7:11 p.m. - January 26, 2003
It's a thick fog
If I could, I'd know funny stories and jokes and would be a raconteur, a jongleur if I could carry a tune as well and humor and light-heartedness would influence my writing and I'd be content. I'm not known for anything. I don't have a specialty dish only I can make, or a magic touch with animals people plants. Neither the life or death of a party because I don't show up when invited, anonymous in solid-color shirts and khakis from Eddie Bauer and J. Crew. There is no signature Jason anything, no passion or zeal identified and understood. I don't know what makes me tick.
It's not school; that's a refuge, a place where I'm comfortable and function well. Maybe too well, like too-tight swaddling or like the old Makah custom of shaping infant skulls; you don't notice anything when you're immobile or like everybody else. Realized today that I ran back to school in order to mine self-esteem from the Yes, I am a Ph.D. candidate at Stanford University rock that's as tiresome and demineralized as the Saharan flats. I've lost myself.
