Hallowe’en.

I just asked myself, “I wonder if it’s possible to make a collage of words?” and then I realized that’s what I do everyday. But not just me, everyone. It’s called thinking. So, I’m sitting here on Friday the 13th, and I think, “I wonder if it’s possible to make a collage of words?”, but since I am thinking this thought, and this thought is a collage of words, do the two nix each other? Then, am I not forming a collage of words, and therefore, by association, am I not thinking? Have I achieved the ultimate state of mind? Am I Zen? Will people stop me in the streets and declare me their messiah for not thinking?

I think that’s how religion works. Kind of funny in a sad way. If someone doesn’t think, they’re all powerful. Maybe that’s how government works too. Kinda makes you wonder, huh?

So, this is my collage of words. I don’t know why I’m bothering to write it down. These are my thoughts.

Don’t you just hate it when people are more talented than you?

That’s not going to be in my collage. I take it out. It’s its own piece of art. Not a collage, but a singular work. I’ll title it “Chestnut” and all will be merry.

Anyway, alluding to “Chestnut”, I was reading poetry recently, and all I could think was, “Damnit, bitch, and damn you for being more talented than me.” Yeah, seriously, that’s exactly what I thought. Not a nice collage at all, huh? Doesn’t paint a very pretty picture. You know you think it too, though.

I guess since we all think the same things sometimes, all our collages are connected in some way. The same way you could take one picture, glue a tiny scrap of paper to it, and glue the scrap of paper to another picture. Then they’re connected. The paper doesn’t have to be artistic or obvious or anything, but it’s there. Maybe that’s how love works.

Or maybe not.

Maybe I’m too philosophical for my own good. Maybe the problem is that I’m not philosophical at all, and I’m only trying to be for the sake of people liking me. Is that it? What do you think?

I guess it’s not always a collage. You could say thinking is like painting. The act of painting, that is. Maybe it’s like painting over a collage. With glue.

… No, really, think about it. It’s a pretty cool metaphor. Or simile, or whatever. Like, you have all these images and that’s your collage. But they’re not connected yet. That’s like all the absentminded eccentricities running around and playing hopscotch in your head, giggling and frittering their time away as they eagerly await the day when they become full thoughts. Then, you paint over them with glue. Made from horses and tapioca pudding and milk. You paint over them, and they stick together, and they’re a collage. They’re thinking. Because thinking isn’t thinking one thought, it’s thinking a bunch of different ones. At the same time. But they all come together when you think them.

That’s a collage.

So, basically, everyone who thinks is an artist.

Except maybe Paris Hilton.

You know, I keep getting off topic. Maybe my collage is coming apart. Maybe there wasn’t enough horse in my glue. My head hurts. The original topic was Halloween. I was making a collage about it. I just thought of all these words I could string together to make a mental image with. Then I thought, “Why bother? Someone else will just do it better than me anyway.”

That’s negative. I can be a negative thinker. You do that when you think negative thoughts. They’re like normal thoughts, only more depressing or angry. They always come apart in the end, though, unlike positive thoughts. I think when you paint over negative thoughts, you use special negative paint. It isn’t gluey, like positive paint, it’s just paint. It’s kind of an assurance that if you don’t glue it together, it won’t last. That kind of makes it positive, in a way.

Some people paint over negative collages with negative paint that really is glue. I like to call them sociopaths, and it’s not very good to associate with them. That’s not a negative thought, it’s a witty one. I’m witty. Sometimes.

Boys and girls. Fairies and goblins and monsters. Poprocks and Roxy bars and juice boxes and suspicious homemade cookies that you throw in the bushes as soon as you’re out of sight. That’s what Halloween is. Small candy bags and apples from health freaks. Those are more suspicious than cookies, because you’re little, and apples are just suspicious in the first place. Are there worms in them? You don’t know.

Popeye candy sticks that you always stuck in your mouth to look like a cigarette. I did that. Other kids did too. Your mother would yell at you and tell you smoking is bad. All you could think is, “It’s just candy.” Strangely, you thought it made you look cool. It did, back then. But if you actually smoked, you wouldn’t like it. Smoking candy and smoking nicotine isn’t the same thing.

Maybe your mom didn’t yell at you because she smoked. Or maybe she did because she did. Maybe negative collages are painted over with nicotine. Is there a lesson here? No, I think I’m just rambling. Rambling because I’m alone on Friday the 13th and it sucks.

For Halloween, I went as an elephant. I had a really cool costume. One time I got macaroni and cheese on it. I got macaroni and cheese on a lot of things. My Eeyore plushie. A stuffed shark. Most of them were soft and fleecy and grey, and did not look good with macaroni and cheese all over them.

I wonder where my love of macaroni went. Maybe I got sick of it because it’s all dad could make when I went to his house. That’s probably it.

I keep thinking, “This isn’t a collage. It’s a journal.” I don’t think it is, Mind, I don’t think it is. This isn’t stuff you write in your journal. This isn’t stuff you write at all. You don’t bother writing this stuff because nobody cares. It’s pointless. It’s frivolous. It’s the little thoughts running through your head playing T.V. tag. One shouts out “Rugrats!” and ducks, and the other one huffs and tries to tag another thought. You don’t write them down. No one cares.

I care. I’d like to know the silly things people think that they don’t tell anybody. They make me giggle. I want Popeye candy sticks. Did Popeye smoke? I should stop this.

When I finish this, I guess it’s a collage. It’s not a finished collage. I don’t think a person’s collage finishes until they die. By then it’s really, really big. It’s ginormous, but no one will ever get to see it. It’s kind of sad. But that’s what it’s about. You don’t make the collage for anyone but yourself. Yet you don’t get any satisfaction. (That’s a word I can never spell right on the first try.) I dunno, but it’s there. It’s a legacy. Not to mention, it’s a big freakin’ collage.

Seriously. Like the size of Greenland.

Actually, it might not be that big. I guess it depends on the size of your thoughts. Like, if you want to take over the world and go about planning it, that’s a big thought. That takes up a lot of poster board space. But if you’re just thinking, “Man, could I ever eat a taquito right now”, that’s not a very big thought. It gets a little space. I guess ambitious people get big collages. I want one too.

Anyway.

So, that makes this a mini-collage. That people can see. I’ll put up a sign, “Come one, come all, to Sabrina’s mini-tastic collage of splendiferous proportions! P.S. I got 29 out of 30 on my English essay!” I’m pretty proud of that. Mrs. Pleskot said my writing is a pleasure to read.

Well, then this is my mini-collage. I could go on for a long time writing it. I have a lot of thoughts that don’t get enough screen time. Much like the Weasley Twins. I want to be one of those cool people who studies at Starbucks.

Welcome to my collage.

It’s to be continued.