December 14, 1998.

"But virgins always get backstage no matter what they've got to say."
- tori amos

Had a nightmare last night that made me terribly lonely. When you can't sleep for awhile, it's such a comfort to wake up someone else and share you thoughts. But I never have nightmares when I'm playing host, and last night was no exception.

Creepy stuff, and it was blocked out in my head remarkably like a movie. Dramatic music, swelling crescendos, the whole bit. I was in a house, and could hear a familiar deep voice. A couple was in the kitchen; he had just killed someone, but that was okay. She was just depressed because she thought that he would kill her someday. I knew, in the way you know things in dreams without being told - that they were deeply committed to one another within the social world of the house. It was a little like a commune, and more than a little like the Manson family. Fittingly enough, I knew that the guy in the kitchen was the glam rocker himself.

Hearing this, I knew that I had to escape before he killed me. So I crept past the kitchen and towards the door, holding a hatchet as protection. I was tense as hell, and they were watching me. Marilyn started toward me.

"Wouldn't you like to suck my cock instead of leaving?"

To which I responded,

"I'd rather live."

But he kept edging towards me, and we both knew that I was letting myself be charmed; that I was going to give him the axe.

Which I did.

I started crying. Instead of tense, I was utterly terrified. He knicked my hand with the edge of the axe, and I started bleeding. I closed my eyes and sank to the floor, waiting for the end. Just darkness from then on in. I woke up when the fellatio began. But I knew that as soon as he was done, he was going to bisect the crown of my head with the axe.

I couldn't sleep for an hour.

I finished my Fairie Queene essay today. Extremely mixed feelings about that. I've been working on the research for the past month or so, a task that mostly involved reading incredibly dense papers by people who seem incapable of saying anything simply. One of the reasons I'm not getting my masters, you know - I simply don't have the necessary fiber to produce turgid academic prose at this level. My great talent lies in summary, which gets me into problems in academia, but will be a vast strength in highschool teaching.

But I've been buried in the stuff forever, and while it was absolutely crucial for my confidence - writing an essay on the Faerie Queene is very very daunting - it allowed me to hibernate in the ideas of others. It was very difficult actually writing this essay, as I wanted to hide forever.

But I did. I handed it in this evening and that's that. I suspect that it's a typical Amoret paper - full of interesting ideas and rather lacking in excruciating analysis - but that's okay. As Amoret, I couldn't write any other kind.

Had a hilarious time at my cousin's 12th birthday party last night. I always feel like an outsider at these things - my family is so depressingly normal - so I managed to convince the Boy to accompany me. Did the usual family things: kissed a lot of relatives, ate decently prepared food, answered general questions about my life, watched others play the new Star Wars video game, cooed over the new baby and watched my brother wrestle a bunch of little boys in rapid succession.

My brother was actually the highlight of this experience for me, which is rare. I mean, I love my brother and he amuses the hell out of me, but he usually maintains a lot distance. My mother and I are the impulsive, emotional ones; he and my dad are the cold, logical ones. So seeing him engaged with us so fully was...well, hilarious. The pinnacle of the night came in a series of fuzeball games that pitted my brother against me and the Boy...and left me laughing so hard that I had to stop playing more than once. I was actually vaguely nauseous from laughter, which hasn't happened in...well, forever. A long time.

We lost, and we lost pathetically. I mean, two against one is a humiliating defeat. The Boy attributes it to the balance of Italianess...he claims that when he is the most Italian at the fuzeball table, the results are a little more balanced. If he's right, than although I'm more Italian that him, what it translates to is female helplessness. Not a good quality to have in a teammate.

But funny as hell.