Hubris.co.nz

July 5th, 2002

I’ve been reading through my old reports, because Mum found an envelope of them, and it’s extraordinary the story that they tell; at the American school I started out really smart and full of enthusiasm and blasting my way out of the remedial writing class they stuck me in thinking that I was a ‘dumb Australian’, and then as I got into seventh grade, comments read like “Joanna does not participate as much in class as she used to” and my marks start falling and there’s even “I believe underlying problems may be affecting her results”. Oh really? Underlying problems like ooooooh maybe I was being bullied every day, and I was fucking miserable and I wanted to die? Do you think that might have affected my marks. FUCK YOU to every single fucking teacher at ASIJ. Just looking at the reports, it’s so fucking obvious what was happening to me, and what the fuck did they do about it? Nothing. And my mother just now is like “Should we have taken you to a shrink so that you could realyl have fit in with those Americans?” Well, yes, maybe, Mum. Or maybe you could have spent at least one day in those four years not telling me how miserable you were, and tried to make things a little easier for me. This is so pathetic of me; this stuff was like, ten years ago, and it’s making me cry right now. I’m okay, I survived it all – thank god for Beth Dodd arriving at ASIJ in 8th grade, and for Lisa Gonser and Ryan Rimschnider leaving at the end of 7th grade.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH.

Last night, I went around to Fatty Si’s house. We went adn got coffee at Midnight Espresson, and then rented DVDs – Zoolander and Nurse Betty. We chatted and hung out and stuff. It was cool. He said that a long long time ago, his girlfriend at the time, Heidi, used to worry about me before she met me, cos he talked about me a lot, but then she met me and thought I was super cool and loved me. As soon as you actually meet me, you realise that there’s no way I could take your boyfriend away from you, even if I wanted to, which I don’t, ever. Ladies, I am not a threat to your man! Statistically speaking, I am far more likely to score your girlfriend. I’ve only slept with one guy who had a girlfriend, and she was far too good for him anyways (as was I, which is probably one of the main motivating factors for me to do it, since it was in the six months I spent last year trying to reach rock bottom). On the drive home, through the wilderness of Wilton, I suddenly started feeling very lonely. It was a little odd.

Now I am sitting in the very warm lounge listening to the Topless Women Talk About Their Lives soundtrack (I love this album so much, although the current association i have with it is of a sweet boy’s white bum shining in the dark as he bent over to put it on at my request), and thinking about doing some writign that i told someone I’d do for them, which I wish I hadn’t. I’m too nice, I think. But my word is my word and I hate to let people down. Maybe I’ll work on it tonight when I come home leeringly drunk from “a quiet dinner” with KateB. We’ll go BYO, drink two bottles’o wine and see where the night takes us. I get to see my baby girl again, YAY. Then I just have to spend lots’o time with Karen, Anji, go visit Oma, see Fatty again, see Hulita, adn maybe call the Rimu Crew (Bopha’s old flat). It’s probably just as well that the Welly Massive doesn’t really seem to exist anymore – Ayna’s on holiday in Indonesia and Daniel moved to Korea to teach English, cos i probably don’t have the time and energy to take e and go out dancing for hours and hours and hours.

Thursday the 24nd of December – Xmas Eve

If you have had reason to be in my address book, you probably recieved the above graphic already. If you didn’t, help yourself. Or if you just wanna PRETEND like I sent you an xmas card, go for your life, you tragic little puppy.

I’ve got three new people on my ICQ list now, and they’re all fanttttastic. Annette, Brooke and Heather. Go and visit their pages, and read their journals obsessivly like me. Except not Brooke’s, cos I don’t know whereabouts it is. But hey! She did the design for my “Frozen Lake” story so I love her anyways. (Instant friends with Vision!).

Today I woke up early (by my standards – ie before 11) and vaccumed, because Mommy had asked me to, and I’m a good little girl like that. What I didn’t vaccum, though I should have, was the floor under this desk, where Pixxie must have been playing with a bird, unless I’m malting feathers unawares.

I also made dessert – chocolate cake with lemon mousse inside it. I made a stencil and put pretty icing sugar stars on the top, and lemon zest. Someone should so marry me, man. Wow, that was a cool sentence. Double Alliteration. Mrs Turner would be so proud. Actually, all my English teachers, with the exception of Mr Mitchell and Mr Vigeland were proud of me. Mr Vigeland hated me because Beth and I always laughed whenever he walked past because he wore tight jeans and thought he was sexy. And Mr Mitchell knew I was smart but he also knew I thought he was a slack bastard, and that was the reason I did no work in his class (I still got an A for bursary though – but I guess I could have got scholarship if I’d ‘applied myself’ and hadn’t been on IRC all year). Annnnnnyways.

Granny came for dinner. I hid in here. Mummy was good to me, and gave brought me in a glass of bubbly. She understands how I feel, and so I didn’t have to resurface until dinner. Then straight after dessert, Karen rang, so I left to answer and never came back. I’m sure it’d be good to spend some time with her because, realistically, she’s not going to be around much longer. But I just have nothing to say to her, and I hate the way her false teeth move around in her mouth. So yeah.

The amusing part of the evening though was when I said something about Mum’s driving, and Leonie was sitting in the corner pissing herself, because she’d admitted to me that Mum’s driving terrifies her as well, only of course I couldn’t let on to that. So I sat there winking at her instead. It’s funny how I can get on with my aunts nowadays – like, as an adult. I HATED Leonie when she stayed with us for a couple of weeks back in Japan. My My, what a problem child I was (according to Mum anyways).

Amy stood me up for Midnight Mass. This makes her Brian. Happy Xmas and all that, people. Me, I’m going to be buried in stacks of pressies tomorrow. Or today even, given that it’s one am.

Monday the 21st of December

JoannJo: “I wanna see a journal entry from you, missy”

Thomas: “it’s better than TV, now that Shortland Street isn’t on anymore”

Ahhhhhhhhhhh fans. They’re the shit, bro! You see, today was a fairly non day. I mean, I slept in, veged aroudn, did two hours of work at Leonie’s. She was collating replies to a survey of students who went to Japan on an exchange.

Q: What was the highlight of your trip?

A: The plane ride.

It made me realise that even if Japan did fuck me up some, at least I made the most out of my experiances there. Mum was asking me if I wanted a book of photos of Japan, ‘to help you remember it’. I was like “um -there really isn’t all that much about Japan that I want to remember”. Which is mostly true, but surely in all of those four years, there must have been some good bits, other than Beth and Brittany. Yeah this is teenage angst, and it’s largely incoherant, so I’ll change the subject. My stories are elsewhere. (Look Mom, no link!)

Aren’t online journals fun? Yes they are, but I’m just clutching at conversation straws now, so I’ll leave you with another picture. The cartoon last night was a self portrait of Penny, drawn in fifth form and coloured in with care by me. This is from the same series, and it’s me. Don’t freak out too much if you can help it.

Monday, November 16th – sort of

Okay, so I think that TECHNICALLY it’s still the 15th, but hey – by the time I’m finished
it’ll probably be the 16th. Oh who cares? It’s my journal and I can do what I want in it.

So yeah. Tonight I drove Shirley’s car to the shop – now THAT was interesting. Her
gearstick didn’t seem to be centred properly, so I fought with it for ages. And stalled
three times pulling out of my park. Then I got lost driving around the block, and had to
turn around in an area the size of a playing card. I hate manuals. I was on a mission to
buy chocolate – mission was a success, captain!

Shirley and I watched this cheesy show about NZ love songs, that was kind of lacking,
and Ardijah had no place on it. I liked the Exponents (Victoria) and Dave Dobbyn
(Loyal), Chirs Knox (Not Given Lightly – of course) and natch Bic Runga, but I dunno – it
could have done with Shihad or HLAH or the Headless Chickens. Yes they do lovesongs,
dammit! Thank god there was no mention of the feelers though!

Mmmmmm so do you know where this is leading you to? Yup, my very own list of
special love songs. These all bring a nochalant smile to my face when I hear them. There
are others – inncidental music and stuff, but these songs are just the esscence. Actually,
maybe I’ll mention others. And count the number of times the Smashing Pumpkins
feature!

1. ‘Don’t Cry’ by Guns’n Roses, age 12. This was my theme song for Ryan Rimschnider
in 7th grade. They used to play it at all the dances and it always made me cry. This was
the guy who, along with Lisa Gonser, was so cruel to me in English class that I started
composing suicide notes, thinking to get Revenge. Hey – I was twelve – colour me
dramatic. Then along came the video for ‘Jeremy’ by Pearl Jam. I thought “Hey, cool
idea” then realised I didn’t want to be a copycat.

2. ‘One’ by U2, age 13. This one is for Simon Darby, who I had on-and-off crushes on
during sixth-eighth grade. He’d had a crush on me in fifth grade, when I fiirst started at
ASIJ, and used to taunt me, pointing to NZ on maps going “homesick?”. I have to forgive
him though, cos he was into MC Hammer at the time – and even had 3 pairs of the pants
to prove it. In fifth grade I was lusting after Scott Pertel, who had long tanned legs and
three pairs of reebok pumps. He was going out with Heather Delany – my mortal enemy.
She was the most popular girl in the grade, and even at age eleven had…..shock horror….
BREASTS. I was in her homeroom in seventh grade, and she was actually really nice.
Simon was also in my homeroom that year, but I think I was too busy wanting Ryan -
who, coincidently, went out with Heather for a week that year. Annnnnnnyways, back to
Simon. He became my main squeeze in eighth grade, and was given the code name ‘BS’
by me and Beth, since his catch phrase was “BIG SMILE”. Beth asked him out once,
which devestated me, but he turned her down. She and he were the reasons I started on
the school BBS system – geek girl at age 13. Anyways, U2 were his favourite band and
‘One’ is probably their last good song since they’ve gone to shit now. I heard it the day
after I’d had a dream in which Simon hugged me and promised to stay friends forever, so
it’s just appropriate.

3. ‘Landslide’ covered by the Smashing Pumpkins, age 14. Like the second day of high
school, I was in the library looking for a monologue to audition for the fall play with. This
guy pointed me in the right direction, and I remember telling Beth on the phone that night,
since she’d transferred to a military base school by then, that I’d met a guy who was kind
of cute. I ended up with a tiny part in the play, while he scooped the major role, which
meant I got to know him a lot better. His name was Nuno Periera, and though he was
kind of short, I was fully smitten. I was also currently in love with Landslide at the time,
and I got inspired by the lyrics “I’m not afraid of changing” and “time makes you bolder”.
Finally, I got up the guts to get my friend Amy Macintire to tell him. Tragic, Tragic. He
said nothing to me, so I thought that was that. Then, on the last night of the play, this guy
called Luke Buckley goes to me “you know, Nuno really likes you, he’s just afraid to say
anything.” That totally crushed me. I know it wasn’t true so I had no idea why Luke
would be that horrible to me. I cried so much before the play that night, such the drama
queen even back then.

Then I moved back to New Zealand. Fifth form passed fairly uneventfully, guywise. I
had a tiny crush on a seventh former named Sam Pearson in my Japanese class, but
nothing major – until New Years Eve 95-96.

4. ‘By Starlight’ by the Smashing Pumpkins, age 15-16. This song is SO the story of me
and Ben Morell- a guy I fell in Love (yes, Love with a capital L, almost the whole deal)
with, although I was only with him for an hour, tops. He was my first good kiss, and my
first get with. I believed him when he said he’d call, and “By Starlight” was my music of
choice waiting up warm summer nights for the phone to ring. I was completly obsessed
with him for nearly the whole year. I stood right next to him at the Pumpkins concert, and
that’s how I realised I was in love with him – I couldn’t move or even talk, I was so
overwhelmed. I could feel him in my every pore. But of course, I didn’t talk to him then,
and since he went to St Pats, I never saw him. I just learnt all I could about him from
Dylan – which led me into trouble. Other Ben songs are ‘Breaking the Girl’ by RHCP cos
that’s when we started dancing, and ‘I Could Have Lied’ (ironic much?) also by the
RHCP, which was when he kissed me, smooth boy that he was. So I guess that ‘Suck My
Kiss’ should be included too, in the three song seduction. Fuck, he was SO the man, I
was completly swept off my feet and didn’t realise what he was up to until it was
happening. He only had two flaws as far as I’m concerned; a) he shouldn’t have lied – I
could have accepted it as just a NYE thing if he’d just been honest, and b) he was too
fixiated on my ass. He told Dylan things went ‘fast’. Oh reaaaaaaally?

5. ‘Set the Ray to Jerry’ by the Smashing Pumpkins. This song perfectly captures all the
frustrations I felt having fallen for Dylan – the boyfriend of one of my best friends. Of
course, I never told him, or her. ‘Set the Ray’ was my favourite song at the time (and it
probably still is), which is why it became HIS song. Other Dylan songs would be the
Counting Crows’ whole album August and Everything After, which I grew to love
because he did. His theme was ‘Rain King’, so we’d always play that at partys, and I;d
even dance to it, not afraid in front of him. He was and is so intuitive, and is still one of
my most favourite people in the world to talk to, because I can tell him anything. He’s
doing a journalism course too, so we have lots in common – I remember one conversation
I had with him about our editorial bond, in the morning after a party when we were both
cleaning in guilt – him for spilling Sarah’s secrets, and me for sleeping next to him, sharing
his pillow and feeling so close. Why did he have to be Sarah’s? They’re STILL going out
so that’s over four years now. I’ve lost touch with her – think it’d be okay for me to ring
him? He always used to taunt me by singing Hootie and the Blowfish, because he knew I
hated them. Singing ‘Hold my Hand’ and going “come on, Jo,” extending his hands out
was more of a taunt that he could guess.

Mmmm. So now comes the bit I’m hidi-ashamed of. Yes, that’s right…….. Internet
crushes. Sigh.

6. Any song by STP. Nick loves these guys and so the two are entwined in my mind. He
was like the first guy I started talking to on the net…. I can even give you the date -
Febuary 15th, 1997. Not, that’s not obsession – it was the saturday after my mother’s
birthday, which was when I started on IRC. Anyways, he was such a charmer, saying
stuff like “I’d climb mountains for you”. It was all cheese, but I took it too seriously,
viewing him as the flipside to Ben. One day I got really pissed off with him being a wank,
so I was like “You just don’t get it, do you? I’ve completely fallen for you”. He was
shocked and things were just a weeeeeee bit strained between us for a while. But now (I
think) we’ve moved past it, and are even better friends. Despite being like my earliest
virtual friend, he’s the only person on the internet that I talk to and like and haven’t met.
And I don’t want to meet him either. I don’t think he could match my expectations.

7. “Black Star” by Radiohead. I remember how I was raving on about this song to Mike,
going “it’s such a beautiful love song” when he goes “it’s about breaking up”. In different
ways, we were both right, just that we viewed things from totally different angles – which
is a good analogy for the way we related to each other. I started chatting to Mike when
the whole Nick thing was at its most cringeful, and we became pretty good friends – I
think. It’s sort of hard to tell with him. Because he was so good to talk to, I saw him as
another Dylan, and developed a slight crush on him. I was grooming and preparing him to
deal with all my secrets when he was told about the crush (thanks Amy) and blew things
waaaaaay out of proportion. Several emails got forwarded to me about the situation so I
wrote him one, which, to put it mildly, was rather not nice. To paraphrase his reaction to
it; “every second sentence was an attack on me – when you get a letter like that you have
to stop caring”. (My memory for detail always did scare him). I felt bad and wrote to
apologise to him but things were never really the same after – it was too fragile and I
thuink I just get too much of a kick out of headfucking with him. He can do it even better
than me though, but I’m not sure he does it intentionally. Out of the blue one night when
drunk, him and his friend came over to my house, and he was actually really nice in real
life. Such clean white teeth. He also came to my birthday party, but I think that was just
to mock. Then there was more trouble after that, involving a lass called Kim, so he gave
up IRC. I think that’s the third time I’ve helped inspire him to do that – maybe that’s just
vanity. If you’re reading this, Mike, cos I know that’s possible, let me know your side of
the story. The other song that lingers from the Mike Era is ‘Protection’ by Massive
Attack – I was the girl seeking shelter in a sympathetic ear.

8. ‘Cherry’ by the Smashing Pumpkins. It’s strange because for Matt, the only guy that
I’ve ever seriously Loved (Ben wasn’t all there), there really isn’t much of a definate song.
No wait, there are. He started to like me when we talked about the Pumpkins, so ‘Cherry’
suits the mood. Amy was teasing him before it really began about having a crush on me
and he was like “well, she likes the pumpkins….” – good reason, pal! One day we both
started singing it at the same time, an eeire coincidence we often had – he was convinced it
was a psychic bond. ‘Cherry’ strikes me as a sort of a cry for help, which is what Matt
seemed to do. I so so wanted to help him. He was always so down, so depressed and
lonely. I know I helped him build up his self esteem to the point where I almost wish I
hadn’t since it’s gone too far now. The line in the song “cos I can tell you once were
pretty” was like how he liked me, and saw more to me than others. Of course, he
shouldn’t have made that judgement over the net. Another song for Matt that’s more
situational is ‘Exit Music’ by Radiohead. This was playing the morning after my goodbye
party when I’d been up all night arguing with him, knowing full well that I was in love
with him and needed to tell him, even if he didn’t want to hear it cos he didn’t feel the
same way. This song caught my desperation and made me bawl. I cried all the way to the
end of the album while he slept in the adjoining room. Then I went to write him a letter
that spelled the beginning of the end. The first bit of the letter was the line “maybe she’s
just pieces of me you’ve never seen” from the Tori Amos song ‘Tear in Your Hand’. I
can just so relate to that heartbreaking song, wondering with Tori why the hell it couldn’t
just work out.

That was back in January, and I’m finally not in love or obsessed with Matt anymore. My
Current Infatuation hasn’t got a song yet. He’s got shit taste in music, and nothing really
strikes me as situational. Having a song is normally the way I tell if I’m serious about
someone, but oh well. I know that I feel seriously about CI Boi, but damned if I’m going
to re-live the Matt Hell again.

Fuck, this was waaaaaaay longer than it was meant to be, but that’s cool. I enjoyed
writing it, and i’m super proud of YOU for reading it all.

xoxox

Who will be next?