put this on lj a couple days back.

I'd rather take the time to burn every last bridge I've ever crossed beneath the sun
Than live my life knowin' you may one day follow me over one.

it was implied at the get-go. if not by mutual agreement. if not then than by the signs we waved as they waded through their scene. she remembers defending the events with her friends, "no you don't need drugs every time you go," and "of course there's sober people at these parties." that was the thing, convincing people to come. i remember bringing a girlfriend and her girlfriend to a new years bacchanal in los angeles and the friend was terrified of people slipping things in her water. like there were these cats out there with pez dispenser rophynol waiting to catch a teenager slipping and throw her in the back of a van. so no, drugs are not essential to the dance scene but the only way to enlightenment was through pestilence and the dancer had crawled through three or four controlled substances before she sat down near the dance floor than night.

we talked about these weekend escapes. how we had climbed into overstuffed hondas and drove two three hours either into LA, San Diego, or the surrounding desert to get away from what? like we tried to live some dual life where school or work and the weekday were something to grind through in waiting for the weekend. this is what terrified me. we had friends that were a bit older. paycheck to paycheck renters; plans upon plans coupled with zero motivation. mid twenties i was looking forward to finishing grad school and being a grown up. what had happened with these people to get stuck in a late post adolescence? it was this scene, man. it was just like any other. in my punk days there were old fucks in faded black denim and sleeveless band shirts held together but just barely with dental floss. old crust punks either working the venues or hanging out with the proprietors. burn outs. that must have been it. it was undying love for the scene that stagnated them. keeping involved with whatever music drove them.

she made a joke about our drugs sounding like license plates. D-O-4-DMT-7; it wasn't funny but it was clever and i liked it. "that was alright," and "no i took four times the reccommended dose and couldn't sleep," or "that's alright but i wouldn't do it again, man." she was pretty, smart too. hair that alway fell just-so and eyes that searched your face as you talked looking for tells or smirks maybe a casual sideglance that mean you had just made something up. everyone's perfect when you're tripping so hard the night bleeds rainbows.

i let her know my greatest suspicion. i was afraid of being a psychopath. i watched a tv show and had all the earmarks mentioned. i could hardly keep friends, people were interesting but simple. what i mean by that is that nobody else was playing this game of show-hide-tell. was everybody so bland that their actions were never the sum of their intentions? she posed driving as en example. EXACTLY. you're on a moderately crowded highway and you see opening after opening. flash blinker, check shoulder, merge. playing frogger from point a to point b shooting the accord between semi trucks for a second to get past the 1990s soccer mom luxury van. everyone else was an obstacle or opportunity you needed to wait for the right time to exploit she said, reactive automatons convinced you were an ass for skipping lanes so often or worse, not even noticing. what was more i said.:i never cried. it was hard for me to emote. people were emotional beings and when it was socially acceptable i never broke down. not that i never felt choked up, just not at the right times. there were moments, maybe a look from cereal buying dad to cereal wanting daughter at the grocery store, or the scene in a chorus line when the pr girl finishes the number about her acting teacher. we laughed it off citing social ineptitude.

the most important thing we talked those following days was hate. how if love could be an all encompassing obsession that what could hate possibly be? she said something like an active dislike. that same involvement in their wellbeing becomes a damnation and you spend you time cursing every second. no. hate is an absence of emotion just as dark is the absence of light. it's not an active dislike that you let boil inside you, there's already names for than like angst and resentment. hate was something special and hard to achieve for the uninitiated. it was the second a name no longer mattered to you. the mention of her doesn't envoke a defensive i-don't-care remark or a second thought at all. complete disinterest. this hate was exciting we said like a discipline you perfect.

we hardly spoke anymore but i had kept all the postcards we traded from our neighboring towns like i needed trophies. like some couplings work out we had fully explored each other and found less than we had hoped. there is a special place old lovers keep your secrets and fears, the things that can turn you from frozen pond to a lake of fire in an instant. only strangers pull punches and hitting someone like that is still a victory.