Author and Columnist
2002.01.01 You are a jerk.
Yes, Coley was reserved in a way that made you feel rejected, not that you could phrase it that way. It does not follow that she is remotely culpable for your cheating.
It boiled down to a physical chemistry with Jen (I don't know why) and her attending your high school. If Jen lived in Hyde Park and Coley lived in Beacon, I cannot believe you would have had occasion or much interest in cheating.
You cannot blame Coley for your infidelity or the situation.
Your psychological issues do not involve your lips, but you won't know that for years.
These likewise do not revolve around your being heartsick.
And do you think it is safe to cuddle up with your ex-girlfriend?
Oh, wait, we can divine how you would answer that question from your post-romantic relationship with Kate.
I am sure a continued attraction to you was not something in which Coley reveled.
My mother still refers to this as an orgy. I am unsure how much of what occurred was on her radar and how much she assumed.
Emotionally? It is absolutely accurate that this was a three-way. Physically? I recall your not insubstantial hope that this would develop in that direction, but none of you pushed it that far.
I don't know that polyamory would have suited you three, but it is the closest you ever came to seeing it as the solution to your problem. (Aside from, you know, living by an ethical code that you don't romanticize and which emphasizes doing the least amount of harm over your being momentarily inconvenienced and awkward. Hurting someone briefly and honestly beats sitting passively and keeping the wound festering.)
Wow, wouldn't it be awful if someone did that? Gosh, I can't even imagine.
How you pretend you do not fully understand Kate's perspective is a mystery of unself-awareness.
Six hours? And you didn't just expedite the evening by removing clothes?
More courage out of you would vastly improve your stories.
When you were dating Jen, Coley once spent the night at your house, and you tried to kiss her, which she hated.
When a bunch of you crashed at Coley's house once, she reportedly fondled Jen without waking her--which Jen did not appreciate finding this out years later. I don't know that this happened, mind you. Zack told you that Jen told him, which is attenuated enough to almost be meaningless gossip.
Kate's parents were desperate to get their daughter back from having run away to her friend's apartment, though going after you was the wrong tack. You wanted Kate with them as soon as possible as that would be normal and undramatic. You wanted your girlfriend to be calmer and more stable, which was not her nature. As such, you were as on their side as possible while still supporting Kate, though primarily by giving her a little money to buy toiletries.
In short, going after you with threats they could not back up did nothing to make their daughter return and might have prolonged her staying away. I don't remember how long this took, though I recall it being weeks around Christmas.
Her friend lived alone because his parents had died, I think, in a car crash. Kate later suggested she thought they might kiss but didn't.
Again, he is desperate and scared. Coming after you would not get him the desired result, but one can understand it.
To my knowledge, Kate never got into much trouble when she ran away. They did report her car stolen, but nothing came of that.
That your family--your mother especially--tolerated Kate at all, given this baggage, might be a testament to how sweet Kate could seem.
They were Catholic and could not embrace the idea of a lesser evil, which is how you saw yourself. You kept Kate on as straight and narrow as possible, which was none of your business. Kate didn't welcome it.
So, yes, they would have rather been inconvenienced by driving half an hour each way than let you sleep with their daughter, even though she was likelier to be the bad influence.
No, you were scared. It was not of Y2K, but slicing through the apron strings and having a New Year's Eve that differed from the ones you always had with your family.
You would have had a better time with Kate at this mass sleepover.
You also would not have gone into anaphylactic shock on the sofa, which you decided must be some psychic message because you didn't know you were allergic to shellfish. It is surprising that your magical thinking didn't harm you more--and it did harm you significantly.
Gosh, you are obnoxious and prissy.
Kate's party sounds exponentially more fun and age-appropriate than hanging out with your parents yet again.
Again: Significantly more fun.
Kate can be trusted because she is her own person. She wasn't being obedient to you or her parents. She was just being herself.
For all your bizarre puritanic nattering, there is a firm overlap between "I would like to do illicit things" and "I will actively harass you for not doing these things" at that age.
You are still po-faced.
Yes, clearly, it is the gods' fault if Kate gets high, drunk, or fondled.
You were not struck down by the Universe. You were laid low by a shrimp.
That seems too on the nose to be humbling.
The readers were there for that, mostly. I wish you knew better than to throw your body at the wrong people as bait to keep them.
Matrona never forgave you for trusting Kate--who was lying--over her. It is not for me to say this was fair, though you lashed out by saying, "I don't know why Amanda or you are lying to me, but you are." Matrona was entitled to write you off.
She was putting herself out there to spare you pain, something you would have done in her position. I recall your trying to apologize, though possibly not with appropriate strength. It did no good.
Why would your ex-girlfriend, who had you on the hook, tell you the truth? She took the immediately easier route of lying, which would placate you long enough for her to yell at Amanda.
Oh, to languish in such uncomplicated pain. You think you are Byronic, but this is fodder for a teen soap opera.
Wren is perpetually going through something. The facile answer is his gender identity. It was a little rude that you were persevering in his presence, but it was also understandable.
I don't understand how he felt about you or to what extent you were friends. One could read into this that he wanted the interest you were giving to Kate, but I can all but guarantee this was not the case. As genderqueer as you are, you were never his type.
She once tried to sleep with you, except you kept to the other side of the bed, horrified you hadn't left yet. She did not get around to pushing, but it was unambiguous that she would pounce if you moved even an inch toward her.
It did mean something to her, maybe as it did for Kate.
It still doesn't comfort you, but neither of them enjoyed other beds in the hope that someone would stay with them.
The excised part was that you had three party options, all of which had considerable virtues. You passed them over to attend to Emily.
Did she have pneumonia? I've covered that I second-guess things she told you. I am willing to argue this down to "a cold" and accept that she was too sick to party--except that she then does when it is at her house. However, "make plans that I can cancel at the last minute" is so common a routine that you become visibly nervous the hour before any event is supposed to commence, waiting for her to complain of debilitating stomach pains.
Did she get near-fatal childhood pneumonia? That is a thing that could happen, and you would give sympathy without verification. From most people, you wouldn't think twice about it.
Emily was reportedly a sickly person, to hear her tell the accumulation of her maladies and those you experience firsthand.
And you discover you have an intense allergy to shellfish that isn't the gods choking you out because you yelled at the stars.
Wow. A stunning recovery from pseumonia.
I cannot promise Emily planned it that way, but I cannot imagine she was disappointed you didn't see Sarah.
Did you invent the idea of Rule 34?
(I know you didn't. It's a simple thesis to independently propose.)
I could not have imagined this would become one of the more consequential sentences in my life. As I am responding to this, I have just finished yet another read of Ellen Crystall's Silent Invasion in preparation for writing a section of a book I initially intended to be an article. I spent hours in United Friends Observer Society meetings. I interviewed people at sky watches. I have been a guest speaker at the Pine Bush UFO Fair for a decade because I turned this into a novel, Artificial Gods.
I do not think any of your cohorts read it, but it is generally well-received.
It's not, though it's a common misconception in town. Instead, parking on roads where any part of your tires touches the pavement is illegal. This is intended to quash skywatchers, but it is not enshrined in law. If someone wanted to give you permission to be on their property--they don't--you could stargaze to your heart's content.
Enforcement (which wouldn't be arrest) is intended to shoo away nocturnal tourists.
One of my regrets is that you never ran into Ellen Crystall. She was no longer in the fields when you started going because she had pancreatic cancer, to which she succumbed a month before you wrote this, though you have no idea.
What you noted accurately represents Silent Invasion. Attempting to exaggerate it would be a waste of humor.
"Tesla orbs" are mostly dust, moisture, and insects distorted by camera flash.
They aren't supposed to be there, and better camera conditions prevent them.
There are so many airports whose planes criss-cross the skies. The size of anything airborne is notoriously difficult to judge, the bane of anyone seriously watching the sky for anomalies. As you know, it was likely a plane.
Crystall made clear the aliens could make their ships look like planes and had their own fleet, so you could pretend it was something else. You don't believe it, though.
I mentioned this in a UFO talk I gave to a few dozen people over the weekend--as I told you, Pine Bush was consequential--and expressed the same degree of amused skepticism.
The video was useless. Melissa deletes it at some point, as it is only you four screaming.
Queen of the Damned is the only movie Melissa ever walked out of.
Ice Age was worthwhile but also led to the studio firing everyone through some Hollywood accounting that makes no sense to me.
It would have riled people if filmmakers whitewashed Aaliyah, however much you feel this would better accord to the books.
As a side note, R. Kelly, who married Aaliyah when she was underage, turned out to have a hankering for minor girls (specifically urinating on them). It took decades before he was convicted and began his thirty-year sentence. Why people did nothing about it after he married Aaliyah is a mystery of privilege.
Nah, Ice Age is cute. You're mistaken.
Over the weekend, I drove past the park--which has been changed so that the dock no longer exists to facilitate more parking spots--and I remembered this fondly.
You and Emily did not lack for cute moments. I wish you were both healthier people, but that would have resulted in your breaking up--which would have been better for both of you.
I do not know the depth of your feeling here and how much of it was "this is the cute thing I could do in this scene" rather than "I want to show my girlfriend I love her." Too much of you is performative and charming rather than sincere.
Also cute. Also embedded in my memory.
I'm sorry the diner had to remain open.
Though, apparently, it had cause enough to be open.
2002.01.11 Waking Life is an excellent, odd movie. It is one of the few DVDs I still own.
In a few months, you will quote the "I don't want to be an ant" speech to Lauren C. When she knows it, you plunge deeper into infatuation with her.
I have no memory of this, and I will not be changing this.
I also have this DVD.
It does not match up with the book, though the latter did a lot to inform the modern myth of the Men in Black. Mothman is one of the most famous cryptids, third only to Bigfoot (and adjacent creatures I'll lump together) and the Loch Ness Monster. There is no paranormal clout now in knowing about him.
At that time, there were few places in America better for ignoring a weeping stranger than Ground Zero.
Humor is a coping mechanism. Would you have these all be somber flyers for crisis hotlines? People need to drink and continue living. You can go home and put this out of your mind. Those people still removing the rubble do not have that luxury, and deserve a beer.
I loved that book and quoted it to a few people after my talk.
I give its author, Ann Druffel, little credibility, but it is more scaffolding I can put around people's experiences.
I just googled to be sure I spelled her name right and found she died a year ago, which makes me vaguely sad.
Why would anyone assume it would? You are not dating. You are sleeping with other people. Kate, more happily and diversely than you.
Stop implying these things.
When I was just 17, a wee 17 indeed, I had Nick, Jen, and Coley over to my home for New Years Eve. [...] Coley had arrived first and was very much acting like an ex-girlfriend, but in a not terrible way. If she had shown half the passion and interest in me during our brief relationship that she did at that point, I might not have been quite so willing to kiss Jen.
Not that I should blame her for my being a cheating dog (more like a heartsick fool trying to discover what was important in the world through his lips, but we will give her the benefit of the doubt and describe my actions as canine).
Coley was trying to be safely cuddly with me, by which I mean, physically intimate but not in a fashion that could be construed as romantic. I don't recall myself being particularly unreceptive, as I did find Coley attractive.
Or, to put it more plainly, she feels a militant version of what I feel toward Kate, except I know that I'm doing it and regret it.
When Jen arrived, Coley was still much with the cuddlies. [...] both Jen and Coley had a vague bisexual streak, which naturally clicked together. As such, I ended up in the middle of them while we all hugged, kissed (on the cheeks between Coley & me and Jen & Coley), and tickled.
I personally believe that this was one of the sources of Coley's issues with me, that I was being warm and semi-intimate with her, but I wasn't with her.
So we did this for something like... six hours. Just cuddled together on my bed. I felt very warm and happy at the moment, because I was playing a point. I was not considering the future or the past, I was just there, with two women I felt the best emotions (in a seventeen year old way) toward.
Coley... she may have spent the night on a cot in my bedroom. I know she did that a couple of times and it doesn't seem wrong that she would have done so then. Though, perhaps, she slept at Jen's.
If you will recall, her parents had a cop call me at work and threaten me with everything from statutory rape (she was the same age as me) to grand theft auto (I had no idea how to drive an automatic, let alone Katie's fidgety standard).
In addition, around Christmas, Katie's father and my mother had a huge scream fest over the phone, where he reiterated his threats to have the cops arrest me and accused her of being a terrible mother for having raised the sort of boy who is willing to provide a friend in need with clothing, food, money, support, sanitary needs, and a place to rest.
The trouble came when Katie's parents came to pick her up. There are hostage negotiations that are more civil. My family was trying to get Katie out as quickly as possible in order to avoid the scene that would surely result.
And, though she had done so several times before and would numerous times in the future, they wouldn't consider the idea that she spend the night. Facing death by drunk driver seemed a better idea to her parents.
The all important 1999-2000 New Years Eve was spent quiet at home. My parents, and to a lesser degree myself, feared that the computer systems would flip out or that people would react in a hysterical manner to the date change.
Katie, whom I wanted to spend my night with, was at a sleepover party with numerous bad influence. To her parents thinking, Katie spending the night with me is intensely vile. However, having their recovering drug-using daughter spend night surrounded by people who have so much trouble dealing with their lives that they pop gel tabs like aspirin and rabidly proselytize their empty life style makes sense.
It should be noted that Katie, to the best of my knowledge, showed herself to be of stellar character even though her friends were performing sex acts of each other in a relatively public sleeping situation and there was quite a bit of drinking.
I knew that some of the people Katie chose to surround herself with at that time (and, well, now) didn't feel content if other people were not practicing self-destructive lifestyles and that they could get pushy.
Around 11PM, I climbed onto the flat portion of my roof and rather screamed at the sky that I would become an utter bastard should whatever Force That Be allow any harm to befall my dear Katherine.
This resulted in my being in something like agony, on the day-bed in my living room, bemoaning my hubris until a few minutes before midnight.
Kate and I had had our first distinct romantic interaction since the break up. I had presumed that it would be a matter of time before she and I were again partnered.
One of my co-workers had informed me, seemingly as an act of mercy, that her girlfriend (a friend of Kate's) had told her that Kate had been fucking one of "the Boys." Understandably, I reacted in a less than admirable fashion.
Kate had told me that she hadn't done anything with anyone else, and I didn't think she would lie to me.
I was in one of the worst emotional places I had ever been, thinking that the woman I loved (and had been physical with) had been bedding another man.
Zanna bitched that I wasn't concentrating on her. Really fucking supportive.
Alison wasn't much better, insisting that she slept with her friends all the time and it never meant anything.
Emily came down with pneumonia and was forced by her parents to not leave the house.
Cold would clearly kill her dead off because she got pneumonia once when she was seven and nearly died. Of course, everyone knows that a strong twenty-two-year-old is exactly the same as a seven-year-old.
Emily parents wished to reward me for my commitment to Emily's health. Emily had told me earlier that the last time her parents had gone to Massachusetts, they brought her back lobster earrings. So I joked that I wanted a lobster. Somehow this ballooned into her parents making me a rather elaborate lobster dinner.
Had I known that this was the case, I would have stayed with Emily and played good nursemaid boyfriend (though she was largely healthy).
Alone. Depressed. Irked. Hungry. Too late to drive to Sarah's party and not necessarily feeling the need to have my car break down on New Years Eve. Irked again.
She tried to divert my attention from my state by playing our porn game. It hinges on the idea that, whatever the subject, there is porn about it somewhere on the internet. It is a pretty sturdy thesis.
Last night, Melissa, Evan, M and I went to Pine Bush.
We drove around for a while, sky watching. Technically, sky watching is illegal in Orange County because of the local airports.
I am not playing conspiracy theorist, but I think is it a dreadful law to have on the books and an abusive cop could arrest one for looking up while answering a question
Well, we were until we decided to roll down the windows to get better shots. According to the author of the book I just read about Pine Bush, the short-wave radiation put out by the objects would screw with the emulsion of the film and prevent a clear shot. This is, of course, ignoring the concept of a "digital camera" and the fact that this woman also believes the alien's underground cave where they mine zirconium, titanium, and beryllium is guarded by mothmen and bigfoots, so we may want to bust out the iodized table salt when considering such matters.
Evan was videotaping out of the passenger's side window and I was taking random photos of the forest in hopes of seeing tesla orbs (which, honestly, I thought were supposed to be in pictures because I see them so frequently).
At 10:53, approximately, we were driving by a forest. I looked to my right so see an object about 300 feet away rise up smoothly. It had three lights in the form of a triangle and thus I am inclined to state that the object seemed triangular. Though this is just an estimate, the object seemed about 70 feet on each side. Emily thinks it was isosceles, but it may just be the perspective. When it was about 100 feet up, it hovered. Then it turned slightly, lowering one of its edges in the process. At no time did we hear any sound coming from it and it most certainly was not an airplane or a helicopter. The lights never blinked or dimmed. When we turned onto a road to get closer to it, it vanished. We did not see it disappear, it should be noted. However, we searched the sky from all sides of that road and could see nothing.
Evidently, they had the trailer for Queen of the Damned that Melissa and I were dying to see and of "Ice Age", the movie that Melissa's sister was involved in making.
it looked like it would suck sundry moose parts. Vampires are supposed to be attractive. Aaliyah was a very attractive woman, only not in this movie. Have some respect for the dead. Also, Akasha? White. As in, so white Lestat thinks she is made of translucent marble. Aaliyah? Black. Which works for any flashbacks, as Akasha was Egyptian. But very, very old vampires are to be so lacking in pigment that they are compared with stone. But we can let this pass, because I like Aaliyah.
We moved to a different theater to view Melissa's sisters movie. Which, I am sorry, seems lame.
While she walked around, musing in a winter wonderland, I made a thirty-foot heart in the fresh snow and put a large M in it. She was pleased.
She declared at midnight that we should get a snack at the truck stop a mile from my house.
We arrived and the place was nowhere near as empty as I had expected. The harried waitress informed us that the other waitress just quit.
Yesterday, Emily and I went to the city. She had to go down to see her therapist. I tagged along in order to see a movie called Waking Life that Emily's father proclaimed the best movie he had ever seen. As I respect her father's artistic opinion immensely, I certainly wanted to see what he found so intriguing.
I alluded at least once to the horrifying television program we had seen wherein a man has his healthy finger amputated so he can have it made into a very nonfunctional penis to restore his manhood and relieve his depression.
my other personal goal was to obtain a copy of The Mothman Prophecies because the trailer for it unnerved me.
Then I realized that all the buildings were covered by soot. I held her tightly against my chest and let her cry for ten minutes while imagined ghosts ran by me in terror.
They were ads that were trying, in grotesque ways to capitalize off of the tragedy. They said things like "Is that $@#^# bin Ladin making you work overtime? Relax at our bar!" "Spent too long looking at the dust pile? Wash it down here!" "The Red Cross gave them free drinks, but ours have more kick." How the hell can the person who made those possibly sleep? What the fuck were they thinking?
I got one called How to Defend Yourself Against Alien Abduction, which I know sounds cheesy bad. However, they acknowledge that the experience may not be "real" in the strictest terms, but that doesn't mean it isn't causing very real trauma to people.
So, Kate came over last night, after I returned home. [...] Nothing inappropriate occurred.
Thomm Quackenbush is an author and teacher in the Hudson Valley. He has published four novels in his Night's Dream series (We Shadows, Danse Macabre, Artificial Gods, and Flies to Wanton Boys). He has sold jewelry in Victorian England, confused children as a mad scientist, filed away more books than anyone has ever read, and tried to inspire the learning disabled and gifted. He is capable of crossing one eye, raising one eyebrow, and once accidentally groped a ghost. When not writing, he can be found biking, hiking the Adirondacks, grazing on snacks at art openings, and keeping a straight face when listening to people tell him they are in touch with 164 species of interstellar beings.
He likes when you comment.