I am no Moleskine

I am no Moleskine. A ten dollar story inside a $30 journal? Try a two penny thought in a buck-and-a-quarter notebook, spiral bound and wide ruled, all shined up and spit out of a Walgreens plastic bag. Sorry clothies, I'll have'em next time [c'mon pull my finger and relax].

Moleskines: "The wrapping is art." Ok, I'll hear you out. Oh...got it. Bands of Hemingway and Chatwin and Wilde like violin strings, Glass's minimalist chimes hem the contours - simplicity at its most Italian, China's finest magic paper all but writes for you. Check, check, and check.

Recoiling for a second, thinking of lovely laughing words, rich texture and real sorrow, all sapping the pages of Moleskines everywhere. There's truth inside, I believe some of you.

But the art is not the journal; it's not what you hold but what is being held. Journals are not umbrellas - flip the cheap things inside out for god's sake, and - LOOK UP. They're not protecting you from the rain, they are welcoming the flood. Besides, it's all pouring out, not in.

Now, I do know a Moleskine. She indicated, mattering very much, that in addition to owning several Moleskines, she also fondles her writing by following over 100 blogs. Spectacularific! I had to bite my brain, cock it toward the doorknob, and think about a circle. Who the fuck cares if you've read 100 gabillion blogs, every typed beautiful word in courier new font, that simple white background shaded with gray letters and amusing hyperlinks - long, long trails to nowhere. And always spotted with graphic art, ooh, that kind that when you see it, you know it's pretty. Picked from a nifty template box - abstract owls, a crispy white hand holding a vintage book, a wing falling from a brass horn, fading and fading away into tiffany blues and somber golds.

God, I see them, these blog pages, and jealousy stings like an ever-lovin' bitch. That confidence. That courage. Much more, or, much less, has brought these writing creatures to create their own spheric space, inviting - no! Beckoning - no! Begging all the world inside their purview - "Welcome to my inner struggle." "Hear the voice I own." "Believe the lies I wish to discover."

Bleezy blah, blah, and blah. Oh, I'm sure there's great shit, some really brilliant shit, things I wish I could write if I could have access to their dreams, wear their Socratic skin like a costume - "Can I feel real pain?" "Can I stare down your gun barrel?" Please give me your disease, your depression, your divine comedy. I'd really love them like accessories, dress up my ordinary pigment all dry and yellow."

Instead, you wear them, wave them around brightly like flashlights in a dark cold world, smiling at people to follow your digitized paths and Mac book keyboards: "I'm ordinary but extraordinary, want to listen?" "I'm living to be good enough, share a comment!"

God, it's crap I yack too but it tastes putrid coming out. Really? Is the key to life a breath mint and a blog? Let's pray not. I'd rather taste the rancid and spew than dress it up in Moleskine and swallow. Ooh - the hypocrisy [blogspot] the jealousy [HP] the circularity [what?] - it's all mine! Heehee! [darting eyes, hands rubbing together].

Ah, what the hell. Here I go again, happy trails and heaving bullshit all tiptoeing smashed like a drunk ballerina toward the Listerine bottle and a laptop.

Shutting the door now...