Catalogue of Names

"I should write more." I say that at least three times a year.  This isn’t a New Year’s resolution.  It can’t be or it won’t come true.

So why did I start this journal? To vent? To wear my emotions on my sleeve?  No, I chose this place to fabricate a romance with a girl.  Words are a wonderful place to explore things you are too afraid to act out.  And then it became a place to try and explain to many a lover the scars I hid. I never knew how to talk about my father, so I learned how to write.  And now it has so much history and bad poetry I can’t bear to delete it.  I came to enjoy writing.  Some people even told me I was good at it. 

I wish I had saved my high school history notebook.  I vaguely remember a quote about history being defined as the stories of great people.  Lately I have come to see the world less as a series of events and more as a procession of faces.  Many faces I’ve chosen to forget.  I wonder if I linger in their memories  as often as they visit mine.  And a select few I can’t remember nearly as well as I’d like.

There’s the boy who tried for years.  He still messages me on facebook sometimes.  He stopped buying me birthday presents a few years ago, and I think he finally disappeared when I stopped answering phone calls.  Sometimes I still think of the fun we had seeing shows together.

There’s a girl I can never trust again.  We were never lovers.  Sometimes I’m not even sure we were friends.  I miss her often, but I’m not sure if I can repair a relationship with someone I can’t trust.  And then there’s the hypocracy of it.  I’m not as trustworthy as I used to be either.  My father taught me that some doors should stay shut.  I’ve always been bad with that.

There’s the Soldier.  He talks to me sometimes, but I’m sure it’s mostly out of boredom.  I wonder if we can ever be friends.  I wasn’t much better to him than I was to any other man, but he’s one of the more unique people I’ve ever known.  I hope someday he’ll learn to trust a little more easily.  I’d like to think I  made him happy for a while.

There’s the boy who went to Boston for college.  I wanted to save him.  Same as I wanted to save the soldier, the poet, the writer.  I don’t miss him at all.  I think of him sometimes, sitting at my father’s funeral, and laugh at how incongruous he seemed in a church.

There’s the Musician.  The beautiful musician who made choices I will never understand.  I’ve picked up a pen to write to her more times than I can count, each time using the lack of her address as an excuse.  She’s a mother now.  I’m sure she’s still beautiful.  And I’m sure the sound of her fingers has only grown more seductive.  I’ve always wondered how I can be that beautiful, or even more so, why I could never attract the likes of her. 

There was the Siren.  I miss her terribly.  Her voice was among the more beautiful sounds on God’s green earth.  Ironic how Catholic school made her rather avidly anti-God.  The prize of her friendship was something I thought I’d never win.  Even being on her outer circle was a blessing I was grateful for.  I hope some part of my friendship eased her heartache.  I couldn’t be friend with her and her lover both, so I let them both slip away.

There’s the boy who lived across from me.  He was always a strange sort, and seemed like he would be a fine enough friend if he let me get close enough.  He never let anyone get close enough.  Except for the Siren.  And when she wasn’t looking, I think the boy who lived across from me let me see some of her softer side. 

There’s the co-worker who came and drank beer in my front yard after Dad died.  He was always a bit odd.  Too old for me, though I was a bit interested.  He enlisted shortly after I left for college.  I wonder where he is now.

There’s the boy I kissed.  No one knows I kissed him.  We spent nights and nights talking and sharing broken hearts.  And then one night, we kissed.   It was one of the most beautiful moments in my life.  I was too young to have him, but not too immature to appreciate him.  And it wasn’t done for revenge.  I’ll never forget how he opened his soul to me.

There’s my  childhood friend and my only true brother.  He would kiss me if I let him, but our wrestling matches were less sexual to me than they were to him.  I drew away because his violence was something I couldn’t identify with.  I still think a lot of it is partly my fault.  I may not talk to him but I will always, always love him.

My ex-boyfriend’s mother.  Every year I think I should call her.  Every year I think maybe she loved my Dad a little too much.  Every year I tell myself it’s been too long, and calling would be too akward.  Every year I miss her crazy rantings.

And then there’s all those that have already fallen away in the few short years since college began.  Another writer, a beatiful one, who I fear I can never be too close to.  We are both too green eyed.  A skinny girl with a strange accent and a foreign beauty.  I barely know her, but I admire her more than she realizes.  Two roomates who know more about me than they should. A lanky, shy, ticklish boy with curly hair and a scattered laugh.  He looks at me like I never new him.  Odd to think we were close once.

I don’t have many close friends.  It took quite a bit of thinking to come up with three females close enough to be my bridesmades.  And one of them is his sister.  Is it because I’m afraid of maintaining friendships?  Am I lazy?  I don’t want to be one of those annoying people who pursues things that no longer exist.  It’s just odd how a few short months of knowing someone can slightly reshape your soul.