November 12, 1995. I went out with Amy Sawyer tonight for the first time since she broke things off a couple of months ago. It was only the second time I've seen her in the last two months, and the first time she's seen me since I shaved my head, pierced my ear, and grew a goatee. The irony of the whole situation is that while we have both chaged considerably, we've gone about it in completely different ways.
My outward appearance has drastically changed, so that some of my old friends at ORU didn't even recognize me at first when I went to visit them the weekend before last. On the inside, however, I've remained basically the same. Amy, on the other hand, looks basically the same as she has since I first met her four years ago (plus or minus a few minor changes). But on the inside, she has changed almost as drastically as I have on the outside. It often seems that she has come to represent to me all the things I have grown (or possibly have always been) disenchated with. The establishment, the status quo, the middle class aristocracy. Perhaps I've rejected these things so vehemently because they are the things I've always secretly desired, but now feel excluded from.
In some ways, I am glad we've both changed, though. It almost seems like the old Amy that I once loved no longer exists. As if in some symbolic way she has died, and once I'm through mourning her, I can return to life, whatever that may be. Looking at things from that perspective makes the situation almost bearable. Maybe it's finally time to move on...
November 11, 1995. I'm starting a journal because once again, I have a need to write down the little things I sometimes think of. Since the age of paper and pen seems to be dying away, I thought it would be interesting to put my journal online. And like all writers, I sometimes entertain the vain notion that someone, somewhere, might have some interest in what I have to say.
I thought of an analogy today. Life is kind of like a bull with me as the bull-fighter, and the object is to take it by the horns and ride it. Not to let it ride me. I find myself often guitly of watching the bull behind a bush or some other cover, silently plotting, waiting until the bull isn't looking, then I run up to him and kick him in the rear end and then run away again. But of course I make sure someone gets a picture of me kicking the bull, and so I make copies of the picture and distribute it among all the people who were to afraid to even go to the bullfight. To them, I am a hero. But I, the bull, and the real bull-fighters know the truth.