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I'm sitting, listening to All Blues and remembering the first time I was aware of it. Aware of Miles. It was my sixteenth birthday and I was with Wyatt. He's made me a tape of Kind of Blue and told me it would change my life. He was right. He's dead now. OD'd when we were still in the blush of our youth. He was really funny and quite beautiful. I hated him when he died. Thought he was a bastard, he was a bastard, but.... anyway.

It always reminds me of sex. Reminds me of an intimacy one loses with each loss. It still makes me cry sometimes, like now. I think I cried the first time I really listened to it, but then I might have been crying cause Wyatt had just gone down on me. It was a hell of a great birthday. Then I went to see the Bolshoi dance Swan Lake.

Birthdays are funny like that. I always think they're such a big deal and do some kind of reflection or spiritual thing. Going diving, swimming with sharks, having some experience I think will add authenticity to my life, but this year, this quiet birthday year I'm taking a different approach.

This year I'm grown-up. This year I've finally figured out that life is life. Really figured it out. There is no magic pill, there is no story, there is nothing but the day to day and the practice of staying alive. Or the practice of killing yourself. I'm straddling that line and there's no judgment on it.

Everyday is practice. Everything is practice. I've been practicing drinking and watching TV and I'm brilliant at both. that's authentic. admission of flaws with no judgment. I've never felt so good in my life. and so crummy at the same time. life's not good or bad, it just is. i know that's not some big secret of nimh moment, but for me it's priceless right now. i feel like I've actually become free. the freedom I've claimed all this time i finally have.

birthdays aren't so bad.