rinue | I've forgotten.

I have spent the past two weeks angry about something, and I don't know what or who it is. I watch Wrath of Khan and Clash of the Titans, embroider obsessively, and crave cola -- three clear and blatant warning signs. I am furious, and it exhausts me; I am cruel to the people I love, unable to be sure it is not them who wronged me.

It's confusing, and so the rage has turned inward until it sickens me. Val says my stomach, my center, is a weathervane for my moods; I am so nauseated and dizzy that I can scarce walk a straight line.

The symptoms are psychosomatic; I recognize them from the end of Raine, the end of Thomas. Only no one has left me this time.

Who do I hate so much?

It's been a rough month, certainly. Enough to bleed onto the screen while I yell "pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!" It's been all rough months since summer. I am often happy through sheer force of will and good company, but we all know I don't belong here. Last year was easier, when I thought I liked Dallas as a permanent home, but now I know it is just Clinton House that I love. Even Arts Magnet is changing, the building to be torn down and rebuilt.

I think I've broken up with Dallas. Permanently. It defaulted on me too many times, until I lost my imagination -- a mortal blow to a dreamer of dreams.

I am sitting here trying to write this journal entry, and mostly I stare at the screen for hours. I've been blanking whenever I try to write lately. I can do it in my head, but when I face a computer screen I can't string the words together. Paragraphs built to match each other don't flow, and I scramble entries, drop narratives, forget to mention important eurekas.

The Parents joke that I have a midlife crisis at least once a year. I don't think they understand how often I die. I live in one place an average of one year, one city an average of two; I reinvent myself more often than that. Dozens of have said "I don't know who you are"; others embrace the myth but not the person.

Nobody ever asks how I am doing. I couldn't tell them anyway.

I looked down a few nights ago, and my forearms were riddled with scars. They were still pink -- slim, delicate cuts, different patterns and ages. I stared at them for hours. "I guess you forget," I said, "when you see them every day."

That was a dream.

The fact that I look in the mirror and see other people isn't.