"I feel drunk but I'm sober
I'm young and I'm underpaid
I'm tired but I'm working, yeah
I care but I'm restless
I'm here but I'm really gone
I'm wrong and I'm sorry baby..."
- Alanis Morissette "Hand In My Pocket"

You ask if I leave myself sometimes. "Maybe," I say. "I can see how you might think that," but I know exactly what you're talking about. I sit above myself. The woman with her legs crossed in the pointy heels is not me. Not really. She has accessorized her anecdotes with her intentions, what she knows with what she doesn't, but wishes were so.

Had you squinted as you and I walked into the room, you'd have seen her shed me. I sit on one shoulder, whispering into her ear. We are authentically self-conscious, the most flattering angle of real plucked out of a catalog, one very contrived original.

She tosses her hair gaily over the other shoulder, so carefree after calculation.