05/09/2024 / I feel like a disappointment today; not to anyone else, but to myself / All of this because I slept in a couple of hours... Just forgive yourself & get over it. / My stomach is making odd, overly loud noises & has not stopped for ten or fifteen minutes

05/06/2024 / Bad latte, mean librarian, but today was good- It seemed like it needed more ceremony / My sister gave me an old stuffed animal that reminded her of that "dumb artist that [I] like," (its eyes), Yoshitomo Nara

05/03/2024 / Sometimes reading the things I've written in the past feels like reading a stranger's writing

05/02/2024 / Good weather today / I did not mention this yesterday, but it rained torrentially. The word I would use to describe it is "hurly-burly;" Macbeth. One lightning strike shook the house. I was out in the storm before the lightning made me scurry home. I watched the rain fall and bounch off the ground like little dandelion wisps / Today I learned to use an espresso machine & I cleaned my room / I stayed up until 4 AM last night writing a paper, wrote another tonight

05/01/2024 / Happy day / Saw this weeb at school decked out in anime stuff & felt kind of jealous; wish I were still into anime... Simpler times

04/30/2024 / Crying fits, but at least I don’t want to kill myself / Ate the best bowl of ramen of my life

04/29/2024 / Still sick / Truly prepared to just not visit my mom anymore; after I graduate in a couple of weeks I’m not going to have school near here anymore / Our relationship’s been fraying ever since she ran out of things to hold over my head; doesn't work now that I’m taller than her

04/28/2024 / I am in so much pain. My body hurts. It hurts. I feel like a doll that was put together incorrectly

04/27/2024 / Sick, didn’t sleep well / Anger embedded itself under my skin like a bug or like a parasite / My sister asked me on the phone if I was medicated, suggested that I become medicated / I think I yelled & ranted about things for half the phone call… The only time we call each other is when we are angry. We have no shared affection; the closest we get is a united anger / Normally anger feels good to some extent, but nothing felt righteous about this. It was more of a sickness / Spent much of the day sleeping, a three hour nap

04/25/2024 / Sore throat / Spent the whole day so self involved that I can't even remember what happened... / Providence

04/24/2024 / Going to read a partial draft of my aunt's smut novel; she said she would grant me the grace of not giving me explicit depictions of hetero sex & this is true allyship / These pants are too big, but they're so cute; the drawstring came out of them & now they just barely grasp my hips, well not my hips, the dip between my hips & thighs / Nighttime: My back hurts right where I hurt it back in October; I wish I could go back & tell myself that I was not being dramatic, that your parents are wrong, that you should go to the doctor, that you should not work with your hurt back / At least I learned my lesson... Just wish the punsihment weren't so long term; A 6 month sentence is pretty goddamn harsh

04/23/2024 / Another day of waking up before my alarm / I wish there was someone to whom I could ask for advice; without sounding tired & cliched, there's no one who understands my mental health condition in the least; I tell them I’m feeling good & they congratulate me / I don’t feel tired at all, though I keep waking up in the middle of the night / Last night, I was awoken by a crystal beam of moonlight upon my head; right now, life is anything but “crystal” / My feet still hurt / I feel like I'm trapped in my own body, yelling at myself to move & to work & it is all to no avail; pointless struggle

04/22/2024 / In the mood to find God & cleaning my room is the next best thing / Sous le couteau / “Being an 18-karat manic depressive, and having lived a life of violent emotional contradictions, I have an over-acute capacity for sadness as well as elation.”

04/21/2024 / Serving a life sentence in my own head / “Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom.”

04/20/2024 / I don’t really mention it often, but I’m in pain almost all the time; not enough to stop me from doing things, but my body constantly hurts regardless of what I do… It gets tiring, frustrating / Skipping school Monday & am going to have a four day weekend

04/19/2024 / Headache, body is sore, maybe I'm falling ill / I keep yelling at people; my dad asked me to stop yelling “I’m going to kill you” whenever I am mildly inconvenienced

04/18/2024 / My fucking jaw hurts

04/17/2024 / Acquired hair gel for $1.19 / Talked to my math professor for an hour or so, one of the topics being board games & chess; she said she expected me to be “hypercompetitive” because I'm smart; I explained that everyone is my family is intense & angry & so I am more mushy in comparison to account for this / Started reading a collection of short stories by Haruki Murakami: Men Without Women / Ate (delicious grocery store) tiramisu

04/16/2024 / Wanted to ask my sister how to clear a shrine in BOTW, but I blocked her number / Was debating whether or not buying hair gel would interfere with my nonattachment-to-appearance philosophy & would make the previous shaving of my head futile, or at least diminished in meaning, but upon seeing the price of hair gel I was quickly reminded of my suburban genteel poverty / Mixed up Medea & Hecuba

04/15/2024 / Burning stomach pain; wonder if I'm getting another ulcer

04/14/2024 / Realizing I have a pernicious habit of putting things off, even when it's absolutely unnecessary

04/11/2024 / I wonder if God is a misanthrope; maybe I am just projecting

04/10/2024 / Cool, breezy day / Today marks the one year anniversary of my diary; proud of myself / Feeling a sense of religious guilt for the first time in my life / Train made a strange sound that I hadn't heard before

04/09/2024 / Okay, maybe Vashti is losing it a bit: Feeling of bugs crawling on my skin; almost cried out of guilt because I killed a roach; almost cried out of happiness because it was raining a few minutes prior / I feel annoyed with everyone, but I still want them to reach out & hold me / I still feel really good regardless of everything internal & external; like my heart is a Happiness Motor

04/08/2024 / Perfect synchronicity in every single way / Supposed to thunderstorm tonight & tomorrow, “severely”

04/07/2024 / Went out & forgot my phone; it was nice / Almost scraped a car that was in my blindspot; maybe not, their car didn't flinch at all, maybe it was imagined / I keep feeling bugs on my skin / Got a cute new crop top, don't know how to descibe it, but it's very cute / Spent hours playing video games

04/06/2024 / Coworker said he went to a movie with his grandma & when he came back, his girlfriend had cleared all of her stuff out of their apartment; I wanted to know what movie it was, but it didn't seem like the right time

04/05/2024 / Called in / Bad headache all day; no medicine for it / Accused of mania / Driving in the dark

04/04/2024 / Almost fainted at work; bedrest

04/03/2024 / My feet have hurt for days & my room is messy / Wanted to hide in the library so some girls from class wouldn't sit & talk to me, but I didn't / Mercy Seat

04/02/2024 / Matcha, pho, then matcha again / Ivy, don't read this italicized part: Picked up 1Q84 from the library / Okay, you can look now / Listened to Runner by Alex G on a loop as I wrote a twenty page essay & then Taking by Alex G as I was runnning

04/01/2024 / One of my professors signed an email off with, “The end is getting closer” / Lots of sirens & many flashing lights today / A nice bus driver / Saw someone hanging a plant from their car, from the handle above the passenger door / A short lived thunderstorm; with each flash, the sky turned a dusty purple / “I’m on the path of the total eclipse.”

03/31/2024 / Cows along the roads grazing in wildflower fields, so many of them; though in this part of the world, if you call them all “cows” instead of “cattle” or “steers” or “calves” or whatever you get scoffed at; seemed like every rancher let their cows out today / Saw a horse too / Saw girls in pastels & boys in cowboy boots & jeans / A couple dozen vultures off the side of the road, but I didn't see what they were eating / I think I should start running / From far away, it looked like a couple was making out on the park sidewalk, but when I got closer I saw it was someone stroking a child's head after they'd hurt themselves on the pavement, brother & sister maybe / I miss scraping my knees on pavement & asphalt; that's one of my favorite feelings, actually / Talked a lot with my friend the Gull, exchanged memories & insights

03/30/2024 / Sore feet / I wonder how much of my life I've spent looking at the sky? / Saw two blue jays, bright blue jays / Walked around our childhood neighborhood with my sister at night / E likes the song “Both Sides Now” by Joni Mitchell; my grandma liked “Big Yellow Taxi” / Got pho with mom & smelled the spoons together / At the bookstore with E, I told her Milk & Honey by Rupi Kaur was the worst work of literature that I had ever read & she read some of it & couldn't stop laughing; she asked incredulously, “Is this what people think poetry is?!” / Went back to the bookstore with mom 'cause the pho place is across the street & I found a copy of Letters to a Young Poet & caved & bought Men Without Women by Haruki Murakami 'cause I was eyeballing it with E & didn't get it; mom offered to buy my books, but I told her no thank you / My dad was insistent that I buy a lotto ticket & I lost / E & I felt nostalgic as we drove down an old road together, the deer road