Tuesday, Jan. 06, 2004 | 2:41 PM

It�s not that the past was meaningless or that relationships and friendships I had were meaningless. Or that EVERYTHING was terrible back in the day and now EVERYTHING is wonderful. There are lots of things I look back on with a great deal of fondness. And yes, there are a great many things I miss, and occasionally I miss them palpably. I won�t list those things now.

It�s just that overall, there was so much bullshit and so much unhappiness, and I�m not lying to myself about that. I�m not making things out to be worse than they were. Things were pretty fucking bad and they were bad for a long long time. They were bad in ways that I didn�t even realize until much later. I was so hurt all the time and I doubted myself constantly because I did not know what was real. I was embarrassed and I hid from people who cared about me, and I felt completely worthless. People would call me and I wouldn�t call them back because I had nothing to give. I cut almost everyone out of my life. I was in so much pain that I became this awful person whom I hated. I was petty and small and I treated several people very badly. I also had no energy. Just walking from my house down the street would cause me to feel exhausted. I felt like I had woken up and wandered into someone else�s life and the future was this long stretch of mediocrity and agony. And I was constantly in harm�s way. I am really appalled at what I put my body through several times and the kind of physical and psychic effect that�s had on me. It�s something I still think about a lot, and it�s my burden to bear for the rest of my life.

Let�s not mince words. Things were very very very very bad and it still hurts to remember how bad they were and how much more awful they would get until they finally got better.

Basically as more and more time went on, I stopped being myself. It really bothers me that I can look back on that period of time, and I really have no idea what to make of it�sometimes I have a moment of clarity, but normally, when I think about it all I feel is a terrible hurt and total befuddlement�how did I turn into that fucked up creature? I was like Golum or something, transfixed by that fucking ring. I was so short sighted and so fucking dependent. My life was so small.

I�m not vilifying the people that were closest to me then�not at all. There was someone who showed me an enormous amount of kindness and generosity during a really terrible period of my life, and I will always be grateful for that and for many other things. But there was a fundamental lack of authenticity about my life then, and about my relationships. There were serious cracks in the foundations of things, which I didn�t realize at the time, and of course it was completely inevitable that they would fall apart. It�s not that friendships were totally meaningless, only that some of them were not the kind of relationships I thought they were, or that I wanted and now have�that�s not a value judgement, it�s simply a fact. It doesn�t mean that anyone is bad or that they didn�t care about me or that I didn�t care about them, but that we didn�t have the bond I thought we had. And really, how could we have? How was I in any position to have any kind of authentic relationship with anyone when I didn�t even know who I was? It�s not surprising in the least that things turned out the way they did. Relationships usually don�t survive that kind of disillusionment. And I�m not just speaking for myself here. I think everyone is far happier and better off than they were. Although what the hell do I know�I�m just relying on my intuition. The only person I can talk about with any authority is myself.

Oh yeah�that�s another great thing that�s happened. I no longer will allow anyone else to tell me who I am or how I feel. This may sound pretty retarded, but it took me a long time to learn that lesson.

There is a dividing fault line in my personal history. There was an earthquake in my life that caused a seismic shift. On one side of that fault line is my past where I had very few people in my life and very little happiness, and on the other side is what? Not heaven or perfection, but something authentic and rock solid. From the moment I jumped over that fault line, things in my life started to change, and for awhile now, everything has been going so beautifully. I found theatre again. I have so many people in my life whom I love and who love me that I can scarcely count all of them. Interesting, exciting things happen to me all the time, and most important of all I like who I am. My entire energy is different, and it�s noticeable to everyone who knew me before and who knows me now. I feel like the people in my life really treasure me and think I�m wonderful, and because of that, I behave like a person who merits that kind of affection.

There was a point in my life where I did, in order to break free and get on with things, have to convince myself that the past was all horrible and meaningless. I don�t feel that way now. But it doesn�t change the fact that everything is so much better, so much more colorful, so much more surprising and interesting than it ever was before.

I feel I�ve been on some amazing quest. And I love seeing life in that way. I find my life totally fascinating. It�s populated with interesting characters and the plot keeps thickening. I am almost never bored. My life is my own personal mythology. You can choose to view life as a succession of days�a bunch of stuff that happens. Or you can choose to see it as a story, complete with all the literary devices that description entails. And like a great story, it exists on multiple levels�the first is just the visceral thrill of living, and then there�s the analysis of it all, and then the archetypal parallels, and on and on. All of these levels are important in equal measure and exist in symbiosis. It may be narcissistic to see life in that way, but in actuality I don�t think it is. Life can be as big or as a small as you want it to be, and I prefer mine on epic scale.