JE VOIS. J'AI. JE SAIS.

Um. 

Shit. 

I do this thing where I regret these stupid little incidents because I have this buzzing. ever-present little gnat poking at my brain all the fucking time, droning on and on: “You’re only living this life one time, so make it good.” I yearn for tiny, perfect moments — because I don’t need a huge goddamn victory at the end of every day or even the promise of a happily ever after: I just want to cultivate small, photographically contained moments of brilliance and pure happiness or something. So I paralyze myself for hours before I go to sleep, replaying conversations in my head and editing. I have a creepy sonic memory and I’ll remember verbatim and just want to scratch myself. I’m working on it. Being a perfectionist in a terribly imperfect world is difficult. 

And the larger regrets? I do, I kick myself about chances missed and not having tried harder for things and people or whatever. I cut a lot of people out and I wonder if these are the right things, especially because all these other people in my life have died or are dying and there’s no fucking time to fuck around with your heart and you should be generous and reckless with your love because who fucking cares if it doesn’t work out if you don’t even try? But you have to count self-preservation as one of your big claims to strength, and so I think about the friendships I cast aside years ago and wonder. I do. But, conversely, I have these symphonic moments of self-actualization and conviction and thrillingly feel like everything — EVERYTHING! — is working out exactly how it ought to.

But “ought to” is bullshit, too. 

I regret a lot. 

I regret not being closer to my mother. I know it’s too late. That’s the big one. 

I sometimes regret my steeliness and pride and vicious snarl of an attitude…but then again, I don’t fucking regret that at all. 

COME AT ME, WORLD

MADE MY DAY. Thank you, this is such a nice thing to say, especially because I mostly tangentially ramble to get some weird perpetual weight off my chest. sjdfhjksdf brb crying

God, everything. Is that an answer? Unhealthy nostalgia is my biggest vice. Here’s a list of five I vaguely feel like splinters in my palm at the moment, I guess —

• 1) Going on walks with my mother, dog, and siblings in the creek begind the library — a decade ago. Wading knee-deep through grassy glades, clover and yellow licorice blossom and golden poppies around our ankles. Jumping through the roots of trees in a ravine into shallow, clear water, cupping the stream of it in our hands, trapping tadpoles and admiring the slimy tickle of tail. Chasing caterpillars out onto the groaning branches of old oaks, the long shadows cast by low, slow California summer sun. The golf course through the fences, lined by identical nautical condominiums. The smell of decaying chestnuts and muddy water and heady jasmine.
• 2) My oldold best friends, oddly, and laughing painfully, muscles distending and retracting on the floor of those big houses, dashing up and down the stairs, sprawling out on the carpet and playing some kind of adolescent pretend. Discovering new and old music, making up stories and talking about how we were going to get out of that town (and, you know, I guess we all did — just not together). Making faces at the cows on the hill from behind huge windows. Cereal and soup out of mugs.

• 3) Going to sketchy punkrock shows in high school — the Fillmore, the Bottom of the Hill, the Bill Graham and the Warfield, and every sweaty, creaky venue in every sweaty, creaky crack in the wall all over Oakland and the City. That weird, suspended gravity feeling of falling in a mosh pit — the sharpness of knuckle-and-elbows and the strange jump and play, and then the slow-motion fall to the ground, and a bold steeling for impact, and suddenly strong arms catching hold and pushing you back into the center, as if to say: you’re not falling today, girl, you came for some human pain, girl. And the feeling of crowdsurfing as someone who is particularly tiny: an odd, angular bounce, and misshapen trust, and the shouting and gritty float on fingertips and fingertips, a pleasantly drunk vertigo, and the hoist and swing of being lowered delicately, almost princesslike to your feet. And the drive home: laughing with your friends and the lights of the city and the bruises and salt on your upper lip, adrenaline swaying between your eyes like a wire.
• 4) That car ride at night, me with my head hanging out the window like a dog, staring at the stars like a citygirl, listening to new music thrumming low, spilling over the glass and into the neon yellow paint lines on the road. Not knowing — but quietly, thrillingly suspecting — that these conversations — “who are you?” and “what are you about?” and “why does it matter?” — would be something more than the tender curiosity of a couple of skinny, nervous, suntanned kids.
• 5) Aix-en-Provence when I was sixteen. We snuck out of our hotel room at night, trying not to betray ourselves as we walked with purpose past the night watchmen, turning our keys in with fumbling hands. We spilled out in a hysterical, heart-bursting spray of a hundred limbs and sweetly-smelling hair. We drank wine at the bars and splashed in fountains and thought we were so grown up — the height of our youths, adults with the freedom of children.  

Actually, I prefer a nice personality and good taste in books.

BAH SO NICE OF YOU TO SAY! 

I don’t actually do much. First and foremost, I obsessively moisturize (with heavy-duty Cetaphil cream) because no primer or powder can disguise dry, sad skin.  I use Everyday Minerals loose powder in Original Glo — IT’S THE SHIT. I used BareMinerals for years, but I’m a total convert. EDM is way cheaper and gives far better coverage. Benefit Moon Beam is a gorgeous browbone highlighter and Nars Orgasm blush is still the prettiest goddamn pink I have ever worn.