Ok, so yesterday I sat at home on my butt like my inertia was the ultimate gateway to complete LOSERDOM! Lara called and saved me by deciding to come over and rescue my soul from the unpopular activity of doing nothing. I was pretty depressed (more on this later) and spent the majority of the afternoon staring at the sky like some baleful phantom dissolved into a myth I had yet to destroy on my rampant spree of KILLING EVERYTHING. On the bright side, I found a nice pair of shoes and some lovely scarves at a nearby thrift store! Yea! Fashion score!

So Lara came over and found me looking like this: Tight little white shirt. Tight navy ankle length skirt with a modest slit - connotes a working woman in the forties. White sandals from my favorite store and yours - Target! White chainlink vintage belt. White sixties bangle bracelet. Long navy and white striped scarf around my head.

Immediate reaction: "OH MY GOSH, JEN! YOU'RE SO CUTE!"

Immediate response: "WHATEVER, LARA. YOU KNOW YOU ARE LIKE THE GODDESS APHRODITE!" And so went the elementary commentary on our selected outfits. Lara still had to put makeup on, so I turned up Blondie and rocked out in my ridiculous outfit (brought on my boredom and a quick splash of low self esteem.) While skillfully roving the disaster area of my room, Lara applied electric blue eighties eyeliner and then we decided it was time to leave and live our dreams in the vast and young navy night - which so beautifully coordinated with my outfit. (Oh my Gawd!)

I grabbed a box of chocolate animal crackers and one of Lara and I's favorite CDs from a few summers ago and we were ready to take on the world. Once in the car we popped in MXPX's Let It Happen and took no notice of our eardrums. Volume fifteen on her stereo (hey that's a lot according to her stereo levels) ---- A NEW RECORD! Way to go Jen! You have now successfully murdered the once new and shiny stereo system in Lara's van. (Yes, she drives a minivan, which is such a contradiction it is hilarious. I don't know how many adventures we've had in that thing. All the far off passerbys taking us for two middle-aged mothers when really the maternal vehicle is only a facade.)

And so we drove, a composition consisting of 1 part chocolate animal crackers 2 parts loud music, and let our hearts be broken all over again as we poignantly sang the sentimental tunes that defined a long gone era of our pathetic lives. There was a jazz festival going on downtown, so naturally, that's where we were headed. We parked in front of a restaurant and before walking to the festival, I led a very baffled Lara into the restaurants lobby. It was only when we reached the photobooth that the blinders came off of her eyes. We wedged into the photographic box and synchronized crazy poses to the flashes of light. A few minutes later and we're plastered all over our two dollar instant photo strip like models in seventeen. Oh yea, baby.

Fame and fortune at last, except I had spent my only two dollars. Hmm. We'll rework that theory later.

After we had sufficiently amused ourselves at the restaurant, we walked to the jazz festival trying to ignore all the drunk JERKS staring at our butts. Double blah. Anyway, we meandered down the urban street of night like true subterraneans. There were a few stages set up here and even the littered surface of the road was beautiful with that unconventional wonder that is a rarity only because of society's misconceptions of what is truly beautiful. The linger sound of a romantic sax called Lara and I to our jazz destiny as we sat down on the grass in front of the main stage and let the earth mess up our clothes like the notes of the music. A couple in front of us sat on a blanket, barefooted, and cuddled like the epitome of what we all really want. They were so adorable and perfect and THEN, it hit me. God, I'm lonely! Help me! WHERE IS KYLE? WHY HASN'T HE CALLED YET! I grabbed onto Lara's arm and tried not to smell her. This is because she wears Curve for men. Apart from being what she wears, it is also what Brendan used to wear and every time I smell it I go insane. I keep thinking about how Brendan has now degenerated into a typical pothead who finds getting drunk sort of mediocre but does it anyway. The personification of a stupid college kid. It hurts to think of ambiguous relationship and to look at what he is now. He's not happy, I know that. I've always known that. I want to make him realize that life is fabulous and take his hand and run him through some field, or even traffic and yell "LOOK AT THAT CLOUD, LOOK AT THE WAY THAT CAR'S EXHAUST STREAMS INTO A PICTURE! LOOK!!" But he just doesn't seem to want to understand. I dont'know, it's the closest thing to depression. And Kyle, where is Kyle?

Lara had to be home soon, so we left our seats of dirt, and our visions of love, and drifted into the amorphous night like two more lonely souls wafting into a dark breeze. On the way out someone stopped me to say hi. It was Ashcon, someone I met briefly at Border's. With him were two more guys (one of which I had also met at Border's) and a girl, who seemed misanthropic and irritated by conversation. We talked for a while. They're all leaving for college, so we got into that sort of chat. They started talking about OSU and how it's a party school. I mentioned my boyfriend was going there and they all opened their eyes wide in pity and told me to start looking for a new one. NO! KYLE LOVES ME! I should hope I'm more valuable than some college slut. Then we started talking more about colleges and they all told me I had a place to stay if I was ever where they were. Then they proceeded to tell me I was hot. (Lara too, but she just kind of withered into the background). And they all wanted hugs, so I was like why not and hugged them. Then they asked if we wanted to go get something to eat with them. But Lara had to be home and she was my ride and thus goes the sad ending of that tale. Needless to say, we went home. She still has my MXPX CD, but I made a run for it with the chocolate animal crackers.

TONIGHT (far away from the mass pike):

So Kyle got back from his vacation Saturday, ok? YEA, well I haven't talked to him. He left last Saturday and even then we hadn't talked or said goodbye. The weird thing is, that three days prior to his departure, he didn't reply to my e-mails or return my phone calls, yet I got a letter in the mail from him Wed. Thurs. and Fri. All very long sentimental I love you letters that if I typed up you all would come find me, kill me in the night, and steal him away for your own. I figured he was just busy with packing or something. So no worries. But now I'm really worried. I had resolved not to contact him because I'm sick of being the one chasing someone. I figured he could at least reply to my unanswered e-mails and phone calls from a week ago. But nada. So here I am being a true independent woman and waiting it out with courage. Yesterday he calls the HOME PHONE, not my cell, which he usually does. He called early in the morning, left a very terse message. I called him back all that day, left two messages, but nothing. Today I called him all day, but nothing. I don't understand. I'm worried. I want to see him. I want us to lay in my room pressed together and talk about Milton. And have him hold all my imperfections and just smile at them. Gosh, I miss him. It's like he's vanished into that lonely jazz night of yesterday. And somewhere back beneath the dark strata of the sky, of the life of the cool and the lonely and the lovely, I'm there. Finding pictures in car exhaust, sauntering through the music, and imagining myself as a lover on a blanket. Barefooted.