March 02, 2003 | 6:11 PM

Well of course of course I still love people and want to relate and all that jazz.

But there is this wound, you see. And it isn't healing. I try not to pick at it, and for the most part I succeed. It's right in my solar plexus-- a great deep gash-- so deep in fact that it's almost a window-- if it weren't for all the puss and clots, you could probably look right through it like a key hole and see out the other side.

I cover up this wound with bandages and brightly colored material, and yet the blood seeps through, leaving great rorshrach stains. This wound reddens the shirts of those who try to hold me close and so they stay away. I attempt to focus on other things, to distract myself. I pour myself into my work. I stay extra hours at my first job and take on more and more projects. I take extra hours at my second job. I rehearse and rehearse and rehearse for Cabaret until I am exhausted-- at home, and at the theater. I go out to dinner and to shows. I talk on the phone. I study German and I clean and I read. I do everything I can to make this wound smaller. Help it scab over. And nothing works.

And so then I sit here in my little cave and I shrink. And I ask the heavens, what the fuck did I do to deserve this? Not any act-- not what someone has or has not done to me. But what the fuck did I do to deserve this hurt? I'm a pretty resiliant sort, in many ways. I've been through a lot in my life (many people have been through much much MUCH worse, of which I am all too well aware.)and I have always come out kicking and screaming, as depressive as I am, with optimism and good will for the most part in tact.

And scarily, I do not see that happening now. Something in me is dying, or has died already. And life has become a funeral procession for that thing, whatever it is-- what would you call it?-- cliches like "innocence" or "trust" don't do it justice. I feel broken in some terrible horrible way that cannot be repaired, and I am on a death march through a desert the name of which is Grief. The only thing I can liken this to is the sudden passing of a close loved one.

Despite all my accomplishments, despite the fact that I am well liked, despite my talents and my decent position in the world, and my off kilter desireablity, I feel like a horrible horrible failure, obviously not worthy of loving or being loved. Some terrible wall is being errected around me. I must have done something just dreadful for everything to come crashing down this way.

And I want truly, in the worst worst way imaginable to be able to change my point of view, to forgive or to shrug my shoulders and think "well it worked out in the end for the best", to rejoin the party. But I cannot. This is how I feel. This is where things stand. It cannot be made any different. I cannot perform that sort of alchemy and make it all turn into something else.

I just honestly honestly wish that none of it had ever happened. All of it-- the good, the bad-- I want to crush my own skull to block out each and every image.

And still I tell myself that this can only be for the best in the end. There is something valuable to be learned from all this-- I just have to find it. If nothing else, it has already spurred me on to face my fears, to perform again, to do what I love. And perhaps, to leave this city.

I am not talking about anyone else's experience-- only my own. I am truly truly glad for anyone else's happiness. I mean that sincerely. Everyone does what they have to do, whatthey feel they must do. We all must be true to ourselves. I still have that level of compassion. Unfortunately, it doesn't make things any easier. In fact, it makes it worse.

All of the research I've been doing on the Weimar Republic and the rise of Nazziism has caused me to confront stories of great brutality and loss-- far far greater than anything I have ever faced. My present sort of heartbreak is pedestrain and routine. It's nothing special. People have risen above so much worse. So why does it feel like the end of the world? Why do I feel squeezed and spiritually mutilated? Why do I feel sometimes as if I simply do not want to go on anymore?

And I think the answer to that question is I am not very strong. At least I don't feel strong right now.

Oh give it time, Anna. Give it time. Time heals all wounds, right?

Right?