a (not so) complete history.

dEaR dIaRy. i was never any good at keeping a diary or journal. i am, and fear i always will be, a diary failure. sure, i'll go through fits and spurts where i jot down my thoughts and reflections with astonishing regularity, but, inevitably, i will hit a wall, often without warning or awareness, and just stop writing in it. weeks will pass before it occurs to me that, yet again, i have abandoned a diary. then i will dive into a shame spiral, bombarding myself with the same questions - can i commit to anything? can i finish anything i start? how can keeping a diary be so hard, little girls everywhere do it effortlessly, what is wrong with me?? am i a total failure??? i have a remarkable number of half empty journals because often a new attempt at maintaining a diary requires a fresh start, meaning an unused, never before abandoned journal. i would set the goal for myself that i will fill every page of a journal from cover to cover, but, what's the point? we all know i won't do it. and looking through my diary efforts over the years, i'm not sure i'd want to. i mean, what are diaries if not embarrassing, with most of the passages bringing to mind such thoughts as "yikes! i really thought that?" "oh god, i was a mess" "what was i thinking?" "was i really that lame?" i'd rather not have written proof that i was, in fact, like that. i ask myself will i regret later on that i don't have a thorough recollection of my thoughts, feelings, and experiences in my own words? will the world regret this? no. and too bad. first of all, if i live to be a ripe old age and i have nothing better to do than sit there and relive my youth by rereading all of my old diaries, somebody please put me out of my misery. what a waste of time. just days, weeks, months or maybe a couple of years left to live and i'm going to sit on my wrinkled old ass and not live but rather retreat to the past? no, thank you. and second of all, assuming things go as planned and someday i am wildly famous, i would rather retain some degree of mystery about my life and my youth. god knows the paparazzi and those damn tabloids are going to give me enough trouble and drag everything they can into the light of day, why should i add fuel to the fire with a complete chronicle of my innermost thoughts and secrets? to the adoring public and my dedicated fans, i apologize in advance, but when i die you are going to have to look and think and hypothesize and imagine to fill in the pieces of my complicated nature and even more complex life. i am not going to make it easy for you and leave a set of diaries from my formative years that hold all the answers you will seek. and those of you who truly understand me will appreciate that and realize that is exactly how i wanted it to be.

in the meantime, i will continue to somewhat infrequently, as it has been pointed out to me by certain friends and drummers, throw thoughts and experiences and stories down on this blog. so enjoy.