Diary.

October 23rd

Thinking about money all the time.

September 26th

Sitting in AHIS250, which has begun this time, and the boy with those clean hands

Never got to finishing this– I chose to spend class taking notes on the Fauvism material Dr. B presented and adding perfume samples to my LuckyScent cart. When I can, I will. It is almost tomorrow– this entire past week I have been up til midnight writing or talking. 1000 words on Warhol (The Kiss (Bela Lugosi)). Oh, and two BLTs later, I am a firm believer in their immense superiority over most other sandwiches.

My recipe:

Toasted but still-soft sourdough; organic mayo; cracked pepper; last-of-the-season heirloom tomato; extra cracked pepper; violet sea salt; organic baby romaine; thick-cut Cookbook market bacon; mayo; bread. Perfect. Grapes on the side and fancy olive oil sea salt chips and La Croix, and Lauren. Perfect.

September 24th

Waiting for AHIS250 to begin. I am chatting with four boys about the museums we've visited for our upcoming projects and about the USC v. Michigan game, which I know Allegra Samsen watched from a bar in New York City. I had better go to a game before the end of the season. Another very warm day. Having Emily over for BLTs, after my radio show with Landon, then going back to the station for my show, which will be all about the best things, (perfume and Slavicism) with Anna, then blissful nothing but probably dishes and laundry. (The BLTs didn't end up happening AGAIN. This meal is evading me.)

It is later now and I am laying in bed, post-Landon, post-Emily, post-Anna, just alone having marshmallows and turkey jerky in bed. Anna and I only really got to talking about pelvic floor strength and played maybe half an hour of songs– I was completely underprepared, distracted and unsettled edging on apathetic. Before my set, Emily and I walked through the brand-new Sephora in the village and I sprayed myself with dry shampoo and Gisou honey-rose hair perfume, which is lingering beautifully still, and reminds me of Lauren's rosey-woodsy perfume that smells more of tulip than anything. I love how she smells. She even sprays a spritz of perfume on her upper back, which is covered in freckles and moles and is deliciously soft. I think of her skin how a cowboy might think of his favorite saddle or boots or jacket, with such immense appreciation that closes the divide between aesthetic and utility. Supple. I recognize how Silence of the Lambs I sound but refuse to rebuke it. My simple truth.

September 23rd

Half-listening to a lecture on the ascetic Zoroastrian Magi and half-thinking about myself. I am always wishing I had brought my diary with me to campus but most every time I do it goes unused. In a low moment yesterday, I took myself to the perfume store on Alameda and was given a sample of Marissa Zappas Violette Hay ... there is nothing better than wearing a powdery crystalline flower perfume that smells like a French pharmacy and an old, old woman on my young body. I adore the contradiction, adore smelling delicate and sickly, adore how it becomes sexy on my skin simply because I am perfectly young enough to get away with it. I aspire to be at peace with myself and mostly am in terms of my age; twenty-one is just right. All my woman things. I am a woman and that means I travel alone and have a chair in my room and go to gallery openings. On my radio show last week, which was very good for once, I spoke about those beautiful German girls with the heart-shaped faces and wavy honey hair long save for baby bangs that I always see in the airport, which Eliza loved and agreed with. What would an airport be without these girls? Someday I will arrive to the airport hours earlier than I usually do and spend the entire time shopping for new makeup and shoes and sunglasses before my trip. Surely nothing feels better than carrying a new pressed powder and lipstick onto the plane. September 23rd is a wonderful day, perfect fall day, though it is 82 degrees here in Los Angeles I drove myself to Canyon for a hot latte and sat listening to a blasting vinyl of The Cranberries in the cafe, reading The Possessed next to a woman in neon green who fell for the flirtation of the slacker barista before going to buy BLT ingredients for dinner tonight, which is not happening anyways and will now probably be just lunch tomorrow, or something. I hate the way my writing sounds. I identify so deeply with Batuman's style and aspire to get under the skin of her words. Like a lover.