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Sunday February 11, 2001, 18:45

I cut my hair again tonight. Nothing drastic, and nothing really too interesting. Just stood over the sink and snip snip snipped off some of the crap that was in my eyes. But it was sort of like arts and crafts, except that instead of using little plastic scissors that can't hurt me but also can't cut colored paper (at least not the thick stuff) I was using the scissors on my pocket knife which was awkward at best. I'm think that I should venture home and gather some of the straight razors that we have kicking around there somwhere. That might be all kinds of fun. On the other hand, I bet it's really hard to do a razor cut on your own hair.

I don't have any more orange juice in the cup next to me and the music has stopped and my CD player decided to kick it the other day (and I don't mean kick it like if you were "kick it" with your friends but more like "kicked the bucket" sort of "kick") and I feel like I am back in school with this work that I have to do.

I got back from a party the other night (in which The Most Awkward Conversation Ever occurred, and I will spare you from having to relive my moment of glory) when I decided that, on that unseasonably warm February night (57 degrees at 1am!), I did not want to return to my apartment. So what did I do? Well I did what any pseudo-yuppie sort of wandering around the city-type person would have done. I hung out on the street and talked to some teenagers from Queens. Who claimed to be from Oakland. Just because they had nothing better to do. Additionally, there were some drunk kids.

Actual conversation follows:

HIM: What are you doing here?

ME: Just hangin' out. You?

HIM: I'm a drunkard.

ME: How's that working out for you?

HIM: It's awesome!

ME: How long have you been drinking tonight?

HIM: All day!

ME: Woah! What time did you start this morning?

HIM: Same time your mom took a shit!

ME: Wow! Long time!

And really, if I was expecting to find anything, any sort of insight into the youth of America, what it is like to be a teenager growing up in these trying times, or anything of the sort, I was not going to find it. Because despite the fact that they were hanging out on the street, throwing 40 ouce Budweisers at each other and picking fights, really, they were just teenagers, and that night, when we all went home, I would be returning to my sublet, and they would be returning home to their moms. And come Monday, they'd all be going to school. And in a couple of years, the piercings are going to come out, the shirts are going to get tucked in, and for a lot of them, real life is going to start.

And really, that's such a buzzkill, on so many levels. The first is that I was really hoping for some deep insight into a life that is completely different from mine. And what I found was that a) there's nothing deep to be insightful about and b) I didn't really care. Besides this, though, there's this whole rebellion of youth that I feel like I totally missed, and yet it seems completely useless. Do you really learn much about life when you're sitting out on the sidewalk? Do you take lessons you learn on St. Mark's and apply them on to your life? Or are those just "things you did" when you were younger?

Options, options. There must be other options. The two girls (from Queens, claiming to be from Oakland) go to art school. They could have been lying, but the lettering on their "OAKLAND (HOME) OR BUST!" sign was really well done, consistent and neat. Where are they going to end up? Do I care? Or am I really looking for some sort of validation that says that I, with my computer science degree and whatnot, do not have to go find a job that will pay me oodles and oodles of money. Woah. It comes down to money. I'm worried because I'm not taking full advantage of my capitalistic potential.

Every day I say to myself "maybe I should get a job. I might like it." Of course what it comes down to now is the fact that I really don't have time for a full-time job. Oh, the irony.

Did I just get totally boring or what?

Cous cous or macaroni and cheese?

Insane. I am insane!

Noteworthy: we (the crowd of kids hanging out on the street, annoying the people in the surrounding apartments) were standing under the canopy of a store proclaiming, in big bold letters, "FREAK."

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