September 3, 2003

Not knocking. It’s a bad habit I have. But to be honest I think it’s a learned behaviour. It’s so consistently led to excitement and drama that I have to admit I’m probably intending to do it on some subconscious level. Bedroom locks were made for girls like me.

At first, as my eyes adjusted to the light, I thought Lilith was meditating. My last roommate was into yoga. But Lilith was on her knees, rather than cross-legged. And she was surrounded by candles, a thick circle of dozens and dozens of wax stubs. The window was open; it was cold in there, the light spastic.

My silly questions died on my lips. A slight movement made me realize that her palms were uplifted. I hadn’t seen them at first because they were blackened from the elbows to the tips of her fingers. The tips flickered slightly as if they had strings attached.

I might have forced myself to say something louder, except that her eyes, usually floaty and detached, were very different. They weren’t underwater anymore; they were flying.

“Sorry,” I whispered, but she couldn’t hear me. There was music playing, a creepy kind of singing. It was a guttural language, one I’ve never heard before. As I slowly shut the door I saw her dip her fingers into a mound in front of her. She slowly drew something long and stringy up from it, something with a greasy glint.

When the door clicked closed I wandered back to the kitchen, kind of in a daze. I realized I was still holding the page of the weekly paper that I’d wanted to show Lilith. I put it up on the fridge and realized I could smell something burning.

What the fuck was she doing in there?

I decided to go to my room and shut the door. A friend had asked me to comment on a manuscript he’d written, and I couldn’t help but notice the things he’d lifted from his own life. While I should have been thinking about his book I was mostly thinking, my life’s just as interesting . . . and that’s when I got the idea to start writing this.

I’ve been wanting to do an online journal for a while, make use of the things I’d learned about blogging from when I was at Locale, this magazine I used to work for. This is as good a start as any, I think.

In the rare moments when there’s a lull in the traffic, just on the edge of audibility, I can hear the music from Lilith’s room. It’s pure, sustained, and plaintive. I can’t hear the words, but even the ebb and flow seems utterly foreign.

That’s enough for now. I’m going to figure out how to post this.

Posted at 9:43pm