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Location: Home.
Listening: Final Fantasy X.

I'll be finishing my last entry when I get back to work (where my song list is currently stored). I took the last two days off for various reasons and am now spending my last night at home, watching Peter play Final Fantasy X and trying to relax.

Made several decisions in the last two days that are, for me, relatively groundbreaking. After a conversation with my mother last night, I've determined that I really no longer have a reason to look to my parents for guidance anymore. For many I know, this conclusion has either already been made already or is, at the very least, a foregone. It hasn't been for me, until last night. I realized then that, no matter what events have occurred in the past or what was done or said (or not), my mother will always manage to readjust her perception to place me in the negative. Despite eight years of existence outside of her home and four "on my own", outside of her financial sphere, my mother refuses to acknowledge me as anything other than a foolish child who knows far less than she about the "real world" and who, consequently, is doomed to some aspect of failure. Despite my having moved from Houston to Los Angeles with half of a paycheck, no job, and a friend's couch to sleep on--and then having obtained a job within two weeks and found my own place and become completely self-sufficient within two more months--I am still naive and unable to progress in my life. Every decision I make is questioned; every perception I express is met with doubt and condescension. I'm not sure why it took me so long to realize that, even if I had gone on to get my doctorate by twenty-four, written a novel, and make her idea of "good money", I would still have managed to do something wrong along the way that I would not be allowed to put behind me or find redemption for.

I've lived in the shadow of these perceptions for far too long. It saddens me as much as it angers me that my mother cannot seem to acknowledge the things that I have accomplished, but only those that I haven't. I recognize, though, that her persistence in doing so only encourages me to dwell on what I haven't become, and this, in turn, contributes nothing to any effort I make to move forward. So, I simply can't afford to care anymore.

Easier said than done, I know, after twenty-five years. We'll see how it plays out.

Some things I've accomplished over the past two days:

• Purchased a new journal to dedicate solely to my reflections on the South. This was done after browsing Borders in a fit of homesickness and realizing that there is no Southern writer I am aware of who can adequately bring the region back to me in print. Peter has been suggesting that I try to write about the South for quite a while. I've been resisting out of a fear of failure and a reluctance to fall into the ready-made traps of either romanticizing or caricaturizing the place I call home. I finally decided to, at the very least, create a record of vignettes, colloquialisms, and general observations to stave off my homesickness and possibly serve as a base for some creative work.

• Read Jeanette Winterson's The Passion for the fifth time--partially as a preparation for recording the above observations and partially because, well, it's one of my favorite books. The Passion was the first Winterson book that I read, having stumbled across it on a friend's bookshelf when I lived in a shared Victorian at USC. It was the book that hooked me on her prose style and, after this latest read, is still my favorite, although The Powerbook and Written On The Body (Peter's favorite) are close runners-up. If you would enjoy a free-form historical novel with strong streaks of magic realism (or if you are in love with Venice, as I am), I encourage you to pick it up. She writes like Tori sings.

• Speaking of music, I reserved tickets for Peter and I for the Over The Rhine concert at Biola University on Sunday night. I'm excited, as Over The Rhine is one of my favorite bands and I missed their show in Los Angeles last year. If you've never heard them, try downloading a song or two. I suggest "The Seahorse", "June", "Faithfully Dangerous", "Latter Days", "Daddy Untwisted" and "If I'm Drowning". A little bit of trivia: if you listen carefully, you can hear the many Christian themes in their music.

• Peter and I have accomplished a significant chore--yay for us. We have separated our mass of clothing into "wash", "dry clean", and "donate" piles. I realized that we've been washing scads of clothing that we don't wear anymore, so we've cut down the workload and will be likely turning our discards over to a shelter. We also moved around several of the boxes that are still in the bedroom. Lots more space. I had the added bonus of seeing Peter in his soccer shorts and my cat hat. Meow.

• A more personal accomplishment, for me, has been finally pinpointing why I have such a strong negative reaction to Peter's latest effort, TD/OS. Now that I've figured it out, I can finally move toward reversing it and being able to be more objective about the piece. This is important to me, as it's been troubling me that personal issues have been hindering my ability to fully support him in something that he has put much time and effort into and that I otherwise consider to be, technically, some of his best work. Adversity has always brought clarity for me; this is apparently one of the payoffs of my recent problems with work and world events. I feel a little more balanced.

In closing, Final Fantasy X is, very simply, gorgeous. Its value as a traditional video game is somewhat questionable, as the player interaction seems to be a mere formality of advancing the pre-determined plot, which is a weakness, but the world they've created is stunning in its depth and beauty. The "sending" scene is like nothing I've ever seen. When I write my fantasy piece, this is the sort of world I'd like to portray.