sometimes I like to think that stars are precarious stacks of beer bottles puncturing the dark carpet of night. or perhaps exceptionally long knitting needles. regardless, I always like to see more of them, rather than less. (I’ve seen so many on too few occasions.)

before he moved my family to suburbia when I was four years old, my father was house hunting throughout the bay area. He told my aunt that all he wanted in a home was to be able to see the stars at night.

more than anything else in my life, I want to realize this forgotten dream.

I recently regained possession of my journal spanning from October 8, 1995 through February 19, 1996. This is the first entry of said journal (verbatum):

Sunday 10/8/95

Hello! Well, assuming you’ve read my last diary, I basically left in a whirl of emotions. Never mind. Well in the past five or so days, so many things have changed, but yet no one can accept the differentces, and everyone is living their life as expected. no one really talked about the changes. Except for me and Katie. I think we are the most aware of everything that has happened, probably since we are the main changes. Anyways, I guess I should talk about the changes I’ve been blabbering on about this entire page.

Well, after Tuesday, I had basically decided that my life wasn’t mine, but that I’ll deal with it, grin and bear it. I’d do what was expected and hope that everything went away. Katie and I walked with everyone else to school, but broke off so we could drop off our stuff. We went around greeting people, but soon we were with the skaters. I don’t really know them and didn’t feel right. I saw Erika, Emily and Fred, decided that anything was better than this and went to say hello. Then I decided that I needed to talk to Humphrey and get some advice. Fred came with me and asked me what was the matter. Well, knowing that she was one of the ones pissed off at me, I decided that it didn’t matter and just kinda told her that I knew what’s been goign on in their minds and how if I don’t eat with them I can’t be their friends. She said that that wasn’t true. Humphrey didn’t tell me much but to follow my heart. Katie told me to do what I wanted, not what she wanted, not what Emily wanted, but what I wanted. So I did. At lunch, I went to Humphrey. I sat down, ate my lunch and chatted with the Humphrey-goers. Basically, I ate lunch with them,. As soon as I was finished, though, I upped and left. Away to the parking lot I went with Alyssia, Ana and Katie. Ahhhh, the smell of cigarettes. Ana’s matches were failing, so Jeff (a senior) came over with a lighter. Alyssia lit it and took an inhale and offered it to me. Soon after, with all eyes, including Jeff’s (he wouldn’t leave), I smoked my first cigarette. It was ok. Not really disgusting at all. Katie was actually tempted. But she didn’t. I was really glad. I finally did it. In History, Emily and Erika ignored the fact that I left with Alyssia at lunch. Jason helped my breath with some tic tacs. The next day, we went at lunch, but couldn’t get the necessary fire. After school, Steve and Jeff gave me and Alyssia rides home, unfortunately, Alyssia was dropped off first which made things a little uncomfortable, considering I had just met them the day before. But it was ok. Oh Friday, I went over to Katie’s after school and then we went to Lyon’s for dinner with Bryan and Mike. Bryan stabbed himself with a toothpick. It was really enjoyable. They are the coolest. We walked over to Blockbuster and discovered where Jeff works. Amusing huh? On Saturday, Katie and I went to a soccer game, Dave’s team against Zach’s. Mike’s on Zach’s team. Zach’s team won. I enjoyed it. There were some nice-looking guys on Dave’s team. I didn’t enjoy seeing Dave again. But that’s ok. That night Natalie and I spent the night at Katie’s and rented Billy Madison. From Blockbuster. Katie went to get it but he was there. Never mind. Anyway, that was fun. This morning, I went to Katie’s soccer game and then out to Friday’s and to the mall. It was Bryan’s birthday (15!) and we were goign to take him somewhere but he couldn’t. We bought hair dye, and I dyed mine this evening. Blue. It’s not noticable at all, but I tried. I thought it would be incredibly bright. I don’t know if Katie did hers (green) or not. Anyways, time for bed.

–Susie J.

…I’ll always keep my hair in curlers even though I’ve never needed any in the first place. I’ll be three tons, fourteen ounces, and I’ll smoke like a chimney. And not just that tobacco junk. I’ll wear mumus covered in paint and I’ll pretend that the lines between my canvas and the walls are blurry so that I blend right into a whirlwind of paint.

But when I’m a really really old lady…

I’ll be so pathetic and yet so high profile that the community will send a poor, unsuspecting teenager in to keep me company. He probably got in trouble for lighting some shit on fire on the first day of high school and got all the administrative staff worried. So they’ll send him to me in hopes that I’ll be able to straighten him out the way elderly people do. And I’ll pounce on him, as desperate as I am for company. But I won’t force him to look at photo alblums. No, not photo alblums in this day in age. He will get to go through my Gmail Inbox with me, reminiscing about past email conversations and fan mail. He’ll learn so much about the origins of spam mail, and, most specifically, about my astrological destiny over the years according to astrology.com–which surely will be a leading Internet giant by then.

Yes, we’ll go over each and every day’s daily horoscope. I’ll tell stories about how apt certain days were to my life, and how off others were. “Sonny, here they say that on July 8th, 2005, I’m to meet my true love. But somehow I missed that bus…but here, on August 25th, 2005, it was totally true that there were ominous rumblings coming from my coworkers. And if only I’d listened to my wise daily horoscope!! For the revolution did rise up. And it bit me in the ass.”

Yes, those will be the days!