It's hard to start over again. Especially in these times and I can see that it is only getting worse with all of the things on the interweb.
The photos, the immature blog posts, all that ego with no real goal. Floating around, little symbols. Everything you thought people wanted to know about you right at that time.
So here it is.
I pay $4.95 a month for this so I am going to use it and when I pressed "ok" to delete the remnants of my past life, I hesitated, but barely.
I used to love Bratmobile and Soundgarden. I used to like Pearl Jam and Nine Inch Nails. I used to hate Billy Corgan out loud but secretly owned the two disc Melancholy and the Infinite Sadness, it was an anthem to my life for a good week, maybe two and it no doubt cost a weeks worth of lunch money.
My mom says now that I used to look like a cancer patient back when most of my hair was shaved off but I think it was more my weight than the hair. I agree now but there was a lot going on back then compounded by my youthful inability to see the future of any kind.
I write just like I did when I was 15, messy with embellished arrows pointing to new paragraphs, afterthoughts (remember that store) and diagonal lines. I used to think this was a brilliant technique because people looking over my shoulder at school or coffee shops could not decipher it. Since you are reading this on the screen you cannot know, but take my word, it is an art. And the culmination of all these years of repetition is comforting, like Fiona Apple in big Sony headphones and a good cry or a long drive by yourself with OK Computer.
I am lying in bed looking at a good luck cat from Chinatown with its battery operated hand moving back and forth like a silent metronome. I wonder if it is bad luck to buy a good luck item for yourself or if it just brings no luck at all.
I will listen to The Smiths today because like any self-respecting Mexican-American wannabe artist I like to wallow. If only for short periods of time. I will likely snap out of it around Unhappy Birthday and I will watch Oprah because when you rarely get the opportunity to watch Oprah you have to take it and it's been an unspoken sick-day ritual for me for years now. The only way this perfect day can be ruined is if Dr. Oz is on or if they interrupt the show with a swine flu panicked reporter. How many times can one person say pandemic in one 1:30 minute piece?
I tried to make a 90's rock playlist but the metal got in the way and I wasn't sure where to draw the pop/rock line. It just got so complicated like all things do. So the list went the way of my 5th grade piano lessons and I gave up.
When Clueless first came out I didn't see the appeal of Paul Rudd but I do now, his consistency is admirable even if his iTunes celebrity playlist is shit.
I got really ambitious right now and rolled out of bed. Now I am sitting at my desk typing leaving my notebook with one more unfinished idea. I opened up iTunes and tried to put on Radiohead for sentimental melancholic effect and then a window popped up saying "The song 'The Tourist' could not be used because the original file could not be found." I grab my external hard drive and bring it up to my ear and hear the worst sound I have ever heard, I believe what I am hearing is the death click. A slow and sharp click , like a person on a breathing machine or a car that won't start. All along my computer and people have been telling me back up your music, back up your music, Veronica, back, up, your, music, my 10,000 songs, my whole life, and apparently it was not safe there either.
I might be starting over for real. With just half-full iPods, snippets, catchy choruses and burned CDs.
I have never been so scared in my life. Erasure is playing in the background mocking me, one of the hundred songs that seems to have survived is A Little Respect and I take little solace.
