Title here

I missed Amanda tonight. I'm not sure what I missed, actually... I watched Spidey 3 tonight after I got home (or, rather, the 2nd half), and I remembered that the first Spider-man movie came out the summer I broke up with her.

I saw it twice in the theatre. Neither time was with her. I saw it with a big group from work. And I saw it with Destiny, the ex before Amanda. Nothing ever became of that... I had changed too much, and she hadn't changed enough. But that's another story.

It's a little strange living and interacting with people so young all the time. Everyone's world is so wide open with opportunity. There's such joy in almost everything. I mean, yes, people bitch all the time... people are people. But I can't remember the last time I talked to someone and actually got a real sense of cynicism.

Actually met someone like me.

I like that. But it might be the catalyst for thinking about old relationships. Especially the one where I was last like that. Where I was wide open with expectation and wide eyed with amazement. When being in a relationship with someone was new in every respect...

I'm not sure that I miss it, actually. Or her. I do miss being that way.

I don't think I'm going to learn it here. I don't think that any of these little girls can do any more than remind me of the boy I once was. I lose myself, perhaps, for a few minutes here and there, but it's just a fun game.

Which sort of begs the question, can I actually love again? Can I give my all like Amanda got? Can I have the faith that Laura squandered?

It makes me sad to say it, but I don't think I can.

I say that I value intelligence in a date/mate/counterpart above all else. I don't know if that's true anymore. In a world where your wife is your best friend, where she becomes a part of you, where that "one flesh" business is actually true, then I hold "her" to the same measure I hold myself to -- which is, to say, she has to work at being perfect. Pretty much constantly.

But it's not. No woman could ever be all of those things. No one could. And no matter what some guy named Paul said, in today's world, I have no business putting faith in some girl. One flesh? Humph. That just means sex without a condom and falling asleep in coitus. Intimate, wonderful, and probably the single most content any man can ever feel, but really, nothing all that hard to accomplish.

Nothing all that special.

I wish I could have it back. I wish I felt it when I took these little girls out. But they're no different than any of the other silly girls. They just haven't moved to the city yet. Heh. The funny part is that I'm actually serious. The last date I went on? Her plan after graduation is to move to San Francisco.

Sigh. So, what then?

I read something recently about three levels of peace. I think it was during some research I was doing for my class on Islamic thought. (I'd try to go find it, but I haven't the foggiest on what keywords to search for -- I only remember my paraphrased version, and that's spotty.) In the first, people find pleasure/respite/purpose in some activity or thing. The example given was sports, but it could be anything -- from chess to mountain biking. One finds pleasure in the act of doing and purpose in the refinement of that act. My skating, dancing, and basketball have all fulfilled that for me. So has work, and even, , to a certain extent, dating women.

The second level is investment in a person or persons. Apparently, people find pleasure and purpose in giving themselves to another person -- a wife, and later, children.

No comment.

I'm pretty sure the last one was god. Or, rather, "God". Devotion to something greater than yourself, giving back to the community, etc., were in there, too, I think, but basically, it was about submitting and contributing.

I don't really remember the last one all that well. It wasn't pertinent to my paper and I was on a mission. Besides, I kinda snorted at the second paragraph and lost interest. Heh.

So, basically, since I don't believe in a god and I don't believe in people, I guess I better start making a list of goals I want to accomplish in the next century.

'cause that's about all I got.

--

So I kinda lost the point of the 3 levels of purpose. I think that I miss Amanda so much because it was the last time I was anywhere near that second level. Maybe the only time.

And I'm still looking for that, aren't I?

No matter how much I repeat this little exercise of telling myself I don't have hope, that no woman is worthy of faith, that this is the way the world works, so just deal...

I'm not trying to teach anybody. I'm trying to convince myself.

It would be easier, I think. I'd be a little dead inside, sure, but that part of me has been beaten up for years anyway -- the death would be a respite from the turmoil. And then I could just have fun... there wouldn't be as much of a chip on my shoulder. There wouldn't be any ulterior motives other than having fun and having sex, which are so much easier to accomplish than "being happy".

The problem with squashed hope, you see, is that it hurts like hell. And I always hope... even if it's only just a little bit. I tell myself it's stupid every time I feel it -- so yes, 326 times every day -- but it's still there. Lingering. Pestering. Annoying.

Painful.

--

I emailed Amanda the other day. She has a new boy. Or maybe not a new boy. I don't know. She said he was new, so I'll assume it's not that old. Whatever.

She sent me photos of them. He's a good looking guy. They -- or rather, she -- looked peaceful with him. Not with the stars in her eyes I imagine when I see photos of us from years ago, nor the posing I remember from her solo photos. Guess she aged some, too. Heh.

I wonder what happened to those photos she and I took on that cruise ship. We paid a lot for those as I recall. I don't remember them at all... I just remember taking them with her. And how mad at her I was. I don't remember what about, specifically, but I remember looking at her with disdain when we shot those.

Maybe Amanda saw that in those photos and that's why she kept them. Or tossed them.

Weird. I haven't thought about that trip in five years. I do remember that we were dressed to the nines, though. We must have looked amazing. I wish I could remember.

--

Anne -- my date the other night, who is about as fun as a glass of water (gift from heaven at certain times, but overall not that interesting) -- talked about Disneyland for a minute over dinner. She talked about going there while in high school. I remember thinking "I fell in love there once" while she talked about cutting in line on Space Mountain.

I didn't feel old. Not envious. I didn't miss anybody. I just noticed. I suppose that I vaguely wondered how Anne would react if I said that, but that was mostly just self-amusement.

--

Wow. Talk about Peter Pan complex, huh? I so don't want to grow up that I packed up my shit and moved away from everything I knew just so I could pretend.

I am a fucking nutball.

Too bad it's too late. I'm fucking old. I don't get angry much, I have experience all over the place, I've lost whatever faith I ever had, and I know how to eat pussy.

I'm sorry. What am I supposed to do now? Don't normal people marry the chick they always knew they would and get saddled up with a mortgage around this point?

What do people do at my age when they don't have those options? I mean, aside from going back to college so they can hit on 19 year olds, of course.

Well?

--

There's this one little ache I have. In the section just above, I referred to "marrying the chick they always knew they would".

That really bothers me. Because I have no candidates. Everybody I know who is married knew the girl for years before it happened. Maybe they didn't always know, but there was always something.

And I don't have one of those. (Unless you count Alicia. And that's not bloody likely.)

Maybe it's one of my ex GFs. Maybe one of them will come back into my life someday and it will just click. Let's see... Jeanette probably still smokes, so she looks 40 by now. Des has to be crackin' 200 by this point. Amanda... well. I don't wonder about her at 4 in the morning for nothing. Chrissy... kinduv a long shot there. Laura is, and ever shall be, Slutbag. Crazy Lauren disappeared off the planet.

Ok. One of the short-termers, then? Alicia? Sarah? Tejas Lauren? Jill? Jamie?

Yeah... not so much. Guess I have to relive my 20s after all. Heh.

Uh oh. It happened.

I'm sad today.

I got drunk with my roommates tonight playing baseball pong, a slightly altered version of beer pong. I thought it would help the comraderie aspect of my housing situation.

It probably did.

But I got drunk and tired, and now I'm sitting in my room coming down from the inebriation, and sappy music is on, and there's no naked girl in my bed to distract me.

And I missed (gulp) Texas again a couple of minutes ago.

And then I thought of home, a little, and I missed Jupiter with Sam and Banana Cream pie with Ayla.

Neither are that bad. I'm not that sad. But the feelings are there, present, and I don't feel at liberty to call anybody.

I kinda just wish I had someone in my bed right now so I could cuddle. I know, gay. Fuck off.

She'd fall in love with me, and I'd feel good for just a little while. And tomorrow I'd make her a cup of coffee and bring her a bowl of cereal in bed before going to class. It would be oatmeal, but I just ran out. Oh well.

sigh. Tomorrow, I will get up at 8am and do Calculus. Then I will go to class and try not to fall asleep. And I will grab the one hot girl in the class (the other one dropped) and make a study date with her.

Then I will find the Lauren in my Religion class and get her number. Lauren from Prescott. I know, I know. Whatever. She's a cute, petite brunette. Imagine that.

And then I will go to lunch with Jenny from psych and sweep her off her feet. After which, I will come home, work for four hours, go to the gym, and then go to one of the 15 parties on my facebook event list.

Ok, it's not 15. It's more like 4. But whatever. I invited like 40 girls to this frat party my bros are throwing, only to have them "cancel" the party over some bullshit non-endorsement policy. It's a house party thrown by the people in my frat, but we can't call it a frat party. So the president of my frat cancels the event because of the powers that be, and I look like a schmuck to every vagina on my friends list. But whatever. The fucking moron didn't put the address on the invite anyway, so no one will show up.

Which means that, instead, I will probably bail on the frat party at 10:09 and head over to either a sorority party (for one of the greek groups who actually throws fundraisers and shite) and have some pancakes and meet hot 19 year olds. Yeah, it's a pancake fundraiser party. I don't know, don't ask.

Or, I'll go to... oh hell. I don't remember what the other event was. But there are a bunch of my girlfriends (the kind I don't fuck) going, and so the odds are good that I won't be writing this kind of shit tomorrow night in either event.

bedtime. If my goddamn roommates will shut the fuck up. sigh...

Barely Keepin' It

So I was feeling the urge to write personal stuff without alpha-male humor (the other blog) or business lessons (the other other blog) and yet I found myself not wanting to come here.

There's so little positive stuff in here to-date that I can't help but associate this blog with only the deep dark skeletons.

But whatever. I'm not gonna go start yet another personal blog.

So I'm having trouble with work. My problem is that I'm working too much. It's so hard to say, "no, I have to go to class" when clients call and ask for things. I mean, everyone is great -- it's not like I'm getting external pressue. It's all internal. It just seems, well, more rewarding to write up architecture docs or fix bugs. I like being the hero, and I like being good at what I'm doing, even as I'm learning on the fly.

It's a weird sensation. Like, when I talk to the few friends I have here who know how old I am, I feel like the same guy -- older, but still young. Cool because I'm older, not in spite of it. Then, on the other hand, I have the youngsters who think I'm one of them and I'm just... normal. Still attractive and smart, sure, but the things they value are different, and the very things that I'm proud of -- about me -- I can't even disclose.

...

Got distracted. Too busy socializing... sorry for the truncated post.

How's It Gonna Be

...when you don't know me? Anymore...

How's it gonna be... I'm only pretty sure that I can' t take anymore...

I listened to that on the way home tonight, from my final hurrah with Spencer and Sammy. Brian was there, and my little bro, and various other folks that mean a lot to me.

It was fun.

And of course, a little Purple Rain and Third Eye Blind, and some chick named Lauren pops into my head.

It wasn't Tejas Lauren this, time, though. Crazy Lauren was there, with memories of morning coffee and shower sex. It was she that got me hooked on Peet's, because I was too good for Starbucks in her eyes.

If only she were sane. Heh.

As I listened to Third Eye tonight, I wondered about the future even as tried to remember the past. Wondered vaguely how all of the various Ls were doing, mostly wishing them well, sometimes fearing for them, usually hoping they were remembering me as well as I remembered them.

I even wondered about Slutbag. I don't miss her, nor anything she ever did (or didn't) for me. I did wonder how she was doing.

I wondered if she missed me, and if every time she did she felt a little guilty. I guess I hope she does.

And then I wondered about crazy Lauren, about if Purple Rain made her think of me, too, and about how I hope she's found her way and stopped using sex as a way to feel affection. I hated that part of our relationship, even when I loved her.

I wondered about Texas Lauren, about how she taught me so much by just her being her, because I was open and ready, because she caught me off guard, and because it was just time for me to find something new. I wondered if she ever thought of me at all, if I had had the privilege of teaching her just a fraction of what she taught me.

Now, as I write this, I wonder about Amanda, and if she's doing as well as she always says, if she's happy and healthy, if she feels loved at least as much as I loved her. I wonder if she gets adored the way I adored her, spoiled like when she was my princess. I wonder if she mutters, "I'm the queen," on a random Thursday night after Scrubs as someone she loves rubs her shoulders.

And I even wonder about Des, if she's really happy becoming her mother and marrying an accountant. I wonder if she set out to be her mom when she was 5, or if she always wanted something more. Maybe I was a representation of her "something more". Then again, maybe I was just hot and there. Who knows...

I wonder, as I sit alone in my now-empty house, about all of those girls, and a dozen more not worth mentioning, if I changed them half as much as they changed me. I wonder if I left them better people, like I hope I did, as Texas Lauren left me (embracing of my youth, save the depression, I suppose) and as Amanda left me (confident and well-dressed). I wonder, because I hope I did.

I hope I leave all of you better people than before, better, more educated, more thoughtful, more introspective, more appreciative.

I hope that, even in my depression, my tearful outpouring of emotion that makes you scroll and yawn, worry and wonder, call and check, I hope that if nothing else, you look at your own lives and appreciate what you have, from where you came, and that there really is an answer to the question regarding your presence on this planet.

I hope you know that I love you. I hope you know that it meant a lot to me, that going away present, that last goodbye, that third phone call to check on our last supper, that last text message, that final hug. I hope you know that it meant the world to me that you were there, that you are there, and that if I call you to crash at your place someday it will be okay. I hope that you know, that now, even as I cry, writing this, alone again, late again, afraid as always of what misery tomorrow might hold, that you are the reason I'm still here.

I'm not scared, not afraid, not in the slightest. Not worried about the future, about being too old, about not fitting in.

Nothing could be worse, in truth, than the last 8 months. There could be no lower a place than my basement in Castro Valley.

Someday, I trust, I'll look back on this, and instead of reliving the tears that seem to be unconsciously streaming down my cheeks right now, I'll remember this fondly, like I remember all hardship fondly, because it is the past that once was and is no more. Because it is a hardship I endured, a hurdle I conquered, a rock I climbed. I hope that I'll remember it with a smile, not because of how much it hurt, but because of how good it felt when it stopped hurting.

Someday I hope to be the man that you see in front of you sometimes. (If only I could see it too.) Someday I'll love me as much as I hope all of them did. Someday I'll be loved as much as I loved them, as much as I love you, as much as all the hope that tears my heart apart even as I try to shush it, because it hurts so goddamn much.

Someday. I will be free. I will appreciate everyone and they will appreciate me, I will be loved the way I deserve to be, I will give love to others freely and without condition because I can afford to, and I will not need to buffer my phone call frequency, hide my attraction, nor hold back my feelings.

Someday I will not sit alone and wonder about long lost loves in reminscience, but in simple goodwill. I will not wonder how they are without me, but simply hope that they're well.

Someday I will actually be able to love someone I've had sex with.

Well, maybe. Heh.

Someday, maybe, I'll be able to sleep alone, after a drink, and not cry. I'd like that.

Oh yeah, Alcohol is a depressant

So if I were being honest, I'm not sure how many times I've driven home with a 0.09 Blood Alcohol Content level. You know, that level where you are pretty buzzed, but can really drive just fine if a deer doesn't pop out in front of you and you're not trying to talk on the phone.

Or, basically, as well as your average chick in an SUV drives while on her damn cell phone. Bitches. ;-)

But I digress.

Or, actually, I don't, because I'm not sure I have a point today. I don't want to whine about some little girl from long ago, nor about some not-so-little girl from the other day. I am here, going through the motions, wrapping things up before I disappear from everywhere but here (as in the blog, knucklehead) to everyone that matters.

Or pretends to.

So, yeah, I'm a little bummed today. I don't know why, I don't know how, I don't understand it. I just get bummed sometimes. Ok, no, actually, I get bummed a lot, but I distract myself enough generally speaking with work and athletics so that I fake normality.

But y'all knew that already.

So my friend Mo was in town tonight, and I hung out with he and 4 other friends from long ago. Or, actually, three old colleagues and one good friend. And Mo, living in Austin, referred to the last time I saw him several times and how I had a reputation for nailing 20 year olds and "living life".

The guy who owns like 11 houses, hardly works, and bangs 20 year olds.

Right. Just call me Alfie.

--

I'm buzzed right now. I have a headache, and I'm vaguely hungry (fucking bourgeois restaruants never fucking feed you properly, damn it!), and if I could go to the gym or go get coffee right now, I would.

But it's a little late for either, and so I thought, hey, I haven't checked facebook in awhile...

I thought, first, actually, about having sex, about making a booty call, because it might be nice for a few minutes. But there is neither the conquest of someone new nor the satisfaction of someone old.

And then, of course, clicking through on facebook, I thought of the last time I had that satisfaction.

But anyway. Fuck that. I'm going to school in a week, going to fill my life with experiences I've never had, people I've never met, and lovers I've never held.

I can't wait.

I would nevertheless be lying if the random "I could just slam on my breaks and hop over the guard rail" thought didn't occur to me as I crossed the bridge tonight.

Don't wince. Don't call. It's not the first time, nor will it be the last, and you know it. I'll be fine. It's nothing a lifetime of therapy and some high dosages of medication can't solve, right?

Laugh. That was fucking funny. Damn it.

--

The thing I notice most about getting older? It's not that you're wiser or smarter, not the confidence or lack of anger.

It's the detachment. Because I've always been this way, but I'd get angrier and channel more back in the day. I'd be at the gym right now were I 23.

But now, I'm not passionate enough to channel, nor in enough malaise to actually even cry.

I just feel... alone.

Weird. I hope it changes when I leave the state next week.

I just clicked through on some Match-spam on the one hottie in the lot. I clicked through, observed the stats (26, SF, UCSB undergrad, Masters from Cal, psych/journalism), cycled through the photos, was intrigued, and then felt angry.

Angry? At what? At women in general? At the privilege? At the fact that her activity time frame as quoted by Match tells me she'd never reply because she's no longer a subscriber?

Amazing. Feeling angry for no reason.

--

Only 4 weeks to go. College awaits.

Working my ass off

I've worked every day for the past two weeks. I'm tired.

It's 2:30am, and I am still an insomniac, still wired to sleep all morning and stay up way past when 30 year old, responsible, young entrepreneurs are supposed to be sleeping.

I just said young. Heh.

So I'm moving to the land of milk (duds) and honey (flavored cherries). Where the grass doesn't grow and 22 will seem old.

And today -- tonight -- I feel lonely. I just went and had dinner with my cousin, sister, and brother, after seeing Serino earlier today and hanging out most of the night with familiar faces at the gym. I saw that girl I went out with once, and the guy with short-man's complex, the fellows that trust me no matter what and those that only seem to see me tired and thus haven't noticed my awesomely better game.

But I still feel so alone.

I don't have the luxury of whining or complaining. I can't talk about how bad my life is when I'm going to earn more this month than my mother has made this year. I can't complain about girls when I can get a date with anyone that suits my fancy. It's just a question of how hard I want to work at it. Will she takes ten minutes of chatting, or can I get away with only three?

And I can't whine about my family because it just gets old.

--

So two of my friends, in their own little way, have conveyed to me in the last two weeks that I have a negative impact on their well-being. That I am, at times, too negative, and whether it be through empathy or just hearing it directly too much, they get tired of it.

They get tired of me.

Maybe that's why the girls leave too.

Ironic. Those that have the most power to put me in my place (as in, close friends and the girls I sleep with) choose not to do it. They don't tell me to shut the fuck up, or grow up, or get a fucking therapist and whine to that bitch instead, or whatever.

They just absorb. Or detach. Or walk. Or some combination thereof.

I wish I wasn't this way. I wish I didn't feel lonely for no reason, angry without cause, and pain without end.

I wish you told me before you got angry with me. Told me before you just bailed on me. Told me when I was acting out instead of acting well, told me when I needed to lighten up and have another beer, told me when I needed to chill the fuck out and stop trying so hard.

Told me I was wrong, was hurting your feelings, was harming our friendship.

--

Friendship is harder for me, I think. When they walk it hurts me more than most people. Sure, everyone is hurt, but normal people don't question their worth, their business being on the planet, and second guess their behavior when someone bails on them.

My happy ass, on the other hand, stews over shit forever. Replays conversations, relives moments, and... I wonder what is wrong with me.

Internalization. Abused child syndrome. Sigh.

--

So, speaking of internalization, an interesting thing occurred to me sometime in the last day or two (I was on the road for four hours today, so I had plenty of time to think).

My father blames everything that is wrong in his life on someone else. He cannot take responsibility for anything whatsoever.

Why? How is it that his type of abuse caused that response? Is that just the result of more damaging trauma?

Chrissy (my super-crazy ex) did that too. Hmm.

Is this one of the results of sexual abuse versus physical abuse? Because my cousin and siblings have that pattern, too. So does my mom. All were physically and emotionally abused, but not sexually. But my dad is a whole different species.

Let's see, Slutbag ex had sexual abuse, too, but later in life. And she had an inferiority deal with an elitist/snobby mask. Not unlike good ol' Alfie in some ways. No physical abuse.

So it's not the type of abuse, although one exception isn't really enough data.

Maybe it's just the intensity and duration. Maybe internalizing is the typical response (you have no control over your life, surroundings, or destiny, so you take control of it by deciding that you're a bad person; if you just became a good person, you wouldn't get raped/beat/tortured any more), and externalization, or displacement, is the result after many years. Or perhaps it's the result of both types of abuse over many years.

It's kinda hard to do an informal survey on this, because no one wants to talk about it, and it's not exactly socially acceptable to ask a chick you just met at a bar about their history of sexual abuse.

(Although that might have its fringe benefits. Oh? You were gang-banged by your 3 maternal uncles when you were 12 while your mom watched? Cool! Wanna come to my car and give me a blow job? Wait, here's some listerine... yeah, sure, your best friend can come too! j/k!!!)

--

Hmmm. Taking this apart like this is a little cathartic. I don't feel lonely anymore.

For now.