August 30, 1999
10:24 p.m.
a couple of months ago someone put up a hand-written sign in the lobby of this apartment building saying
that someone had left an X-rated video on their doorstep. the purpose of the sign, it said, was to be sure
everyone knew that living among us was a sick individual.
the sign made me mad, and i think i just figured out who posted it.
it made me mad because it was so openly accusatory to everyone in the building, leaving virtually everyone of us
unable to say "I didn't do it" because we did not know who to respond to. and as far as i was concerned
the sign existed for the benefit of whoever left the x-rated video... come to think of it maybe that is who
actually posted the sign. maybe s/he felt remorse of some sort, and attempted to dilute the shame of the person
who found the video on their doorstep by making it look like someone else had suffered the same indignity. maybe that person
sat in their apartment printing a whole series of posters designed to make it look, over the course of several weeks, like
everyone was finding pornographic videos on their doorsteps and in their mailboxes. the police would be called, Channel 4
would
surround the building, there would be cavity searches and midnight obscene calls from foreign payphones.
tired as hell tonight. today i realized once again that i do not have one of those jobs where
i should hop skip and jump to the office with the hope that
i might change the world. it's just not one of those jobs. which is fine,
i'll save the world on my own time anyway. if i must.
i'm tired, but to the point where i'll probably take a sleeping pill and get it over with. tiredness makes the front
of my head sleepy and the back of it jumpy. lightning shots of adrenaline that keep me up through the night. maybe
i'll brave it tonight.
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