D) the answer is always D

Monday, November 25, 1996
10:15am, train

Don’t want to pick up exactly where I left off. Went to the museum by myself yesterday, also got some writing done. This after I walked home from Frank’s, with a stop for breakfast with him along the way, during which we discussed, of all things, politics.

I realized this morning, maybe the reason Fang is always in my dreams is because he’s there in the bed nudging me. Anyway, as I was saying, I also did some good writing last night. It shows me how much easier it comes than I think, and how distractible I always am.

Frank and I slept so lightly on Saturday and woke up at 8am Sunday morning. It’s like we keep waking up as if something is wrong. Again, I would say I’m learning to relish days like yesterday. But did I relish it then, or just in retrospect? No, I did enjoy it, except for the part where I almost took mushrooms, or the part where I smoked four joints again. It can’t go on. But what can?

I left the bulk of the writing for the column until the last minute. This is boring. I guess I do feel some despair. Well, it’s Monday morning and it’ll be a good week. There, surprised myself into believing it. Yeah, good things can happen this week. Good things can happen today. I can be good to people and receive goodness in turn. Everybody doesn’t suck. I’m not fed up and angry.

Okay, it is working a little. How come so hard? A woman is watching me write from a few yards away. I just happened to look up and see her. Pain in the back of my neck. She’s still looking. This pen sucks.

So, maybe I will strike myself blind so as not to become overwhelmed by all I see, to turn the eye inward so I can hear and see and taste again. I don’t even feel like making fun of myself anymore. I feel better when I don’t. I hope the company meeting is today and not Tuesday so don’t have to miss it for my appointment with Judith, whose help I really, really need and it’s okay to need.

Who are you kidding? A quiz. Number one, your life is a mess. I’m sorry, but it’s not like you don’t know it. You walk around announcing, “My life is a mess.” You need to A) get plastered, B) get laid, C) get real, D) get over it.

Two, your lover is an asshole. She/he is repeatedly inconsiderate, so you’ve explained the conditions under which they can stop causing you undo pain and anxiety, but she/he continues. Your shitty relationship is A) their fault, B) your fault, C) your parents’ fault, D) one of a long string of failures.

Three, you are approximately 24 years old and have been reading magazines specifically for woman for more than half your biological life. You now know A) you’re fat, B) you’ll never have everything you want, C) more than anyone except a pro cosmetologist needs to know on a daily basis about eyebrows, or D) the answer is always D.

Tuesday, November 26, 1996
3pm, desk

Sitting at my desk, trying to focus. Just came from a meeting of the department heads where Josh castigated me in front of everyone. This is not your company. You don’t say how things go. You think you know everything but you don’t. I was shocked. I didn’t even get angry at first, I was thrown on the defensive.

Nobody stuck up for me, not that I expected them to. Everybody knew I should have been elected project coordinator, that’s all I do all fucking day, on top of everything else I do, is try to get other people to do their fucking jobs and deliver what they promised. But Josh said he couldn’t trust me, that I had shown myself to be untrustworthy, the intimation being that I got together with Frank while I still had a boyfriend.

I couldn’t even speak. I thought I was going to throw up. Frank didn’t say anything, he didn’t even look at me, he was looking down at the table and all I could see was the bill of his ballcap. Coward. Afterwards everyone was crowding around me saying that was bullshit, Josh is an asshole, you’re the greatest, etc. Frank just took off and is now nowhere to be found.

He’s so limited. He can only take so much interaction before he runs away. All of his conversation is just anecdotes, no insight, no depth. So much of our “relationship” has to do with work.

What am I doing with this schmucky guy who’s incapable of appreciating me? Maybe I was kidding myself, maybe I just needed to feel close and loving with someone and he was handy. Maybe this thing with us was just meant to be an attraction, and we’re ruining it by having it. Maybe I’m angry. How boring and typical. Maybe I’m jaded and I feel like there is never a reason not to be.

I have to calm down. I should take a few days off. The pressure has been intense. Fuck Josh, that manipulative freak. He’s an asshole and a scumbag. I don’t like the way he treats his girlfriend or the way he does business. Supposed to interview this girl as an Assoc. Producer in a few minutes, I should tell her to run from this building and don’t look back.

This place is full of lunatics and idiots. I actually had to tell Galinsky yesterday, you can’t put “buy ecstasy” on a company-wide memo about party planning.

This place is a joke. Everyone knows it. Any time I meet someone in the dotcom world and I say I’m at Pseudo, they’re dismissive: Oh, you guys throw those crazy parties. Yes, but we’re also pioneering interactive real-time audio/visual content aimed at niche audiences in the youth market! HA HA HA. As if.

Phone. I’m not picking up. I don’t want to speak to Frank right now. Maybe later when I’ve cooled off.

I know he’s not the one I’m angry at. He’s not the one who went off on me in front of all my colleagues. I’m not angry at him, I’m just disappointed. But he must have been as freaked out as I was by Josh’s attack, he must be taking some of it personally. He’s probably trying to reach me to apologize, and I’m the asshole for not picking up.

Nope! Phone rang again and it was Tony, trying to do damage control for Josh, like he always does, following Josh around with a push broom cleaning up his elephant shit. Now I’m really fucking pissed off. Where the fuck is Frank? I’m not calling him, if that’s what he thinks is going to happen, since he made it clear he didn’t want to deal with me. If I didn’t have this interview I’d pick up and leave right fucking now.

Here we go again, crying at work like a fucking girl. I should go fix my face. I should go fix my brain.