04/11/2001 - 12:43 a.m.

Nuances of myself

There are so many things I'd like to write right now, but I don't trust myself not to write something I'd regret. I know that, really, anything I'd have to say probably wouldn't matter anyway. This is some more of the hazards to having friends: you get certain expectiations about them, and they hurt you by completely bypassing them.

I have always loved best the things I do the worst at. I love to sing, but I'm too self concious to be any good. I love to act, but I lack the ability. I love art, but I can't draw the things I imagine, only copy the prefabricated images of others (Mr. Disney, for example). However, I am stubborn enough not to give up at these things- now that I know I can't do any of them, I want to do them all the more, to get them out there so that somebody will say "you're not too bad". Maybe it's fishing for compliments, but I would like to hear that I'm good at something I love, and the only way to do that is to make sure everyone has a chance to know what I can do to tell me what they think.

Finding I can't act has made me work all the harder- I know I'll never try for a BFA, but I want to get better, so that maybe someday I'll be good enough to finally be cast in a lead role. I would never be a good enough singer to even consider auditioning for All-State, but Concert and the musical are exceptional opportunities to learn to do better, so that at least if I sit in the back hallway or sneak off to the science wing to hear the echo, I can at least believe that my voice doesn't sound so completely horrible. Is it any surprise then that I cover my notebooks with my own ugly renderings of photos of people I know very well (only to have no one recognise them)? If I stopped doing that, it'd be giving up on myself, and I don't want to do that, because I would like to be at least good enough for me, and right now, I am doing that. I do the things I love to do almost as well as I would like, and am happy with that. It may never get me fame and recognition, but I can deal with that because I at least think I do my best.

But, the things that I'm supposed to be best at are the things I do the worst. People used to tell me that I was a fabulous violinist (back in sixth grade), and that I was just as good as Austin and that I could be better. Well, I screwed that up for myself- I didn't love it, it was just something I did, and so I suddenly got worse and worse. My writing that everyone goes on about- it gets worse and worse as the compliments rise, I don't want this to be the fabulous thing I can do, because it's just something I do. I sense myself ruining the only future I may have, so I try to make myself love it, and sometimes I do, but then I despise it again for reasons I don't understand.

I don't know what point I'm trying to make. I sense that I'm not making any. I'm sure this is a desperate attempt at something, but I don't know what.