if you think you're it ...

jesus.

it's been a long time since i've taken stock of where i am. i didn't even have a welcome-home party when i got back to san francisco. that seems wrong to me, as if i am not really here without that ridiculously-important ritual. richard and i were joking today about how i should have one when i'm ready, even if it's in a year. some people will not have even realized that i've been here the whole time, so when i say that i got home in march, they will just nod and say welcome back.
maybe i was just afraid that no one would show up.
it's really hard for me to come to terms with some aspects of my life here in san francisco. such as the friends that i've lost. even if they are still in some semblance of my life, they are far away. even if they live down the street, i can't touch them. it feels wrong, bad, unfixable. and then there are the ways that i cut myself off from people, from everyone. i've been cranky and isolated and unreachable, by choice. i've been sick with the flu and sick with hermit-y fetal-positions.
right now i am sitting in a closed and locked bookstore, listening to the luxurious 5-disc CD changer (and it DOES feel luxurious. what is an ipod, anyway?) and refusing to budge. there is something romantic and calming about having this much access to books, but in some ways it makes me kind of crazy with wanting. sigh.
but i can hear every word of what people say as they pass by the locked door. that glass wall seems to amplify. laughing upwardly-mobile-types drink their way past to the next bar, walking out of the corner store when they don't have the organic type of american spirits, as the badass woman who works there barely looks at their exit, but yells "have a nice night! goodbye!" after me as i leave, as if she could not possibly send me enough happy welcome-ness. i could still hear her a few doors down.
so, whatever. "i'm lonely as can be..." the beatles sing. kimya dawson says she needs more time to think. "if i wanna leave you better let me go ... "liz phair demands. and i nod and keep typing