For a brief moment I went and logged into my other account, but adding an entry to it seemed a little herectic- such an old and complete record really shouldn't be disturbed and it seemed like a waste anyway, what with this entire account made already designated specifically to Portland events.

Kind of a buzz kill that I never use it, but whatever. Anyway, I'm back, once again, but with a different motivation and intention than before. You see, I've learned a few things- allow me to cover each one in a little detail.


The first lesson is what I've come to call The Rule Of Travel: You can't get to where you want instantly. There is always going to be a passage of time between you figuring out what you want and getting it.

That's a no-brainer, right? If we all could get what we wanted the moment we thought about it then I'm sure existence would have been undone a while ago- and the very moment before it did I'm sure there would have been naked women and gold and giant subway sandwiches filling it to the brim.

The statement is simple but the concept can get complicated. That passage of time is the key variable; it could be anything to " a few minutes" to "infinite"-  basically "never."

Which is where working at something comes into play.

Work is what will cut that time down from never into something relatively possible. Planning, thinking of a strategy to get to your goal ticks that "travel time" down even farther. Every second you work on that specific goal is another step closer you get to it- another tiny reason to not give up on it, not turn back and throw that progress away.

But our time is limited- at best you'll have another century of time to invest. It's best to think of what you want, figure out how much time it's going to take to get there, and how far along you've gotten.

Just be sure never to forget where you're going while you're on the way!

Bare them
Sevens
Three to a pall....
 

So, I've found that I'm no longer talking about inane things in this journal, and that's because I don't think the tiny aspects of my life are worth talking about or even archiving. Instead it's looked like I've made this the place where I do my research- and weigh in on what I've found and what I think of it.

This is a piece from my next project. I think you'll be able to tell the topic.

http://onemansblog.com/2006/10/24/the-makeup-myth/

You see every once in awhile, the inevitable post. It can start innocently, talking about someone's day, or some random subject, before it swings full tilt, driving right up to the dead end question:

Does anybody even read this?

You do, of course, otherwise you wouldn't even notice. And depending on this person, as you scroll to the bottom, you'll see their comment bar bulging with reassurances of that person's audience. You might even be the one to click that "comment" link .

For years, one of my questions has been "does it matter if anyone does?" I found the answer today, and it's surprising.

According now to journalists, the divide has become clear. Welcome to the new generation.

This is a subject of both incredible importance and uncertainty; the idea is so new that an official name hasn't been decided on.

But the appearance of such a need to name this change is testament enough to its importance.

What are the characteristics that have set us apart from our parents?

being the stars of our own lives, for one.

This is the answer I was searching for. Why we feel this need to think that we need to fill up the blank box with text. Why we speak into cameras, tell people what's on our mind.

Because there is always an audience listening and watching, whether we think there is or not. It could be to those who have friended us, those who just happened to pass through- or even ourselves, when we are older.

All in all, nothing we say is unimportant- even the most inane posts are valuable in the future, because they place light on what was important when the post was made, like snapshots.

These times are revolutionary; these ideas, the ability to be vulnerable but strong, to bare all and be ourselves without mind to what others say, it's amazing, and it's changing the world with every year that passes.

But is that really a good thing? It really depends on how old you are, and if you understand. To not have secrets, to place those private things in the open and let them go, despite what others say, is a blessing and a curse.

I still have trouble letting go of it all- I still like to think about what I'm going to say before I say it; my modesty, my sense that my opinion is something people will neither appreciate or want, is clear. I guess I'm old fashioned like that. Or maybe I'm just afraid of getting a black mark from those who don't agree; which is silly, if you really know me.

It seems like we're all in this together; society will lump us into one category when our time is done.

Do you want to be proud of what we've done or deny responsibility?

I guess it'll come down to what you wrote here.

Let's stop this talk of privilege
Because the songs that we sing are as much a product of our privilege as
The clothes on my back
And the phone call I made to my mom last night.

Let's stop this talk of action
Because action comes easy it's the moments just before that are hard
When I've got to get my voice and my fist on the same page as my heart...

I think that it's better to just not have to deal with customers in your job.

But I don't think my reasons for thinking so are the same as everyone else's.

People speak and tell the most terrible stories of their worst customers, the worst times they've had dealing with them, but on the other end of the coin there are just as many instances of bad employees fucking up on their job and being just as rude and spiteful.

It's a cooperation thing that sadly can't always be so equal.

The scales, it seems, are weighted more on the end of the employers to get away with being douchebags to customers. In fact, it's almost an element of business itself.

When you're a customer, you have the option of going somewhere else. You have the option to complain, and you even can have the ear of someone to complain to.

But if you notice, the only places you could really do that are at the lowest rungs. Minimum wage workers. Food service. The very places where most of these terrible stories occur.

Now come try and complain to me, an apartment manager, if you don't like something. You can't. Because I can ruin your life.

I'm not here to serve you. I'm here to serve the people who graciously allow you to live on their property.

Do you know why customers can treat people in low level service jobs like shit? Because they're the ones who need something, and you're the one who provides it. Here, we're the ones who have something. You're the one who needs it.

Can you think of any jobs that aren't entry level, low wage, that follow the same demand structure? In other words, how many services, how many products, are there simply to serve you?

How many places out there have you serve them? Now think about how many more of those outnumber the first.

The insurance industry, the car industry, the real estate industry, the electric company, oil companies, Telecommunications providers, the entire system of capitalism itself is geared not to serve anyone but to rather survive by sucking on the sweet juices its working host (the people) can produce. And like a parasite, what happens when those juices run dry? It abandons the host.

This machine of commerce and industry grinds forward, mashing up anyone with a weak wallet, stripping them of all they have before discarding them, making a slime trail of wrecked lives and poverty in a great unseen wash, and all of those pieces, those people who are not fuel for the machine but rather the very moving parts can do nothing but avert their eyes from what they have been a part of, knowing full well that it could very well be them that could wither and be run through next.

There is no room for humanity in this machine. Every year here they have awards given out to the best apartment managers, these great things of prestige. I think about it now, and I wonder: what makes a good manager? It has to be going that extra mile for your tenants, that drive to make sure that everything in your complex, your community, runs smoothly and with cooperation.

Of course, that's what the criteria is on the brochures they hand out. But the awards themselves? They go to those who maximize profits. The ones who leading the tide of rent raising, the ones who can move someone out who was paying one price and move another person in three days later to the same place for 200 dollars more each month, and do it again, and again, and again.

And you're supposed to be proud to receive such attention from your peers.

To go that extra mile for tenants, by the way, is actually against the rules. Fair Housing laws, those amendments signed in to make everyone equal and provide opportunities for everyone, are instead just used as a perfect reason why the entire industry can no longer allow people to make any mistakes at all in their tenancy. Nothing, absolutely nothing, can be done other than what strict policies meant to "protect" the company and the employee tell them they can and cannot do.

This of course doesn't just apply to my job. It's laws like this that gave us such wonderful rules like "Do not try to apprehend any shoplifters or robbers" when I worked at Ralphs Grocery.

It's why someone can go in there and fill up a cart full of merchandise and walk right out without paying. As soon as they step out the door, anyone who follows them will be fired.

http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070829/NEWS01/70829023

Why is this happening? For one, the legal system has refined itself through trail and error over so many years that it's too much of a liability for anyone to interfere but those with specialized training and experience. (and a bigger legal team)

But more importantly it's because in this great machine of economy having a moral code, having guilt or any humanity is a defect. Companies want employees who are precise, unthinking, and uncompromising. Anything other than that means lost profits for the top tier people who own the company. This is why large corporations are evil. This is why we have companies who can make our own military seem forgiving.

I only bring this up to remind you that you're fucked.


Whatever job you're working at, whatever good you think you're doing, you're fucked, because either you're being fucked over by customers or you're taking part in fucking them over.

The real question is:

Which makes you feel less like scum?

People sometimes tell me, "Hey, Talon! Where have you been? What have you been up to?"

...okay, so nobody does that, because all the usual ways I could be found on the internet are no more, or visited infrequently.

Rest assured, however, that I have not died.

Where have I been, then?

Well, let me tell you about a little place I like to call my Internet Home. My own grubby little corner of the net.

It's called Bored And Lonely, an IRC channel me and a friend made nearly three years ago for no reason. At the time, there were two people, just me in him.

Now we have a cast of about 12 regulars and have had twice as many people just coming in and out. we have our own dedicated stats page with somebody to talk to online at almost any time. It's really like Cheers you stay around long enough and everybody will know your name.

For being so small (most IRC channels are like, 20-30 people) we're actually one of the more active channels on the network; there is rarely any drama and most of the time we just link each other weird shit from the internet and laugh over things.

With the channel the way it is, I really don't need to go anywhere else. Of course, I do miss out on old friends...but that can be remedied quickly.

Why don't you come on by and have a chat?

we're located on:

irc.furnet.org
#boredandlonely

see ya

A long journey down; disappointment at every stop. Now, at the destination, it continues.

Comic Con has turned into something else entirely; it's simply gotten far too big. Too many people. Too much stuff.

Still, many of the things, the small traditions forged over the years, remain the same.

It is far too terrible in my mind to be here and knowing that I'm not going to participate. The cycle is broken, and with it, my resolve to come back.

I hate California. My friends here (save for the ones I try to talk to regularly) are ignorant and uninspired. The days here are short; the weather terrible.

It's a good and great thing that I didn't come here for pleasure. This time, this entire trip, I have to admit, is just an obligation. Promises forged with trust that I can't break. Too many people depending on my assets.

I don't have to enjoy this. It's simply a matter of duty.

But I don't think I'll be coming back- there are much better conventions, much closer, to attend.

being responsible for yourself is a lot of work: it takes what I would consider a ginger step and a chess-like ability to think three moves ahead. I come back from a week of rather depressing reminders (as well as a few good times) of why San Diego just never really felt like home.

Of course, for the first time I got homesick- I certainly missed my apartment up on the tree-filled hill, and my job.

It's been three days and boy, I don't miss em anymore...but surprisingly, I don't hate it either.

This one week away was just enough of an open opportunity for life to come along and try to bone me as hard as possible- since I got back I found out a few things that made my blood pressure rise a little:

-by the end of this month I was supposed to have 480 dollars to cover a 150 dollar rent as well as a 170 dollar insurance bill.

24 hours later, I find that the 380 dollars is looking more like 160 dollars, and my rent is shooting right back up to 650.

Say it with me now: ffffffffffffffffffuuuuuuuuuuck. I now have a week and a half to figure out where I'm going to make 500 dollars magically appear.

Borrowing money looked like my only option, until I went and reviewed the state of a loan account that I had been paying for the past few months; there, gleaming innocently, was 650 dollars, all mine, completely ready to save my ass.

I do a few arm-pistons and only spend ten minutes going FUCK YEAH.

The end of this month's crisis has been averted and fresh money is going to start flowing in halfway through next month- already I'm doing my figures in my head and dividing it to feed a few hungry bills that will show up around that time, as well as feed myself, and Oki, and the truck, and the cat...

Because in this particular game, it's all about thinking ahead.

...well he finally got it right...

The game has changed once more in the past few days but I've taken it all in stride.

I've garnered a new promotion at Cambridge- now working in the heart of downtown in these new lovely tax-credit apartments, which is a definite change of pace. With that of course comes a whole lot more hours, which will be added to the regular hours I already do at my apartment complex.

To make time for this I've quit my other job. Goodbye soul-degrading call survey work! My love/hate relationship with you has come to a close.

Working down here is different: I've become a paper-jockey, making copies and doing filing and signing forms; which is different from the raccoon wrangling I do back at my place.

It's a lot more complicated, too: the tax credit stuff means that everybody here who wants an apartment (and they sure are swanky) has to fill our some ten or twelve forms per person, which means we have to keep track of it all and make sure all the i's are dotted and the t's crossed, so to speak.

Which means very little or no downtime, exceptions excluded to the ten minutes or so that I've gotten to write this here entry. I doubt I'll ever have time like this again, for at least here.

Next week, as some of you know, I'll be down south again to ye olde stomping grounds- The Sandy Eggo awaits- frankly I'm care more about having that week off and it's effect on my finances than all the people I left behind (take that whichever way you want, friends.)

As for my feeling on this new direction my job is taking- I like it. Downtown is a neat place to work at: people are interesting, the food here is varied and range from expensive (sit down resturant) to dirt-cheap (roach coach) as well as having the wonderful advantage of being right next door to the coolest coffee shop in town (Backspace) and the best bar/arcade (Ground Kontrol) makes lunch breaks vastly more interesting.

For instance: walking around today some guy came up and asked me "What tribe are you in?" I kind of drew a blank. Did the guy really think I was Native American?

I seem to get that alot around here. It's weird, but I don't think the kind of mexican I am (from the middle provinces- Chihuahua and all that) travel this far up to be common. It's kind of odd but pretty funny.

Also seeing mounted police. That's pretty funny.

Anyway my break is up- I gotta get back into the thick of it.

This one is dedicated to everyone who swims in circles.

I thought my frustration with people in general would be over once high school finished. It's a year later and I look back, and hey, what do I find.

Everyone, and I mean everyone, is still deadlocked in exactly what they were doing when I left. Tiny details have changed but those decisions they had been grappling with still remain there unsolved.

How can people stand it? The answer lies in something I call fishbowl.

Do I even need to explain it? C'mon, all of you, just admit it: It's nice in your fishbowl. You have internet. You get fed. You don't have to do anything.

But to anybody peering in all you're doing is leading a mediocre lifestyle, swimming in the same water you shit in, eating the same food. I guess you can call that being happy.

I just want to say that you're only going to get bigger- and the fishbowl is going to only get smaller.

Do you really want to get put in the bigger tank and be the lazy fatass fish? It's from my experience that those don't ever seem to last too long- within days they're usually belly up.

Get out of your bowl while you can still be flexible and healthy enough to survive harsher waters. Or hell, just do something other than thunk your head against the glass.

I'll always be here for you.

And by know you've learned that Oki has left the apartment, gone to move her things up here, bringing her parents in tow. I've had two months to prepare for this; it's been two months too long of saying "we're not fully moved in yet".

She'll be back, and stability may finally become a goal we'll be able to touch.

I did some thought after my last birthday- I decided to make a choice, to go and indulge and undertake something I've spent most of my life wishing to do but never having the courage.

I bought a violin. And I could not stop smiling for hours after I bought it- and only for short amounts of time for another week.

The elegance of it- the action of pushing and pulling delicately this bow, making the entire instrument sing and cry and whine with the carefully firm touches of my fingers, sliding the bow and massaging the strings, making something clear, clean, solid, a note.

Everyone who has had the pleasure of playing music after childhood should know what I'm talking about. Everyone who hasn't: go get one. You have plenty of time in your life to make something beautiful and do everything else.

And with that, we transfer raggedly to the first subject.

With Oki gone I'm sure I'll be working hard to focus on my jobs, maybe even just practicing harder- more entries like this.

Until next time.

You know that image on your TV on all the channels that you don't have- the never settling blizzard of black and white spots, the "snow"? Of course, you probably know that they call that white noise.

White noise, if you were to look at it closely, are jagged lines of sound and frequencies- peaks and valleys of a varying nature.

That hiss that comes through the speakers, it's somehow calming. Like standing on a beach, like hearing cars pass on the freeway, there's a soothing aspect to the roar of chaos.

Those peaks and valleys, you can't see it at first glance, but there's a balance there. With every high comes a low to offset it, negate it and take it farther so the next pattern can proceed.

If everything were to stay in the middle, if there were no valleys or peaks, it would be a straight line. No pattern.

There's a reason why such a line means somebody is dead in medicine. Without movement, without strain, there's nothing.

It's that insight on things in nature that help me understand that now, while I have everything, the empty, cold feeling of melancholy has returned. It's simply the pendulum swinging- chemicals, neurons, any scientific explanation can back up what I'm saying.

But the simple fact is that the feeling is here, and in time it will leave, only to return again. Like the rise and fall of the tides, like the in and out of my breath.

It's only natural.

I think I was in seventh grade when I took a general assessment of my attitudes and motivations and came to the conclusion that if I were to head in exactly the same path as I seem to be going, that I would be dead by nineteen.

And that was by a good estimate.

Today, I turn that estimate entirely on it's ass. Nineteen. The extreme end of everything.

It's amazing I've survived everything- from the scorn of others to my own destructive hand. So, from here, where do I go?


Hell, I'm too drunk to care or even think about it. Let's just make it to tomorrow and see where we go from there.

In nature there are some things that exist that simply have no polar opposites or similarities. Like fire. There's nothing out there that you can create that does what fire does, which is break down chemical and turn their energy into heat and light- but is there something that does the same, but instead emanates cold and darkness? Nope. Just not possible.

Least, not in the real world. That just might be a really good idea for Brimstone...

Anyway, same thing goes for falling up. I mean, the word "falling" essentially means you're going down, in some aspect or another. The internet defines it as:

-decreasing in amount or degree; "falling temperature"
-becoming lower or less in degree or value; "a falling market"; "falling incomes"
-dropping: coming down freely under the influence of gravity; "the eerie whistle of dropping bombs"; "falling rain"

So, all of this really means that when I say "falling up" I mean it entirely in a metaphorical sense.

Long story short: things have been looking up. I've collected my first checks from my two jobs just in time to pay some bills rushing in from the horizon at a fast clip, the truck is back from the shop with more stuff on it than before the crash (thank you, dumb bitch in the Suburban, for paying for my new rims and tires) and we've got enough extra money to buy some food and maybe, just maybe, a few nights out on the town.

I feel obligated to mention that my birthday is in two days. I have to work down in the office that day. I'm pretty sure I'll have an entry up out of sheer boredom about what I think about turning one year older- I've already got it cooked up.

oof. I'm tired, and with our recent visitors gone (favlaud, Blackwolf) I can get some rest and enjoy living with Oki.

I still miss people, though.

And doing art. I need to get back into the groove.

bleh.

...quietly from the second story view from my apartment, making not a sound.

Down here in the office where all the action is, though, it crashes against everything these drops manage to land on. Thunking against wood. Pinging against metal. The sound of a thousand tiny drops hitting a thousand leaves on the trees and foliage below me completely indescribable; these quiet drum beats, too many to count, thrumming away.

About an hour ago it got much, much louder. A tinkling roar as the sky burped glass beads- tiny, little frozen drops of rain. To call it hail would be insulting towards the beauty of these pearls thrown freely from the sky.

For me, hail is a rare thing. Here, though, I've seen it come down twice before this moment, and I took the opportunity to stand out there, holding out my hands, catching them.

I wish I had a big bowl and some cherry syrup- despite how cold it is a cup full of cherry shaved ice, au naturale, would have been an interesting treat. Lord knows I've made a mental note for next time.

Heh. It's been three entries in and I'm already making inane conversation. Well excuse me.

Within the past weekend I've sat down for a few rounds of chess with Zeta to mull over our previous conecpts and project ideas; both he and I had placed them on the farthest of backburners but now that most priorities have been taken care of and I find myself more and more constipated with creative expression the dam has once again burst forth.

So we've picked out two projects that we had out of the pile to further develop: Codenames are Valence and Brimstone.

Valence is an idea that stemmed from a very late night AIM conversation between me and Zeta some three years ago: it is a story of a scientific and futuristic setting, set in an environment where business and bioscience have molded the social frameworks into this twisted nightmare. At the same time, I've gone and placed a heavy amount of religious references and allusions within every aspect of the world and background; if you think you'd like to see how nanotechnology is kind of like Jesus Christ, then stay tuned for that.

Unfortunately, we've gone and outdone ourselves again. Valence has been placed back in the vault simply because we went and developed the entire thing so much that it'd be impossible for us to push as our starting project. That's good, in a way; means we'll have things left to use when we get enough success to fuel them.

Our second and most focused project is codenamed Brimstone; it's much simpler, easier for us to tell and way more accessible to a wider audience. Things I'll take the liberty to tell you about:

-It will be a graphic novel script
-it's going to be set in the present day
-our characters will be living in Portland, working for real portland jobs
-it's going to be funny, serious, and horrifying, in many places all three at once.

I can speak fro both of us when I say that the idea is exciting and that we really are spending most of our thinking time towards getting a script banged out. There are many steps in between, though, before we get to that point.

In either case though, I'll keep you all posted.

To follow with my pirate line of thinking I see life, and one's body, as a ship navigating the waters, starting from a home port, being built by a pair of engineers, taking years and the involvement of hundreds of people, each adding their own twist, their own mark of craftsmanship, until the moment comes that it has to brave the open seas, to finally test those sails, check the seals, the hull.

So I set up this huge metaphor here to simply say that now the storm is over and I've patched up whatever leaks and tears I've sustained, I have no idea as to where my next heading should be.

Who here has big dreams? What are they? Do you think they are what you want to do for the rest of your life? Would you spend that life you have just to obtain it?

Answer no to any of those questions and you're not thinking up to the caliber of my definition. Hell, even I'm not living up to it. Which is the problem.

So I have projects- ideas, things that I'd like to do, and get done. But none of them can be done under my own power- I need talent, skill, a partner- and most every one promises great wealth and notoriety.

Anybody want to throw their hat in?

It's time to dream big again.

For those of you who are following me and my story, I'll apologize, but only because I don't feel bad for you, or sad that you've missed out. Only that you've not gotten over the fact that the part you played in my life is now over; you were just a minor character (at best)

This may sound like a cocky statement to you, but imagine it with as much tragic mourning as you can imagine my voice to have. If you can, that is.

So this is my new journal. This is the new album. The extra book. The added chapter. Less directed for those who knew me than for those who know me, or will know me, consider this your introduction. The prologue.

We'll begin with some backstory.

Years ago, I had firm ideas of who I was and where I was going in life- Call it being young, naive...generally optimistic. It was this knowledge that made me into an unbelievable asshole, too gigantic for words to really satisfy.

Truth of the matter was, I was sure I wasn't going to live past 19. These dreams I had, these plans, never really went past this imaginary line, this estimate, where I was sure someone was finally going to do what I wanted and stab me for my recklessness.

If you don't think that was optimistic thinking then you've never truly lived life.

So, a quick look back at my older journal (http://talon-tcd.livejournal.com/) tells you that I was melancholy and my academics were shit- I was pushing a D average three and a half years running and everything was looking grim.

It had to be- you'll soon know (if you don't already) that me being in a happy and wonderful situation with no bad in sight is like placing godzilla in candyland. Does. Not. Happen. Candyland wouldn't be happy, Godzilla wouldn't be happy- it's just not the way things are.

So did I do it on purpose? Hell yes. Am I in the right to whine about it in my livejournal like a whiny whinerstein? Shit, what the hell do you do in your journal? Oh, you don't have one? Let me talk to one of your friends then. I'm sure they can tell me loads of stories about your constant bitching to them- okay, point is, we all gotta vent someplace. Anyway.

In essence I look back on that and consider it as training- because life came smashing down almost exactly a year ago.

It was the twilight of my Senior year- the final semester and I was flying (like I always had) by my ass hair, aiming to graduate with at small amount of effort as possible, maybe even taking a dive and giving all those teachers working against me a moment of triumph before I came back and showed them who's boss.

However, despite how good things were going, I needed some time to think. My 18th birthday was fast approaching- a deathly close sign that I had reached the end of my road.

I decided to go and head back to the place of my birth to meditate and think about what I was to do next- my family, in El Paso, would guide me.

Cue a month of thinking. Then me coming back.

Things, then, get fucked up.

Stacie (at the time a significant female figure in my life- not quite girlfriend, not quite fuck buddy) gets into a car crash, nearly killing her and placing her in the ICU. From the moment they pull her from the car, she does nothing but call for me.

Nothing in the world sets a person straight faster than when they are desperately needed.

I stayed at her side until she left the hospital a week later, in a wheelchair, unable to place any weight on her right leg, due to the plates embedded in what was a complete pelvis- the crash shattered it in three places- and a cast on her right arm, where two more plates now sat, the long scars a testament to the less-than-a-hundred-feet her life came to ending.

So, she went from the hospital to her house, unable to walk, or do things like pull herself from the wheelchair or even get out of bed. Responsibility to take care of her was on the shoulders of her parents, for a time, before they passed it on to me.

Meanwhile, tensions and stress had taken a toll at my house. Between going to Stacie's and my own house, I had no time to do schoolwork or even really eat- my mother, one day in a terrible fight, flung me out of the house.

Nothing in the world makes a person feel more helpless than to be on the street with the clothes you wore that day and 200 dollars in birthday money, knowing that when night comes you have to find somewhere to sleep, and then, if you're lucky, maybe get to school the next day. (I was on contract at that point- one day not in school and I would be expelled)

So, for serious this time, everything I had was gone. The training was over. This was not a drill.

But, like in nature, if you step on a piece of coal, it crumbles...but place it under extreme pressure and heat for a long time- it'll come out the hardest substance known to man- a glimmering diamond of unhampered rigidity.

I moved in with Stacie, going to school early, getting home, taking care of her, doing my work, and sleeping on the couch- months passed.

I graduated in June, right in the back of my class (woohoo) Stacie had begun being able to stand and would soon walk again, 2 months earlier than what the doctors had hoped for. I of course, was desperately in love- she had been for a little over two years by that point.

I got a job working tech with a friend's parents business, doing stupidly easy things and making stupidly easy money while living at their wealthy estate- During which I had enough money to go and travel my way up the west coast, where, during one whole hour, I walked around in downtown Portland and became enamored.

I came back telling stories to everybody- and with a plan to move up there and start a new life, a place we could call our own in a beautiful city full of people like us. Only one was down for it, like he had been for every one of my logical plans (mostly).

Joshua "Engel" Morrison- the first guy I met from the internet, entirely by accident. Quiet, smart, funny, my best friend, it was only natural that he thought this was a great idea. Of course, he told me that it couldn't be just us two. "You're going to have to take Stacie- she won't live down here without you."

So we included her in the plan and then told her a few days later. She was down with it, and the date was set for us to go in December.

September came and my sweet job and living space expired- it was fine, because I was all ready to leave to Portland- they gave me till October to get everything squared away.

September 23 Engel goes missing. It takes seven days to find his body.

My best friend had taken my best idea: to drive to someplace out of the city until his car ran out of gas, to walk into the woods until there was no light left in the sky, and then settle in that spot.

But he added the part where he shot himself.

The closest friend I had, the person whom I included all my plans, my hopes, my dreams, left with a nine millimeter round placed firmly in his skull.

As if things had to get any worse. There was no way I could leave now- I was lost, the careful refinements and tweaks I had in plans just a faint direction now.

I moved back in with my parents. I got a shitty night job. Stacie practically lived with me.

Then, the break happened. Stacie came into contact with a lot of money- lawyers, insurance policies, and multitudes of loopholes had seen to that. Tired of everything, she bought a truck from her parents, packed it with my stuff, and moved into an apartment in the hills just inside downtown Portland.

It's so easy to dismiss all of the work that was required to accomplish such a task; just know I planned it carefully.

That was just a mere month ago. In that space, I was left two weeks to get everything in order.

At this time:

-I have two jobs, both are awesome and provide incredible benefits.
-I got into a car crash that was not my fault within two days of living here- the truck has been in the shop since, and we haven't actually needed it.
-I love this town, and have made good friends, some old, some new.

So, there you have it. The beginning is complete. Why am I starting a new journal? What am I planning on doing next? Who the hell am I and what do I stand for?

If you really want to know, then you'll find out.

-Talon