Dear Journal

Dear Journal,

I know i’m totally pathetic, but I’m sitting on the stoop, pretending to write in you, and waiting for Michael to get home again.  Why do I do this you ask?  Because I love him.  I know i’m just a kid, and he’s an adult, and there’s absolutely no future there, but I love him journal, i really do.  Every day he comes home from work, walks up the stairs past me, and he says hi, and asks me how my day was.  Nobody else does that, nobody else cares.  I have no idea where he works, or what he does there, but I don’t care.  he’s never told me, and I’ve never bothered to ask.  Maybe I will today.  Maybe today will be different, and I’ll get up the guts to say more than “Hi” and “fine, you?”  Maybe he’ll sit down next to me and tell me all about who he is and what he does.  Maybe, anything is possible, right journal?

He’s late coming home tonight, he does that sometimes.  I like to imagine what he’s doing.  Did his boss keep him late?  Did he go around the corner to the bar, and have a few beers with his work friends?  Why does it have to be today though journal?  I’ll sit here awhile longer hoping he comes home.  I really will ask him today.  Ask him what he does.  It’s something.  Wow, how pathetic am I?  Super pathetic, I know.

I like to sit here and people watch while I’m waiting for him.  Think about the people that walk by on this New York City street.  Where they’re going, what they’re thinking, what their lives are like.  The guy that just walked by in an Elmo costume...what’s his story?  I don’t know that I could even dream up something for him.  A mom walks by in an expensive tracksuit, pushing a stroller that probably cost more than...i don’t know, apparently more than anything I’ve ever owned.  What’s she doing on this block?  I bet she forgot to write someone a check yesterday, so she had to drop it off at their apartment this morning.  Yeah, her nanny, or her dog walker.  I wonder, is she nice to work for?  She kind of had her nose up in the air, so I bet she can be a bitch.  Is that mean? To judge her by how she walked by?  I wonder what people think about me when I walk by.  I would take the fantasy life they made up for me over my real one, any day.  Sometimes I wonder how I get there from here.  How do I get to that fantasy life?  I know, I know journal “you have to do well in school if you want to get anywhere in life” I do ok.  My grades aren’t terrible, but that’s not what I’m talking about.  How do I get from doing well in school to a world outside of here?  I guess that’s the great mystery, isn’t it?

Wow Journal, he’s really late today.  I wonder what’s keeping him?  Did his buddies convince him to stay for “just one more beer”?  Did he meet a girl in the bar that he’s trying to go home with?  I hope not.  I know that’s really pathetic, cause I have no chance, and I can’t expect him to be single forever.  That’s selfish.  I know it’s selfish, but it doesn’t mean that part of me doesn’t wish for it anyways.  At least until I’m 18, and then it wouldn’t matter anymore.  He’ll be older by then too though, maybe he’ll be married, moved away with his wife, and had a baby.  Maybe his wife will be the one walking by with the expensive stroller.  And I’ll be sitting here, forever, waiting for life to change somehow.  Change for the better I hope.

Doug and his friends just walked by.  *eye roll* They think they’re better than everybody else, but they’re stuck here too.  Forever on this block with no way up, and no way out.  They can prance around in their baggy pants all they want, pretending like they own this neighborhood, but they don’t.  Their lives are just as sad and pathetic as the rest of ours, only they’re better at denying it.  Good for them.  Deny it all you want, but it doesn’t change anything.

Wow, he’s really late today.  All night project at work?  Or was his all night project just the girl from the bar?  Maybe it’s neither of those things.  Maybe something happened to a relative or a friend, and he had to go straight over there after work.  I hope not, I hope everyone’s ok.  

I’ve been sitting here for too long, it’s starting to look strange.  It’s starting to get dark too.  I better go inside.  Just a few more minutes though, maybe he’ll come home in just a few more minutes.  If I miss him tonight, then I’ll just ask him tomorrow.  I’ll wait till he comes home, and i’ll talk to him.  Get to know the sort of stranger that lives across the hall.  Tomorrow, I will definitely have a conversation with him, tomorrow.  I will.  I’ll be up all night rephrasing it in my brain, but not matter what...I will talk to him tomorrow.

Moms yelling, I have to go.  Bye journal.  I know will talk to you tomorrow.