Pangs

I guess my reading ability of late was a sign of things to come (and they came, and hit me hard on the groin).

With shame and reluctant admittance of inadequacy, I realize that I am becoming a poor reader. I know someone who can't finish a wonderful book like Wonder Boys in days must be. I have Chabon's book with me for a month now and I'm just halfway though it. Somehow I can't reconcile the jouissance I feel when I open its pages and the amazingly disappointing speed it takes me to finally put it down.

I look at the small closet I have in the rented room I share with a high school teacher and my frustration deepens. Its two layers, too small even for skeletons and for me to hide inside it, has turned into a trash bin of unfinished business: the upper part of clean and dirty clothes laid out carelessly on top of each another, and the lower part of books waiting to be read and compilations of advanced readings for my MA classes that I've skimmed through but never found the time and energy to completely understand. They'ew spilling out and the books are everywhere: all over the floor, under my bed, at the foot of my bed, beneath my pillows, beside it.

In the past there were only two permanent things in my system, as permanent as the sunrise and the sunset of day: reading in the library and watching TV at home. I found that nothing else mattered; not going to malls, sleeping over at a friend's house, eating at fancy restaurants, hopping like rabbits from one bar to the next, joining a motocross, or playing paintball shootouts (but these last two I really did enjoy). Now I find myself with all sorts of excuses not to read, from an unfounded need to go to the gym and spend the last waking hours of my day with men who moan and groan but sound nothing like inspired by something lovely, to the reckless desire to stroll around malls and look for the gayest shirt or pair of pants and eat the night out until the waiters turn off the lights on me (occassionally with friends). Its a shame that I don't gain anything from all the food that I eat and which makes my other excuse, like I said, unfounded.

These things, not unlike weeds*, provide me with a certain sense of satisfaction, a brief glimpse at a life of blissful contentment, but only for so long as I keep myself from doing number two. After wiping myself clean, the shapeless brown (sometimes green) marks on the tissue remind me of the things I did that made my life resemble something a little like its mother ship. And flushing the toilet will not change the fact that I just suddenly stopped attending my classes a few months earlier, completely disrespected my professors by not telling them I will be dropping out their classes, and giving them plenty reasons to give me a failing grade instead of the less troublesome DRP. And that I could no longer enroll in the Comparative Literature program.

I hope it's not too late. Next year I'll try my luck on a university abroad (as if!) or another Master's program which I will truly enjoy. I'll wear glasses if I have too, and I'll eat lots of carrots if it will help keep my eyes from hurting after reading for more than 10 minutes. I'll abandon my fantasies of looking like the Adonis that I'm not, and I will resign myself to the fact that I have nothing remotely attractive to anyone; not my body, and not most certainly my cold and abrasive personality. I'll put myself back on track and remind myself that I don't live for girls, or boys, or for anyone in between. I'll have none of my excuses, and I'll try to enjoy reading again.

*Pathways kids: you know this is bad, don't you?