Writing introductions is a bit tedious so....just take a look at my first post if you want to know more....

....and if you get curious about the name of this World or my posts, check out the second one.

A Jail Called Remorse

It's over.
I read it all.
There's no more.
I thought there was more coming, but I was wrong.
Again.

OK, so I'm being melodramatic. Obviously. It's just a story. (someone keep telling me that, please...)

-I keep having this urge to type song lyrics into my post. I used to do this weird thing where every other phrase was one. It usually ended up not making much sense.-

So in the end, it was worth reading I think. Of course I still can't help wishing it wasn't over. Can't help wishing I'd stretched it out just a little bit longer. Wishing I'd slept a bit more in between. Yeah, more sleep would definitely have helped with a lot of things.

-Ok, maybe just a few....-

Of course, now that it's done. I can't change this. It's done. I can never take this back. And that's all there is to it. I can't change your mind. No going back, no pretending.

"For once a thing has been known, it can never again be unknown."

-bleh, enough of that-

It's a sad thought, but maybe a little bit hopeful too. Once you know something, you can try to understand it and then maybe look at it in a different way. Maybe the next time I'll see it from another character's point of view. Maybe I can see beyond the confine's of Edward's self-sacrificing, self-blaming, overprotective head.

Or maybe not.
It's not like he could ever act differently either.

Point of Purpose

I've learned something about myself since being in Japan; I am not a good leader. My mother always told me I was a leader & not a follower, & I suppose she's half right. But just not following doesn't mean you have any clue how to lead. Not that that's such a bad thing. There's more than 2 things to do in life.

I wasn't looking forward to today at all. Well, really I wasn't looking forward to this week at all. It's 5 days straight of jr. high with no elementary or testing days to ease the sick-fluttery-I-don't-belong-here feeling in my stomach. I think it might be the only one like that this month at least...

Today being Tuesday though, I was dreading it even more than the other days. I've hated Tuesday since I was a kid (bad dance school memories...) so I figured I might as well stay up late and read as much as I wanted last night. At least I'd have an excuse for being in a bad mood, right?

As I slowly grew into consciousness on the bus I remembered that one of my English teachers had gone to the doctor with a bad fever at lunch time on Monday. I tried not to let myself imagine the pleasure of teaching 1st period by myself. She's a tough lady, she wouldn't let a little fever keep her from returning the kids' tests. I told myself not to get excited, that I'd just be let down....

Then I got to school. Four teachers absent, including fever-lady.

Nothing could have woken me up better, or faster. Another English teacher came along and sat in the room 1st period (just in case) while the kids & I celebrated by playing games. She's got a cold too. She didn't need to hang around. Of course I shouldn't complain.......so on the way downstairs I offered to handle the rest of fever-lady's classes for the day. Unfortunately she only had 1 more, but add that & prep for it to my already scheduled 2 & suddenly my day was completely full.

I only thought of Bella & Edward twice. Once after lunch while waiting for the next class to start, & again after the last class was over. It was easy even then to put them out of my mind though, thankfully. I remember thinking at one point, "I think I'm having a really good day here...." & I knew it was because I had something to do, not just something to occupy my time. It's not often that I really feel useful in a jr. high school.

When I say I'm not a good leader, maybe it's better to say I'm not a good creator......meh.......that may not be the right word either (I need more words.......) I can't make something out of nothing very well. Or rather, I'm not particularly motivated to try. I'm much better at restructuring, patching & morphing things that already exist. Give me a bunch of stuff & I'll put it in the most effective order. Give me problem with certain conditions & I'll meet them for you. Give me a void & I can fill it. Especially if you give it to me on short notice.

Needless Emotions

Well, that's all emotions in my opinion really....

It's a rare occasion that I'm glad I feel something. Even if it's a happy feeling, I don't particularly want to be having it. Things I want more often than not are complicated by things I don't want.

On Thursday (My Thursday) I went back to my old jr. high for an English seminar. I kind of hate that school, but I go to see someone who I know will be there. And with the hope that I might see someone else who should be there. At least, somewhere in the building. I saw them both. Of course I wanted to hug them both. But that's not allowed. Even if Japanese people weren't a bit repressed, and even if I wasn't painfully shy about that kind of thing it wouldn't be ok. Well, maybe one would be ok. Girls hug each other all the time. Friends do anyway. This particular girl though, when I was her teacher, I always got the feeling that while she admired, (dare I say adored?) me........she was also a little bit terrified of me. On the last day of school last year she shook my hand to say goodbye. In her mind it was quite probably goodbye forever & I could see her whole body shake as she did it.

The other person......well, I'd never be allowed to hug him. My おやじ. Quite probably my favorite Japanese person. Definitely my favorite English teacher I've worked with. He's kind of like a favorite uncle, but a bit too young, kind of like a big brother but a bit too old.........however, he's married w/2 kids & definitely NOT allowed to hug foreign girls who have nonsensical attachments to him while at work. Or anywhere else for that matter. So I spent my fractions of time with the two of them smiling & not saying much due to the immense concentration required to fight down every silly impulse that came over me.

Meanwhile, back in the real world time kept on going. Before I knew it Friday was here. And sure enough there was more of what I didn't want getting in the way of what I did. And just like always, I decided to do the thing I didn't want in order for what I want most to keep on going smoothly. Because what I want for me is far less essential than what I want for them.

Then again, maybe I'm just being selfish because what I really want is just to be with them. Whatever it takes.

Crossing the Rubicon

This morning I couldn't see the mountain. The Mountain, that is. This of course is the worst part of a self-fulfilling prophecy. If something happening is good, then by definition that same thing NOT happening is bad. It's Wednesday. I told myself, "don't panic. It doesn't mean it has to be a bad day". After all, I lived almost the entire summer without seeing Mt. Fuji and I was just fine. Plenty of good days. Not many bad ones. Most of them were just normal of course, I can't go as far as to count anything not bad as "good".

Still, it was Wednesday. Hump-day, they call it. It's really the day that sets the tone of the week I think. Monday and Tuesday, you just live through them. And when your brain wakes up on Wednesday you wonder. What's this week like? How's it going to come out in the end? It's a precarious place to be, Wednesday. You sit waiting. Waiting for something -good or bad- to happen. Just something. Anything really. A sign that things are still in motion.

All day I thought about the humps I had to get over while I waited. Waited for that inevitable time when it would be downhill again. Downhill to the end of the day. Downhill to the end of the week. Downhill and back to my jr. high school at the foot of the mountains where it's so much colder than in the city near my apartment. And I realized as I sat watching the seconds tick by, while the hump appears to be an obstacle that once cleared will allow you to slide happily downhill, the descent is always bittersweet. For lack of a less cliched word......

I finished the third of my books last night. Around 11pm. I actually could have gotten a decent night's rest, but of course I couldn't fall asleep very easily since I've been keeping such ridiculous hours. Being that there are only 4 books published I'm well into the downhill slide on this one. And it's painful. I don't want it to end. I know it won't end now, there's more to come, but I also have a sinking (sliding?) feeling that the end won't be what I want it to. For that reason I'm not starting the fourth one tonight. I'm going to pretend not to think about it. It's getting easier to deny the craving now that I've been reading them for a while. Like the vampire who subsists on the blood of animals, over time the desire to not feel a different kind of pain overwhelms the thirst for human blood. I can go a little longer between reading sessions now I think.

Maybe it's just exhaustion or maybe it's the desire to not reach the bottom of the hill, but either way I can't give in to it yet. I've already passed the point of no return of course, but I can delay the inevitable for a little bit longer. Stop my mental time on Thursday morning perhaps. Not such a bad place to be, Thursday. The world spreads out in front of you on Thursday. The weekend holds infinite possibilities on Thursday. I was born on a Thursday.

Twleve Tone Rendezvous

Muse

I love their music. I've always described listening to it as feeling like you're drowning, and you like it. A bit dangerous for extended listening really.

As I've been reading my vampire stories I felt like I wanted to listen to the two albums I have over and over. Then, on a whim, I went to the author's website. OK, so I was really looking for the leaked partial draft of the alternate perspective version of the first book, but still.......it counts as a whim. I found it of course, and lots of other information that I'd been telling myself I didn't want to know until after I was done with the 4 completed books.

What I didn't expect to find, was playlists. She has one, sometimes two, for each of the books and not just the songs, the actual player is there. One click of a button and you have the perfect, intended soundtrack for reading. I knew nearly every song, or at least the band who performed it. But the one that occurred most often (and led me to go download two more albums) was Muse. And really how could it have been otherwise? And then of course I read her paragraph long thanks to them in the end of the second book (somewhere around 3:30am) and it couldn't have been clearer.