CHRISTINA

 I met Christina 22 years ago in the 8th grade. I had just moved to California from Ohio and we were introduced by my first friend in California. She was pretty and chill, a winning combination, and my feelings developed for her during the next couple of years. I managed to meet up with her at the movie theatre while she was movie hopping with a friend in order to watch The Ring together in the 10th grade. We made out for the entire movie. Afterwards, I suggested going to a spot overlooking the city. I tried to get to second base but she became uncomfortable and asked to be taken home. She somehow forgave me later in the year and we ended up smoking weed in my car. Again we started making out, but this time I whipped out my dick. Suffice to say, she asked to be taken home again. Five years go by, I am finishing college and we reconnect. I have just graduated and I am feeling on top of the world, completing my first ever Ramadan and then celebrating it by dropping acid laced with mescaline. We had hung out a few times by this point, her coming over for a hike then eating dates with tea in the backyard overlooking the lake, and also a doggy date with our yellow and black labradors. During my trip I began to believe that I was going to ascend to another dimension with Christina as my queen. I distinctly remember my phone dying while texting her, and interpreting the symbol on the phone to charge my phone as a message to go home where Christina would be waiting for me. I open the door to the house but it was my dad answering to my chagrin. I began running around trying to irrationally rationalize why she was not there until I ended up on my first 5150 with a bipolar diagnosis. When I got out, I tried to explain this all to Christina, which most likely scared her. She would not hang out with me anymore at this time, but we stayed in touch online as I journeyed to Japan. When I came back to California before leaving for Vietnam, she told me she had moved in with her boyfriend since 16 years old. I made it a point that I would find love elsewhere, but because we had never actually been together or broken up, I unknowingly left a piece of my heart with her. When I found love in Vietnam, Christina was one of the first to support my unorthodox relationship. She Skyped with me as I fought my way through a manic episode in Vietnam while my wife and daughter were asleep. She informed me of her postpartum depression and lack of care from her husband. Although she was diagnosed with depression, her husband’s family did not believe in mental health services and discouraged her use of them. Christina was able to pull through on her own, and I also had a baby later the same year as hers. My daughter was feeding her son snacks when they met at 2 years old after we moved to California. Things were going well, we would go months without talking, then check in and update each other on our lives in different orbits. I found out about her suicide 2 months after the fact. I had texted her asking to catch up 4 days before her death. Left on read. Self inflicted gunshot to the head.

Christina’s Ballad

We met in the 8th grade

Though I couldn’t be saved.

Like an Angel straight from heaven

January 2nd, 1987

We reconnected, but I’m going crazy.

I scared you a bit, that i can see.

I wonder, should I leave you alone

And find a woman of my own?

 

Still keeping in touch

Not meeting too much

Sending my wife flowers, calling me in the psych ward,

Early morning powers, you’re always feeling the Lord.

It’s a mental health issue,

I told you I would miss you.

Guns all around, the kids can see

Their beautiful mother be

Arms crossed, blinds closed,

Pacing back and forth.

Gun in hand

bang.

this is the view from our 4th floor apartments terrace. pretty sick spot. usually smoke a j or a cig up here. last night was my first night out which proved to be quite interesting. we had to stay out till 6 because the family padlocks our apartment building at 11, so i geared up for a big night. got drinks, nothing too out of the ordinary, until we got to the club. at the club a girl came up to me and my two friends. she kept raunchily dancing with me, unbuttoning my shirt, before goin on to my other friend, until she would sit with a guy that put his arm around her. i was very confused, at first i was very stoked and my ego was fed when a girl came up to me so aggressively like that, but after a while it felt like i was being sexually molested with each button she unbuttoned. i guess that was my first brush with vietnamese girls, though i wouldnt say she was a typical vietnamese girl. well thats about it.

landed

so now i am in vietnam. nothing much interesting happened on my plane ride. i got into the security line at LAX with two extra strength edibles. i ate one, but it smelled so strong that i got paranoid and ate the other one before i went through security. needless to say i was trippin on the flight. i thought a buddhist monk came and sat next to me. i woke up 10 hours later and he was still there. a buddhist monk sat next to me on the plane, i truly was going to southeast asia. during my layover in taiwan i met a dope dude that grows a lot of marijuana in the bay area and comes out to southeast asia every year for 3 months to get away from the shitty season of the bay area. he was pretty cool, hooked me up with a xanax for the last leg of my flight to vietnam. i dont really remember my flights. anyway i landed and met my good high school friends and got shown around the city. it is absolutely beautiful, a mish mash of french colonial, traditional vietnamese and modern architecture. i will have pictures soon enough. tonight will be my first night out in vietnam so hopefully i will have more interesting stories.

getting ready to go

so for my upcoming adventure i decided that ill try and update everyone with this thing. i am kind of wingin moving to another country so it should prove to be an interesting story. i am moving to vietnam on a tourist visa and living with some close friends from high school. i have no job, no working visa, no place of my own, just gonna wing it. i leave tomorrow night and i guess i am pretty packed. just waiting on some laundry to finish so i can pack my underwear and socks. not so interesting i know. but packing is pretty important for this endeavor. i mean i dont want to make it look like i am moving there so i am making sure to pack only one suitcase (i packed 3 when i moved to japan, but i moved to japan with a program so it was legit). i have a japanese visa in case it looks suspicious, can say i am moving back to japan or something. i should have some stories with the custom officials comin up real soon. there is no real point to this entry, just trying to get into the habit of writing life's happenings on a daily basis. sounds easy but ive failed plenty of times, just look at the last time i posted! lets hope this time it works, i am actually doing something that i would want to read about so lets see if thats enough interest for me to keep this going.

The Cactus

The cactus was prepared for this moment his whole life. "All my life" he mused, "I have been sitting here in the rain, perfect weather for a plant, trying to gather all the water I possibly can". Then the dry spell that the vulture had warned him about appeared. For days he was worried. "How will I start living with only this water i've accumulated, i've gotten so used to these days with lots of rain fall. it will be hard but such is life", he told himself. He was so worried that he began sweating, and losing some of the water he had been accumulating. it was sort of weird to watch a cactus sweat. the thorns it had on its sides were glistening with the age old water of wisdom that it had kept in preparation for his first dry spell. It sort of was like morning dew on blades of grass. That always happened in the morning. it was the morning where everything usually began. sometimes people have a lot of plans for the day, and they wake up feeling very set, as they must adhere to their schedule so they can accomplish their tasks on time. "first i must graduate with a high gpa, then i must take my mcats, then i must go to med school..." mused the medical student on his busy morning. he wasn't too worried though, he had used a day planner the day before so he was pretty set. some people wake up in the morning with nothing really planned. some people just end up doing nothing. usually cacti are the ones that have been waiting for the morning with no plans for day, but really wanting to do something. wanting to do something to a point that they worry themselves that now its so late nothing will get done. but that is the life of a cacti, to just be enjoying the precipitous rainfall until a moment arises. sometimes a moment takes forever. but it makes the moment all the more special when the anticipation mounts to such great heights. that is why the cactus wears his thorns so proudly. he wants to be alone, not being pushed in any direction so that he can worry himself to the point that when the moment finally comes, it is ecstatic. or at least thats what they say to justify their actions as they prepare to stand alone in the searing heat. if it ever comes.

Thoughts on a Provider

I go up the hill, following the provider. Yes they usually have their lives set, and everything you could possibly want. But I only follow just to see how they do it. I don't want someone else's path. I do like the providing, but I think it'd be a bit of a waste to provide the same exact way for followers of my own. It'd be kind of a rip off, a reused product. I like to walk up the hill with him at times just to see how he does it and how he feels about it. Then I note all the things that I wish to change, and just add these ingredients to my recipe for a "perfect life". Its never really a perfect life, but its perfect to someone isn't it? Life can be all perception, so I think it is right to say that the world does revolve around you. It revolves around everyone, every person just a point of reflection. As you know your role, you see how everyone revolves around you, depends on you. You can see the power you have to disrupt, when you don't fulfill your role, people can't get their things done, people blame you. The world can be a bunch of complex relations, so life kind of revolves around the relations you have. Relations you have in work, in school, in family, in friends. You have a certain role in all those I think. I think that may be why I like to constantly change my role, change my relations. Kind of like trying on clothes, got to see which one fits just right, looks just right. Eventually, I'll find a set of relations that I think I will like a lot and I won't want to change. Or at least I hope. Then it will probably change on its own and I'll have to deal with it. Its that kind of hope and uncertainty that I like that keeps me excited to wake up and try out my relations for the day. Just to know I can change my own world by telling one person off or telling one person how special they are (to me) makes me feel pretty special. I wonder why we were always told the world doesn't revolve around us, didn't it make you feel less powerful?