Thursday, Jul. 24, 2003 | 10:59 AM

What a strange strange moment in my life this is. So much beauty and so much fucking shit to wade through.

I�ve been staring in the face some of the not so nice parts of myself lately. Things I haven�t wanted to face. Sure I�ve been down on myself before, but always in a really emotional way�that�s not what I�m talking about. I�m talking about objectively and honestly reviewing myself.

Life is a mine field of Catch 22�s. When I decided to move in to my own apartment, I didn�t really think through some of the financial aspects of it. I didn�t because if I had, I would have seen that the equation wasn�t going to equal out�not without living like a monk. And if I had thought about it responsibly and how it would affect someone else, I wouldn�t have taken the apartment. I wouldn�t have lived alone.

But the thing is I needed this. More than anything else in my life, I needed this. It has been the single most rewarding and important thing I have done in my adult life, and has lead me to be a much better and actualized person in so many ways. That single move was the key to every other good thing that happened to me. It gave me an autonomy I desperately needed. It was the first real breakthrough I�d had�a turning point if you will.

And it has also placed me in a financial quagmire. I am struggling to release myself from debt quicksand, and the thing is, if it was just me, if it just affected me, I wouldn�t care. Because my feeling on these things is that it�s just money and it will work itself out. It always has to some extent. And it always will. But it isn�t just me. My name is tied to someone else�s name and what I do affects that person and he is being badly affected. And every time I attempt to make it better, it just gets worse.

The thing that I have to look at is that on some level I simply didn�t care enough to not allow this to happen, and that is most painful of all. That I made a (subconscious) decision that what I needed was more important than his welfare. And then I think about the centrality of that theme in my life�how I�ve been very much on the other end of it as well. How we wind up teaching each other these painful lessons, and how good it is but also how sad.

That nobody escapes being wounded in this life. That it�s impossible to go through life unscathed. That sometimes the decisions we make have a hurtful and debilitating affect on people we care about, and that sometimes it�s the right thing to do. That things, quite simply, aren�t fair.

And yet on some level, I honestly believe whatever happens gives us an opportunity of some kind. I have this metaphysical appreciation for the rightness of how things work out.

But that doesn�t change the here and now aspect of the present situation which is that I am on the edge of a cliff.

Now let me remind you, dear readers, that I am perpetually on the edge of a cliff. I have been homeless. I have seen my apartment burn down. I�ve dealt with just about every soap opera quasi crisis that could possibly occur in the life of a middle class 20 something broad�you name it, I�ve been there. I�ve had more drama in the past 26 years than most people have in 50. I have had so many near tragedies, and somehow have scrapped through and triumphed in bizarre O Henry-esque scenarios. I have strange luck.. And I know that somehow things are going to be OK. That they�ll be OK for everyone.

But I�m also terrified. I�m praying that something is going to dawn on me that I haven�t thought of.

You know what I�m looking forward to? The moment of relief when everything is alright.

And then, last night I rode a bus home from my second job. And on the bus, everybody sang along together to Motown. We sang Lean On Me and What�s Goin� On and My Girl. And everybody on the bus had fucking great voice. We were harmonizing and whooping and hollering and it was like a spontaneous choir. Black people, white people, asian people. Everyone just singing and laughing and hugging. I don�t know how it started because I got on in the middle of it, but it was one of those moments where you realize how simple things truly are�that life is made up of millions of opportunities to connect with people�that a fucking bus ride can be magic. How many of those moments do we waste? How much more beautiful could the world be?

It�s times like that when I realize that this stuff isn�t going to kill me. That ten years from now, something else will be happening. That this too shall pass and work out. That as in the past I just have to figure out how to make it work.