i am home for the holidays. thanksgiving happened on thanksgiving day at my dad's house; it will happen tomorrow at my mom's. the most tension of my trip home has yet to come. i will encounter my step-dad, jim, tomorrow at my mom's house. i really do not care for him. we got into a huge fight last thanksgiving. i have yet to be able to forgive him....

today was not a very good day. i woke up and went shopping with my dad and debbi. when we got home, my dad and i played frisbee outside for a while. sometime after that, my day began to fill with anxiety. i don't really know why i became so anxious. i have tried to calm myself down, but i am afraid sleep is what i need..

two people told me that i scare them today--one being linda. she says that i scare her "not in a bad way, just in a not so sure about anything anymore kind of way." i haven't talked to her since she sent me that email. i'm kind of interested to see what's going on in her mind. i've kind of been feeling the same way today...anxious about our situation. i think we are still on the same page....

i'm off to read more of "stone butch blues," then to bed...

she took it well. her only reaction was "oh, i understand." to which i responded, "you DO?" "i mean, i'm not GAY, but i understand." laughs broke my tension.

coming out to my sister was painless. i'm leaving in about an hour and a half for nashville, where i will first meet a friend for dinner. after that, debbi and i will see each other for the first time with her knowing i'm a lesbian. hopefully it won't be too akward of an experience.

i am falling. falling into the mouth of something so big that i can hardly wait to get to the bottom. for--the bottom holds the key to happiness. let me explain. i've been thinking a lot about volcanos. my life as a volcano. my life thus far has been spent climbing to the top of the volcano. each time the volcano erupts, i must run back down to safety from the blazing fires. finally i stand at the top of the monster, peering down into its mouth, wondering what it holds for me. i begin to fall in. not scared. for, the person sucking me in is beautiful. she brings me strength in demanding a place for myself, and our love, in the world that up until now has caused me to retreat. our love will heat the eruptions of my life's volcano from within its mouth. i will no longer have to run from the eruption, for love has found me and i have found love. love brought me into this world as who i am. i will no longer hide my identity because this world wants me to, and linda has shown me that. thank you linda...

"real is what we make it," she tells me. i exit this day wondering what is being made...

ok so the past few days haven't been all that swell, but i finally said all the things that i needed to say to linda. the high points of the conversation are as follows:

she said that she has no doubt that if i were in boston that we would be together..."serious together."

she told me that the girl that she has been "dating" has $20 on it--it being that linda and i will start a serious relationship the next time that we see each other.

she asked me why tennessee wasn't closer to boston and why i wasn't a senior.

the other night she was talking about how she'd take me to a club so that cute girls could hit on me. i told her that all i could think was how i didn't want other cute girls to hit on me--that she was enough.

she told me about how she had been wanting to have this conversation with me for a while, but she could never get the nerve. she was glad that i was able to bring it up.

she said that she didn't know where exactly this left us....

i might add some more bits of the conversation tomorrow. i am eager to get into my bed and think about her while i fall asleep.

my emotions are currently ruling my life. i have so many, yet i am unable to understand any of them. i feel so unsettled.

my sister is flying into nashville in a week and a half. we will spend the night at sewanee on wednesday night and head home for thanksgiving dinner early thursday morning. we will come back to sewanee sunday night. her flight leaves monday afternoon. i'm very nervous about her coming. see i am not out to any of my family. this is a problem because my existance at sewanee revolves heavily around my sexuality. i have pride paraphanalia in many places. i am so tired of hiding my true self from my family. i refuse to disquise my life. how will she take it?

the linda thing is becoming confusing as hell. she is the sweetest thing in the world, but i do not want to fall for her with such distance between us. i want to make sure that my falling for her is real--not something that would crash if we were together. what to do?

one of my professors (a clinical psychologist) asked me the other day if the situation with my brother was getting in the way of my studies. she said that she noticed a huge drop in my participation/performance since he left for rehab. it is disturbing that someone noticed. she advised me to make an appointment with a psychologist to talk things through.

i wish reality would stop biting me in the ass...

i am 21 and am legally having my first beer (a 40 heineken) as i am typing....

i went to chattanooga today with my good friend, mitch. i got some new clothes that i'm excited about wearing this week. i am also excited about tuesday at 11 am, for that is when i will turn in this HARD ass research methods test. it is an open note/open book test, but that only means that the teacher is justified in putting whatever the hell he wants to on it. and he did just that. its probably the hardest test i've ever had....

i'm really happy that the test is due on my birthday. it will make the majority of the day so nice because i will move from 100% stress to complete relaxation. i don't even have class on wednesday.

until then...

yesterday, i got two packages in the mail from linda. they contained burnt cd's with the letters 'h, a, p, p, y, b, i, r, t, h' in the cases. so i finally got to talk to her today to tell her how she made my day. i asked her where my 'day' was. to this, she simply asked me if i got them on the same day. in amazement, i asked her if i was supposed to get them on separate days. she said yes. this is when i nearly pee'ed my pants. how adorable is this? so my 'day' is coming in the mail with more cd's (i'm guessing) on monday. she told me that she had long conversations with the guy at mailboxes, etc. about when the packages would arrive. HOW CUTE?! the rest is coming in the mail this week.

i just want to give her a huge kiss. too bad she's 20 some odd hours away...:(

i saw cary pierce, last night. i was/am a huge fan of his defunct band, jackopierce--not as big a fan of him, solo. but he played a lot of old jacko songs, which was a very nice surprise.

i had a great day today--did good on my political science test, did ok on my latin quiz, and my neuropsychology class was cancelled. petya and i went to the blue chair today to get some lunch/coffee around two. the rest of my day was filled with petya, petya, and even more petya. we hung out with virtually no break from 2 until 9--very fun. petya has pictures of our fun up on her site. check them out!

i have a lot of stuff going on in my life at the present:

1. the ex: talked to her today and told her that i wasn't sure if it was a good idea for her to come see me. she was taken aback by this, so i explained that i would feel one of two things upon seeing her--either anger about how wrong she did me or a yearning to be affectionate w/her. opposites, but both are bad. i don't think that i want to deal with either of them now, but it would be nice to see her.

2. linda: talked to her last night and emailed with her today: she is looking at tickets to come see me next weekend. she asked me if i still needed a date to mountain top ball. we had a 2 hour conversation the other night, which was nice. it felt as though we were in a relationship already. odd. i'm a little sketchy about her coming to see me as well. she would stay in my room, which might bring about some physical interactions. hm...then back to being 20 hrs from her? can i handle that afterwards? i need to remain in this healthy emotional state for as long as possible.

3. school work: i have a test tomorrow, one due sunday night, and another due tuesday morning. ah.

4. birthday: tuesday is my b-day. the big 21!!

i saw melissa ferrick last night in atlanta. anne heaton and edie carey opened for her. the entire show was incredible. i love live music--especially when it involves hot female guitarists!

petya and i had a cocktail in the middle of the afternoon today. it was fabulous--milk, amaretto, and vodka. i think petya called it a white italian. if she ever calls me, petya and i are going to watch a hot lesbian flick tonight, gia. until later....

yes, it has been two months since that last post. to catch up, i am hardly talking to my ex these days. she did not end up coming to see me the week after that post; however, she says that she is coming this weekend. we'll see how that turns out...

my night has been as spontaneous as a night can be: drew and i ran in to each other in the library and decided to meet in my room around 10.30 to play nintendo (i think it may be how i compensate for my penis-envy). we played for about 45 min then called colt to see if he wanted to join us. the three of us played for some time and then decided to head to pop's. i messaged petya to see if she'd like to come with us...so the four of us make a midnight run to this nearby truckstop. we had a 'happy' time eating and talking. i love nights like this--when i am not expecting anything and the night turns out to be a memorable one.

i've realized lately that i am tired of being gay. i think i am going to lay low for a while and try not to engulf myself into too many activist roles. since my last post, i have represented the gay-straight alliance at a luncheon at the women's center, helped coordinate activities for national coming out day, and been a panelist on "what matters" at sewanee by talking about homophobia. just last week, a newspaper article on the panel came out. this article outed me to whoever in sewanee happened to read the paper. i just need a break.

i'm tired now, so i'm gonna head to bed. thank petya for lighting the fire under my ass to start journaling again :)