insomnia.

heavily breathing. just like my dog when she needs a bit of water. drained, then stopped by a clump of matted hair. strung out, stressed, stretched and worn out from too many smiles. the good times are exhausting. i wish i could sleep, but the two cold-brew coffees i drank at midnight have turned my body into a cage and my brain outside in. the church bells are ringing and they're staying with me in my inside-out brain.

i am not in advertising, i do not own a mac, nor do i have an acute understanding of modern technology, and i enjoy pretzels. the crunchiest pretzels. i don't do much in cold weather and i'm kind of scrappy and what i know is coffee, sex, the sand and the water, and the blues. i know the bright whites, too. people smiling makes me smile and joy brings me joy and tragedy is tragic and i relate. but. (there are always buts.) i should be doing something! something! maybe i'll start using a mac and make lots of money just to sit in front of it. it will surely make the world a better place to exist. my worst nights working only toward the next moment are better than my best days in a sweet-fuck-all cubicle.

my life is not a lottery! incredibly inedible, requisite inevitable credibility. how silly you look, spilling down this town's crooked cinder hills. hindered thrills, they're fill-in's. really. how many holes have you got in you? plenty. there aren't as many in me. your eyes are shut, incredibly. inedible credibility grows steadily free, and i disagree but apparently, it grows on trees.

on words and actions through ears like mine.

when i attempt to decipher what people are trying to say, not only through words but through actions, the fragments of reason i find usually never amount to give me much of an answer. convincing arguments become so logical that it's hard to believe anything could be explained so easily. why is it so comprehensible? nobody is telling the whole truth all of the time, unless they disguise it as something else. with this in mind, the little mysteries of romances, friendships, and the most common interactions with people become more complex after i begin to analyze them, because through ears like mine, innocent modesty can turn ones words and actions into lies that were never intended to be lies at all. in fact, they began as truths. on the other hand, i have an imperfect understanding for people who say exactly what they mean. does that mean they meant exactly what they said?

usually, i mean what i say. but sometimes, i don't say what i mean.

last night i played a show at the lost and found bar of greenpoint. i played a very good set, although nobody was there to see it. well, there were a few. there were a few people who went out of their way to come watch me sing, and i love those people very much.

davi, josh, and i walked to a "spot". we walked to a "spot" and had a "moment". i brought my guitar. we sat on the edge of a thunderstorm, the edge of the concrete, and watched the lightning illuminate the sky. whenever it flashed, the clouds looked dark. we smoked some pot and played guitar. josh broke two of my strings. again. cops came, and left.

and then...

then the clouds swooped over us and slammed us with sheets upon sheets of water. i quickly stuffed my guitar in its case and we started running. we ran from the rain, we tried to fight nature. davi stood in the middle of the road, with his shirt off. soaked isn't the word.

we were all dripping. we began to walk back to davi's. none of us even bothered skipping over puddles. we just sloshed right into them. we got back and dried off, put on pajamas and cuddled each other. and josh sat, still soaking, browsing through davi's itunes. silent. besides the occasional "ooh!".

i skipped work today. how could i follow a night like that with a day of work?

Ain't nothing sweeter than a watermelon dream.

This morning I woke up in the cemetery. I'm not sure how I got there. Maybe it was a mixture of cheap whiskey and the thick t-shirt that kept me barely alive through the chilly night. But what I do remember is watching episodes of Afro Samurai with a stranger. I trust he treated me kindly, because I remember for a moment being in his warm bed, beneath a warm down comforter, being fed water, and having my hair brushed with his fingers. How I wound up resting against the tombstone of Abigail Harrow is beyond my knowledge.

Everything suddenly reeks of Vicks VapoRub and I'm nauseated.

I learned something at work yesterday. You cannot ignore something that doesn't exist in your life. I am not sure if that makes it any less difficult to ignore. I've got the blues, but I cannot figure out why. I've been screaming my lungs out about it since I woke up in the graveyard. If you must sing the blues, what better way than to holler them?

today was very eventful. i woke up just in time for work. i was proud of myself. what a shame.

after an alright work day, i met up with josh and went to central park. we walked and talked a bit, then we blew a blunt in a little shady spot on the grass. to make things even better, our trip to applebee's in times square was seamless. despite the nice weather, and it being a friday afternoon, we got seats on the spot and didn't wait at all for our artichoke dip.

after that, we went back and hit a bong and watched a slasher film. and chilled. and talked about our old bands. then he burned me some cd's, and even made little diy jackets for them.

i had a pretty awesome night.

i am dying to make more music with adam. we make a great team. i want to write many songs with him and record them all outside with the sounds of the neighborhood kids playing "hot peas and butter".

i'm never wearing shorts in bushwick again. thank god josh gave me a hoodie.

i haven't felt this great in a while.

yesterday, andrew came over after work and we bummed around for a little. his iphone is like an extension of his hand.

adam came over after andrew left. he is my new best pal. here is the story of what we did that made my night/morning so much better than what they have been for quite some time:

we decided that the plans for the night were to 1) build a fort, 2) make music in the fort, and 3) bake cookies. we did not do any of those things, but did variations of them. we played the two acoustic guitars and sang songs while angie watched and clapped along. we play very well together. i think i found the other half of my duo. his voice is great, and he sounds just like adam green. he has a great range to compliment mine.

we walked to the corner store for cookie dough and toilet paper, but there was no cookie dough. so instead, we went from sweet to savory and decided to buy things to make quesadillas. he made them. they were delicious. i made the best smoothie i've ever made. we had a wonderful meal. we started to get very tired, so decided against making a fort. we watched south park to fall asleep. apparently, i was talking in my sleep and said "i'm not wearing the earrings." and he asked me, "you're not wearing the earrings?" and i replied, "no." then he pinched my ear lobe.

we woke up, and made quesadillas for breakfast. i tried to make a smoothie with what fruit i had left, but it came out more like sorbet, so we ate it with a spoon and dipped our quesadillas in it. we then wrote an improvised song about pie and frosting. i sang about how much i like pie, and he contested pie with a verse about how much he likes frosting on cake. it went back and forth like this for a few minutes. it's very moldy peaches. he is the adam to my kimya.

i like him a bunch, he's great. and he likes me a bunch and thinks i'm great. i questioned why we get along so well, and he said that we're both easy people to get along with. it's very true.

he has a good memory. i do not.

well, that's it i guess.

i've been looking out for myself, and i've been doing what i enjoy. i paint more often, and i sing more often. i work a hell of a lot. i make my money, and i spend my money. and i wonder why i still feel like shit. and then i realize! i do not make myself feel like shit! other people make me feel like shit! how could i have been so foolish? i think about how i've been doing the right thing, and wonder why i still don't feel alright.

it's because i'm surrounding myself with people who disregard my happiness and my feelings. people who are supposed to jot down when i am sad, and help me feel better after they make it through their day. but i was stupid for thinking that these people could ever care about me more than they care about the little things that make them happy, temporarily.

to me, a person who is important in my life is important in my life. if i have love for a person, i will be there for them. and even if i do something unintentionally to hurt them, i will do everything in my power to change that. not because i care more about the other persons happiness than my own, but because if i truly care about somebody, sacrificing a minor joy in my life is worth their happiness.

and that is what makes the world turn. and apparently, that is why mine is at a stand-still.

my nose can't smell. my taste buds can't taste. my wisdom teeth are really dumb. i'm falling apart on the outside. i'm surprised i went to work today.

i woke up at adam's, after a night of chicken tacos and jamming with his roommates. we listened to a tribe called quest while we were falling asleep, and it feels like it took me forever to get there. i remember tossing and turning, trying really hard not to wake him. when i woke up, he asked how i slept, and i told him how bad it was. he told me "aw" and that i should have woken him up and that he would have made me "sleepytime tea". he's such a moosh. he also gave me a watermelon ring pop.

he walked me to the train in his sweatpants because he does that sometimes, and i was on my merry way to work. my hair was uncombable, but at least i brought my toothbrush along. everybody could tell i was sick, by the sound of my voice. there is so much crap blocking my nasal passage that i actually miss breathing through my nose. my m's sound like b's.

there were three guys set up on the sidewalk selling books. i brought them out coffee and some crumb cake. they called me "sweetie", and we had a nice conversation about comics and graphic novels. in exchange for my "coffee kindness", he sold me maus II (in beautiful condition) for seven dollars. it was marked fifteen.

justin met me after work, and we got sushi at blue ribbon. i couldn't taste anything. i wish i could have, i hear the miso soup is really delicious. we got green tea ice cream and it soothed the pain in my jaw.

and now i am home. wilson and hitomi are watching a movie, and i made myself some chai. i have a long work week ahead of me, and an even longer play week planned. i think i'm going to catch up on some reading with my chai.

if you've ever envisioned real, thick dew, that is what my life was. the smell and taste and sound and feeling of dew. if dew is or could ever be any of those things.

we are not what we want, but we breed like cockroaches.

"don't think i'm buying into any of that ‘growth from bad experiences' crap. i've had enough growth experiences to last a lifetime. right now i'd trade a little growth for some happiness."

saturday night i destroyed myself in williamsburg.

i had three gin and tonics, and a shot of...well...sour cream, jager, and peach schnapps. i'm pretty sure i also drank some jack and coke and a couple sips of frozen margarita. i don't remember much, besides a catfish taco, walking in on a girl peeing in the men's bathroom, and a hookah. and walking home in the pouring rain at 4:30 in the morning. i met new people, nice people. i think i can call them friends. a girl my age, too. i'm really worried about money. really worried. it's making me very stressed, and my eyes are twitching.

soon, i will explode. and on that note...

it started like a stone. i grew it out but then i rested it, i found sweet road. it came announced on the right. i left my purse then found the road. i'm tainted in a patchy problem, none can tell what i can tell ya. let them eagles have good times. it's a road and not a soda. i found sweet road, i found sweet road.

old dirty day. an old, violently rainy day. i woke up at five in the morning, and got on the subway around six fifteen. i arrived for work four minutes late. drenched. i was ready to beg for a cup of coffee to drink on the clock, but decided against it. i wouldn't want to risk looking desperate for caffeine. so instead, i implied that i can't start my day without it. it was cool. i made myself a soy latte. old bastard day, it was.

my manager told me she thinks that i am a potential shift supervisor, and that her and i should sit and talk about it. i think that's a great idea, since i've been with the company for about two years now. it's about time i move up in position. considering i just transferred there, i'm afraid i might piss off some of the other partners. "well this girl just started working at this location. why does she get a promotion and not i?" well, it's because all of the higher authority can see that i'm one of the hardest working baristas at the store. i never goof off, i never milk my breaks. and if i feel as if i'm wasting time, i find busy work. whether it's re-writing the c.o.d.'s, or plunging the toilet. i'm a damned hard worker. and i have a pin back button that tells me so.

i've been alright lately. i'm thinking about getting a second job. maybe three. one part-time for my week days off, and another for the weekends. granted i'll probably rarely see my family, or greg's hairy face. i need the cash.

i like when fire engines blow passed our building at late hours, because then i think, "that probably just woke up the neighbors, and it's not my fault!"

i'll be recording all of my songs right outside philly in a couple of weeks or so. michael is going to help me with that. i'm very excited. the high e string on my guitar popped a couple of weeks ago, and i've been to lazy to re-string it. so i haven't really been able to practice any of my songs properly. in addition, my guitar seems to be excelling in crapitude daily. i walk to guitar center once every couple of days and daydream in the acoustic section, playing all of the wonderful guitars, admiring how far i've gotten. you know, since i can't tell how great of a guitarist i've become since i just...can't really tell when i'm playing a piece of crap.

i guess i'm just stalling until gregory gets home from band practice to hold me until i drift into sleep. it's hard for me to sleep alone, now. not good. i should desire sleeping alone every so often. for the privacy, or some crap. i'm no psychiatrist, but i'm pretty sure that's how it works. i had just gotten used to sleeping alone after i moved back into my parents apartment in august. i had just gotten there. to the point where i could say, "hey, check it. i can scratch my ass and nobody is here to say 'ew'." but here i am again...insomnia due to lack of company.

what a dirty bastard day.

(edit 12:52am:)

turns out greg wasn't really practicing at all. very considerate. suddenly, i'm quite comfortable sleeping alone.

i finished printing up my mini-comic at office max. it took about three hours of trial and error to complete, but i did it. and it only cost me about fifteen dollars for approximately one hundred copies, with seafoam and peach covers. i call it "my boyfriend hates me". i'm worried lately, i've been going really crazy in the apartment. i'm not sure where i am going, and it's certainly terrifying. it's easter. yesterday afternoon, i took a train back to long island to see my family. my mom let me drive her brand new, $50,000 cadillac back home, since i almost forgot how to drive. i really, really miss driving. and that freedom. i miss my car. i pulled up to our driveway, and my car was in the street and it made me want to cry. so many memories. it's a piece of shit, but...so many memories. on the train, i peeked at the conductor's hands. they were so old. such old hands. am i going to have hands like that when i am older? and will they be punching holes in ticket stubs? will they still be serving lattes? will i be constructing buildings with my hands? will i be tearing them down? what about my feet? will they still be beautiful and dainty after i'm through with them? will i ever be able to purchase another pair? i have a lot to learn. last night, my mother kissed me on my forehead, because i am sick, before she went upstairs to sleep. she told me that she misses me being around. i told her, "i know." i told her that i'm part of a living, breathing city now. i have an obligation to that city. i am a part of what makes that city tick. and it needs me. she understands, and she said that she knows, but she misses me. i am only nineteen. i'll be twenty-five in six years. and so on. i don't want old hands, and i certainly don't want old feet.

i love ginger beer, and i started making a mini-comic called "my boyfriend hates me". i've been inking greg's comic. it is called "slowcoach". i have serious trust issues, and i am constantly paranoid. thank you, everybody in my life that i've ever met. thank you, i appreciate the way you killed my self-esteem completely, and made me feel no self-worth at all. thank you all very much for making me feel that i am not worth loving. because i think i am? i hate myself, but i don't care enough to...care. does that make sense? i'd like some coffee now. one day i will be famous. tomorrow or next saturday, i am going to hand out the first bound issue of "my boyfriend hates me" on st. marks. java...

what a great mood i'm in! i'm not sure why. maybe i should be embarassed of this, but i'm listening to the blood brothers' "burn piano island, burn". the whole album. and i mean, they're talentless, but they bring back so many memories of being 16. i just got back from my doctor appointment. no surgery, yet. but they did slop this goo all over my chest and rubbed it around with a wand. it was awkward, sure. but i've had ultrasounds before. the technician said she'd send the findings over to my ob-gyn, and that he would send me the results. i did, however, ask her if she found anything harmful. she said, as a technician not having her phd, she wasn't qualified to tell me. but she did give me her professional opinion that whatever the lump is, be it a cist or whatever, that it is highly unlikely and rare for a female my age, with my background, to develop breast cancer. maybe that's why i'm in such an uplifted mood. although, it isn't unheard of, so i'm only going to get my hopes 99.9% up. on the transfer train last night to ronkonkoma, there wasn't a single seat available. so i had to stand for about 40 minutes, until we hit a station where a lot of people sitting got off. but while i was standing, i had my earbuds in, and i didn't realize how loud i was being. my cell phone sounded the nokia tone every time i got a text message, neutral milk hotel blasting in my ears...well, anyway. the train shifted, and i was only leaning on a hand rail, so my weight shifted as well. i fell on top of a young woman, and yelled "shit!" but in my head, it was whispered. so the whole way to ronkonkoma station, everybody stared at me. i was the worst train ride i've ever been on. i should go dry my underpants.

brooklyn public library. the worst time to be here is now, around 3 or 4 o'clock when all the elementary and middle school kids get out, and come hang out. use the public computers for myspace.com. talk loudly over themselves, about shoes. i used to think that the library was a nice quiet place to sit down and read a book. i'm going back to long island tonight. my train leaves at 6:42 pm from flatbush to ronkonkoma. i feel very sick to my stomach. i was alright all day, really, until about an hour ago. i'm not happy. the events of my day are as follows: gregory and i woke from a banging on our door. the super. he came to fix the toilet and the shower leak. hoorah, right? wrong. i was stuck in the room, avoiding the commotion, for about two hours. the entire time, wishing i was taking a shower. i really had to use the toilet, too, but...there was no toilet. eventually, they finished up, but the faucet in the sink exploded water. and was smoking, sort of. we bathed, then got a cup of coffee at washington bagels. and here we are. greg, working on his comic. myself, dwelling on what a terrible trip back to long island i'm going to have. i'm not looking foward to it. i tried to think of what i'm really upset over. it's not my family, because i can't wait to sit and have a cup of coffee with all of them. it's not the doctors appointment, although it's a pretty serious visit. most likely resulting in surgery on my left breast, removing a cist. damn my cisty genes. so i came to the conclusion that it's not necessarily the trip itself, but more of my hatred for being alone. i hate being alone. i hate being alone on the train, i hate being alone on the bus, i hate being alone on the subway, and most of all, i hate being alone sleeping in bed at night. mike tells me that i should recognize that i don't need somebody else near me to make me happy. that i should realize that i am my own person. well, i know that. i am amanda bret labozetta. but for some silly reason, i prefer to be an extension of somebody else. i feel much more safe that way. jeff kennedy and nick came to visit last night. it was the first time i met nick. he's a nice person. and his cat is out-of-this-world adorable. i was so happy to see jeff's face. he made me laugh so hard that i cried. we live so close to eachother now, i'm glad. i love him. i'm watching the door to the auditorium right now, and the librarian who, moments ago, walked around the floor, waving a flyer about african dancing and suggesting everybody join, is participating. waving her arms around, scrunching her shoulders. it's amusing. made me smile for what feels like the first time today. but now i am not smiling anymore. i'm back to being sad and down on myself. i also had time to think of my trust in other people. i can trust a person very easily if they've never given me a reason not to. even if they've never given me a reason to trust them. but when that person betrays my trust, and hides things, i find it very difficult to trust that person again. i mean, i owe it to this person to trust them again, since it's already apparent in my actions that i do. very substantial things that i've done to make it seem that i have full conviction in this reinstated trust. but in my heart, i don't. i just can't let it go. for some reason, that small incident that caused my heart to sink completely into my stomach, it's still with me. if i had a belief in a higher power, i'd pray for the strength to trust a person after deceit. i have already found the strength to forgive. forgiving a person is the easy part. some days, i want to just disappear, and have nobody notice me anymore. somewhere, to the other side of the world. nobody would know my name. they'd say, "amanda who?" and i'd smile.

i am sitting at washington bagels at washington and dean st. greg is going to c-town up the block to get some groceries. the ketchup in front of me is watery and shaking with every tap of my keypad. it's repulsive. i just ate an entire egg and cheese sandwich, and i feel stuffed to the brim! things are going alright. last night, greg and i went to whiskey ward with mike campbell and i was very happy to sit down and have a couple gin & tonics with him, bryce, and dave. it's nice to go out every once in a while and bullshit with good people. i think the problem is, i had one too many gin & tonics, so we were very lucky to navigate our way home on the subway. (i guess you could say that we could have used the keychain compass that dave was trying to peddle to everybody at the bar. haha.) greg just got back, and tonight, i'm going to make pasta with faux-meat sauce. i love making him dinner. yesterday morning, i made him eggs. bird in a nest eggs. as well as oatmeal and a banana and juice. and he said it was the best breakfast he's ever eaten. speaking of eating...the black mouse ate the tan mouse. they must have faught. i'm thinking it's because the black one was significantly bigger than the tan one, and the tan one was agile enough to hop from the bottom of the tank to the mesh wire lid and crawl around upside-down on it. the black one was getting pissed, i guess. when i saw the carcass, and the black mouse gnawing on it, it reminded me of spirited away. when chihiro gets sucked in the cruddy mud of the spirit in the bath house. i'm not sure why. jeff kennedy is coming to see me today, since he's riding his bike in brooklyn, anyway. i hope he doesn't flake out, i really want to see him. we were on the phone for an hour or so last night. i was pretty drunk, and i don't remember much of the conversation. i just remember chugging a red stripe that was in the fridge. and crawling up next to greg after my drunken antics were through, when i realized that he was well into a deep sleep. i told him i have to be back at my parents house wednesday night into thursday afternoon for a doctors appointment, and i joked about how he's going to get some peace and quiet. he said, "so this means i'm going to have to fall asleep alone, and wake up alone?" and knowing greg, i thought following that would be a "sick!" or "damn bitch!" or something. but little did i expect him to really say, "that really upsets me." and he made his little sad face that makes me melt inside. he's walking home the groceries. i guess i should go catch up. ketchup.

so it has been approximately 6 days since we moved into the new place. everything is great. we finally got the bottom of greg's bed in. as well as a futon, and his green reclining chair. for guests. we are walking a lot, just examining our whereabouts. finding new and exciting places to eat. and be. there's a bagel place right on washington that has free wifi, which is great since we have no cable or internet. and they have great coffee and sun-dried tomato & olive spread. we went on a date in manhattan last night. it consisted of great chinese cuisine, and a failed attempt at catching "zodiac". we couldn't find a theatre that was playing it. we walked around a bit, and had a really nice time. the high e string on my guitar popped, in the middle of finishing up a song i was writing. i have about three loads of laundry to do, here at my parents house, before i go to pick greg up from his parents house. oh! beardlift played a show at rockstar bar on friday. it was great, just way too many people who thought they were better than everybody else. the williamsburg hipster douchebags. i worked the door, though, so i had authority! unfortunately, everybody who stepped in had the cash for the cover fee, and valid i.d. so i couldn't toss anybody, although i was sort of looking foward to it. they played so wonderfully, and their new song is even better than i expected. i'm glad that my love is the drummer of a great rock 'n' roll band. i just organized what is left of my records here, and remembered how much i miss having them. there is no food in the house, so i'm going to see what i can do to whip something up. i'm pretty hungry.