August 18, 2006:

Oh god, those phone calls.

Hour after hour after hour after hour. Night after night after night.

I loved her so much then.

At the end of our summer we each went where we'd planned to go. San Francisco State, for her. San Diego, for me. To save the world.

It hurt so much to be apart.

I miss that pain, now. To love someone so totally that the only hours of the day which counted were the ones on the phone.

My mother paid the bills, bless her martyr heart. Hundreds of dollars every month. She worked in a factory so that I could talk on her phone.

I should have gone to San Francisco with her.

I should have broken up with her years earlier.

I should have walked away from her the moment we met.

To this day I detest the telephone.