a friend of hers points out the jeckell/hyde quality her evil blog has taken. well said indeed. she wishes she could write as honestly and openly as her friend. it's a brave thing to do, you see. to say things honestly. let's try.

she avoids television on september 11th. it makes her sad. and a little annoyed. and reluctant to live her life at the fevered pitch that cnn wants her to. it's true erica has taken a lot of refuge in various conspiracy theories in the last few years. and she knows she's dangled a few of them out there, trying to see if anyone else caught the vibe. are they just another one of her phases? who knows. all she knows is that certain conspiracy theories are comforting. they make it easy to place blame.

another truth. aging. tonight her husband said "we're going to age miserably." yes, yes they will, she thought. their hearts are already ancient. their minds were always leap years ahead as children. they were both first borns who turned their desperatly needed selfish time into ways to postpone growing up.

erica once went through a phase where she was convinced she was an old lady. her joints ached. her walk slowed. everything became trivial. she always found herself at the end of hallways pretending she was walking toward the light. new impulses hit her, like the urge to play bingo. the urge to sleep in a sears craftmatic. she was only 80 years old for six months but she'll never forget what she learned. or the look on jayc's face in the housing office, when she tried to explain it to him what her coffin should look like.

another thing that she should set straight. erica has two faces that are frequently confused. her neutral face, and her sad face. nine out of ten people agree that her neutral face looks like her sad face. not the case. her neutral face occurs when she is disengaged. when her deadly boredom is kicking in. she's not thinking about the parakeet her mom let fly away. she's honestly not interested in anything going on and is simply trying to remember the last time she was stimualted. it's true also that erica has had bouts of melancholia in the past and will probably have more to come. but if she's not in one of those moments, please please please don't ask her why she's sad.

now if she can just drop the whole third person thing! hugs and airkisses to all the friends that made it to the end of this post!