5/31/2007 Love At First Site: Sarah, Break My Face.

5/31/2007 Love At First Site: Sarah, Break My Face.

My ability to talk about my experience in my support group is limited. I certainly cannot use real names, and I cannot talk about what happened in group. Only in a general way can I communicate what I need to get across.

First of all, while individual therapy was an unmitigatedly positive experience, group was the opposite.

I don't think I said much the first session. Second session I said more. But I was shocked at how fast I became “the quiet one” again.

I thought that I was going there to find people like myself; alone, fighting depression. Instead these people had friends, girlfriends/boyfriends, roommates. They just had a variety of panic attacks when they got around people they didn't know. They were far more “well adjusted” than me. In the waiting room they made chit-chat like pros. How humiliating it was, to be the shyest of the shy, the most anxious of the anxious. Soon most of the discussion around me was why was I so quiet, why wouldn't I share anything with the group.

But things became more complicated. There was this women at the group. I'll call her “Sarah”. Sarah was the worst S.A. Case outside of me. The difference was that she drank to calm herself. She only felt she could be herself after a few drinks. The first day, when I saw her, I thought that this is the kind of girl I could fall in love with. She was slender with big, expressive brown eyes. I was kind of stunned that all the girls in the group were attractive, not even one dud. I would have been more comfortable with the duds. But the first week I felt attraction to Sarah, and I knew that if I spent more time with her, I would probably fall in love.

That first week was sheer hell. Not only was I scared to come to group, but My car got a flat on the drive there. I went to group and then came out and called the roadside assistance. They took like three hours to get there and then they told me they couldn't bring a new tire, only replace the old one with the spare that was in my trunk. I could have done that in twenty.

So then I drove around to three different auto places before finally finding one that had my tire. I waited in their waiting room for three more hours while they were apparently refusing to work on the car because the rim was bent, and calling my apartment to tell me so. When I went up to the desk to ask what was the problem, they asked me where I had been, apologized profusely, and then when I was still angry, they cried, “We can't put the tire on sir. You bent the rim! See that? You bent the rim!” As though I took to the rim with a hammer or something.

But it was in the waiting room that something happened to me. I fell in love again. She was a gorgeous little latina with a baby. The baby would take the cell phone from her and yell gibberish to whomever was there. I hadn't felt that profound attraction to anyone since Jen, some four years before. I was beginning to wonder if I was capable, if my soul had died. Well, right there, in the waiting room, some three hours after I met the women who might turn out to be my soul mate, the love of my life, I was in love with this girl. She would hold the child in her arms and I could feel the love she was giving from across the room; profound and divine. I tried not to stare at her but every time she looked away I couldn't help myself. All the feelings I felt for Jen were back and I was alive again. I couldn't have made much of an impression on her when I got pissed off at the guy at the counter. I'd probably never see her again, but somehow I felt like it was Sarah that had woken me up. And the next year would be about Sarah.

As the group went on, it seemed uncanny how similar Sarah and I were. I really couldn't expect to find someone more like me. We both had very similar family situations, and had both basically reacted the same way. My relationship with the other members wasn't good. It wasn't hostile, but not social either. They told me that I was defensive, that it was like I didn't want them to talk to me. My relationship with Maura wasn't much better. I would occasionally try to reach out to her, but she was having none of it. My feelings kept growing anyway. Every week she had a new horror story, and eventually her tears became a common occurrence. It was so hard for me to sit there and listen to her talk about her pain and not be able to hold her, to touch her and try to make everything ok. When I was outside the group, every love song brought me joy, no matter how Celine Dion it was. But eventually it turned to self-hatred when I couldn't tell her how I felt. On top of it, Sarah seemed to be developing a crush on this other guy in the group who was gay. Shit, I thought, this is getting to be a stupid soap opera.

In time she dropped out of the group and I haven't seen her since. You might think that this was the most intense “love” I've ever had, since I actually “knew” her, but it wasn't. It didn't seem any more real than Jen. In time I came to understand something about myself: I always fall in love with women in peril. Christine was out of place in art class, that's why I was initially attracted to her. Jen had an abusive ex. Sarah was in the throes of her own family situation, and it was tearing her apart. Always women in pain. I was the Christ figure, or at least I saw myself that way, who could sacrifice myself to feel their pain and save them, protect them. All those years, and I was still trying to rescue my mother from my father. Love at first site my ass.

That makes me wonder, is love about issues? Is that why children of alcoholics often marry alcoholics themselves? Is that why we love? Does every love story have a past that the couple is trying to deal with by loving one another?

As for the group, it didn't last much longer. I kept coming in, thinking it would be good for me, but it wasn't. To be honest, the group leader said that it would take at least a year before the group really started to be comfortable enough to work together. That never happened, there was 100% turnover in a year. I did try to connect with some of the other members, but whenever I spoke to them they became curt. They told me that much of it was because normally I was shut off and when I spoke to them it came as a shock. But I think that part of it was that no one in the group wanted to be the one person I connect with. Of course, they're right about me being shut off. If I could walk in and smile and shake their hands and tell them jokes, I'm sure they would have opened up to me. But sometimes it feels like a smile would break my face; I had to force myself to open up and when it happened nothing came of it. That and whenever the group talked about me they said they felt sorry for me. SO I became a pitiful figure and was liberated when I walked out. Seeing me through the eyes of others did nothing but confirm the worst. I much like seeing me the way I do now: with imagination.

But what does this do to love at first site? Now I know the reason why my feelings for these women were so strong despite not even knowing them. This was the “mom paradigm”, I'll get more into my idea of sexual paradigms much later. But, while on the one hand, there is a reason that I was so drawn to these women that has to do with my past. But then, if we are soul-mates, then wouldn't we naturally be put in a position to notice one another? Isn't that part of fitting together? Perhaps, but there is something else that tears at me, and that is the appearance of these women. If any of them were my soul-mate, then why are they all so beautiful, when I am so...uh...well...not? We've gone around and around here. Next post, time for some answers.

5/31/2007 Finally Some Relief

5/31/2007 Finally Some Relief

the Doc gave me some meds that are doing the trick. The vertigo is still there, but it goes away now when I don't move, and I can enjoy myself again.

My recent protracted convalescence has caused my apartment to become quite a mess, something I am unexpectedly pleased with. I may well have to clean up eventually, but there's little time.

Lately I have been thinking how long it's been since someone other than me has been in this apartment. Probably almost a year now. Does that trigger some sort of ancient curse? Is that why I may be haunted by a ghost? They told me that the people who sold it to me were gravely ill. I have been ill almost non-stop since moving in. I don't know. Anyway. When I first moved in I invited over a bunch of people I sort of knew, and was stunned to see that they all came. That was over a year and a half ago. I recently emailed all of them, but only a few responded. Time does that. Oh, well. I learned.

This weekend, I might actually have something to do. I am going to a baseball game with my brother. I feel funny about it and would rather not go. Too much to do here, and I think baseball is boring. But he has procured for us excellent seats, and I feel I should have the experience of the ball game. How much are dogs at the park nowadays? Like 10 bucks or something.

Once upon a time I would know I could count on Bro telling me off for gaining all this weight, but he's “mature” enough now to hold it in and seethe silently.

Lastly, my car has acquired bumpiness on flat pavement, I have to take it in and get it fixed. Cars suck. Time away from the things that make me happy. We would be better off without them. Two things to do this weekend and I feel swamped.

Today during my lunch break at work I went to my favorite Italian place. It's my favorite not only for the food but there is a beautiful waitress there named Wendy. She used to always be there at 2:00PM when I came in, she was always my waitress. She has this perfect little petite body and a face that is a work of art. But today she wasn't there. >:((( Instead it was this Melissa Ethridgey looking woman who I would like to think is much older than me but really isn't. She was bubbly and all joke-making and trying and I was really annoyed. Still, she was somewhat attractive. I always try to put myself in the presence of a beautiful woman at least once a day, it keeps up the spirits.

I'm continuing my dissertation on love now.

5/29/2007 Genius, I

5/29/2007 Genius, I

When I was younger, I used to get good grades. One of the things that set me apart is that I did so without studying. I never did my homework, never read the text. But I aced every test.

That made things interesting. Some of my teachers hated me. My science teacher told me straight to my face he hated me. “It's so obvious you're the smartest student in this class and yet you won't put forth an ounce of effort.” He was right. But, I would add, there was little incentive to do so. Sometimes it was downright funny. One of my English teachers read off two grades one year; the homework grade and the test average. My homework grade was 8 out of 100. My test average was 98. Since homework was 25% of the final grade, it was going to be a -C-. My eighth grade French teacher tried shouting at me for like ten minutes in the middle of class. That was funny since I never said anything in class, so it came out of nowhere. I was just sitting there and then she's screaming at me. That one even had popular jock types who normally disdained me patting me on the back and telling me, 'She's a psycho.” Of course, I made it a point not to do any of the next two assignments, just to let her know that I won't be manipulated.

But it was no mystery to me how I could get those grades without doing homework. I didn't have any friends in school (you can imagine how relieved I was) and therefore had no reason to ever be late for class. Nor did I ever have a reason not to pay attention during class. I do attribute it to good genetics that I understood everything as it was being explained and never had to ask questions. (That actually can make it hard to pay attention as the teacher tends to try to explain everything three or four times.) But I didn't need to do the homework.

One day, when I was very young and still had friends, there was a teacher who overheard me talking to two other kids. They were making fun of me because I never did my homework. When the teacher overheard this, he asked me for a meeting a week later. He talked with some of my teachers and then we met. I was nervous because, well, I was not above mischief. Mostly dumb kid stuff like throwing rocks at buses, taking trash bags from the dumpster and throwing them on the roof, or throwing books out the window during class when the teacher wasn't looking. But the meeting wasn't about that. He offered to put me into an after school group for gifted students. Usually such an honor was handed out according to grades. But this teacher had determined that I was not being challenged (no kidding) and this might help. I asked him what I would be doing after school, and he said basically school assignments that were more challenging and mostly from the fields of math and science. Math and science? I hate both subjects. Why would I want to do that? He said well, if you don't want to be challenged...this guy's way of calling me chicken. I turned him down. Now I wish I could have recalled his name, because I think he deserves recognition. I think I heard he got fired over some controversy, relations with a student or something nefarious like that. I wish I could give him credit for taking an interest in me that he didn't have to take. Most of my teachers just resented me.

But that brings me to the final subject for today. What is the difference between genius and passion? If you know something about something, chances are you put in the time to learn about it. But what do teachers do? So they tell you to pursue your passions? No. If you tell them you want to be a baseball player, do they tell you to pursue it with everything you got? No, they tell you to study your math because that's what you'll be doing when you stop dreaming. They are there to crush your spirit more than anything. I wanted to be an artist. Put me in an after school program for painters, that I would have signed up for. But in school today, it's just math and science, math and science. That's what the corporations need, that's where they put you.

When I was in a therapy group, I met two people with master's degrees. One was working as a data analyst for like $16 an hour and hated her job. The other didn't hate her job much, but enough to go back to school to switch career paths. Neither made enough to live on their own. Listen to me: a degree doesn't mean shit. It's job training now, it's not what the Greeks had conceived of; a citizen who was educated enough to be a leader and work for the betterment of humanity. Today education is about taking the financial burden of training off of the corporations. Every person that walks down that graduation isle does so specifically so that the employers can offer less money. The reason people who have degrees make more than people who don't is that many of the people who have degrees also have the ambition, greed, and creativity to constantly be developing new streams of income. They are the ones that don't settle for an ordinary life. They don't want to just get a degree and then get married and work nine to five in a job they hate and then go home and watch football. They are the ones that throw the numbers off. If you think that you're gonna get your degree and then relax because you're set for life, you might as well drop out and start working now. Your degree will not do shit for you.

I believe I heard this one from Anthony Robbins: if you're not living your own dream, you're living someone else's. Grammar not perfect, but the point gets across. I think most kids go to school out of fear. School chews you up and spits you out. Where is there room for genius in all of this? There isn't. Are we all geniuses, and then settle for less out of fear? Fear that we'll make a mistake? Fear that we'll be called arrogant? A degree is usually about fear, isn't it? Fear of working at pumping gas the rest of your life. A degree is proof, an affirmation from society that you are worthy. But of what? I think you could write “conformist” under every degree. “I need this piece of paper to prove I am a smart person.” I need this degree to prove I can't think for myself, that I do what I am told. Where are the geniuses today? Are they recognized as such, or are they called arrogant? Are they playing guitars in coffee shops, singing songs no one understands? Are they sidewalk prophets? Politicians? Are they sitting at their chairs, trying to sit up straight, typing out a blog entry?

Doubtful...

5-29-2007 That's Not Vertigo, The Room Really is Spinning

5-29-2007 That's Not Vertigo, The Room Really is Spinning

Had to take off work today because of the vertigo. Fuck. I used to never miss work, I used to be proud of it. Now-a-days I miss it all the time. The doctors don't know what the fuck is wrong, they sent me to a specialist. Until my appointment I just have to tough it out.

Slept until 2:00 today and I'm still tired. Whatever. Suffering is supposed to be good for the soul, right? Get me into heaven? Whatever. Re: heaven, I want to see the place before I sign the lease.

I am so bad today I can't continue on love until tomorrow, but I will post a short adjunct on the subject of genius, provided my ISP lets me back online. For the record, my experience with Verizon DSL has been awful thus far. But, onward...

5/28/2007 Love At First Site: Genius

5/28/2007 Love At First Site: Genius

My father used to tell me a story. It was a story about a girl in his class in elementary school. She was one of these child prodigies. My father would tell me that the teacher let her do whatever she wanted. She could go out and play, run around, leave class. She always got an -A- on every test. And here's the thing: she never read a book. She just knew everything. He'd look at me and ask me if I believe him, and I'd say no. I didn't think a genius would never read. He would get angry with me and tell me I was a narrow-minded empiricist.

So, then, what is genius? Can we know things without the senses? Let's not hold back here, love can easily go into the realm of the mystical. But let's also remain philosophical about it; the word intuition, the word “a priori”. How would anyone know these things without the senses?

Because the world you see is the world you create. Wouldn't the post-modern world see science and art as twin romances? When we look “outside” ourselves to see, we look to learn about our own mind. Not only would many modern physicists tell us this, but many Buddhist sects and Hindu. There is no reason matter cannot pass through matter. Linear time, as we know it, does not exist. The world we see is what we can perceive, not that which is there to be perceived. The world we see is our own imagination. When we learn, we learn about our own mind. Given that, why can we not know things that we haven't seen or read about?

Beauty is not only skin deep. It comes from deep inside us. It moves us. It is part of our mind. And so is love. I still don't believe that the girl never read. But I do believe that we can see past the shield of linear time and the illusions of the mind to something more: to the imagination.

Our mind may be limited in many ways. But the divisions we make are illusion. “I see her body, but I do not know her mind.” I don't believe that. We do not know her mind, but we can imagine it. And that's more important than our eyes. We can spend time together, but our perceptions of each other are always firmly in the imagination. We try to recognize patterns, establish expectations. But then the person changes, and we say, “I don't know you anymore.” We are too complex to fit into those expectations. And, in time, our resentments may build, and we begin to see a selfish reason for all of our lover's actions. That's when we “see through” each other. But no one ever really exists except in our imaginations.

And may I go out on a limb? Women have much stronger defenses than men. Women are hurt more often than men, and women are less able to defend themselves in the physical sense. For women, we need to establish expectations, safety. We need to earn their dropping their defenses.

Listen to “The Tao Of Steve”; be desireless, be excellent, be gone. We have to approach in a non-threatening way, there is nothing to be gained here. All in good fun. Then be excellent: let her know you can make her feel good, that you can take care of her. Then be gone; be anything but overbearing. You don't need her, you give her time to think about it. Easier said than done. But how to be desireless when you are in love? How to be excellent, when you are terrified? How to be confident, when you don't see any reason she would want you? Being gone? Well, I find that part to be easy.

Love at first site, then, may well exist, may well be true. However, it virtually guarantees you won't get the girl; unless your game is already well rehearsed.

I remember once a coworker told me he doesn't believe in love. He said, “It's an invention.” I said, “If it was invented, it must be real.” I don't believe in “soul mates.” I believe you can love more than one person. But I also believe that love is a function of the imagination, like anything else that's real. And whether or not you have the ability to love depends largely on the quality of your imagination. But it also depends on the ability to confront fears. And largely, those two things are in short supply today.

5/28/2007 Old People Kissing

5/28/2007 Old People Kissing

Don't you hate that? At the coffee shop this morning this couple is in front of me and they are all over each other. My pet peeve in these situations is when guys standing in line decide that a good distance to keep in between themselves and the next person in line is about 15 feet and that the line should therefore extend out the door. I became one of those guys today so as not to be too close to the horror.

God, this vertigo isn't going anywhere. It's been three weeks now and it's worse than ever. I don't know what to do and I feel completely helpless. I feel like blowing up the building. It's nice out and I had a long weekend and I wasted it sleeping. I am just pissed off.

Last night I had a weird dream. I was trying to figure out how to dunk over Bill Russell when I became aware that there was someone on top of me, gently holding down my arms so as not to wake me and rubbing his cock on my ass. He was sort of stirring sexually though not penetrating, and after I realize this I try to roll over to get him off me. As I do I wake up and there is no one there. Of course. But this all ties in to something I have wondered.

A while back I woke up one day and found that my bed was vibrating. It didn't last long and I wrote it off as my imagination. But then a few weeks back it happened again. I was not asleep and I kept thinking, am I shaking and not realizing it? But it was undeniable. The bed was shaking and I was doing nothing to make it happen. It lasted about two minutes. I have no explanation.

The word for it, of course, is incubus. But an incubus generally has sex with women. Maybe it's a gay one? Fuck. That's all I need. The proper specter for my purposes is a succubus, preferably one that appears to me as Anna Kournikova. I would like to send a little note out to the spirit world that such a spirit would see us going at it all night with a vengeance.

But then, I've always been popular with gay guys, or that's my perception. I have never once in my life had a women tell me she was interested in me romantically, nor have I ever had anyone else tell me a woman was interested. I have had two men ask me for sex. One guy walked up to me in a park and asked me in a thick accent if I was a girl. The next one pulled up next to me as I was parked by a river and asked me if he could suck my dick. You might think that I've reached a point where any warm body would do, but apparently not.

Still, there are a few good looking guys I'd give it a go with. Next time this incubus better do his freakin' homework.

Anyway, I will continue my dissertation on love at first site tonight.

5/26/2007 Love And The Intuition

5/26/2007 Love And The Intuition

"That all our knowledge begins with experience there can be no doubt... But... it by no means follows that all arises out of experience." -Immanuel Kant

In the movie “Hitch”, the lead character says something at the climax of the movie that I found rather disturbing. It went thusly:

Sara: “You're a scam artist. You trick women into getting...”

Hitch: “Into getting out of their own way

so great guys like Albert Brennaman have

a fighting chance.”

Is that true? Do women have to be tricked into getting out of their own way? I hated hearing that, but it's easy to believe after joining match.com and sending out 30 emails and getting zero responses. Getting advice from others, including the therapy group I was in at the time, definitely felt like trying to fool them. And much of that was coming from women. And it makes sense, doesn't it? Men like pretty young women, so older women put on the makeup and try to look young. Men are judged by a different standard, so we try to fake confidence and act like it doesn't mean that much to us. Then we try to impress her without letting her know that's what we are doing.

So, women's intuition. What does it mean? Do I have to fool a women to get her to go out with me? How am I going to find my soul mate if I have to act like someone else? I am not a misogynist (famous last words) but I would much rather have to pull on a tight pair of jeans and a halter top than have to act like someone I'm not.

So why? There is no question that when it comes to choosing a mate, women are the more intuitive of the species. Intuition is difficult to define. Roughly it means sudden knowledge. But many people will take it to mean knowledge obtained without reasoning. This is contrary to the context that the quote by Kant was assuming. Intuition was that which is not obtained by the senses.

So what we mean by saying women use their intuition, we mean that they make up their mind before they wait to see the whole picture. Women are attracted to a man's looks, but there are other things that flip their switches. So they decide who you are to them, with or without reasoning, in the first minutes they know you. Do they get it right? The “nice guys finish last” theory is at once inviting and yet tremendously condescending. I have heard women ask, “don't you think women want to be treated nice?” Of course they do. Yet, women all talk about the hurt they suffer at the hands of their past mates, while lots of nice guys sit at home. I am not going to play “games” with anyone, I wouldn't know how. Yet I got no responses, and you bet guys who are playing games have plenty of women to play them on. What does this say about women's intuition?

Here's a link. http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn9135

The link goes to a site that tells of a study of women. In the study, women are shown pictures of men. The majority of women (20 of 29) were able to identify the men with high testosterone levels by pictures of their faces. The majority of women were also able to tell which of the men had an affinity for children. (Note that this research is far from establishing anything factual.)

Is some knowledge, then, genetic, or at least built into the “machine”? Yes, we are talking evolutionary psychology now. But are we also talking soul mates? If a women could sense these things, couldn't we be genetically inclined to sense our soul mates? And for that matter, what is the soul? Is it our genes? Is the genes we have a reflection of the soul? That would be a romantic view of assortative mating, which indicated that humans choose a mate based on genes. That's more than just an evolutionary sense, but also an attempt to find a mate that has the same genetic virtue as you, in an attempt to pass that virtue to the young. Like when stupid people marry each other so that their child will experience bliss.

I've got a long way to go on this one and I am tired and my back is sore. I need some sleep. I'll continue tomorrow. Please return as I will continue to speculate about love at first site, then tell the story of my latest love interest, get a little more into evolutionary psychology, and finally segue into rape fantasies. See ya...

5/26/2007 Bitch Is Back

5/26/2007 Bitch Is Back

This Goddamn vertigo won't go away. Last week I couldn't even put in 40 hours. I came very close to falling asleep on the ride home. This sucks out loud. I am going to spend most of the weekend sleeping. Hopefully this will go away one day.

I am going to post tonight in my continuing series on love at first site. Then bed.

5/24/2007 Love At First Site Continued: Jen

5/24/2007 Love At First Site Continued: Jen

I remember the first time I saw Jen. I was in my mid-to-late twenties. I was coming from work in the morning and walking out to my car. Behind me I hear a car door. I look and there is this girl walking into my building. She is utterly gorgeous, this perfect little teenage girl. At least she looked like a teenager. I didn't know if she was there to work, to apply, to interview, to visit a boyfriend, or a father. But I just hoped that she would be hired, she was so perfect. And yes, she would be hired.

At the time, I was working in this place that I won't name. But there were two divisions in this place. The division I worked in was all guys. I hated that but there it is. The other area often hired attractive women, and I was jealous. Of course, the wage was lower over there. Still, I couldn't meet women in my personal life, it would have been nice to have my soul mate “drop into my lap” by coming in and working with me. But, all guys. Ick!

My father was the general manager of the place. He would tell any guy who would listen that the feminists might just bring a lawsuit against him if they found out he that there were no women in the division. Not really, there were only 5 guys or so. Plus women didn't even apply for work there. There would have been no case. If anyone had jumped to the conclusion that my father was a misogynist, though, they probably had a case. He often talked about how women stand around and talk all day, while the men did all the work. That one astounds me; the guys in my line of work do so much standing around and talking, you would think they were teamsters.

But my father would figure into this. He eventually would hire a women. She walked in one day and my immediate thought was, “I wonder who's affair she is.” He said he would never hire a women and now here she is. I also admit to being a bit selfish. The other area gets Jen, I have to look at her all day? Shit.

My father would eventually leave my mother for her. Much of what happened there I will not go into, as it has nothing to do with the story. Once the shit settled, I turned in my notice. I never really wanted to work with my father, but this time, putting myself in a position where he would have authority over me was nothing less than masochistic. But during that painful time when my mother knew there was an affair but didn't know who it was, the “other women” once called my house and gave the name, “Jen”.

A clear attempt to hide her identity. My mother and my brother always remembered the name Jen, even though as the divorce went on, the real name was revealed. My mother always said that she knew that Jen had something to do with it, even if no one knew what it was. My brother always seemed to believe it was really Jen that my father left mom for, even though there was no evidence. As time went on, something came out; my father had given money to Jen. He said it was to help her out because she needed it. I could see that as he always had a guilty conscience. But it was never clear if there was more to the story.

Soon after I left, my father was fired. There were new owners and he wasn't cooperating with them. They came back and offered me a job. I needed it, so I took it. I was back. For a time, things were placid.

*

The next chapter starts with something very simple. They put a window in our door. What that has to do with our story is this: I never had to see very much of Jen before that. But when the window went in, I realized that she is on the phone a lot. And there was a phone right outside the window. So I saw her a lot. Jen had matured somewhat over the years. She no longer looked like a perfect little teen. Now she had acquired an elegance with her years. I tried not to look at her, but I couldn't resist. As I was now in charge of my division, I was often in the office area. When she was put in charge of her's, we began to see more of each other. With all that had happened, I didn't want this. I didn't want to be in love with her. But the explosion that happened in my mind every time I saw her was hard to deny. Something strange accompanied this. I kept thinking of her every time I had an orgasm. Usually, when I have an orgasm for a women, I lose interest in her temporarily. For some women, it lasts weeks. Others, only a day or so. But I was thinking of Jen every time I orgasmed. That was just weird.

I began to learn about her. Most personal details I must decline to write, as I wouldn't want her to be identified. But other than her beauty, which was apparent to anyone around her, she also had a fantastic smile, and a great sense of humor. She always made everyone around her smile. And she learned everything quickly: she had earned accolades from the management, and earned her way into a management position, leaping over a number of people that had been there for years. Some of the other workers were sore at her for taking money from my father, but if there was more to that story, I never learned it. And the way I was feeling, it wouldn't have mattered. But I wasn't in love, not yet.

One day, after work, I was sitting in a parking lot. I was trying to think of what I wanted to do. I had suffered from depression before, but it had subsided during the divorce. I had a lot to do and I put everything aside and did it. Being away from my father was a temporary lift. But I could feel it coming on again like a veil falling over me. I needed something, I needed to do something to stop this.

I got out of the car, just to stretch my legs a bit, and when I turned around, I saw the greatest rainbow I had ever seen. It was not out in the distance, but right there, in the street over me, like it was made of neon. I couldn't believe it, but then I saw others in the lot stopped in their tracks. It was amazing. Then something else happened. Something came into my mind. It wasn't so much a vision as knowledge. I had two paths. The first path, I work. I become the man that I am meant to be, and the reward for all of the pain I had ever felt would be the love of Jen. The second path, I don't work. And then I languish for the rest of my life.

The rainbow disappeared when I got home. It was not visible from my apartment. But things were going to change. I had a glimpse of the future. And This women might be a part of it. What joy that would be! What fulfillment I would know! I began to eat a good diet, listen to music again. My feelings for Jen once again eclipsed any sexual feelings I had, and I lost the ability to masturbate over her. I began to wake up early, and work out. I was losing weight. But things began to get complicated.

*

One day I was putting my time card back. One of the other guys in the division was right behind me. Normally, I always put my card in the top slot. Why not? That way I always knew where it was, and rarely did anyone else have the same idea. But today, feeling whimsical, I decided to put my time card next to hers. When I turned, I got a glimpse of his face. Let's call him Bluto. When I saw his face, I saw immediately that he had feelings for Jen. He saw where my time card was and looked like he was trying to melt it with his eyes. Later, I overheard him say to someone else, “If I could marry a girl like that, I would be happy for the rest of my life.”

So competition had entered the picture. And from the location of my time card, he seemed to be as aware of me as I was of him. I didn't hate him for it, he was a decent guy. I didn't have a confident bone in my body. If I ended up with Jen, it would be because we were meant to be, not because I was better than the best. Jen could do better than either of us.

I waited. Bluto was well liked and had many friends in the company. But this bit of gossip made him the star of the show. People would come in to the division and talk to him constantly. And if I entered the room, their conversation fell silent. It was funny. I could only catch glimpses of their thoughts. “Wherever she is, I'll be.” “I don't know why you want to do this. You're just making a fool of yourself.” “Why do you want the responsibility?” “Because she's beautiful”.

Finally, one day, he came in and went straight to her division. To my surprise, I was nervous. But when he came back, I could tell from the look on his face what he had done, and what her answer was. He was smiling, but the soul was drained from him. His feelings for her were as intense as mine.

*

With that out of the way, came opportunity. Management was sending Jen, myself, and one other guy to a seminar for mangers. Wow, here it is. My big break. I had not lost as much weight as I wanted to. I was not the man I was “meant to be” yet. But I don't want this to pass me by. At first, there was a possibility it would be just be me and Jen. How I wished for that! But it didn't happen. It was three of us.

Normally I would have gone on a trip like this with the plan of saying as little to my travel mates as possible. Only if they ask questions, and I would dread their questions. But this was Jen. This was going to be different. I knew nothing about attracting women. But I knew enough not to force anything. We don't have to come back married. Just plant the seed. Just talk to her a little bit. Be funny, be charming. And then be gone. I'll ask her out in my own time. Flirt a bit. Make her laugh. Try to enjoy the time together.

The ride up could have been worse. Some awkward banter with the other guy in the car. Much of the conversation was between them; they worked together and were comfortable with each other. But I managed to say a few things. That alone was progress.

When I got there I made some small talk with the both of them. I felt a feeling of familiarity with Jen. We went into the seminar. If the other guy had sat between us, the end would have been right there.

But she sat between us. Great! I made some comments on the other's attire. Asked her a few questions. To my surprise, I began to feel a sense of comfort that bordered on grace. I felt completely in my element. I really was enjoying just a simple conversation with the women I was in love with. The seminar began.

Jen is cold. She wore a skirt and she regrets it. She's also sick. She's very tired. But then, she drops something. She bends over to pick it up, and her hair falls on my hand. Angel hair, so soft it's lighter than air. But my mind is racing! Is she flirting? Is this a flirt? Kinda. It implies a certain closeness. But I decide it isn't a sign. Confusing me here is that Jen is the type of girl who probably flirts with everyone. Something like that could very well be natural.

Then the instructor tells us to turn to a blank page in our books and work with the person next to us. For me, that's Jen! I don't turn to look at her right away, I'm afraid I'll betray myself. I listen to his instructions, barely hearing. Finally I turn to look at her, and...

She's right there! She was waiting for me to turn and now her face is like one inch away from mine and she's got a big smile on her face! Oh, what to do? I smiled, but I turned away shyly. I looked down at the notebook. We talked a bit about the assignment. I did mine, but when it came time to do hers, she didn't do it. I asked her why and she just shook her head. From heaven to hell! Feast to famine! Did I do something wrong? I was looking forward to knowing what she would think of. But she wouldn't write anything. Was it over? Did I blow it already?

We broke for lunch. Jen leaves immediately because she is cold and wants to find a place to purchase some pants. The other guy, (who, I realized just now, I am disrespecting when I call him that. I should state here that while he is not relevant to this story, he is a good guy. When I left work after the divorce, he gave me a number for a guy who might have a job for me. He was a good man and I hope that in the future I get a chance to work with him again.) invites me to lunch with him. I decline, saying I have to get out of here. He looks at me like I snubbed him, and says ok, but clearly wondering why he tried. But he wasn't going to keep me from Jen.

I walk out but Jen is no where in sight. I go in the general direction she would have gone, but can't find her. I stop in a sub shop to get a sub. I am too fat for the booth, and eating an italian sub that is leaking oil, and generally miserable when she walks in. I am so shocked and happy, but I freeze. The part of me that is shouting ILOVEYEW is too strong, I barely contain it. Then, to my relief, she says, “Hey, UM.” I say hey back. She walks towards the back, I am trying to think of a graceful way of asking her to sit with me. She comes back and says without looking at me that she is looking for a place to change clothes. That ruins it, I can't ask her to stop knowing she's cold. So I recommend that she go back to the seminar, they no doubt have a restroom. I regret it because it sounds like i wanted to get rid of her and plus it seemed so obvious. Would she have walked in if she didn't want me to ask her to sit? Oh well, at least I know i don't look too desperate to her.

I give her a five minute head start, and then I go back. I figure she will be in the dining area with the other guy, and I am wrong. In fact, even though there is ten minutes to the restart of the seminar, no one is in the dining area. Fuck. I go back to the seminar room and Jen is now wearing skin tight sweat pants that cause me to melt all over the floor. Some small talk before it begins, and then the ride home are uneventful. I have this fantasy that the instructor tells me to take the person next to me in my arms and gaze into her eyes. Didn't happen.

As the three of us part at the building, I make a complete ass of myself by offering to pay for gas. The other guy informs me that he will get reimbursed. Then I manage to thank Jen for coming despite being sick. She gives only a polite thanks. Still, I was flying high after this. I feel like I have planted some seeds.

Then the next day. I have to go in to ask her for something. During the conversation, I notice she is mirroring my movements. A natural flirt, right? Halfway through a completely businesslike question I smile, just to see if she will, too. She does. I am stunned. I ask the question and she answers, and I go. On the way, I am tormented by the question: Could she really be interested in me? I got the definite impression that if I asked her out at that moment, she would have said yes. Then later in the day: I hear her and some other people on the way out. I think I catch an exchange between her and someone else. The other guy teases her in some way, and she responds with the following statement, “I am not in love with UM!” Did I hear that right? Are they teasing her about being in love with me? Could they have a reason?

The next day I resolve to take my own advice. When I was thinking about Bluto, and how, if I were him, I would try to get Jen to like me. Every day, without another word, go to her when she is alone and tell her a joke. Every day a new joke. That would be a way of telling her you like her without putting too much pressure on her too soon. Most guys ask a girl if they can buy them a drink before she even talks to them. Most women have no choice but to decide their interest in a man based on looks. The joke-a-day thing gives her time to think about you. And it also makes her associate you with laughter and fun. So I decided to do that. I waited and waited for her to walk by the window on a smoke break, but I didn't see her all day. Then the next day, I saw her, finally. She goes out, Then I go out. But she's standing there with her friend, so I chicken out. I act like I was looking for someone else, and then I go back in. The next few weeks, my fear gets the better of me, and I didn't talk to her at all.

Then she seemed to take up with this guy who was three times her age. He was just an average looking guy. He did have a good sense of humor and was popular with all the girls. But they would take breaks together, sometimes stand a little too close. Then they would have these wrestling matches that were supposed to look funny, but to the outside, seemed to be an excuse to put their hands on each other. There was some negative talk about them.

I was in hell. The love of my life, not only did I give into fear, but I also could have saved her from this older guy, and I didn't. My depression got worse. I was suicidal. The rainbow was right, I was on the wrong track.

I don't know where Jen is today, or the older guy. I still talked to Bluto from time to time. But there is no doubt, that the greatest regret I have in my life is that I never told Jen how I felt. I am not good enough for her. I know that. I am not beautiful like her, or rich. But I would have dedicated every ounce of energy I have to making her happy, because her smile put light in my heart.

When my mother died, we were all gathered in our living room. My father was losing it, as expected. My grandmother didn't know what to say, but started talking anyway. My brother just sat there and seethed. I went to the window and looked out. It was spring, and there was a gentle breeze blowing through the grass on the lawn outside. I had this overwhelming feeling that my mother was in that breeze, and that in a way that I could feel, but not understand, everything was ok.

There are only two times in my life that I have had that feeling. The first time was the day my mother died. The second was when I was talking to Jen. To this day, some nights I think about that moment when her smiling face was so close to mine, and I am thankful that I was once so close to beauty. Then there are other nights that I think about how I might have had a chance and didn't take it. How stupid I was. And how all of this is just shit. All the stuff I typed before this is just crap. All of it is just a defense. Really I am scared to death that I will never feel that way again. I am scared that I will never feel truly alive again.

5/24/2007 Return Of The Dizziness

5/24/2007 Return Of The Dizziness

Boring day in a boring life. Yesterday morning I felt better than I have in a long time. I haven't said this on this site before, but I have been suffering from Positional Vertigo. I am not going to go into what that is, there is plenty of info on the web, but I will say that I get dizzy when my head changes position. There are no other symptoms, but I do find that I become exhausted very quickly this way. Yesterday it was gone and I felt good. This morning I felt great and had more energy than I have had in a long time. I went to work and tore into it, but I crashed a few hours later. The vertigo has returned with a vengeance, and i came home early today. That sucks. I am living like an old man, by the time the day's half over I just want to go to bed.

I am getting down right now. In the past, I have battled with depression. But depression seems to be a left in the past these days, and I'm not entirely sure why. Anyway, I can't help but think negative right now. I have gained forty pounds in the last year. I am getting older and now I can consistently gain weight on a moderate diet. I get angry when I see thin people around me eating enough food for me to record a three pound gain in one day in one sitting. I have been cursed with these genes. It gets me angry and I get tired thinking about it. If I stop eating, I will be hungry all the time and lose little, if any, weight at all. If I keep eating then I will be 300lbs soon. Whatever.

No doubt some of you don't want to hear that. Conservatives always want you to “take responsibility”. The number of people in society who have maintained a consistent workout program for the last six months, 8%. That means that 90% of us are the way we are because of our genes. People don't want to hear that. Asking a thin person to believe the truth is like asking them to give up their gold medal and take a bronze.

But then what difference would it make if we admitted it? People don't like fat. God don't like ugly, even if he is the one that created it. No one holding him responsible for his mistakes. And no one is going to cut me any slack just because this isn't my fault. The best I'll get is pity, which never fails to make things worse.

Well, anyway, I was going to continue my treatise on “love at first site”. Today, the story of Jen, who was my last big crush. But I will type that into the next post, so see above. In a little bit.

5/22/2007- Love At First Site Continued...Hottie Outcasts

05/22/2007 Love At First Site Continued... The Hottie Outcasts

Another boring day. Last night I made the mistake of taking a nap when I got home. Whenever I do that I can't sleep come evening. I got like three hours last night and pretty much mailed it in at work. Whatever, though. The effects of my disease still linger somewhat, and in general I am not able to enjoy the summer much yet, excepting the girls in their shorts, which takes me out of myself.

I had some plans for the day, but felt so lousy I just came home. Whatever. I started working out again last night, so hopefully my energy will return. Or maybe I hope it won't, I'm not sure. After all, when I have the energy I will feel like I have to do something constructive with it, and I am determined to be counterproductive.

Anyway, to continue with yesterday's theme: Love at first site. Or should I have said, “falling in love from a far”. What is the classification of what happened to me? You may call it obsession, but that implies the sexual. You might call it a crush, oh, please don't. Can love exist when two people don't know each other? If we are two halves of the same soul, it certainly looked better on her. I often think that if I did find my soul mate she'd run the other way and try to find someone who isn't her soul mate. “Did you try not being my soul mate?”

I can hear the arguments coming into my mind now. “You were in love with her body.” Can you love a body? If I only loved her body, why wasn't I sexually attracted to her? Why was I always thinking of romance? Of her mind? Of her (GULP, I can't believe I'm about to write this...) heart? (Yeesh. Good thing I post my first draft. Next I'll be using the word “special” or start to give thanks to Jesus or something. If there were a God he would not be a merciful one unless he spares me the destiny of wanting to listen to old music and fish for my old age.) I don't believe I was in love with her body. Or maybe I was. Maybe it's better that way.

After all, aren't we too sophisticated to mindlessly abide by the Ghost In The Machine theory? In all due respect to Descartes, I think most of the thoughtful people have moved past that, certainly in greater numbers than has abandoned Plato's soul mates theory. Do we not live in the post-modern era? Most of us don't, I know, but humor me. If we live in an era, in a country, when even the Christians try to stake a claim on being humanists, where we believe in questioning everything, and where being bored with something is enough of a reason to claim it's falsehood (or at least call it a cliché), isn't the Ghost In the Machine a thing of the past? Do we or do we not believe that the separation between the divine world and the physical one is fictitious? Her body was her soul.

Those of you who lack sophistication may scoff. “You are rationalizing.” But no. I will pull out that system that women hate. That system where the men “rank” the women by judging their appearance and rating them on a scale of 1 to 10. Of the three women I “fell in love” with, all three would be nines. “That proves it! All of them were beautiful. You were in love with their body.” No. The fact that they are all nines indicates that there are tens out there that I did not fall in love with. Furthermore, there are other nines out there that did not have the same effect.

Yet, I could not have been soul mates with all three, could I? Perhaps assortative mating explains all of this. It's true to say that all of the women did bare some notable resemblance to my mother. All were terminally polite people with high, soft voices. Two of the three originally caught my eye by being more quiet than I was. Fellow outcasts. Hottie outcasts. Sounds like a good name for a band.

Tomorrow, I will write about the last of my great empty loves. Her name was Jen. It's somewhat complex. After that, I will get into female intuition and sexual attraction, and then, of course, for fun, sexual subversiveness. I will delve further into genetics and prove once and for all that a little education is dangerous as compared to a full education, which is completely useless. ;)))

05/21/2007 Love At First Sight

05/21/2007 Love At First Sight

Spent the weekend sleeping and finally my disease is starting to break. Now I can start running again, and continue my workout program. Sunday morning was great. I woke up and felt lousy. I got up and my head was aching, my throat was sore as though I was screaming in my sleep. Then I went back to bed and masturbated. When I reached a satisfying orgasm, I layed back...and felt good for the first time in weeks. No headache, no dizziness, no ringing in my ears. Nothing at all. I just laid back and felt good, listening to the wind. Nothing beats classical music on a rainy day. I was also able to fix my running toilet, which has been bothering me in my sleep for some time. Having dropped my classes for the summer due to my disease, I have some free time to start planning.

Today I have been thinking about love. That ludicrous invention of the minstrels. Does anyone out there really believe in Plato's idea that the soul splits in heaven and seeks it's complement on earth? It's difficult to believe that anymore, given the divorce rate and just generally what we do to each other. Then again, when it happens, it can be hard to deny. But emotional connections has no importance to my own situation. Love at first sight, does.

My first love at first sight was Christine. I was 16, she was 17. She was in my art class. She was amazing. The primary reason I fell in love with her is that, not only was she gorgeous, but she seemed as shy as me. Little did I know: she was one of the most popular girls in the school. But even when I found out, then seed had been planted. It was the first taste I have ever had of true love.

What made my feelings for Christine so different from anything I had felt before was this: I wasn't that attracted to her sexually. Even though she was hot, my sexual feelings were completely overwhelmed by an intense spiritual longing. I never thought about sex with her. All I could think about was making her laugh. Things I would say to her, holding her when she was sad. Only romance.

She sat right in front of me in class. I would listen attentively to anything she said, but rarely said anything to her myself. This would be the blueprint for all future attractions.

Always things start with no sexual attraction where normally there would be one. ( I must add here that I am very sexual. What is it that Emily Dickinson said? “To understand the nectar- requires sorest need.” I generally am attracted to any female around me and usually masturbate over pretty much anyone under the age of 50 or so. To not be lustful of a beautiful women my own age is very strange. Of course, if I were Brad Pitt, that might seem viral, but on me it's just desperate and pathetic; a designation I am unmitigatedly proud of.)

This one culminated in an end of the year art show in which she drove me to the setting and we were alone in the car. I was determined to tell her how I felt, even though she had a boyfriend in college. But I didn't tell her. I told myself I would tell her after the show, but I didn't. She graduated and was gone forever. Once she was gone, the sex thing kicked in. I would masturbate over her several times a day, reaching mind-blowing orgasms that had me wondering if at 16 I might actually have a heart attack. But they faded...she was gone from my memory as well. I had already suffered from depression and it got worse as I my soul had died, and furthermore I couldn't stop escaping into masturbation.

At 36 years old, I have had three such “loves”. All of then followed that same pattern.

More on love at first sight tomorrow.

5/17/2007 Vertigo And The Comfy Ignorance

5/17/2007 Vertigo And The Comfy Ignorance

My disease lingers. Yesterday I made the mistake of trying to make up some time at work. I came home dog-tired and with the massive headaches that I get when I go long periods without eating and then drink a lot of diet coke. Still didn't get to bed early, though, and I am tired again today. I long for the weekend. I have to miss classes because of this, too, and I think now that I should take online classes to mitigate the pain off them due to the capriciousness of my nature.

Anyway, I am thinking today about ignorance. We all think that we are not ignorant, don't we? We all think that all the problems in the world come from ignorance, right? Racism, war, the other party getting elected, pot holes, people who change lanes without signaling, people who don't believe in God, people who do, people who believe in gun control, people who don't. We all blame everything on the ignorance of others.

The most obvious example of this is conservative radio. It's not hard to understand politics, right? Teachers vote for the pro-union party, gays vote for the gay rights party, rich white guys vote themselves a tax cut. Yet all these white guys go on the radio and wail about how anyone could ever disagree with them, insisting that voting in their best interests in the right thing to do and everyone else is just ignorant or confused.

Listen to people talk. All of us are such students of human nature! We all think we have each other figured out. I am reading excerpts today of Reagan's diary. It astounds me how one can ascend to the presidency and maintain such an immature view. I can only hope that these diaries are strictly for publicity. Reading them, one might get the impression that Ronny and Nancy were Christlike figures, the only people on earth intent on finding the right thing and doing it. He is always the only one who sees the right thing and does it just because it's right. Everyone else is ruled by self interest, greed, evil, confusion; and then they don't listen to him when he tries to set them straight. Such childlike innocence! His bear in the woods was truly a case of children manipulating infants; stoking their fears to gain power.

The most elementary realization of the knowledge of human nature turns out to be rare, and I'll guide anyone through it who wants to go. It only involves the imagination, that wonderful tool that we all have, and that we all use, for better or worse. It is the only tool that lets us see past this world of the senses that we all live in, and as such, is the only true window into the real world, albeit an foggy one at times. Here goes: I want you to go back into your memory. Think about the person who said the worst things about you of anyone you can remember. The very worst criticism you can recall. This should be specifically a criticism of your ill-intent or general character rather than an accusation of a crime, per se. Then I want you to sit down and list at least ten reasons that this person was right. These must all be reasons that you believe are right, morally and in terms of accuracy. And finally, you must do absolutely nothing to correct it. Step two: try to remember the worst things you ever said about someone else. This, again, must be some character flaw rather than some bad action. Then think about what the correlation would be in your life. For example, if you accuse someone of being selfish because they drink too much and screw up, the correlation in your world might be that you eat too much or sleep around. Then I want you to write ten ways in which you might have hurt people with your vice. Lastly, you now need to write down at least five instances in your life in which someone else has dismissed you by assigning a character flaw to you. An example of this is telling someone that “you only disagree with me because you are ignorant”, or telling a conservative that they only vote the way they do because they are rich and white, or telling a black person who is effected by racism that they are “playing the 'race card'”. But for you, try to find more personal examples from someone who knew you. Then I want you write down for each dismissal some way in which you have dismissed someone else for similar reasons. Then I want you to imagine what they were saying. Finally, and this is important, imagine what was the worst possible thing they could have said to you. What were they getting at that you had to cut them off? And think of why they would have hurt you so.

The realizations that come from these exercises will be two, but they are really one. First, quite obviously, is that you are ignorant. Ignorance is rampant, you are no different than anyone in that regard. The second realization is not so easy, but will come in time. That is that human beings are completely and permanently motivated by fear. We don't always realize this because we spend our whole lives building up defenses. One of the primary defenses we build is that of right and wrong. Not only is right and wrong a set of rules that we all agree to live by, and something that keeps us safe from being physically hurt as well as letting us know what we can get away with, but it can also defend us from the truth. So often the truth is met with accusations of cruelty. So often accusations of cruelty mark truth. What hurts more? Any fact, or observation, that is painful is often deemed ethically wrong. You only said that to hurt me. But it goes even deeper than that; for there is nothing we fear more than our own ignorance. Imagine, while you are sitting there reading this, if you're car were not there when you went out to it? Or if the floor under you suddenly didn't hold? What if gravity ceased to function and we all drifted off into the vacuum of space? What I am saying is that in order to live our lives, we have to count on certain things, that things behave in a certain way. We base our lives on these rules and expectations: without them, we lose everything. To use these rules, we must be aware of them. That's why we are all amateur psychologists, amateur sleuths, amateur politicians, amateur prophets. (Of course, there are professional psychologists, politicians, etc, but calling them amateurs is more appropriate to even their level of knowledge.) And I mean all of us. And what that means is, by the time we are adults, we have a vast network of assumptions, expectations, and theories, all of which is based on our ignorance. So to realize our ignorance is to realize the worst of our fears. Things really are the way we were afraid they would be. Unfortunately, like anything else, this yields little in terms of anything that would lead to constructive action. You cannot rid yourself of fear because you realize it is blinding you. Nor can you give up your values because you realize they are based on ignorance. Nor should you try to stop figuring out the world and exploit it's rules.

What there is, now, left to live for is your problem. The point is that now you have a basic understanding of your ignorance. Never again will you offend a more enlightened person by portraying yourself as Reagan did, an innocent lamb in a den of thieves. You now possess, also, a rare quality: the ability to listen. You are now ready to embark on journey to attain elementary knowledge of human nature, which is the same as the world around you. If you ever get there, get ready to live in a lonely place. Ignorance, after all, is not necessarily bliss, but it is nice and comfy.

May 16th 2007 Not Guilty

Well, I've been ill now for about a week. For the first 36 years of my life, I never got sick. No colds, no flus. The flu would go around at work and I was the only guy never to get it. Lately, I get everything that goes around and then some. What the fuck ever.

I mostly have slept the last week. That's literal sleep, not the figurative slumber that describes the rest of my life. Missed some work, felt guilty about it. Pesky thing, guilt. Let's me know I have some evolving to do. What is this crap all over me? Fuck. It's guilt. I thought I had outgrown it with my morals.

I'll take this time to say a few things. You may ask, if anyone ever reads this, how could you have ever got into this situation? No friends, no women. Well, I'll tell you. I have tried to be different. I went to therapy, I joined a therapy group. I did learn a lot about myself in therapy, and I believe I have put depression in the past as a result. But as for the group, the people there mostly just felt sorry for me. Which, of course, just made things worse.

Then I had the misjudgment to put up an ad on Match.com. I remember I was so nervous when I did that. What a laugh!!! I put up the ad and didn't sleep that night. I fought myself to check my messages in the morning. Nothing. Kind of relieved, kind of disappointed. Next day, nothing. Day after, nothing. I was on for a year and never got one message. I sent out 20 emails and got no responses. Nothing. Nada. Zip.

I have since decided that cyberpersonals are basically heaven for women and hell for most men. Most of the major sites claim something in the range of a 5 to 3 ratio of men to women. Many “experts' that I have read indicate that those numbers might even be optimistic. Even average looking women and older women sign up for those sites and let the emails come pouring in. Many smaller sites even let women join for free. But men join those sites and get nothing. One article I read said that 75% of men who put up personal ads never get a response. The women have the advantage online, and why shouldn't they? Men often go to those sites because most men are scared to approach women, even men who are not “shy” or afflicted with SA. So there is every incentive to go online for men. For women, it's different. Women just show up in bars and men approach them. There is no incentive to go online, except that you are dissatisfied with the men that you have been dating. Which, of course, most women are.

So, anyway, after therapy and pulling myself out of depression, I started reaching out to people. And people have beat me down. I was angry about that at first, but now I'm kind of relieved. Relieved to be spared the despair, the narrow mindedness, the judgments of people. After all, these women that put up ads, that dress up and go to clubs, that have bodies that blow my mind and set me on fire, are, after all, just the same mediocrity as anyone else. Just exploiters of instinct. Alone, I can experience beauty, deep thought, art, and music undistracted. So whatever. I rejected the world, but then it rejected me. I am better off for it. I was forced onto the road less traveled, and it made no less difference.

I'm going to bed now, and I'm going to listen to the theme to Red Violin. And I'm going to find total peace in my mind.

First Post And A Personal Record

For my first blog post, destined to fall, for now, into the black hole of cyberspace, I must start out by bragging that last Sunday I set an all time personal record by masturbating for 8 consecutive hours. For anyone reading this who might have read the “about me” section, you might have guessed that masturbation plays a large role in my life. The imagination is strong for one such as myself, who has little in reality to distract. Well, perhaps I shouldn't have put it that way. After all, the world is full of beauty beyond what that which we can imagine. Despite my isolation, I certainly see enough of it myself. But such pleasures cannot full all of me, and I find I have to tap my imagination for much of that which satiates the desire in me.

For the record, it started off innocently enough, with a few downloads of pictures of Jessica Alba, and then Alyssa Milano. Then Jennifer Love Hewitt, and Ashlee Simpson, who was more attractive to me before her nose job. As the day passed I cared less and less, and finally I chose to bring myself to orgasm as there was no chance that I could possibly eat and get 5 hours sleep before I had to get up in the morning. I chose a picture I knew would do the job: a picture of Britney from behind wearing pink sweat pants. The orgasm was dissatisfying, likely because it was deliberate.

My thing for girls in sweat pants is almost as powerful as my thing for girls in denim, which is not quite as powerful as my thing for girls in spandex. Usually I don't go for celebrities that much, today was an exception. Usually I download teenage girls doing softcore porn. But today was different for whatever reason. Just part of the vicissitudes of me, the randomness of my moods. Of course, my interest in teenage girls at the age of thirty-seven opens another whole can of worms that will get into later.