papa died smiling

mood: not good
music: the clock
CPCetc: ow... headache...

** ** ** **


I was reading The World According to Garp today, and I came across this passage:

...he lay beside Walt and smelled the boy's fresh breath, remembering when Duncan's breath had turned sour in his sleep in that grownup's way. It had been an unpleasant sensation for Garp, shortly after Duncan turned six, to smell that Duncan's breath was stale and faintly foul in his sleep. It was as if the process of decay, of slowly dying, was already begun in him.

Unfortunately for me and the rest of the world, that got me thinking. Now I can't seem to stop.

I think I've realised what I hate so much about this awkward, adolescent stage of life: we're beginning to realise how possible it is for us to just stop all of a sudden. Back when you were younger, you thought everything would just keep going and going; your road would always become another road and your days would always become nights, then days again. But now, it's impossible to think that way.

I keep looking ahead and realising that soon--very soon--I'm going to have to leave. And I'm going to have to go out in the big, scary world and figure out everything for myself. I'm going to have to get a job and pay for groceries and worry about the electric bill and being a grown-up. But I don't want to be. I don't know what I'm going to do with the rest of my life or where I'm going to go or who's going to be there with me.

I keep feeling as though I'm hanging desperately onto the few shreds of childhood that I can find: crayons, colouring books, the teddy bear that Don gave me before he died, and I just can't let them go for the life of me. I don't want to grow up ever. I'd rather stay seven and on a swing set with my friends. I want to think that there's good in the world and people don't hate each other and everything will work out and be fine. But it's getting harder to do that some days.

...I'm spending too much time alone. It's getting to my head. Soon I'm going to dress in all-black or wear a beret or join The White Stripes. Christ.

I think I'll switch books. John Irving is too depressing right now and I need to read Haroun anyway.