Friday 26 May 2000

Pic of the day: OK, so I have tampered with the picture. But it is for a good purpose. Read and find out. :)

Belated teen angst

No strike, but a sick leave. Nothing dramatic, just the digestion acting up again. I got up an hour early, don't know if that could be a reason. Probably not. I wasn't hungry all of yesterday, so it has probably been brewing.

Apart from the things that follow from a hyperactive digestion, I also got snatches of sleep. In one such, I had a dream which was not spectacular in any way and was immediately forgotten. Except for one thing: There were scrolling credits at the end of it. I think this is a first for me.

Also tried to convert my diary page from using tables to using CSS margins and float for the layout. It almost worked. Except that I got 3 different layouts: One in Opera, one in Internet Explorer, and one in Netscape. The one that looked passable in Opera looked like made by a blind man in the other two, only differently in each of them. So, back to tables. Perhaps I shall try again when the browsers hit version 6, if I'm still around. I guess the seperation of text from layout is somewhat like the separation of church from state: Each has his own ideas on how it should work. :)

***

In the self-styled Journalling Community, there is a concept called teen journals, which should more correctly be angsty teen journals. These are supposed to be in pale writing on a dark background and be all about trivial emotional stuff, exaggerated to olympic proportions. Teen crushes the size of Romeo & Juliet. Stuff like that.

When I was a teen, my angst wasn't about secret (or not so secret) love, but about my immortal soul. (This was before I discovered that my soul was actually mortal.) I dreamt at night that Jesus gathered his saints and I was left behind. One memorable night I even dreamt that I was thrown in Hell proper. Not that I didn't deserve it, for not picking up every piece of trash along the road, or for not putting the cap back on the fountain pen.

I guess the fear of rejection (and the experience of rejection, too) is rather fundamental in the life of a teen. It is after all the end of the world. Namely the world we lived in as a child. As grown-ups we move into a new, larger world full of dangerous and uncharted terrain. Will we be accepted there, or thrown out in the darkness where there is wailing and gnashing of teeth? Eventually we learn to assign the proper value to the things we find there. Or perhaps not? Lately I have come to revise some of my conclusions. I may do so again. I guess these last few weeks may seem a bit angsty, compared to the cheerful happiness people are used to from me.

***

I'm considering, here. Post this now, and regret it later? Or regret now, and not offend anyone? OK, here is a poem I have named "woe". What can I say? It has cheered me up repeatedly already. And I even wrote the thing.

Oh woe is me! The sun has set;
I sit her, trying to forget
my aching legs, my aching gut;
this town that's got no Pizza Hut.

The girl I love won't give me none
(and she is not the only one).
My bills are due, my landlord mad,
but I just sit here, lost and sad.

When others go to have a beer,
I tell them that the end is near.
And when they go to get some food,
I tell them that it is no good.

I've got no friends, I've got no dog,
and now I am too fat to jog.
I've got no car, I've got no house,
I'm poorer than a farmyard mouse.

Oh woe is me! I feel so sore
and soon I have no readers anymore.

(Some experience with teen angst journals required.)

Speaking of teen angst journals ... or perhaps not! Click on the garish picture on top of this page to see a somewhat unusual teen journal and even badder poetry than mine. The poetry is a must! Read it and think of me ... Recommended site of the day.