissed it I wrote it here so never mind. and that, to me, is just inexcusable because. So. after considering what I had said, I told her that maybe she should stay with him because I remember when I first told everyone I was going to end my relationship of 4+ years, all my friends were like "DUMP THE FUCKER" no, they weren't that bad. They just didn't understand why Andy and I were together because well. he's an engineer and I am a freak and we are just as opposite as night and day.

But I was sad because nobody was saying "Cathy, you should keep it going, maybe things will change." Then I decided before I left for Russia it was over and when I came home, he had finally gotten a job and was doing stuff to feel better about himself, but it was too late, I just couldn't give to him anymore, so we broke up.

The problem we ran into was the problem that I think many men have, and it has nothing to do with money. Women want to be emotionally connected to their partner and sometimes we both do things to make that connection deteriorate, and then you have an unhealthy relationship. This doesn't mean we won't suck your dick or do your laundry, we just want to be talked to and treated like you give a fuck about us more then that damn blow-up doll in the corner.

I don't want that any more. I can be treated like furniture by anybody, I want a man that puts into the relationship just as much as I do when I am ready for that kind of thing, but for now, I am having fun dating.

I suppose breaking up with him was the best thing I ever did because I was so unhappy and he was content living life the way his parents taught him. Plus he likes to do what a lot of people do and blame his parents for his character flaws and that is inexcusable to me. We are adults now, we will always be affected or traumatized by what did or did not happen to us as children, but now that we are adults, we control our own lives.

So. yeah. I spent that day with my main man and gave him lots of love and kisses. Melissa got her job back so I got to hold him and squeeze him and listen to the poor thing cough and sneeze. I got so scared one time because he was having a coughing fit and I was afraid he was choking, but he was fine. I have never seen a baby act so good that was so sick. And my his eyes are big and he's just the best baby. We talked about dads and how they aren't as important as society makes them out to be and that as long as your mom loves you, then you have everything. He wasn't interested in talking about his dad and he didn't have any questions, so that subject was dropped real quick. He did however lament to me that he wasn't breast fed long enough, but I think that is every man's complaint.

January 4, 1998

I feel like I am teetering on the brink of insanity. I feel myself looking over thinking, well, it looks rather comfortable over there where I can slobber all over myself all day. There is no release for this anguish I feel, and the doctors told us she would only last trough the holidays. Now I am counting the days. I think she will live forever and I should just give up any hope of having a release from this pain. She is improving anyway. She sounds much better and she looks good too. I took Priscilla over there and she was like "She doesn't look as bad as you made her out to look." I didn't say a thing. I suppose I should have broke out in tears because I just don't know what to believe anymore.

I wish I could be one of those people that gets a kick out of carving on themselves. My skin would look like pizza without cheese, but then, I am way too vain about my skin to do something that foolish. Maybe an eating disorder is in order so I can feel more control over something, anything. Or maybe this break from school has just been too much. I try to sleep, but I can't. I try to create, and I just can't. I feel more helpless and vulnerable then I ever have, and nothing I do or say seems to help me come out of it.

That's it, I am just insane with grief. I think I will be checking out for a while, don't really know when I will come back. Hiding doesn't seem to help, though. Nothing helps. There is only me, and only I know how wacko I am becoming. I'm like my mom. I look perfectly normal on the outside, but I'm totally fucked on the inside.

I guess it would be different if I wasn't the one she depended on for emotional support, but I am the only one that can deal with it, or so I pretend. I think I will check into a hotel with a pool tonight and just go swimming. Swim all night and feel comforted by the water that envelops me. Maybe then I won't go completely berserk

No, I have a video to finish and other shit I need to do. No, I need to go swimming so I can't feel the tears roll down my cheeks.

January 5, 1998

I am so nervous. I am patiently awaiting to find out if I am a Derby Princess. I have about 2 more hours to wait and find out. I suppose it's no big deal if I don't get to be one, but it sure would be a lot of fun. Diane Sawyer was a princess. I am not sure if she got to be queen or not. To become the queen, you have to spin a wheel. I suppose it's like the Wheel of Fortune and it's spun until one lucky girl lands on the prize.

After seeing what kind of girls were there, I don't think I am going to get it. I just.

Oh. this is horrible. I am watching the minutes tick by. Please, God, Please fucking pick me. The irony will just be too hilarious.

Plus if I am not picked, then Zac wants me to marry him. I am not too sure this is a wise thing to do. I don't mind just doing it to say "Hey, I was married once" but he wants to stay married for a while, and I just don't feel like I can commit longer then a week. He wants a tax write off and his insurances will be cheaper. If I marry him, then I won't have to pay for my health insurance anymore. That's an extra $100+ a month.

Fuck Fuck Fuck. It's almost 5. I must be a loser. Oh well. Maybe I looked too much like a slut. Maybe I am too fat or maybe I am just not yuppie enough. This sucks. I feel like if the phone rings, I will shit in my pants I am so nervous.

I need to finish my artists statement too. Then I can mail off my application to Cal Arts. All the rest is ready to go.

Marina is coming by. Fuck, I just know it's not going to happen. Shit. Oh well, I suppose I will just not do much of anything now. I suppose it doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of things, I just wanted to be a little special for a change.

Mom wants to go to the auction. When she wants to do something like that, that means she is feeling better. I suppose I will meet her.

SHIT!!! I am going to go take off my make up. That isn't much better. Now I am freaking out way too much. AHHHHHHHHH. me and my neuroses. I feel like passing out. FUCK!

Well, I didn't get it. No $1000 wardrobe or luncheon. I feel like I shouldn't have even bothered, but these things happen for a reason, and it's just that I wasn't Princess material and that's all there is to it. I didn't say the right things. I like to think that these kinds of things are fair, but how naive can you be? At least I tried and I was rejected just as 25 other girls were. It's not the end of the world, it just would have been nice, for a change.

OK OK. so after feeling sorry for myself for the past two hours because I couldn't penetrate the fucking piece of shit society of ugly cunts, I feel a little better especially since my brother told me that I don't need those fuckers approval so fuck that shit.

So the thing that sucks is that I don't have special Derby powers. If I was a princess, I could put Vaseline on my teeth and use duct tape to tape up my tits. I wanted to be totally obnoxious anyway, and mock the establishment. For the formal I was going to wear either one of those gigantic Southern bell dresses or a slinky thing that showed the crack of my ass. I just don't get to do this now.

I just know that I am not the type of girl that would get picked for that kind of shit, I should have showed up wearing my thigh high leather boots and cunt red lipstick.

This brings me to my next point. obsession. I think, after seeing As Good As It Gets last night that our society is way too obsessive over stupid stuff. We don't deal with one another so it's much easier to obsess over external things that have no importance. I have been listening to Marina bitch about thinking she might be pregnant for the last 4 hours. She hasn't stopped.

" Cathy, do you think I'm pregnant?"

" No."

" Cathy, do you think I'm pregnant?"

" No."

" Cathy."

" NO, shut up, Marina Allen."

" blah blah blah. do you think I'm pregnant?"

" Yes, you are and I just did it with my special derby powers, now shut the fuck up."

I'm not ever so slightly bitter, I'm jilted and I have every right to be huffy, but I suppose since it is the Derby, they need girls that look like horses. Fuck it. I leave for California Wednesday and those cunts are stuck here. Ultimately, there is a reason I didn't get to do this. It will reveal itself in time.

January 6, 1998

So much for feeling sorry for myself. Someone died that I knew, and no, it wasn't Sunny Bono.

His name was Mike, but I called him Dad, because I can't remember. I would talk to his mom when she would come to school with him and while she waited for him. He was in a wheelchair so he needed extra assistance. Apparently he died when his chair fell on him. God, this is not my life. This is too fucked up.

We ate lunch a few times, he gave me lots of shit,he was an excellent painter. The last I heard of him was from Merissa and she was bitching about keeping his evil cat because he had gotten in a fight with his parents and had moved out.

This is why it's important to let things go. Accidents can happen when you grasp something you don't want to lose. This isn't fair. I am suppose to be saving this grief for my mother, and now I get to pass some of it off on to Mike, and that makes me mad, because now I have to grieve for him as well. FUCK!

I have to go. Visitation is until 9 and I am still not dressed and now the shock is wearing off.

Later.

The mayor of Louisville killed Mike. No, that's not how it really happened, but that's how I will remember it. Jerry was holding the door open for Mike when his chair got stuck spun back and fell on his leg and broke it. Some blood clots got into his brain and that was it. Now he's gone.

I just can't get over it. This is too fucking weird. Roxell is the one that called and said, "Someone I knew died."

" Who?"

" Mike Lasslo."

" WHO? You mean the guy. in a wheelchair. you mean. the guy I knew as well." It was too weird.

I called Merissa and she was like "Cathy, I'm sorry I didn't call you."

And I was like, "Merissa, fuck it, you can't think of everybody. I found out today from Roxell."

" Wait a minute, you know Roxell? I didn't know you were hanging out with him. Well, we are going to have a party for him next weekend, a service like he would have wanted."

" Well, I don't have a roommate, so if you want, we can have it here."

I stood in the procession to hug his mother and both his parents were so composed and when she saw me, she gave me the biggest hug and started to lose it. She was like, "Were you still pestering each other?"

" Oh yeah. We gave each other hell all the time. I used to call him Dad." That was so important to her. It was important to me too. God, it's weird, going around school this semester not having to worry if I am going to trip over him in the next corner. Not seeing him looking more and more like Salvador Dali with his Goatee and lip hair. This is pretty fucked up because it was a freak accident.

Roxell was invited to his Christmas party and he even had his number written down and in his wallet. It was just too weird. I saw people there I haven't seen in a few years. I didn't talk to hardly anybody. I mean, how do you socialize at a funeral?

" Hey Will, looks like you had fun in Hawaii. What's it like working at an airline? How's it feel now that one of your best friend's is dead?"

" Hey there Lisa, looks like your pretty fucked up now. Is your grandfather still alive? Oh. he's in ICU. Well, my mom has her good days and bad days but she's getting close."

" It's about time."

" Thanks, Lisa, would you like to turn that key to my sanity just a little further."

At least Roxell has a sick sense of humor too. We joked and said inapproiate things under our breath to each other all night. I made him watch my video, and he says he was impressed with the content but not the cinematography. I wanted to say "Hey. I was the star, I couldn't very well film myself that easily." But instead said "Perhaps you were expecting a Hollywood production?"

He made me laugh a lot today. He would say, "With MY Derby Princess powers, I can get any cat to smell my finger." So all the cats would come up to him and smell his finger. Then as he left, he smelled his own finger. He held it out for me to smell and I pushed it away saying "I'm not your pussy."

Yeah, I guess you had to be there.

January 7, 1998

So I have been thinking. ut-oh, Miss Clay, not that again. yes, it happens all the time.

So who gives a fuck if you show off your body? Well, apparently some pervs get a kick out of my censorship photos, but you can't even see anything. My biggest argument when they took em down was "Shit, you can't even see my clit ring." And Zack's cock had a big ol' Prince Albert dangling off of it.

What could be the possible appeal of seeing pubic hair? I don't know. but I think what is inside is much more appealing. I have stared at myself with a mirror, and I am jealous that I can't get as close to mine as an outside observer. I hear guys lament how they can't blow themselves, well, if a woman could lick herself, do you think she'd ever leave the house? Of coarse she would, ding dong, she's a woman.

So why are we so anal (pun fully intended) about having images of our naked bodies copied? We aren't the most vulnerable when we are naked unless of coarse, that's all that you are about. I am much more frightened about telling someone how I feel then showing them my body. I lost all sense of modesty when I had surgery. And it doesn't matter who is going to see your body or what they think, because all bodies are beautiful.

I was telling Roxell how few people drew John's penis when he modeled for our class (John is a mutual friend that we met through). We even had one model that wore Speedos. He was just astounded. But this is Kentucky. My mom told me she never saw a penis until she was older and had been pregnant twice. I suppose if it was acceptable to like our bodies, then this wouldn't be such a problem.

My mom walked around naked all the time. One of my therapist said that this was sexual abuse after a certain age. I can't figure out why it's abuse, if our society accepted the body for what it was, then it wouldn't be such a problem. Nor would it be a problem to deny children their sexuality and allow them to have good body images instead of having the body be something to hide and be embarrassed of.

I, in no way condone pedophilia, but children mock their parents and learn about their bodies as well. One of my friend's used to tell me her mother had to make her quit masturbating with herself because it was rude in front of company. We are animals, and there are rules we have to follow, but some of these rules are just stupid. I must have known that by age three or I wouldn't have been Cathy Clay Streaker, stripping my clothes off to play in the back yard.

One of the nicest compliments I have ever got from a lover is "I love that you are so comfortable with your body." Well, that's not true, but I am more comfortable in my skin then most people. And when you are comfortable in knowing what you are, then it shows.

This doesn't mean I want to be a stripper, because that is a little too intimate with strangers for me, unless it's for a lover. But putting a photo up, who cares? It's a surreal image stealing a moment in time.

Be back on Sunday.

January 8-11, 1998

Have you ever met someone where you have so much in common that it's almost scarey? Not in a bad way, I mean a totally great way.

I knew Tanya and I had a lot in common before I came out here, but now that I am here, It's crazy. We use the same brand of Olive Oil, dish washing detergent, shampoo, and deodorant. The only thing we don't use in common is tampons, and I am trying to get her to convert, but I just don't think it's going to happen. (Do you know where your plastic applicator has been? YUCK!)

She is so pretty too. She has nicer skin then me, bitch, but that's OK. I am more pink-blue and what I mean by that is my skin is so white, I glow blue. She has a yellowish tint, but it doesn't matter, that is just one of those things that makes us different.

She is smarter then me, in a way, because she is an engineer and she had the patience to calm down enough to study, and I just don't. If I am not the slightest bit interested in something, then forget it. It was comforting to be with someone that totally understands me and it's disconcerting as well because we can't play those mind games that people tend to play on one another because one of us can look at the other and say "You are so full of shit, just stop."

My heart misses her already, and I am just in the airport. We talked about everything. Fucking, dying, living, suffering, why people just don't have a clue, why there are so few of us that do that are on this planet. By us I mean people that realize that life is what you make of it, not what somebody else tells you.

And my god, we are both boy crazy. She wants me to come out here because she could still tell I was a little reserved and she thinks getting out of Kentucky will be the best thing for me, and I know she is right. "Katya, you need to move to California so you can flourish." So no matter what, I suppose I will come out here, there just isn't anything for me in Kentucky any longer.

I met another wonderful, kind, generous lady here as well named Conni. She is like an older version of me, but thank God I realized what I was getting myself into before I married Andy and settled down into being what was expected of me. I see her and I see how I react to situations and how I just don't want feel, so I keep myself occupied so I don't have to feel. It makes me sad, and I know she is sad as well because she feels powerless with all the power.

We talked about men and how they are and she took me to the ocean (Santa Cruz) and a sex shop. Let me tell you, having someone ask you "Would you be needing anything like lubricant with your purchase?" That just made my jaw drop. I am just not used to the sales clerk up selling sexual products. There are some things that even make me blush, and this just so happened to be one of them.

That was the best afternoon because I was in a trance. It was my first day being here and she made me talk about mom dying and told me how she felt about when her mother in law died and I just felt as though my whole experience here I was loved and that's why I will always think good things about this trip.

The best evening was when Tanya and I went to Haight and Ashbury we both found Doc Martians for $53. We ate at an Ethopian restaurant and talked about men and bonded. That shit is so important. All the money in the world can't bring someone happiness like being able to talk about the stuff in life that matters.

Plus I live my life to a certain extent through other people's experiences, trying to grow and learn from what they have to say and advice and she had a lot of interesting stuff to say.

I think we both agreed that one of the main reasons for living is to. procreate (tact here, I'm telling you!) There is nothing in this world that is as important as sex. How people can suppress their sexuality into oblivion totally astounds me. One chick I know has sex once a year and she thinks that is fine. What ever floats your boat, I just personally know I could never do that. Shudder. Now that doesn't mean I am not choosy about the guys I sleep with, either. I'm very selective and I think today you have to be. But then again, maybe this is one of those Kentuckisms I need to shed myself of.

The part that made me the most sad (in a good way, if that makes any sense) was seeing Hannah, Tanya's niece, in the hospital. She is only 4 and she has cancer, but she is so fiesty and full of life that I don't worry for her what so ever because I know she can lick this. Anne was different when she did chemo, all melancholy and teenagish. It was horrifying. Hannah is different, she has that spark that makes her so precious and endearing, and she doesn't know how to abuse her disease, so she still likes being a kid. We played and she told me she loved me and she was just a joy. I let her draw on my face with a marker and I had that on my face all night. Tanya said I looked like a battered woman because I couldn't wash it off my face. That is one big difference between Tanya and me, she is more subtle and tactful and I need someone to say "Whore, go wash that shit off your face, you are bothering me."

Met another Internet buddy, Hadley. It was cool, she is a photographer too and I see that she was like me when I was her age, which sounds so horrible to me She is another one of those obnoxiously creative people that is bursting at the seams, but right now, she can't channel her energy because she is unhappy where she is. She has some growing to do, which I heard when I was her age a lot and there is no doubt in my mind that she will achieve whatever she sets her efforts to. She had these HUGE Polaroids that were just amazing, AMAZING I TELL YA!. I wish I could recapture a tenth of her energy so I could do more, but.

I hate to go home, because so much of my energy will be focused on my mom, but it was so nice to escape my prison of misery. I feel refreshed and today I felt especially charged because I got over flying. Flying always wipes me out for a few days, and I have school in the morning. Shit. Oh well.

January 12, 1998

I'm not neglecting my page, I just haven't had an opportunity to sit down and plug in, but I will tonight. It's such a beautiful day here in Kentucky. I'm going to go sit in the sun.

FOUL FOUL FOUL fucking mood. I am just pissed as hell. Not because it's the first day of school, not because I didn't get enough sleep, Andy told me last night he had a crush on my best friend. What the fuck ever. I am so mad. How can he betray me in this way, I understand that everyone is entitled to his or her own feelings, but now it makes me wonder how long he harbored feelings for her and all this other bullshit. I am so angry.

To make matters worse, I had this GRAPHIC nightmare about me and Jenn and killing her boyfriend last night. It was so real I couldn't even imagine it being a dream. I killed him and decapitated him and buried his head back in the wood close to my mom's house, then went to go take a shower and I was there, naked washing my hair and Jenn was like a mouse.

It was horrible. I am not in a good humor what so ever. I was glad when I showed up to work and there was really nothing for me to do so now I can go buy my books, apply for graduation and other stuff. I am sitting in this class with my laptop, and I was debating if I should take notes like this all semester and I am sure I will. I just don't give a fuck anymore and writing stuff down is such a waste for me because I never look at it again.

Plus I can write and write and do my diary as well when I am bored, so I will stay awake. Oh look, there is Slava's girlfriend. She's so pretty, I wonder to myself why she is with him, because. well. it must be love. Oh shit, the head is getting heavy and the teacher hasn't even walked through the door.

Fuck I suppose I will have to keep a notebook so I can recognize what pieces of work are shown.

Foul Foul FOUL. I wish I could have stayed in San Francisco.

I feel like a ton of bricks have fallen back on me. I am here with my mom and I just want to sob to no end. All this pressure and strain have just fallen back on my shoulders. There is no escape, only reprieve and I need to escape from this pain. Well, she's a good mom and she didn't die while I was gone, so I suppose I can thank her for that.

I need to write more about my trip to San Francisco, but. I am going to be lazy and skip it.

Some guy wrote me and told me he found me through a mention of the Post Feminist Playground in Wired so I am ecstatic. I was much more ecstatic when I first found out. EXPOSURE. Here I am. just waiting to be exposed, oh well, I have myself exposed all over the place.

This guy I met on the plane last night was like, "I have been through hell."

I was like, "Join the club."

" Oh but you were raised in Kentucky, you couldn't POSSIBLY have been as FUCKED up as ME."

OK little boy, I will let you think whatever you want. I respect that millions of people have been through hell, but I think I can safely say that I have as well, and I usually never disregard other people's hell as trivial.

I feel greatly for him because he still hasn't found that thing. but then again, I am just right there so.

The coolest thing he said when I asked him why Phoenix was better then Boston was "solidarity." I knew it would be an interesting trip. But. he had that macho thing going, and you know, whatever. Cut the shit. Besides I have something stronger, estrogen.

I suppose it was better sitting next to someone that is interesting and he had Roman's birthday as well. It's that Gemini man factor. I told myself I would never date another Gemini and my last lover's birthday was the day before mine, so. I read our horoscope, and that stuff, yeah, I believe in it, I like it, it's a nice waste of energy, but the one from the LEO is much better. (Roxell is an Aries as is Melissa).

I told myself next time I date someone, He wasn't going to be a Gemini and he would have his own car and Roxell fits both of these criteria.

January 13, 1998

Poppa is OK, by the way. I was relieved to find this out. His prostrate is a little hard, but there is no evidence of cancer.

I wish I were a cat sometimes. They get attention when they want attention and the rest of the time, just go to hell. Although lately I feel like my old cat is becoming co-dependent. I have to leave every once in a while so he won't get clingy, but as soon as I return, there he is, wanting his belly rubbed when he wants it rubbed, not when I can actually give him attention.

Coco, the youngest, is perched on my lap purring away. She is getting attention while she can. She used to be Andy's cat, so now she is at a loss since he's not around. The funny thing about her. oh ho ho. When I first got her as a kitten, she peed on Andy while he was sleeping, once with the cover over him and the other time right on him. Oh that makes me laugh. When we broke up I was like "you need to take her, she's yours, she peed on you."

" Maybe that's the problem, Cathy, you never peed on me."

Unfortunately, relationships with humans are a bit more difficult. You can't just feed a woman and change her litter box, you have to bond with her. Telling her after the two of you have separated that you want to be with her best friend is a sure fire way of making her completely angry. Because then she starts to think how long has he felt this way (because like all things, this takes a little time to have feelings like this for someone else) and how many times he fantasized about her while he was fucking you. Then she'll get mad at her best friend for existing, and she has nothing to do with the way he feels, but that's how our society has set it up to be.

" Hmmm are you a little bitter today Miss Clay?"

Why, yes, I am, thanks for asking. I think I will live a cloistered life for the next few months, since I have nothing better to do then worry about my last semester of school, my mom dying, finding a room-mate that is COOL, and all the other bullshit that doesn't even involve a man. No men for me for a while, even though I am about to pop, I don't need to worry that the next one will have the hots for my best friend. I guess I shouldn't complain, her last love wanted a threesome with me, and that would have been too much for me to deal with if I was her.

Men. HA!

As if it couldn't get any worse. Never ask yourself that question because it can ALWAYS get worse.

I used to think I was cool because I had more guy friends then girl friends, but as I get older, I am really starting to appreciate my girl friends.

Zac called me up and I was just in a foul mood. I knew he wanted to talk about getting married and I just don't need to deal with that shit, so maybe I wasn't so kind.

He was like "blah blah blah blah blah and if your friend's are asking too much of you you just need to tell them to fuck off."

I almost blurted it out to him right then and right there, but here I am trying to learn how to be tactful. So I bit my tounge.

Then he started in on this marriage shit. "OK, but first I want pre-nups."

" I can't believe you are hitting me with this shit." He knew from the START that I wasn't going to marry him without a pre-nup. HE KNEW. I don't want his shit and he's not getting anything of mine so no. No pre-nup, no marriage because this was just going to be a temporary thing so he could have it on his record. I am not the one that will greatly benefit by being his wife. The only advantage I would have is not having to pay my health insurance.

" I'm not hitting you with something you didn't know."

" Well I don't want any of your shit." You say that now, buddy. I don't trust you as far as I can throw you and boy did he let his colors show through.

" Blah blah blah, you are such a bad friend. blah blah blah."

Did I just hear what he said to me correctly. I think I did. I can't believe it. "I'm a bad friend, where's the money you owe me? Where the dinner you said you take me out on when you got your job? Where's my Christmas present? Where are my CDS?" I'm not into that kind of stuff, but dammit, appreciation is EXTREMELY important to me in a friendship. I gave him fucking 4 16X20 prints when I only wanted to give him 2. I can re-print them so it's no big deal, but still.

" I do believe you have a magazine of mine."

" Why yes I surely do." As IF you can compare a magazine to that other shit. What the fuck ever.

" blah blah blah. why don't you just get over this shit of your mom being sick, it's not like you haven't had time to deal with it or like it was a surprise."

That's it. I don't want anything to do with him again. If I could cut off how I felt about my mom dying, don't you think I would? I fucking hate feeling this way, and I hate looking at her knowing she's dying and there's not a thing in the world I can do. It hurts so bad, but I can't make it stop and this one statement. that's it. I can't have anything to do with him ever again. He just graded a frayed nerve and he's way too selfish for me to deal with any longer. I can't give him the attention his mommy does so I am the one to blame because I am not totally into him.

" blah blah blah. Oh, I am just too demanding." Yes, mother fucker you were, but now you can fuck yourself and when your mom is dying, you will get no compassion from me.

So after crying for a while fell asleep and dreamt of Roxell. We were in red-neck Wal-Mart, where my grandparents live. We had been out somewhere and I needed to pee and there was this huge outside facility. Ever since I have been to Russia, I can't dream of our American toilets the same. So it was a frightening experience. I suppose I was trying to piss Zac away.

So anyways, I offended one of the red-necks (big shock) and he started chasing us. Roxell was parked somewhere in a garage and we couldn't get out. I was trying to keep the guy from coming into the garage and naturally the car wouldn't start.

I woke up with my heart racing and I was really scared.

I called Tanya before my nap and she made me feel better. She is the bomb. I know all this shit I need to be thinking but it sure helps coming from someone that cares about you mouth. I know I am not a bad friend, he was just projecting himself onto me because he knows he is a bad friend for even asking me to marry him.

Tanya made me some babagunish, if that's how you spell it. That stuff is like heroin for me. I love it so much and I would be laying in bed and the first thing I wanted to eat in the morning would be babagunish. Eggplant, tomatoes, garlic, onions, and olive oil. The best stuff on earth. I want some now, but I think I am going to call Roxell and see what he's doing first.

January 14, 1998

Today is Pris's birthday. I might make her dinner.

Katie called me earlier and I love her so much. She is so cool. She's a punk girl with a heart of gold but it takes some time to get to know her. We had the best conversation. She made me laugh harder then I have all week.

OK. I will swear off all men except Roxell. He's who he is and I adore him more and more.

He came in tonight and was upset because he broke up his band. I said something bitchy and he looked as if he could back hand me so there is a limit to the shit he will take and that makes me respect him. If there is one thing I can't stand it's a man that takes it and takes it.

We were both in particularly foul moods tonight, but still he managed to make me smile. And blush. Even though I can write a lot of this stuff down it doesn't mean I can say it out loud without blushing, especially in front of someone I like.

He was sad, he said breaking up was like breaking up with a girlfriend and I suppose I can understand because, well, I have no intentions of seeing Zac again. But at least he parted on good terms with John.

I was like, "let's go get a milk shake, I'll treat."

" What did I do to deserve a milk shake?" I suppose he has never been treated like I treat him, I don't suppose many guys have. I like to treat men like I would like to be treated. A little objectified, a little seduced, a lot of attention and joy, and some natural pain and suffering.

I read in an interview with Nathan Lane (he's one of my favorite actors) that we are all suffering and that happiness is a chemical imbalance. That is so true. I just think some of us are into suffering a lot more then others.

Some guy asked me why I like to take the hard way and I have been giving this a lot of consideration. I think I like to make things more difficult on myself because if life is easy, maybe I will forget what it was like when it was so hard. There are certain external factors I would like to change, such as my climate, but if I am not in emotional turmoil, I feel like there is something ghastly wrong with me (because that is really all I have ever known). Then I might be happy or something truly tragic like that.

In the beginning it's all easy in a way, because you try to feel each other out and see if you would like one another. Then if you are lucky you have matching perversions.

I asked him out when I challenged him and John to tie a cherry stem in their mouths. He could do it and John Cassanova couldn't. Most girls I know can do that, but big fucking deal. Show me a man that can and oh boy. just don't get me started thinking about that. He didn't think I was serious when I did. Then when we saw each other out again he was talking about how no girls ever asked him out and I was like, "I did."

" I thought you were joking."

No. and then we went out a few times and I scared him and for some reason, I suppose he's interested again, we don't talk about that kind of stuff, and I am not going to push it. I suppose I am enjoying just spending time with him. He makes me smile and I dream about him, so that's enough for me right now.

January 15, 1998

I hate myself. Honestly I do.

This is the worst time of the year for me. I don't want to do a thing. I have felt like crying to no end for days now and I just realized why. 7 years ago Anne was diagnosed with leukemia on Jan. the tenth. I once believed that when the fifth year came, I would just be relieved and all the pressure would be alleviated. (Supposedly if there is no recurrence of the disease after five years, the person is cured) Boy was I wrong. The fifth year came and went peacefully. The sixth year I cried and cried and cried.

You build up your emotions and you don't hope too much because hope. oh how can I articulate this. Hope is what a lot of people hold on to and if you have your hopes up and you get fucked, then what was the point? I don't get my hopes up for much, cause as you can see when I hope for something, it doesn't work out (yeah so being a derby princess was a stupid hope, but still, I can be stupid on occasion). I don't follow that Jesus crispy shit either. If I can't believe in myself, how the fuck can I believe in the fucking holy spirit? I just won't get started on that tangent.

So. I am full of anguish for about a week, and I mourn those feelings or perhaps I mourn the fact that I prepared myself for Anne's death and there was no outlet for those emotions so they sat there and festered and they just don't disappear.

In ceramics today this cunt told me that I need to be taking better care of my mother because "what comes around goes around." Fuck that shit. I used to want to believe in good karma and bad karma and all that other shit, but there is no such thing as justice, that why there are males, and ugly things and people. There is a natural order to things, that's for damn sure, but justice has nothing to do with what's right and fair any longer.

I do believe in survival of the fittest, however. Right now I am at a weak point so it was easy for Zac to attack my values and beliefs. Once I get over this hump. fucking watch out because I will be the biggest Nazi cunt bitch. Right now, I feel like I'm shedding that reptilian skin my sperm donor gave to me.

That fucking bitch. I hate old people that think they fucking know it all. Really, I do. As if it was any of her business. I was talking to another lady in my class and she seems to be the only physical person I can relate to about this kind of stuff right now and this bitch attacks me in a way. (There are other people that I write to that I can relate to here).

I know I shouldn't take it personally, but why the fuck not?

I had a group of people over last night. Roxell and a bunch of girls. Katie was here, and none of my friends are very social. I think of all of them Priscilla and me are the most social so it was just a stupid idea to get a bunch of anti-social people together. "Let's mix Molotov cocktails and drink them."

I made the biggest ass out of myself by using a fucking stupid cultural standard that this whole fucking country believes.

I ran into a girl I went to high school with. I just laugh when I see some of these whores because they have a kid or two and are getting a divorce and a bunch of other bull shit. Well, this particularly girl was friends with some greasy cunts that used to make fun of me when I was a kid. She gave me exactly what I wanted to hear and I totally love to make these kind of assholes feel inferior to me because when we start talking about what they have done with their lives verses what I have done. it's like comparing diet coke to coke or masturbating to sex, sometimes, you just need the real thing.

So anyways, these little bitches are all a bunch of alcoholics and drug addicts. So I was laughing about this feeling all superior because they were so evil to me and I forgot Katie was sitting there and then my heart stopped. I felt like the biggest piece of shit. I haven't felt that low about myself in a while and it just seems that this is the week to make Cathy into nothing, and that's how I feel. I just can't give anything to anybody right now because I am so emotionally bankrupt that it's going to be painful getting out of bed tomorrow morning.

I fucking pop pills on occasion, so am I a drug addict? I am not a lesbian, but I see the beauty of women. These standards are just bullshit and that's all there is to it. I hate myself for believing in them and finding comfort in the norm, how atrocious.

I can't wait for this week to be over. I know it can get much worse, but why can't it get just a little bit better?

I went by mom's house before my night class and sat with her and videoed her. Cried even more. I really wanted to skip this class, but mom woke me up from my nap and told me to leave. It's Kloner's class with his side kick Ziggler. He's not as interesting and Kloner kicks severe ass. Kloner makes my brain hurt. Ziegler's specialty is Soviet political bullshit so I am just biding my time for him to say something stupid about Russian society today, which I am sure he just won't, but man that would be nice.

" It's difficult for me to take a bath." I should move back home, I know I should but I'm afraid to. I'm already starting to do freaky compulsive things and I know if I move in there I will check on her before I leave for school and work and check on her before I go to sleep and try to feed her and care for her. I can barely take care of myself. Laurel, the lady in my ceramics class, and I were having a really great conversation about how she cared for her mother as she was dying and stuff. It's funny how that works. I never expected to bond with a woman like her because we are SO different, but I found much solace from talking with her, and then it was all bastardized by that fucking bitch.

Fuck it. I wish I could be a drug addict, but what can I say, I like hurting too much.

January 16, 1998

I got this quote from me mate Peter this morning:

" Religion is for those who want to avoid going to hell"

" Spirituality is for those who have already been there"

I think that says it all. Plus he yelled at me (not really) or gently persuaded me that I am not a druggie since I take pills for pain and not pleasure, which is true. I haven't had to mess with beauties like Tylox, percoset, Zanex, or just Ultram in a while, however. What can I say, I have lovely endorphines. I have this nasty bruise on my bicep and I can't even begin to imagine where in the hell I got it. It's one of those bruises that has leaked to the top and it's nasty and ugly.

I had sex with him last night. We were all over the place. On the couch on the floor.

It was so amazing.

And it was all just a dream. oh. "Captain, we can't keep her together much longer."

I'm dying, that's all there is to it.

January 17, 1998

It's snowy and yucky and I don't really feel like going to Jean's to clean.

So here are two stories. Yesterday I just had finished crying while I responded to a sincere letter and was feeling pretty awful because I think I figured out the only way my mom can die is to go tell my father to talk to her and assure he will take car of us. I haven't spoken with him in 7 years, but I honestly think that the only way she can let go is if he does this.

I had been crying at work and for now I have a little office, so I am alone and I am starting to feel a little better when Dan walks in and hands me a disk and says "Here's that information for the new Cancer web-site." and I just burst into tears and looked at him and said "My mom's dying from cancer." Laughing. This is my life.

That's a sad story. The funny one is I know I can't move back into my mom's house because I don't want to find her dead so I am looking for a roommate. I took an ad out in the LEO, which is a local tabloid-style magazine where they allow ads for homosexuals and lesbians. Some guy calls me last night and asks me why I wanted a gay man because I wrote in my ad that I would prefer having a gay man live with me. I was like "cause they are cleaner and I am a fag hag." He hangs up and I go about my business.

About 2 hours later he calls me back. Oh man is he a hick. He has a thick accent and he sounds all scared and stuff. He starts talking and it finally comes out that he is looking for a room where he come meet men and fuck. I'm just like "If you pay the rent, I don't give a fuck what you do."

So then he gets all kinky and asks if I would help him pick up men and shit and I like, well, you know I have had a hell of a week, so I am like "Sure, why the hell not." Plus I am thinking cool, this guy will be here just every once in a while and I can have the house to myself most of the time.

That's when I was talking to Insert name of your favorite friendly Fag calls and tells me him and his boyfriend had just broken up and he was free. DOING! Well Mr. Blank let's go meet this guy because he's a freak, I need a roommate, and you're horny.

So me and Mr. Blank get ready and go to Hicksville to meet this guy. Well, he's a hick, he lives in Bumfuck, and he's a little scared, which I can understand, I would be scared of meeting me too. Me and Mr. Blank sit around and talk and this guy is sitting outside in his truck and stuff, beating off I suppose. He even calls the place to see if I am there. We were done eating our meal so Mr. Blank got up to pee and as he was coming back, Mr. Perv was staring in the window at me. IF I had of noticed, I would have ran outside and called him a fruit loop and I can't believe he called me and had me wait for him while he work up the nerve to come inside.

No, I would have been understanding and then later on I would have been a bitch about this whole incident.

So the moral to the story is. Kids, figure out your perversions before you are thirty or you are going to have to pay dearly like this poor hick. (At least I had a funny story to tell you this week).

And I make a piss-poor Heidi Fleiss.

I can't get motivated to do anything. I am so disgusting I haven't bathed for a day. Tonight will make it two. I just have to get out of this funk, but I feel like I have a black hole in my heart that just keeps getting bigger and bigger.

My wrists are starting to hurt, and when I mean hurt, I mean hurt. I try to ignore it, but I know I suffer from Carprel Tunnel. I usually OD on B6 and that makes it better for a while. This semester is going to kill me with work and my computer art course and ceramics. If I come out of it with my hands in tact, I suppose I will be happy. but I know I am probably going to have to have something done to my wrists because I can't do this the rest of my life and them hurt this bad.

I didn't even call Jean, I just laid back and bed and fell asleep. I could use the extra money, but I just don't give a fuck. I suppose I am trying to just think of going to see my father and I don't want to, I want to yell at him at her funeral and ask him if she's thin enough now. I want to make him hurt like he's hurt me and I suppose I do and that's one of the main reasons he just won't deal with me.

Daddy is a millionaire. Daddy is the most powerful lawyer in Kentucky. You don't get that kind of power without sacrificing something in return and what can I say, kids are expendable. Daddy wanted me to look like mommy and the only reason I can gather is because he wanted me. I can think of no other reason why when at 15 I looked at him and said "I get the feeling you hate me because I look like my mother."

And he looked at me with no emotion in his face and said "Yep, you're right."

I had this job at a lab on campus and I think my boss had the hots for me and he started blaming me for his feelings, which is oh so male, and it reminded me of how daddy used to treat me. I couldn't even go back to work to tell them I quit.

I don't want to go talk to him, it hurts both of us way too much, but I need some kind of support from him, and she won't die unless he promises to take care of us and I know that's what she is waiting for. For him to be a man. She is in so much pain now and it hurts so much every time I go to see her. Anne is going to be there tonight, so I am excited about that. She still talks to dad and he doesn't do shit for her. Won't pay for her education, won't help her out with her horses, won't pay for her to have a new car (not like she really deserves one anyway).

Anne doesn't understand why it bothers us for her to go and talk with him. "He's still my father." Well, then don't bitch about what he won't do for you.

I remember going to Rhodes back when I was 8 and I was wearing consignment clothes and not having dresses that covered my ass and being made fun of for the clothes I didn't have in yuppie-puppy Goshen and he spent over $1000 on a camel hair coat. The family car was a Porsche 911. His clients, which were criminals, were our babysitters. I was afraid from the minute I woke up until the second I fell asleep.

I was so afraid of men until I was about 19 that I didn't know it was "normal" not to be afraid.

It hasn't been until recently that I have realized that because I wasn't able to express myself as a child I have over compensated for it as an adult and I scare people. But part of that is because I am honest as well.

I have seen what money does to people, and I don't respect people that have it not because I don't, but because it doesn't guarantee happiness. I was miserable when I lived with him.

And you know what? He changed. He got married to a white trash whore that he had represented her ex-husband in a drug case 10 years previous to their marriage. She didn't think he could be the monster I told her he was. Thomas tried to have a relationship with him earlier this year and it hurt him so much more. My brother was so fucked up by my dad he can't even function in society. And my mom did a number on him as well.

SO. I have to be the better person and go and tell him that if he wants to say anything to her, he better do it soon. I figure they both still love each other on some level or they wouldn't still be trying to hurt each other so much to this day.

The only time I ever saw them together that I can remember was when I had brain surgery and the nurse asked me who I wanted to see and I told her my parents and they were both good. They didn't look at one another, but just both held my hands and looked at me with such sadness in both their eyes because I looked like a monster with my face all swollen.

I remember that image most of all even through the drugs. I never saw them look at each other with tenderness, or warmth, or even caring. And I could never figure out why they hated each other so much, but my father was evil and did hateful things to my mother to make her react the way she did.

OK. enough of that shit. I need to go bathe and take some pills to Priscilla because she is sick.

Roxell came by and told me he wasn't interested me in "That Way." I feel like leaping for joy and I am a little sad as well, because well, he was a nice distraction from thinking about my mom. I have been realizing over the past few days that I don't really need to start worrying about any kind of relationship though, and that's why I am happy.

I told him in December that I still liked him a lot and maybe he was trying to figure out if he could like me, but we are too different. This is the second time he's done this to me and I am just stupid for even going along with it the second time. Maybe he was thinking I could set him up with one of my friends, but I would like to think he's not that kind of guy.

January 18, 1998

I am watching The Truth About Cats and Dogs with my mom. I love this movie. It almost gives me hope that there is someone out there that is just oh so good for me. And someone so sweet and so nice, but it's all a fantasy and the reality of the situation is there just can't be someone like that. That someone that is just so perfect, it can't possibly exist.

So there is this boy I met when Roman and I went bowling with Priscilla and he is of so cute. Adorable and only 20, which is one year older then me, haha.

In lieu of yesterday's events with Roxell, I really don't want to think about being with someone in any kind of relationship because just the thought of doing what I did with Andy nasuates me. I hated the person I was and thinking back I get a little sad because girls my age are suppose to be their happiest in a relationship, according the the mandates of our society and that's just not true.

Priscilla I think is actually going to move in with me. She is ending a 3 year relationship and the guy she was with has just treated her wrong. I couldn't be a good friend to her for a while because I couldn't stand to listen to her put up with the shit she was putting up with. She told him she was leaving him on her birthday and he was like "Will you still take me to work and help with my kid." What the fuck ever. He's a loser. I like him as a person but he is shallow and just into looks and he keeps trying to make her into him, and that's just not possible.

There she blows. I don't even know. wait, it's a pear. And it's green. She has tumors growing against her spine now so she'll bend over and have me rub her back. We had a really great conversation last night about character and raising kids. I was really happy. Although every time I look at her legs, I just want to die. There is no muscle there.

I don't know why she even tries to eat it hurts her so much. I have never seen my mom so thin. She was so little when she was 16, she was so happy then. don't know why she chose the life she did. I hope I don't make the same mistakes.

I had quality time with mom last night. I held her close in my arms, gave her a bath and as I left, saw the desperate look of wanting to live. "I'm wish I wasn't sick, Cathy" she apologized.

" You couldn't help it, mama." What else could I say? I don't feel the way for people that have AIDS today like I do for people who's bodies attack themselves. And I don't feel sorry for drug addicts because that is something they took upon themselves to try. Fuck those people. Nor do I feel for alcoholics very much. I'm an alcoholic. I've never had to go to an AA meeting or anything like that, it's just in my genes and I decided long ago I never wanted to let a chemical control my life.

People that succumb to that shit perplex me. I could never understand how in high school girls would get fucked up and "not remember" what happened to them. I suppose that's their way of letting go and releasing their inhibitions.

Mom's butt resembles the skin of a Shar-Pei. She let me photograph it on the condition that I never show anybody. I suppose will keep this promise. but it's going to be really really hard.

I gave her a bath. I am a replica of her except for subtle differences like I am over a head taller, my legs are nicer, her boobs are bigger, so it was like bathing myself but the difference of a gigantic scar down the torso and a missing belly button. I can almost carry her in my arms. That will be a cool picture, me holding her in my arms.

She wasn't a conventional mom. After the divorce she quit the June Cleaver routine and wouldn't clean our rooms and wouldn't cook for us. But she would talk to us as we were her equals so that was more important. I think of how Andy's parents treated me and I think they were pissed because I treated them as my equals and didn't show them more respect because they were older. I think it really pissed his dad off.

Andy's grandfather was given the cancer pink slip a few years ago and Andy's dad flipped. He was so mean to me for a while and when this happened I couldn't help but say one time "Imagine if you had been going through this shit as a teenager." I think he had a new found respect for me after that.

I really don't want my mom to die, but it hurts so much to watch her suffer because I suffer. She said she knows how I feel but I told her she doesn't. She's starting to lose her mind a little bit more. She's finally taking her pain killers.

Anne was there last night. She is. delusional. She doesn't want to talk about mom dying what-so-ever. Anne constructs these fantasies in her mind where she is always the victim and I don't see how anybody can live their life in this manner, for the simple reason that I just can't.

Thomas stayed in his room the entire time I was there. He didn't check on mom. He's just fucked, that's all there is to it.

I felt a surge of strength today. I know I will be devastated when it finally happens, but I feel that I will also be, I fucking hate saying this, stronger.

I think if I hadn't have had this happen to me, my creativity would have consumed me at a much earlier age. I was stupid in realizing I was creative. I was a science geek in high school, trying to do chemistry. That's how I met Andy.

Priscilla came over today and in less then an hour had all of Dave's shit in the two living rooms. She tried to clean the bathroom, but. there is her way of cleaning and there is mine and I KNOW I am much much much more neurotic then her. It was a little traumatic to come home and see the place much worse then I have left it. So things aren't in perfect order now, but I don't spend too much time here, and I know I shouldn't take it personally.

I think I need to go vomit.

January 19, 1998

I woke up not long ago. I have slept over 12 hours, it was a welcome relief, and I didn't vomit last night. I am sitting here in my ugly one-piece long-john suit I bought at Victoria's Secret for $14. It was over $100 and I just can't see any woman in her right mind buying this ugly thing for that amount of money. I bought it in San Francisco with Tanya. You know if you can buy butt floss with someone, you have bonded.

So. I had lots of funky dreams last night. I dreamt of this man I met in Russia, I dreamt of Colin, and Roman oh. now I totally remember what I dreamt of. Roman was here and he brought their baby, his and Sveta's, and he was leaving with Anne up in a rainbow balloon and I told him to give me the baby, because I was afraid the baby wasn't going to be safe on the balloon and I told him that I would take care of it and bring it back to him. I was living in San Francisco and my mom was healthy. I took the baby and went to Wal Mart to buy supplies and then I laid down with it and let it breast-feed.

Part of this dream is because next weekend I will be babysitting Colin while Melissa works the weekend. Part of it is because I saw Lesli breast-feeding my nephew yesterday, and where Roman comes in, I have no clue, and why I was in San Francisco I have no clue.

The guy I dreamt about in Russia, well. that was just a good dream and that's all I remember.

I think I will go back to sleep. I need to do 150 things, but I just want to sleep for now, and I think this is the only time of this semester I will be able to do that. So I am going to go take another nap, wake up and finish my application to grad school, Dammit.

January 20, 1998

I didn't sleep well last night since I was asleep most of the day. I hate that now that I am older, I need to be more regimented. I remember when I could sleep as long as I wanted and stay awake for days. Sucks not being a teen and having those hormonal surges.

Besides, having a good nap is a wonderful experience. One of the best naps I ever had was when Andy and I were asleep and I was just in a coma sleep. We were laying in my water bed all snug and warm and oh, it was amazing. I am such a light sleeper. Then I felt this light in my eyes, I was in a coma sleep or I would have heard someone come in. Then I heard "Mam?" And I was dreaming so I was like, smiling and all happy and stuff.

Then I heard "Mam, why is the front door unlocked?" I bolted awake. WHO THE FUCK IS IN MY HOUSE???? (I had left the door unlocked for my roommate, and it was only like, 7 o'clock). I couldn't believe a cop was in my house, rousing me from my nap! What had I done wrong? They had their guns drawn and everything. I think they were more scared then we were.

" We got a call that someone at this address was trying to kill themselves." No, Mr. I was just comfortably sleeping in my bed (thank God I had on clothes, Andy had to put some on under police surveillance). They called to whomever and found out that the person trying to kill themselves was not at this address, DUH! But it's a cool story.

I was dreaming about being in a plane wreck. It was horrible. A girl in my ceramics class, Bridget, was in my dream. We did a couple of loops and stuff and I was like "There's something not quite right." Then people started jumping out of the back of the plane. The captain came on and I was running to the back when Bridget decided she wanted her suitcase so I ran back to the front of the plane to help her, had the suitcase in my hand and that's when I started to see trees. We were coming in for a regular landing on a residential street in England. WE landed normally and hit a few by standards on the way. I was flying South West, going to Russia I suppose. I called my family and told them " I survived a plane crash!!! I didn't even have a scratch on me!" It was so cool.

I threw a porcelain/stoneware mix today Mostly porcelain. It's like working with butter. I told it how much I loved it and we worked magic together. I was impressed for it to be my first time because I have heard so many bad things about it. I think I will mix some of this stuff up and play with it. I believe if I keep telling it I love it, it will work for me and we can bond. This woman in my class named Tanya told me "Maybe you just have an affinity for it." I think you have to have an affinity for each other, and what good would I be if I couldn't work with clay? It is my last name.

January 21, 1998

Today feels like it's just going to be one of those days, I feel it in my bones. Not a particularly bad day, just a boring blah day that is completely uneventful. I hate days like this. But then again, it's not even 9:30.

I was talking to Brandi the other night and she was just rambling on. When you call Brandi, you are in it for the long haul because she will talk and talk and talk some more. Well, I was just listening to her when she was just rambling and then she started talking about how being honest is considered a personality disorder.

This bit of info, needless to say, has really pissed me off. Why is honesty such a bad thing? I just can't figure it out. Maybe I should start telling lies just so I can feel like I have started to contribute to the growing lack of caring that is so much a part of our society. I don't know, maybe it's part of my personality disorder due to brain surgery, but I really have a hard time lying to anybody else and especially myself.

Now being deluded over a man is a totally different story. I will lie to myself over a man any day for some reason. I suppose it's my way of trying to be acceptable, to somehow make myself fit into a certain societal category that I just don't fit into. I suppose some of that comes from being raised by my father. I learned more "manly" characteristics. Plus I was a Tom Boy. Just when a guy thinks he can control me, I totally pull a 180 on him and then he's like, "what the fuck happened to you?" I don't mean to, it's just part of my personality.

That's one of the reasons Andy and I lasted so long, besides me putting into the relationship. He would look at me when I would do this and be like "That's my Cathy." He was totally un-controlling (even though he imagined he was in control) and whenever my personality would overwhelm even me, he would talk to me to make me better understand who I was. I miss that in him.

He did and I suppose still does totally love me, although I wish that could be enough. I need something more. challenging. Priscilla and I had this discussion last night. We are both the same way since we were both Tom Boys and both raised by our daddies for the most part. I just don't think I can know what I need until I fail a few more times.

Part of me feels like an idiot when it comes to what happened to Roxell. But I am glad it didn't work out because our personalities are so different. I started to realize it as time wore on and I suppose I was just lying to myself to get me to be more acceptable? I don't know. I haven't totally figured this thing out and you know what? I don't really have to.

It's going to be one of those days.

January 23, 1998

Well, one of those days has turned out to be one of those weeks. Damn El Nino and that beautiful weather.

I really admire writers, anyone that can limit they vocabulary in the constraining manner is a genius to me. I personally can't stand it. There are many times that I can't express what I want to with language and it's not from a lack of vocabulary, these words simply don't exist.

I have finished the most grueling part of my application to Cal Arts. If I am not accepted, then I suppose I will travel Europe for a year and then come home to some kind of domesticated hell and apply again next time. I could probably use the break after pushing myself so hard these past couple of years to achieve the goal of graduating. And I have to admit, I am a hedonist in the purest sense of the word and if I don't see some value to what I am doing, then I just am not going to do it.

I read Priscilla a piece. She kept bugging me to read what I had written. It's no great surprise to say that most artists can't write for shit so after I read it to her and asked "well, what did you think?"

" That was really good."

" You liked that, really?"

" Yeah."

" Were you surprised?"

" Honestly, yes I was. I didn't know you could write so well."

I think what we have here is a failure on both our parts to recognize we are a lot alike and both extremely intelligent women. I don't let her see that horrible side of me that often, and it's only after knowing her for all these years have we really started to get a greater sense of who the other really is, even though I have considered her one of my best of friends for over 5 years. She is also letting her guard down and revealing more about herself. It's strange how you can know someone and not know them at the same time.

Priscilla just put in a tape of South Park. OH shit. this is what I need. I finished my application for Financial Aid. now I will send that stuff tomorrow and work on my artist statement and send my money in at the last possible moment. I wish our cable company carried Comedy central, I'd never leave the house.

January 25, 1998

As if my self-esteem couldn't be chipped away any further. I applied for a scholarship from my language department to go to Russia this summer. I suppose I am a bigger cunt then I imagined because I can't figure out why I didn't get that scholarship unless it's because I ran my big fucking mouth one too many times. I suppose freaky girls like me just aren't accepted until they are successful, and maybe even then they aren't accepted, just tolerated.

The time is coming soon. Mom is getting much worse. She can't breathe. She is in so much pain. She is forgetting everything. I was rubbing her back, and she used to be so strong, so full of life. Now, she is so thin, so awful. I can feel how flat her hip bone is in her pelvis and it disturbs me greatly.

I watched Colin this weekend. It was a welcome change. I am so tired. I got very little sleep and was sad for a while. I called Andy to come by after I brought Colin by to meet my mom, and had him hold me and squeeze me and call me George, and that's exactly what he did. That's exactly what I needed to feel more human.

Lesli called me today. She usually only calls when she needs something. Today she wanted to share her misery with me. She was most unhappy. it's finally getting to her. She is going to make funeral arrangements this week. She made the comment about putting mom on liquid nutrition. I asked her if she really wanted to prolong this misery. She needs to be on a morphine drip, fuck the liquid nutrition.

I shouldn't touch her. It bothers me too much. I just rubbed her chest and I can feel her rib cage. The grossest thing that ever happened was she had an infected port back in 1988 in her chest, I couldn't even look at it it grossed me out so bad. I would just hear the others talk about how the hole in her chest was so big, you could stick your hand in it. They tried to con me into looking, but I just couldn't look, I remember smelling the wound and the decay of healing flesh and that was enough. I would look today, but back then I was just a teen. Today I would photograph it.

She should be on morphine. She's already disoriented. I don't think I should bother with my father. It's his loss, his irresponsibility. If she dies and he didn't talk with her, it's his own fault and I hope she torments him for the rest of his life.

Oh. and one last thing. I don't care if the President stuck his dick in a fucking donkey, he's not our moral leader. and don't think if I was in the same position as Monica that I wouldn't be rubbing my ass up against his thigh begging for it.

January 26, 1998

I think Dave was here, which is making me paranoid. That means it's time to go out to get Duncan.

I have failed to mention one of my favorite pastimes, and I don't know how I have neglected to do so. probably because it has been a while. I love to shoot. It makes me hard. To feel the power of a gun, not just any gun, fucking rocks. My brother possesses a Beretta 80/40 Cooper 40 caliber. That's a big fucking gun. I haven't been to the range too often, because it's expensive, but I have done well each time I go.

That's a lie, I do better then well, I do most excellent. I put a half a grin on one target while getting the heart and groin as well, with relative ease. I even got the little guy in the middle of his head on the little little target in the upper corner.

Thomas nick named me the "Catherinator" after that. He was impressed because I am a girl. They say that girls are better shots for some reason, I am too tired to remember why. I have those targets hanging in my house, my ode to white trashdom.

I hunted that fucker down the other night where he works, because the past few times I have called for him he "didn't work there." He said he would pick his skanky shit up on Sunday (yeah right) and pay me the phone bill money he owes me. I took down his license plate number. With as erratic as he pays his bills, I am willing to bet my left tit that he doesn't have insurance on his piece of shit car, and in the state of Kentucky, as probably every other state, driving without insurance is braking the law.

I am not his bitch and I certainly don't enjoy being fucked like this.

Maybe some punk kid took that shitty statue, I hope so. But to be on the safe side, I am going to go get Duncan, my mom's Rottweiler. Maybe he will eat that fucking cat that attacked Cootie a couple of weeks ago, he loves eating cat, and skunk, and opossum.

Violence isn't the answer to everything, but it sure as hell can cure a debate real quick.

January 27, 1998

I haven't been to sleep yet. I am going to go mail my application soon. I laid in bed all night, trying to fall asleep at my regular insomniac time of 2. I laid there longer. Tick tock Tick tock. I told myself if I wasn't asleep by 4, I was going to go throw some mugs, so that's what I did. I threw 7 mugs. Class started at 9. I told Michelle I was there until 4 and after she did a demo if I could go home. She didn't do a demo, but I took my cylinder test anyway.

The last time I had a cylinder test, I fucked up and that's back in October's entry. This time, since I had been doing it all night, I did OK, but I thought last year when I did it I threw a much better cylinder.The top wasn't as impressive, kind of thin, but I still got a 93.

I found much solace being in the studio alone, dancing to Madonna. The usual station I listen to played "new rock" all night, Pearl Jam and Nirvana, snore. After I realized I hadn't heard one chick band all night sometime around eight, I said "Fuck this noise" and moved it the real "new rock" station.

I am wiped. I need to go see mom though. I will take a bath, go mail my application and then come and take a nap.

This woman that is normally a cunt to me was really nice when Michelle announced I probably wouldn't be there next week and she trailed off. Everybody was like "Well, aren't you going to say why?"

So I blurted out "My mom is dying." I suppose most people don't say it that way, but I just don't give much of a shit about social convention. And there is no real way to sugar coat death.

Lesli and I were talking about it the other night. She started to say "You know, I don't remember it being this bad the last time she died."

We both started cracking up. I think this is the third or fourth time we have been so scared, but I mean this time,it's for real. All the other were just practice for this time, the real death. I'm kind of glad I had those practices, even though it was the equivalent of Hiroshima on my emotions. I suppose this time. it's Chernobel.

Jean called me yesterday. I told her I was sorry, but I just couldn't take care of her. I feel kind of bad for leaving her in the lurch for the past three weeks, but I just don't give a fuck. She's old, but death ain't blowing on her window.

Bye. I am mailing off my application now.

I think today has been one of the saddest days of my life. After I wrote the first part, I called Granny and she told me that when she checked on mom this morning, she was blue. She told me how she thought for sure she was dead. I told her I would be here in about an hour.

I jumped in the shower and washed my hair, and I don't think I even noticed the tears but heard the sound of my wails from deep inside my soul. I fought the tears when I realized what was happening and that just made it worse. I thought about how weird it was to hear of someone dying from cancer, since my mother, sister, and grandfather all survived. I feel to my knees crying as the water started to get cold. When I began to shiver, I remembered there was a dial that made the cold water cut back.

I don't know how I even got clean, but I remember washing with those loofah gloves and they weren't on my hands when I was sitting on the couch. I just sat there, sobbing allowing myself to feel the agony. The pain, the immeasurable pain that I have so desperately sought refuge from is finally consuming me. The thing about disease is that you can't blame anyone or anything for what is happening. All the hurt, aggravation, frustration. even the emotions that have no name can not be pinned on to one object or thing, nothing tangible, so here we are stuck with the natural order of life, and what Newton never counted on when he first tried to introduce order in to this world was the simple factor of chaos theory.

We try so hard to make science explain everything that is wrong with the world, and science just isn't the implicit answer to our problems. Some things will never be solved and that is the beauty of chaos, no beginning, no end. It exists to introduce turmoil into our lives to fuck us up.

She has lost the use of her facial muscles. The Hospice nurse said that we don't realize how much energy it takes just to hold our face up, it's really quite strange, to see her lips unable to stand at attention. They just lay on her teeth. I tried to take her to the bathroom, but I dropped her. I called Andy to come help me (He came over when I was sobbing on the couch to comfort me and he brought me here because I didn't have the energy to do anything). We lifted her back up to the bed and Thomas showed up and got her there. I helped her pee and then we waited for a few minutes for her to gather her energy.

He didn't give her enough time and as he heaved her up, her knees buckled and she went crashing on to the floor and bruised both her knees. There was no padding underneath the carpet so you could hear a big thud as her knees hit the wood.

I didn't know mom was blue. Granny waited to tell me this in person and I almost threw up. Still, I somehow managed to get the stuff ready to bathe her. I started slow, the Hospice nurse was here and I was just there. Mom can't even talk now. When I came in, she didn't even look real, but like a cartoon under all the loose skin.

There is this vein that is sticking out of her forehead that grosses me out so bad. I have been awake now for over 24 hours. I need to sleep. No application, but it's together, and tomorrow is the 28th. I will express mail the fucker.

I wish I could fill that hole in m heart, but every time I try to fill it, the hole just gets bigger. I suppose I should treat it like a wound, and let it heal from the inside out.

January 28, 1998

I can't sleep. It's as if I am trying to spend every second I can with her, even if she isn't conscious. She is laying next to me, her breathing labored. Her chest rises and falls as if she has just ran a marathon, only she is asleep. It's funny how we treat dying people as we do babies. Don't wake them up unless they are already waking up.

I really think that people that go quietly in the night are luckiest. There has to be a point to this suffering. I wish I could say I believed in Jesus, and all that other shit, but she is one of my Gods, someone I can touch, feel, love physically and mentally. Someone that is tangible, accessible.

Merissa told me what she misses the most about Mike is that she thinks of something she wants to tell him and she will be thinking, "I need to remember to." and then she remembers he's dead, and that is what hurts the most.

What I am losing is not only one of my gods, but unconditional love and acceptance. I am by no means perfect, but mom accepts me for most of my quirks. Granny has been more of a mother to me, doing the traditional things, but mom was so unusual. I could always talk to her and I can think of only one time I ever threatened her with violence, back when I was 16.

When Anne was on chemo and mad at the world, she got angry at mom for something and went to smack her and was there and I hit her hand down and when I came down, I was close enough in blocking her that my hand got tangled in her Hickman ( a port inserted into the heart) and it yanked out a little. To hear Anne tell the story is totally different. She claims she hit me in my head, and I think after that, she did, because I was protecting mom.

I have been in only one chick fight. Some cunt in high school and I were once friends. She was a cunt and we quit talking. So someone wrote "I hate cunt" on the bathroom wall. She erroneously assumed I was the one that wrote it and the shit she wrote about me was just horrible. Something about putting a bullet through my bleached blonde head.

I stewed. I didn't confront her because we all know confrontation is the biggest fear of all. Lisa and I went to this record store and guess who was in there? Cunt and her boyfriend. Lisa told me before I noticed and so I waited outside for her. Lisa came out and was like "They are paying and coming out."

Adrenaline is surging through my brains, she exits the store and I call after her, "Try and kill me now, BITCH."

" Oh, Cathy Clay, FUCK YOU!"

Then she committed a grievous mistake and turned her back on me. She stepped down off the sidewalk, away from the car, not towards it, panicing I assume, and I jumped down off the sidewalk and grabbed the back of her head and just started pounding at her face. There are several advantages to growing up in a big family, and being farted on by your brother isn't one of them, learning how to fight is.

She was hitting me with her purse and pulling hair and I am just pounding away. She falls back on to the pavement and I go with her since she has my hair. I fell on top of her and heard "Oh GOD!" I was on top of her, and I clocked her right in the nose, and for some reason, I got scared she was going to hit ME, or the cops were around the corner, so I jumped up off of her and Lisa and I took off. She laughed the whole way to my house, and I was just stoned from the rush.

Boyfriend told me the next day at the lunch table what a bitch I was for making him have to listen to "I'm gonna kill her" all the way back to her place. He pointed out that she was the one with the bloody nose, hence she was the one that got her ass kicked. I am sure she wasn't happy about this revelation. I don't think they stayed together and she ended up getting pregnant by a 14 year old.

There was one other fight where I didn't want to hurt the little bitch. I was 14. The other fight, I was 16. So I was living in Danville with my grandparents. I did not fit in at Hicksville and Daddy didn't want me to go to Danville because he was racist and didn't want me to go to school with all the blacks. I was 14 and didn't have much of a voice then, especially against my father, so I went to Boyle County High Skewl.

Rednecks from hell. I was more out of place there then I was at Oldham County, but I hated the people I went to middle school with, and I hated being a pawn to my parents mind games, so I decided Boyle County was my best bet.

I told some bitch named Charity that I didn't like Terri and she ran and blabbed her mouth and told her I called her a bitch. I had first and last period with this red neck and I was scared. I even went to the councillor's office to try to tell them I was afraid but they didn't give a fuck.

I didn't want to hurt her, and I just wished she was dead and would leave me alone. Well, we were playing soccer one morning and she threw herself on top of me and her fist just "accidentally" landed in my left eye. I was too much of a whimp to stand up for myself, if you can imagine that.

So, spring rolls around and it's wet and rainy and she was in a car accident and she died. I didn't know how to feel. I felt responsible for it in a way because when she was terrorizing me, I just wanted her to die. I suppose it's no great loss today, she was the type of girl that used butter as a lubricant. I mean I am sure her snatch tasted better, but then she would have a greasy cunt. hence the term greasy cunt, the worst thing you could ever call a female in my book.

I don't talk a lot about my grandparents. Poppa has been the only solid male influence in my life, and he is. He is pop. Can't argue or state your opinion. Thomas hates him for deciding not to get his education and not reading. hates his ignorance. Times were different back then, though. That's the reason it was important for his grand kids to have a college education, even though we are a gaggle of educated cunts now, and he doesn't deal well with that.

I love my grandfather, but he is disappointed that I am not with Andy now, and I just can't bear him to be disappointed in me, so I haven't been to Danville much after the break up.

Granny is the bomb. She is the reason I am so creative. it's really both of their genes. Even though pop isn't educated, he has a practical knowledge of how things run, which I think is more necessary to know how to change your oil. Granny is a seamstress. She makes all our formals and where mom's creativity is just out there, Granny taught me about craftsmanship. I think that is the difference between an Artist and someone that does Art. Anyone (or so I would like to think) can do art, but only an artist possesses the skills to be an artisan.

Granny, next to my mom, is the woman I most admire. She was born after 7 months of her conception. She wasn't suppose to live. Mama, my great-grandmother, laid her on a pillow and just cared for her. She had Scarlatina, a mild form of Scarlet fever. She is deaf in one ear, and hears a hum in her other and has all her life. She says it's like bees constantly buzzing. Her mama had cancer too. Granny was the second oldest of 5. She took care of the family. I think I get my practical view of how things happen from her. Her parents were divorced when she was young, and that was a no no back then.

She got married to pop, they raised my mom through much hardship. She lost her second baby because mom tore her insides up, at least that's my theory. Her uterus was turned up-side down, so. she was pregnant one other time and couldn't carry it.

She worked in a shoe factor. She always wanted to go to college but she never did. After mom was married, she quit her job so she could sew full time. She traveled to the Chek Republic back in the sixties as well as Argentina. She decided there was no place like home, where I think anywhere but home.

I talk to Granny about my feelings and life, trying to figure it all out. She is a good guide, although she can be a little Jesus crispy.

I can fall asleep now. Sorry about the Novella, but it should keep you entertained.

January 29, 1998

The shoe dropped.

She's gone.

January 30, 1998

Closer is playing. Joy Division is my favorite group. Probably because of the irony that the Joy Division was the group of women Jews that the Nazi's used for sex.

I cut myself shaving this morning. Bad. I think I may have even gotten blood on the floor. When the blood began to pool in her cheek, I massaged her cheek until it was gone.

The last two days. my fingers can barely type. I tried not to get so upset. but I suppose it shows when I type. I knew my mom was going to die Wednesday. After listening to her the night before, I could tell. Andy had driven me there Tuesday and I had Pop take me home Wednesday morning. He knew she was going to die yesterday too. He told me how things were going to change. The next time he saw me it would be under horrible circumstances.

I have seen Poppa cry twice in my life. When his mother died and yesterday. He kept telling stories about her and one was when mom was a teenager, they were having an endurance contest and they were running up the back lot in the snow barefoot. As they were almost to the finish line, mom stepped on a can with the lid and almost cut her toe off. Pop carried her into the house. She was little back then, 120 pounds. I never saw her that little in my life.

The closest I ever came to seeing her that little was now. The nurse gave her an enema Wednesday. She was comatose most of the morning. When she realized she had to go to the bathroom she started screaming to go. Granny and the Nurse told her that she could go in the bed. She refused. So Granny and I helped her on to the toilet. Getting someone down is easy, getting them back up is the hard part.

I had only been there about an hour when the nurse came. She was coughing hard so I got underneath her and propped her up with my knees. I hadn't slept for 2 days by then. I was comfortable and I felt that I could sleep then the nurse came in and woke us up. She had taken her vitals and listened to her lungs and they were still clear at that point.

Poppa dropped me off here at home. I got ready for work. I took a shower, put on my clothes and was listening to Vercua Salt. My favorite song of theirs is the last one on the album, and some day, I will sing it with them on stage. I started to sing it. and the tears and sobs wouldn't stop. I sat in my kitchen for a half an hour and knew what I had to do. I went up to school and told all my professors my mom was dying. If not today, then tomorrow.

Poppa was talking about himself as being an idiot for running in the snow with mom and how the doctors in the emergency room must have thought he was foolish because he was a grown man acting like a teenager. They didn't have any money when I split my head open when I was 3. I remember her holding me in her arms as she held a bloody rag to my forehead and dad raced to the emergency room. I don't know how they paid for my stitches even though she told me the other day.

I couldn't support her on the toilet any longer. My ass was numb from sitting on the edge of the bathtub for so long, plus my arms couldn't support her any longer so she laid there on her knees in a most uncomfortable position.

The first thing they do after someone dies is to confiscate the narcotics. I think they destroyed over $1200 worth of drugs. Oral Chemo, Valium. but the one that I wanted to keep was the Morphine patch. Morphine is the drug of gods, I have been on it twice in my life. Lesli told me if I wanted it, I should take it, and I didn't know she meant hide it. I thought "Why would I slap it on my ass now?" I didn't watch as he cut it into fine strips, but I photographed it after he was done.

Granny and I went down to pick her up. She had such little control it was like. it was carrying someone who couldn't support her own weight. I realized she couldn't make it so I picked her up and she started moaning. I put her down and yelled "Momma, hold yourself up for a second!" and she did enough so I could bend down and get her underneath her hips and pick her up and carry her the rest of the way to her bed.

She said my name that morning, but that's all I remember. I told her "I love you." And she said "I love you too." I was the last person she said that to.

After she was in her bed, I hadn't the strength to fix her so she was in bed properly. So I went downstairs and ate my first meal since I couldn't remember when I ate last. Granny and I talked. criticizing my brother for not going in to see her when he still could, but that was his way of coping.

We went back upstairs to arrange mama so she was comfortable. Then I went back downstairs to make some no-bake cookies since Granny had never had them.

After I composed myself, I got up and left the kitchen table.the first person I wanted to see was my photography professor, Don Anderson. His mother has Alzheimer's disease, so when we would see each other in the hall over the past year, we would talk about our mothers. I wasn't sure he was going to be there and he was. I handed him my video on bulemia and told him I wouldn't be in class tonight. He looked at me and asked what was up and I just started crying. He held me and let me cry, and I asked if we could go in his office because I didn't want anybody to see me then. I cried even more once I was in his office and we talked about stuff. The reason I was there to see him was so he could read my application over and find any errors. He read it and was like "God Damn." I can blow him away because he knows me, but will the people at Cal Arts see the same thing?

He contrasted himself with me and how he likes to hide himself in the sand where as I like to "dance on a volcano." I said "the volcano's here" as I pointed to my stomach. I know that I am so intense to some people they can only handle me in small doses. It's like I make you feel, I bring you to my level even if you aren't ready for it and if you can feel that here in my diary, you should feel it in person because it's much stronger.

When PhD Kloner saw me outside his door, he was smiling and I said "My momma's dying" his face dropped and he said "come in and sit down." We talked for over an hour about life and I told him everything I had been through and he talked about when his mom died. The most valuable thing he said to me was "Don't make any big decisions."

Then I talked to PhD Buser, and he just didn't know what to say. PhD Van Ausdale told me that if I need to be at home, then I should leave. This is the first semester where I have had only professors. I had told Michelle, my ceramics professor, that I wouldn't be back Thursday. That left my computer Art professor. He is known to have an ego and he let it show, I just wished I could have enjoyed it the torture I inflicted.

" We missed you in class on Monday." Trying to be a smart ass.

" My mother is dying." His face dropped.

" I'm sorry. blah blah blah."

I came home, put my stuff together. Thought about doing laundry since I would be at mom's, but I couldn't lift the clothes. This was before I had taken her to the toilet so I must have been saving my strength (I have one of those gigantic plastic tubs that holds 50 gallons).

When I got to the house, Granny was relieved. She wasn't the only one to attend to her any longer, and she isn't nearly as brawny as me. I got behind mom, paced her head on my lap and washed her hair. When I gave her a bath on Tuesday, she told me I could shave her legs, and I meant to, but I didn't.

The funeral people had trouble carrying the body down the stairs outside that Poppa had made so many summers ago. They are strong, sturdy stairs, but they aren't perfect. The first step down is too long as is the second step. The third is slanted at an angle so it is crooked and hard to climb because it takes more effort. They used the banister to knock the gurney against as they took her down.

Theresa showed up around 5. She was a woman that sold toys to mom for Christmas for Nate. She had been so impressed with my mom's courage she had sent a letter. I can not give the Jesus crispy shit my grandmother needed to hear. This woman could. I called her and she was there in a half of an hour. Granny and her went downstairs and ate some of the no-bake cookies I made. Granny had never had one before. They were bonding. I started a letter to Hadley, the photographer I met via e-mail and actually got to meet in person when I was in San Francisco. She is the bomb. It's weird how deeply connected we are on the same level about so many things. We are sensitive in the same manner, and we both can not understand how people can not feel as deeply as we feel. When I sent my letter to her, she cried.

Theresa came up after visiting with Granny and asked me if I had ever been around someone that died. I said no. Well, their body will convulse and they release gases (Mom did neither of these things). I had heard that before. Then she said "It starts off with a death rattle in the back of their throat." She said a few other things and was about out the door when mom started coughing and she tried to lift herself. I lifted her up and got situated behind her so she could lay on my knees in an upright position. When we were situated, we heard her breathing. I looked up at Theresa and knew that was the sound she was just talking about. And she knew, and Granny knew. It was the sound of fluid filling her lungs, of her drowning. It was about 6 o'clock. I tried to get more comfortable and she moaned. So I stayed there. Lesli came. Noah was with her. He stared at her. He knew she was dying. Kids know when there is something wrong. At one point, he reached out and touched her and took his hand away. He was just learning to call her "Bo" her name for grandma. Lesli called Anne. I stayed there, behind her, hoping she would die like that, in my arms, but by 9, as she started filling up, she got heavier. I looked at Lesli and she is the one that said it. I said "I can't lay her down." and when Lesli said "So she can die faster" I lost it and my chest heaved with a cry of no abandon and momma opened her eyes and looked at Lesli. She knew. They say the hearing is the last thing to go. My butt was sore from sitting there so long, not to mention I had to pee. I got up from behind her and we positioned her so she was up against the headboard. I liked being behind her much more then looking at her. When I came out of the bathroom, Anne was there and I heard mom say "Hi" to Anne. That was the last thing she said. We kept her up until Anne got there so Anne could see her one last time. I called Melissa, since she is a nurse she told me this could go on for days. I told her no, it was going to happen tonight. She said as long as she is in an upright position, her lungs will keep draining. I went into the room. I said, "should we leave her up of should we lay her down?" and everyone agreed to lay her down. We laid her on her side, how she used to sleep. Conni and Joy, her best friends showed up. She opened her eyes when Conni yelled at her. Her lips were slacked against her teeth and you could see her tongue. When she opened her eyes one would stay closed and the other would be half open like Kenny from South Park whenever they kill him. I couldn't stay awake any longer. I hadn't slept since I went to sleep on Sunday, and even that wasn't very long. So Andy and I went to lay down in another room. It was comforting having him there because his shoulders are as broad as a Mack truck and he just held me in his arms as I fell asleep. That was around 11. Granny woke me up at 12:50 something and said "Your momma's going." So I bolted out of bed and they had laid her so she was on her back. Her breaths were much more shallow. You could see the material she was drowning on coming out of her mouth. I didn't know that's what it was and I tried to clean it out of her mouth, but realized it was going to stay there. We kept telling her we loved her. I was on her right side next to her foot, holding her right hand. Granny was on the same side at her head. Lesli was on the left next to her head and Anne was in the middle. I kept looking at the clock. She died at 1:10 am. Anne was diagnosed with leukemia on 1/10/91.

She laid in her bed. I took a photo of her hands. Anne couldn't believe it, but I told her that is my way of coping. She grew ever colder and bluer. She had finally lost her color. I don't go out in the sun, so my skin resembles that of the dead. She had more color to her. I glow blue-white and she still had a flush of color with a tinge of blue.

In the letter I was responding to, Hadley had stated how gross fried cheese was, but how yummy Mozzarella sticks are, it's just the thought that is gross I suppose. I guess she though I would think they were disgusting too, but I love them as well. After they came and took her body, we went to Denny's and I ate Mozzarella sticks. He took me back to the house. I finished my application to Cal Arts and mailed it in. Lesli was trying to find the poems that she had done for mom in high school. She was freaking out.

I looked at her and said as I opened this wardrobe in the kitchen "They are in here. I remember reading them a little while ago." Mom was a pack rat, everything is everywhere. Lesli kept talking about the poems and kept mentioning them since Tuesday and I knew where they were, and I don't know how I remembered. She started looking through the labyrinth of cookbooks and papers and found it. When she found it, it was like finding a long lost soul.

I left, went to Kaleidescope to see if they were open to get my haircut. They weren't. It was 10:15. I went next door to the camera shop and looked at Hasselblads and a Leica. I had the guy try to explain to me about the cameras. I looked at lights. By the time I was done, Kaleidescope was open and I made an appointment for 12:30. I tried to stay awake. I went to Winn Dixie and picked up my photos of San Francisco and forgot photos of Christmas were there. I lost it bad when I saw the photos, in particular this one.

I came home. Priscilla was like "Who's there?" and I couldn't answer her I just started crying and she was in my bed and I just laid in her lap and told her all about it. I told her I needed a haircut. So after making phone calls, we left. Kimmy gave me such a great haircut. We talked and talked.

Pris needed money, so she went to Kinko's to cash a check and there is a store next to Kinko's call the Red Geranium that mom and I used to go to. Mom loved rhinestones, so I bought her a broach to put on the dress she wore when Lesli and Doug were married, the same dress she will be buried in on Sunday.

January 31, 1998

My Nazi-Cunt Step monster called my brother. It was a little after midnight. She was telling him all kinds of shit. Attaching blame. "did you call?" As if my brother would have called those assholes. It's a way of saying "I'm thinking of you and don't want to admit that I am the weaker one that wanted to hear your voice." She was saying all kinds of shit. I didn't know it was her. I wouldn't have answered the phone.

I suppose guilt is an extreme. can't articulate. damn language. Guilt makes everyone do strange things. I have not heard from anyone on my father's side of the family since we left him 10 years ago to live with my dying mother.

Thomas said "well, if the three of us left, what does that tell you? Do you think I was making shit up?"

" Aunt" Martha Ann showed up to my mother's house with food and a card. Their fucking audacity amazes me. I wonder how many of them are thinking about showing up "I haven't needed you all my life and I certainly don't need you now." Is what I will say.

Granny and Pop's preacher was trying to console me. I was like, shove it up your ass you using fucking bastard. Priscilla, Marina, Kate, and the Thompson's all showed up for me. It was nice having that support. Anne's boyfriend didn't come, I don't respect that in him. Lance, Thomas's ex best friend showed up. Sincerity is such a strange thing because even though Lance and Thomas haven't talked for a while, I felt more sincerity coming from him then the fucking greasy preacher.

I called Lisa and told her. She said "I had a dream about Thomas last night." They once were lovers.

I called Genipher from my childhood. She knew momma was dying and called to talk to her when her daddy was dying from cancer. I never got her number. I was being a bitch and letting her suffer through her shit alone. That's what she had done to me. She explained a lot of things about herself. How she was insecure in high school, how she realized high school was just bullshit.

I told her she had changed a lot. She replied "Did you think I was going to be an asshole the rest of my life?"

I don't think I have changed that much since high school. I was a good friend and I asked her why she shit on me back then when she knew I was a good friend. I don't want to think of such things. I don't know if it's good to try to start something with her. She told me how she found out that she had brothers and sisters when she was 20. I always knew there was something not quite right about her family.

When I came home last night, Andy and I had the most beautiful sex. doing something a little different here and there. After I came, I just started crying uncontrollably. Sex is such a powerful way of communicating for me and I can't really figure out why I started crying unless sex and grief are some how interlinked in the same pool of emotions. It was so wonderful, and we finished right around the time momma had died the previous night.

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