Criteria and methodology for the 28/30/31 entries that make the cut:

It’s much like Cusack’s High Fidelity (2000) explanation on the rules to a good compilation tape. I write a shitload of em, like a killer record collection. Then mentally pick them - autobiographically. I leave the first blank, until the last is chosen. The first is delicately picked: a capturing collection, but not too great. Don’t wanna blow your wad. Then you gotta cool it off a notch. You still want mildly appealing work toward the end, not too mind-blowing though. If deadline allows, you finish off with something dramatic and meaningful.

That’s a demon that I can’t bring myself to face. I keep my consciousness dangerously close to it. I toy, dance, and make love to the idea of a confrontation to finally get it over with. But I know how it will go down. It would be conquered but not without a breakdown. So what’s the harm in declaring that evil taboo if I don’t have the actual responsibility to deal with it? I don’t want the trouble of reconstructing my heart and rebuilding my structure in the final aftermath. Only if it challenges me will I engage in battle.

God! Those words were so angry!! I’m sorry, I’m so sorry cruel for the cruelty. Those colors weren’t true. My poor baby! I never meant those horrible accusations. I’d incinerate my flesh before I deliberately made your eyes swell with sorrow. There’s a world of troubles I should’ve bagged and taken to the grave instead of burdening you, but I didn’t. Not being able to apologize is just another weighted measure I have to haul until death. I’d kill to retrieve the pieces that might make you whole again. Of course, you still have your personal bag, aside from me.

Every passing year, I budge into new terms of standards. Since global male population is endangered, (calculating players, haters, fatties, uggos, criminals) statistically the percentage of favorable odds are belligerently against me. Another year of no success… seems the right course of action is allowing convicts on my list. I’ll find ways to entertain myself, maintain and manage MY house. He can play pretty housewife. I’ll gradually give up on the female compliment we were raised to wait for.

Somewhere,
I hope there’s a normal guy thinking,

“Time I start lowering my standards, go for a more asymmetrically appealing looker.”

He calls, employing his slightly raspy tenor voice and strange Texan accent I mistook for Cajun. I don’t usually engage him in conversation, but I’m thinking of attending the company picnic and get buzzed below the radar sufficiently for him to understand anything goes. Then I’ll lure him into wanton wanting. Just when he thinks he’s getting lucky, I’ll shoo him away with my innocent, “You don’t really want me. I’m so troublesome.” He may or not choose to act upon that. Either reaction will entertain me, but unfortunately I’m too balanced lately to amuse myself at someone else’s expense.

Retail receipts, insurance statements and updated term of condition updates are the sort of paper junk I collect in ever growing piles. Oh, and clothing tags. I figure these are important documents. There needs to be a trail left behind, a history, in the case I decide to return an impulsive purchase, get sued, or receive a fraudulent bill. It never happens and probably won’t, so when the mounds of trash get messy enough, I get a black trash bag and chuck it all. Hard copies don’t provide the security I wish it did. Surely, it’s somehow electronically accessible anyway.

Anything remotely related to him is gone. It didn’t take many tears to eradicate the pictures, theme park stubs and heart-shaped chocolate boxes. The gorgeous evening gown: I have no qualms keeping it removed from our break-up, therefore no problem seeing the satin glitter in my closet. The only thing preventing the house vibe from settling is the root bear chilling in the refrigerator shelf. It was bought specifically because I loved his childlike demeanor at the mention of a tall mug float. It shouldn’t go to waste, but I won’t offer it to anyone. That means bringing it up.

Stand-up comedy is my new thing. My last thing (classic novels) has been paced to slug. The author seems to have been cooped indoors for many Russian winter months, enabling him to elaborate on every thought process of every character, relevant or not. I’m accomplishing it slowly but thoroughly, rather than skimming. I enjoy knowing one person can accurately depict several complicated characters to the T. That’s the comedian gift. They don’t improv material that is funny to them, they anticipate the audience. Sister encourages my skit but the outline means nothing. You need to see the act to react.

I’ve been to the beach with the midnight moon shine overhead only once, because I don’t have the type of friends who constantly need to experience nature at different hours, locations, or terrains.

I lie.
I’ve done it twice.
Or more.

But when we’ve walked high tide I’ve been drunk.

Not true. I’m pretty sure I was sober.

I was bouncing off sand dunes in such euphoria that I was cart wheeling.

Well, maybe not, but surely my step was kicky at the shore line.

It happened with people who matter.
So what if I hardly remember?
It certainly happened.

Age has curbed my appetite and drinking habits. I go all the way to the kitchen for cookies and as they travel to my mouth I think,
“I really don’t want to eat this. When was the last time I ate?”
I put them back.

After a long day, I pop open a can and say to myself,
“My belly’l ache.”
I know better than to pour good alcohol down the drain, but I don’t drink it.
I may go for a wine glass.

The light in my complexion has dimmed, ponytails hurt my head.
Eh… but I can’t complain.

Dear Mike,

We have the same outlook on marriage. Here’s my proposal…eh, preposition: Let’s get hitched! This can be a strict business transaction… with only some bodily fluids exchanged. A lot, actually. You’re guaranteed daily, herpes-free, free sex. We won’t talk about anything meaningful. One of us will undoubtedly close the factory to stay clear of mishaps. You’re free to chill with the guys anytime (if you let me hang with them too). I won’t get fat, if you don’t go bald. If you bald, I’ll get fat. Deal?

Seriously,
Me

P.S. There are possibilities I might fall in love.

You and I are never gonna happen. I know. I told you so.

Still...
Wish I wasn’t so affected by your failure to summon me constantly.
Wish I hadn’t pushed you to pursue that girl, or pushed you away.
Wish I wouldn’t keep you around.
Wish I wouldn’t check to see ‘what’s up’.
Wish when you told me ‘what’s up’, I wouldn’t care.
Wish you would still be saying things to make me feel so damn sexy.
Wish when I told you it was over, you would’ve protested more so than you did.

So, that’s that. Time to let go.

There was talk about me and his brother checking out the chemistry. I could never do that to him though. There’s a part of me that would love to stick my tongue down his throat, ardently hoping that when he found out he would instantly set ablaze in fury. But I could never to that to a person I loved at some point.

The desire to see him pay is much like God’s forgiveness: There must be consequences to separating from His law.

But who am I to play God?

However, it does seem something that that Devil would do…

Psychiatry, I feel, is as blood-sucking as Scientology declares it. I almost agree with the church that refuses medicinal treatment to dying members. But I won’t sit idle, thumbs-up-ass and wait for the convulsions of mental anguish to vanish with praying sessions. Until I find my managing style, I’ll give it a fighting chance.

Advice to Finance Department:

DON'T…

I re-fucking-iterate…

DO NOT…

Send a bill with 4+ number figures because of brainless insurance errors to patients under your psychiatric care. If you do so, please attach loaded gun. (Include plenty rounds, cause your staff is going down too.)

Thank you.

I wasn’t always impossible to influence. As a little one, I was a sensitive little bugger. Some phrases would impact me for life. It was a tropical evening at a theater courtyard full of the coolest teen punks. This “grown-up” called me a people pleaser. The speed of the world come to a halt, a cosmic record scratched and everything I would ever do in regards to what she accused me of would be a course forever altered. Oh yea, that lard ass also said I would never be a size 3. I’m a 2, sucka!!! Does that please you?

It was the Pig Pickin’ Anniversary. He was duly obliging an appearance.

Status at the time: OFF.

I’m not family, but connected through friends of the clan. There were plans that after the eatin we would all get together. When he learned moi was coming, he simulated indifference (his talent) and mentioned driving two hours back home to shower away the football scent under summer’s heat. Turns out he didn’t, but they pit stopped at a grocery store.
Heaven knows what he might’ve done, but we ended up canoodling at the movies. He smelled like desire incarnate.

Status then: ON

Nobody likes a drunk girl.

But isn’t that drunk girl sexy as you follow her wobbly line into the bar’s rear janitor closet while your friends high five behind you? She’s a little bit lost and it reflects in her moves. Its difficult in the dark room. You can’t see the gloss in her eyes, you both smell of whiskey, and she keeps forgetting where she originally intended her hands to go. But she only wants you. And she doesn’t mind the bruises that will be imprinted from the clumsy kissing, which isn’t that great, but nevertheless, a conquest.

Items that I’ve learned to always keep in the trunk of my car:

Always, always have an option of sandals or heels. Very handy. A change of gym attire, fresh underwear, strapless bra (multipurpose allows for bouncing from occasions to occasion), shorts and a versatile shirt. Must, must have one piece and two piece bathing suit. The aforementioned is for diving off boats. In addition to that: a basic razor. Two kinds of books: fiction and non (the dictionary too of course). Camera. Tweezers and lip balm. Rollerblades, for when you have to move faster than everyone limited to speed.

Does anybody love an emotional wreck? A plastered soul motionless on the ground, with tears stuck on the floor, waiting for a savior. One to soothe the wounds on her diseased flesh. Not for healing‘s sake, but just for the gest of the minimalist amount of humanity left. And not to heal, but to tear gashes open and inflict the stabs deeper. Because that would feel just as divine as it would if a blade was being dragged from one side of the throat to the next in a slow single sweep. How could anyone care for such a creature?

Whether it was the neurons I zapped or that my muse only comes through certain mediums, I once again heard myself talking in conversation. Not at all the interpretation from brain signals to audible words that I intended to send. It was rather languid and much too paused for the speed at which I process. And the perfect combination of thoughts that I get when no one is around, they’re MIA. So it has nothing to do with the way I think, it’s about precise delivery. Anyway, I was also informed I lisp when exhausted. Speech therapy as an option?

Once my bones stop hurting, I’m going to run like a bat flying out of hell. Minimum 7 miles. My body is aching to move. I want to run until I can’t feel my arms or legs. Until I hear the joints popping out of their respective sockets. Until the wind dries up my vision while my eyeballs are still open. And then I’m gonna do how I usually do, lift my shirt, look at my stomach, feel my ribs, and check to see where the exercise hives emerged. Then collapse, and wait to be ready to do it again.

The Johnnie Walker Blue Label was doubling as a paperweight on his wooden bookcase, collecting age in the scotch and dust on the cellophane. He saw me eyeing it and asked me the magical words, “Do you want it?”. He doesn’t drink the stuff, but still….this is something you keep!!! Instead of being misspent, he allowed me to have it. I, in honor, also passed it onto a more deserving connoisseur of fine spirits. I wanted him to rip it up and dive into it, but I understand this delicate valuable is to be saved for a finer occasion. Cheers!

The clean slate of a new year has always been a hopeful one for me… mixed with dread. I’m incredibly excited about it, yet when I express it to others it sounds absolutely morbid. There’s this little ball of bursting energy stuffed deep in my system, probably stuck in a stiff muscle, quivering in its restricted area, dying to be tapped and released, free to bounce around and declare sunshine and happiness and all that damn jolliness. It just doesn’t match my voice and style. So, I just hang around, lean on walls and say… ‘whatever’. What’ll happen will do.

It’s not coming to me. Nothingness. I will have plenty tomorrow.
It always happens when I'm on the go, under the sun’s emission.
Where there is sun, there is life. I usually keep the notebook around.
But the earth is spinning pretty fast, not permitting me time to jot it down.
I’ve considered a small tape recorder to haul in my purse, but its complicated enough keeping up with a camera, cell phone, iPod, keys, meds, key ring coupon tags.
Too much under my source of light. I need to close the shades a tad before making sense of it.

Where do I start? The part where I was patted down through my scrubs for the shoe laces of death. The moment I waited at the counter for instructions and perceived the commotion of catatonics to my right, a woman behind me calling me daddy and a tall grown man on my right skipping and yelling “Strawberry” at the top of his lungs. Or should we start at the beginning, where in one of the happiest places on earth, Downtown Disney, I was twice kicked out of the Irish Pub and placed in the backseat of a squad car.

I’ll start with my favorite character. Jonathan. 29. Caroliner. Had an admirable row of teeth. Freckled skin would turn pale or pale pink depending on the weather, excitement and dehydration. Not many could stand his jabbering. It was endless. If you assume everyone in there belongs institutionalized, you could see why he was placed in there. But listening intently, there was logic throughout his spiels. I loved talking to him, especially when he included his paperwork props to identify his handwriting under the influence of medicine. Can’t tell if he recognized he was bipolar, but he definitely admitted to HYPERACTIVITY!

The psyche ward is like high school. The boys and girls are in different worlds. The first opportunity supervision vanishes for a second, the worlds merge and hormones release. Except this was more delicate. If I didn’t lead on Luis, the Puerto Rican gang banger, he would go to the end of the hall, fume and punch walls. ADHD boy’s life was immediately endangered for sending me little notes and scented soap. He was so enraged that I preferred talking to a guy that doesn’t shut up over listening to his woes about murder, he spread rumors saying I’m promiscuous.

Paula: my female favorite of the bunch. She didn’t belong in the psyche ward. She belonged in a home. Initially, she didn’t talk much. When Derenise would start marching backwards and begging to be recruited by the navy, she exhibited gums and a tooth, and made eye contact with whoever else laughed. When she spoke, it compared to a child whispering. She rambled a little as a homeless person might get accustomed, but in all her wits. A sympathetic cop probably picked her up, dirty and starving, put her in there so she would have a bed for the holidays.

The circus is in town making its annual rounds. My youthful amusement has been taken by reality. Therein that arena lays the place where exactly one year ago, we officially started dating. He promised me a Bengal tiger among other things. If it wasn’t love, I never would have accepted the date. I must remember that this time I go for someone much more special. I’m taking my brother, despite my loathing for clowns and exaggerated entertainers. I’ll find myself concentrating so hard on the Asian acrobatics, that I will inevitably self-induce a migraine from ignoring what this event means.

There’s a crap load of artists wanting to write. Where are you? Why is there only an average of 50 finishing their months?

We need to hear it from YOUR stand point!

Your stories are better than journals, books, poetry. 100words aren’t too many. Don’t be afraid to commit. Don’t be afraid to be perceived a certain persona, because every reader of your batch will envision you entirely different. You’re input is another fundamental element that makes up the chemicals of the universe. See, I’m hardly getting across what and how I’m really trying to say.

Just write.

Spread words!!!!

Getting involuntarily admitted to the funny farm and promptly discharged after seeing the doctor was the best option next to being arrested. They didn’t even do evaluations or zonk me out with Valium. It was understood I was there to get a sobriety check on life, make sure it never happens again, and go home without visiting a judge. Still, it was a cattle prod on my brain. The rest of my days, I will stop at periodic check points to make sure I am centered enough, that I never end up in a straight jacket. Unless I’m the therapist.