1.11.2000

Another evasive day.
I've arrived at the conclusion that I need to drop out of university sooner or later. I simply can't handle it. I took a look at what courses I'll have in the spring. There's too much writing to do. I can't handle the writing of essays. Almost everything else I can do. But I can't do those.

My wrist hurts constantly. Moving it hurts. I didn't feel a thing for the first day or two, but yesterday it started to ache when I moved it. Now it hurts more when I move it. The blood has dried up and turned black and there are hints of a bruise around the cut.

It doesn't look too good.

I once accidentally cut open my heel. It took weeks to heal properly. I still haven't made cuts that bad. My cuts heal, even if they too leave pink scars everywhere. My heel is also scarred.

I have a keloid on my thigh. It's less that two inches long, about an inch wide. It used to be more raised, but nowadays it's only a few millimetres above the normal skin. It used to be bright screaming red, but nowadays it's turned white and very pale pink. Around it there are dozens of tiny white scars where smaller amounts of the hot water landed.

I remember the doctor telling me that it could be dusted away. This was in the eighties. Nowadays they'd probably tell me that new skin could be transplanted, and that the traces of it could be completely erased.

I objected violently. There was no way anyone would take away my scar. There was no way anyone would take anything from me away if there was any way I could stop them.

I was ashamed of the scar at first. People made fun of it in the dressing room. I didn't look at it at first. It scared me, like the wound itself had scared me. It was difficult to change the dressings and take care of it. It was difficult to look at it, difficult to accept my own body acting in ways I couldn't control.
Like all of my wounds, it refused to heal properly. I grew accustomed to it, with practise, but I don't think I ever accepted it.

My body is mine. That's what I thought, till I realised that it actually isn't. I tried to comfort myself that at least I was mine, I was present, 'I' being something spiritual, 'I' being my thoughts and emotions. I tried to comfort myself, tell that no one would be able to get inside my head, no one would be able to change me if I didn't want to.

It didn't took long to realize this didn't work either.
I remember feeling like everything was slipping away, like I was falling on a slippery surface, with nothing to hold on to.

It never stopped feeling like that.