Tonight I looked through my various DVD's and decided I didn't want to watch any of them: I moved down to the videotapes and found Three of Hearts. When I pulled out the inner cassette, I saw it was one that I'd dubbed myself, and upon sticking it in the V.C.R., the film's preview came on. The sound had an auditorium-like echo quality to it. I'd manipulated it long ago, which I'd long since forgotten, but it was instantly familiar. I knew I did it, and I even knew the nuances of the events that would occur, although years had passed since I'd last seen them. And then I started thinking about the life that was... when I was back in Kentucky, spending all my days trapped at the video store.
That life seems so different from now, and yet so similar. Now I find myself trapped in my own apartment, tethered by work, but lacking the familial interaction that at least Kentucky provided. Not having Jay around to pass the evening time, I find myself constantly on the phone with Jamie, waiting for his next real life visit.
I miss going out. I miss interaction, but it's remarkable how incapacitated I feel to change it. I used to know how to make friends, but lately it seems I've forgotten. How could a film's preview of many years ago be familiar, yet something practiced far more often, making friends, be so alien?
The one friend I did have in recent months decided dick, and the quest for it, was more important. I couldn't pin him down to even have dinner; the quest for random sex held greater appeal. Another guy I met at the cowboy bar talked to me all during the night, but he never called to follow up afterwards. I felt like a fool for kissing him, even at his request. I knew it wasn't going anywhere when it was happening, but with Jamie's facetious suggestion that I do so, I thought perhaps I could give away a little to reel him in, just to have someone tangible in my life.
I know that was stupid and I know Jamie wasn't sincere, but the desire to have people in my life beyond fast food and grocery clerks is so strong, I thought perhaps it might work. I hate being trapped here, and even today I noticed that the problem's compounded in unobvious ways.
Coming back from the bank at 4:30 this afternoon, my mom kept talking on my cell phone until I made it inside. She asked if I'd locked the doors, and then I realized her constantly doing that, making sure I made it home safely and got securely inside, was enforcing the idea that this is fortress, or better yet, a prison. I mean, it was 4 o'clock in the afternoon and still I had to return home and "lock the doors"?
Incredibly, I'm not miserable all the time, and tonight, walking through the apartments here, I found myself wondering about the lives of those inside. All so similar, yet so different, and all so egocentric. I never think about them, and they never think about me... except when one of us that does something which effects the other directly. How are we all so similar yet so different? So connected yet so separate? Things to ponder.
So life goes on. I play my Nintendo GameCube to pass the time. I talk to Jamie on the phone until he next arrives. I'm hoping an infusion of cash from working so hard will be the catalyst for change, but I don't have the answers and that frustrates me. All I know is that things will change. There's no stopping, and no doubt about, that.
